Appeals Court Throws Out Va. Abortion Ban

The Virginia state legislature thought it could get around Constitutional problems with banning all late-term abortions by defining them as "infanticide," but yesterday a three-judge panel of the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond (regarded as the most conservative appeals court in the nation) threw out the Virginia law because it provided no exceptions to protect the health of the woman. Granted, the two-judge majority were both appointed to the court by Bill Clinton, and also granted the one dissenting judge (appointed by Bush the First) wrote an inflamatory opinion that accused the majority of (you guessed it!) judicial activism (the Bush appointee said that the majority's opinion "is a bold new law that, in essence, constitutionalizes infanticide of a most gruesome nature") ... but whaddya gonna do? The two-judge majority wrote that its hands were tied by U.S. Supreme Court precedent. Citing a previous decision, the majority wrote: "But even if 'abortion [is] offensive to our most basic principles of morality ... that cannot control our decision,' for our obligation is to apply the Supreme Court's definition of personal liberty, 'not to mandate our own moral code.' "

Imposing a moral code, especially on young women who have S-E-X, is exactly what all this abortion stuff is about, and we're beginning to think that eventually they'll get it done, and we'll have the theocracy they've been promising.

Then young women -- and men, for that matter, but obviously less so -- will get a lesson in reality.