There’s a lot of loud noise on both sides of the aisle on the abortion question. Let’s start with the Left.

Put bluntly, the Left is demanding abortion on demand at any point in gestation. In Virginia, the former governor, a pediatrician(!), famously said that if a child was born alive, it was just fine for the mother to set it aside on a counter and have a prolonged discussion with her doctor about whether to let it die. His intellectual compatriots stated that “the whole world would end if children lived.”

Let it die.

In other words, the Left is just fine with killing babies. Forget about doing it before they are visible to the outside world. It’s fine if the parents decide that this child just isn’t good enough to live while that one is.

This is only one small step away from Jonathan Swift’s Modest Proposal, in which he satirically stated that “a young healthy child well nursed, is, at a year old, a most delicious nourishing and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled; and I make no doubt that it will equally serve in a fricassee, or a ragout.” If we proceed reductio ad absurdum, it is not difficult to show that most children, and even young adults, are not viable and thus appropriate to be aborted for the stewpot.

Image: Pregnant woman by freekpik.

This fact is memorialized in the Affordable Care Act’s mandate that children under the age of 26 are eligible for inclusion in their parents’ health insurance plans. This is only necessary because they cannot take care of themselves. Right?

But no one actually believes that, do they?

Of course, this little exercise demonstrates that the Supreme Court’s original discussion of the “threshold of viability” is, at best, fraught. And that puts the Pro-Life crowd into a corner. Unless they declare that children, at any stage of development, are made as images of God, any logical argument they make becomes self-refuting.

This points out that the Pro-Life position is inherently religious. That then runs afoul of the First Amendment, which prohibits the establishment of a state religion. By these lights, Pro-Life laws inherently establish a religion. What’s a mother to do?

Lest we despair that this is a new dilemma, consider what Clement of Alexandria, one of the early Church fathers, wrote in the late second century.

For that investigation, which accords with faith, which builds, on the foundation of faith, the august knowledge of the truth, we know to be the best. Now we know that neither things which are clear are made subjects of investigation, such as if it is day, while it is day; nor things unknown, and never destined to become clear, as whether the stars are even or odd in number; nor things convertible; and those are so which can be said equally by those who take the opposite side, as if what is in the womb is a living creature or not.

The Supreme Court in Dobbs clearly stated that abortion was not properly an issue for the federal government. So why are Pro-Lifers so adamant to get the feds involved again? Lindsay Graham is famously credited with stirring up so much opposition to Republicans with his calls for federal legislation against abortion that the “Red Tsunami” turned into a pink trickle. And this circular firing squad continues.

Republican candidates for the nomination for President in 2024 are challenging each other to commit to some form of federal abortion restriction. All they are doing is fomenting resistance. If abortion isn’t the fed’s business, why are you trying to make it the fed’s business? Stop the useless posturing!

This sort of inane virtue signaling will be as useful as California’s ban on gasoline-powered cars. They can pass the law, but the laws of physics and chemistry will repeal the statute just as quickly. There are some fights you just can’t win.

And just as the loonie Left has encouraged half of the state’s population to exit stage right, idiots on Republican debate stages will encourage swing voters to go the other way. It may be that the only winning campaign slogan they have is, “We may be stupid, but those other guys are evil.” The last time I checked that doesn’t exactly inspire confidence.

It’s time to wake up. If a federal law somehow banning abortion is doomed to be overturned under Dobbs, perhaps pushing one isn’t very smart. It would just be Charlie Foxtrot. In what universe does this make sense?

Republicans running for federal office need to understand that they have exactly two viable options. First, stop advocating for federal laws banning abortion. All that does is energize your enemies. Second, stop advocating for federal laws banning abortion. Did I hear an echo? That’s because it’s time to stop tilting at windmills. But if you actually want to get something done at a federal level, there has to be a different way to look at the problem.

Any politician with an attention span longer than a three-year-old will recall all the furor over the definition of “natural born citizen” with regard to “anchor babies.” Authorities from all sides opined, and the only thing that’s completely clear is that the Supreme Court has not weighed in to clarify the legal questions.

This is a place where Congress ought to act. After all, the President must be a natural-born citizen. If Congress were to pass clarifying language, we wouldn’t have any more debates about whether Ted Cruz, born in Canada to US citizens, or Barack Obama, allegedly born in Kenya, were natural-born citizens. Black letter law would settle all questions.

Now, suppose that, along the way, this law includes clarification of what “the people” means in Constitutional interpretation. While I won’t presume to compose the perfect legalese, suppose that “the people” is defined to include the unborn in some way. That would mean that those persons—unborn babies—would acquire the right to life. With the right to life is the right not to be killed. And since abortion stops a beating heart, every unborn baby would receive federal protection.

Would such language pass? It’s a long shot, but it’s the only real shot there is.

Ted Noel MD is a retired Anesthesiologist/Intensivist who podcasts and posts on social media (even restored on Twitter!) as DoctorTed and @vidzette. His Doctor Ted’s Prescription podcasts are available on many podcast channels.