A new way to confuse the abortion issue

I don’t want to get too involved with American politics, but this open letter to Sarah Palin (via Feministing) was a bit hard to resist. Lynn Paltrow asks,

Did you know that [changing the law on abortion] not only threatens the lives, health and freedom of women who might want or need someday to end their pregnancies, it would also give the government the power to control the lives of women — like you who — go to term?

What does she mean by that? She goes on to explain how Palin reportedly took over 11 hours to get to the hospital after her water broke during her last pregnancy, then citing cases where C-sections were forced on women or charges were laid against women who allegedly didn’t get to the hospital fast enough because this was considered to violate a fetus’ right to life.

I don’t even know where to start.

Honestly, Ms. Paltrow, are you incapable of telling the difference? There’s a difference between negligence and murder in other areas of the law already. The question of whether a doctor has the authority to say that a C-section is necessary is a different question from whether or not a doctor has the authority to kill an unborn child. The question of how to deliver a baby is a different from the question of whether or not we can kill a fetus.

That there are complications or examples of abuse is extremely troubling and we ought to address those problems, but I fail to understand how that justifies abortion. Women have the right to abortion because without it they might be forced to have a C-section? Seriously? I call bs.