Blogger Andrew Sullivan raises a very poignant question, and one that I hadn’t really thought about until the murder of abortion clinic doctor George Tiller. Sullivan asks:

“What interests me is why these groups target a late-term abortion doctor. By their logic, there is nothing worse in killing an eight month-old fetus than an eight-minute old one. By my logic – see The Conservative Soul – there is an intuitive reason to worry more about babies that are much more developed than an enbryo. But I can’t see why Operation Rescue would believe that. I suppose it’s better marketing, because the images are so gruesome.”

The point Andrew makes is well taken. Namely that most Right to Life members believe that the instant a sperm fertilizes an egg, a human being is created. Destroying or aborting this person, no matter how few cells they are made of, is in essence nothing short of murder. If this is true, why is it that most anti-abortion groups only target late term doctors? If they were truly honoring their convictions wouldn’t they just as aggressively defend against destroying zygotes as they would late term fetuses?

We never hear of the biochemists who develop drugs like the so-called “morning after pill” being targeted for domestic terrorism, but doctors like George Tiller have had their clinics attacked and even their lives taken. Are these conservative groups practicing their own version of situational ethics when it comes to the unborn? Or are they simply playing the media so that they can be depicted in the best possible light with the public? I don’t pretend to have the answers, but I lean towards the latter, and if true it makes the whole lot hypocrites.