Safe, Legal, And Early

Saletan responds to Steve Waldman's abortion compromise:

...people won't take the more-but-earlier-abortions deal. Yes, they prefer earlier abortions to later ones, as Waldman's poll data show. But those data say nothing about a trade-off for more abortions. So earlier timing isn't a substitute for reduction. It's an add-on.

In fact, the timing approach logically fits the reduction framework. A nine-week abortion is better than a 12-week abortion. A six-week abortion is even better. But eventually, this trajectory takes you all the way back before conception. That's not an abortion anymore. It's birth control or abstinence. In other words, it's reduction.