Last night on The Daily Show, Jon Stewart had a long talk with Mike Huckabee about abortion. It was so long that they cut it to confetti for airing, and I don't suggest you waste your time watching it in that version. But they have the whole chat up on their website in three parts. This link will take you to the first part and I think the others will follow in sequence.
I kinda wish Mr. Stewart would do a separate show on the weekends where he'd just engage in these kinds of conversations for longer stretches. At a time when so much of what passes for debate/discussion out there is just W.W.E.-style wrestling matches dressed up with "issues," it's nice to see two human beings talk without trying to smack the other down. I tend to agree with Stewart in most areas, and his stance on abortion ain't far from mine, especially in its lack of certainty…but he always lets his guests talk and doesn't do those moronic O'Reilly tricks of cutting them off and trying to manuever them into sound bites that will be damning when later taken out of context.
There were a number of points in the conversation where I think Stewart dropped the ol' ball, as it were. One was letting Huckabee largely dodge the question of whether he would or could support abandoning the silly (to me) notion that abstinence education is effective, and whether he'd favor increased access to information and condoms and such. Another was when Huckabee claimed that he knows of no one in the so-called "Pro Life" movement who would favor allowing a mother to die to save a fetus. Every poll says that somewhere around 10-15% of Americans believe abortion should be forbidden in all cases. What else could that response mean?
But watch for yourself. I don't know where this issue is headed — "nowhere" would be my best guess — but if there is any progress, it'll come from more discussions like this one. And less of the O'Reilly kind.