Is it possible to be anti-abortion, pro-life, and vote for Democrats? Sure. This might not be the most common combination, but it's also not impossible. Most people are ambiguous about abortion and see it as a huge grey area, not absolutes of black and white. Thus, one shouldn't assume that all liberal Democrats are big abortion supporters.

Amy Sullivan writes for Tom Paine:

[T]he real solution to reducing unnecessary abortions in this country doesn't lie in banning specific abortion procedures or sending doctors to jail.  It also won't be helped by marshalling all of our political resources to fight parental notification laws that strike most American voters as sensible (Bush highlighted them for a reason in his answer to the same question).  Instead, abortion rates drop when unwanted pregnancies decrease, whether through better sex education (that includes, but goes beyond, abstinence promotion) or insurance coverage for contraceptives.

It's easy to stake out a post as a pro-choice or anti-abortion extremist; it's much harder to articulate a desire to respect unborn life and protect women.  I suspect, however, that Kerry's answer—particularly the reference to the influence of his Catholic faith—plays better with swing voters than with political reporters precisely because it reflects a genuine attempt to grapple with a difficult issue.

There are very good arguments for the idea that someone who wants to see abortion go away is better off voting for Democrats who want to keep abortion legal and available. Statistics show that abortion rates are lower in places where abortion is legal, easily available, and where there is a strong social safety net. In places where abortion is illegal or very difficult to get and where the social safety net is weaker (is it a coincidence that those factors seem to go together?), abortion rates are much higher.

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• 2004 Elections
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• George W. Bush
• John Kerry