WHen he got to that point, I wondered if this wouldn't be a little "bait & switch"---LOL

I look, and I have to speak up for some principled friends, who really do care. For them there are two lives to protect, and it is possible to hold intelligent and courteous conversation on the subject.

That said, there are PLENTY of others I strongly doubt. Interestingly, I suspect most of those have literally no idea what their "beliefs" truly are. Position on abortion, like religion, is a group identity proclaimed by the label they wear and point to proudly.

I am never so discourteous, or foolish, as to ask those sorts why, for instance, if abortion is murder, it's okay to murder children conceived in incest or rape. First, they can't answer, or won't answer because the Old Testament answer is very "socially unacceptable." Second, the question identifies ME immediately as one who supports murdering sweet little babies and I'd lose all credibility forever on every subject.

Of the three types of conservatives, the first are the good ones; they dislike change but aren't too negative about those who are different. The second is social/religious and need to attack everyone who is different -- those are the troublemakers.

(The third is economically oriented, but may lean to either group above.)

the other was when he said (and this is a paraphrase, but close)
...'the yardstick by which you measure others will, in time, be the yardstick by which you are measured'

The right to abortion is in danger. Fuck him.

He's chiding liberals for supporting reproductive choice as much as he's requesting Republicans drop the death penalty.

Reproductive rights are human rights. Fuck the pope.

Whether or not one agrees with the Church's stance on reproductive rights -- and I do not agree with it -- one had to expect that a pope (any pope) would reaffirm it. What this Pope did, however, was to find a way to reaffirm it that, at the same time, (a) reminded his hearers that the Church's teaching regarding the sacredness of human life extends to ALL human life, including post-birth, and extends even to the most despised of human life, that of condemned criminals; and (b) pointed out the utter hypocrisy of those who are all too willing to claim the Church's teaching in support of their opposition to a woman's right to choose, yet enthusiastically support capital punishment and advocate economic policies that undermine human dignity.

but calls liberal Catholics "cafeteria Catholics" is picking and choosing from the same platters.

Of course, he is also head of state of Vatican City with a population of a whopping 842.

Under the law of this country.

No more than any other Catholic who is even a citizen is this country.

I refuse to burn up with hatred for people who disagree with me. Especially when I agree with them on other things.

They're responsible for the bulk of the anti- choice movement. They're responsible for being a major contributing factor in Prop 8. Their bishops and cardinals run bullshit antivax and anti birth control campaigns in poverty stricken countries. If their dogma hag no impact on the rest of us, I would never say a word. If you think they have no influence on our laws, you're dangerously mistaken. What you claim to be true is what many of us are screaming from the mountaintops for. To leave dogma out of a secular society.

. . . I think a lot of people are missing the significance of what the Pope did in that moment.

...at least they manage to be consistent with their rhetoric regarding issues of life at stages beyond just birth.

And right wingers gung ho about the death penalty can't help but squirm in their cognitive dissonance to that respect.

Pope Francis, in those two sentences, exposed the hypocrisy of practically the entire anti-abortion movement in this country!

Repukes are the scum of the earth.

so I will not continue on that.

I have always thought the Catholic Church hypocritical, in that they have always talked about how every life should be protected, and since they feel that life begins at conception, that philosophy justifies their opposition to abortion. Yet, the same church supported the death penalty. The two were at odds in my mind and quite hypocritical. This just lessens that particular hypocrisy.

. . . Even the very conservative John Paul II wrote in 1989 that "the cases in which execution of the offender is an absolute necessity 'are very rare, if not practically nonexistent.'"

He basically called to end abortion and the Dem side was cheering.