I am father to a beautiful 6-year-old son. The road traveled from conception to birth was wondrous for me. Holding him for the first time was truly magical. My wife required early ultrasounds. Her physical challenges allowed me to glimpse into her uterus long before I normally would have. The experience was transformative.

Seeing that heartbeat on the monitor, unbearably tiny and precious, forever altered my perception of unborn life. My faith was born out of intuition and emotion, not thought, and it was liberating.

I write as someone personally devoted to unborn life and politically committed to women's right to choose an abortion. Thus, I strongly believe Congress and President Obama should enact FOCA.

Contrary to popular propaganda, FOCA does not allow abortions right up until birth, but is designed to insure the supreme law of the land is respected. Its codification of Roe uses "fetal viability" as the standard for abortions.

Roe established a three-tier approach. Women have the right to choose an abortion before viability without undue state interference. The state can restrict abortions after viability, if exceptions are made for women's life and health. The state has "legitimate interests" in protecting women's health and "the life of the fetus that may become a child."

These rights are granted women due to their "dignity and autonomy," "personhood" and "destiny," privacy and due process, "equal citizenship stature," and their own conception of their place in society. One might disagree with their decision, but certainly not with their rights.

Propagandists like to refer to pre-viability abortions as "late-term," despite obviously being either early- or mid-term. A relatively new tool in this war against women is the gruesome misnomer, "partial-birth abortions," designed to produce righteous indignation and moral horror.

In its April 2007 Gonzalez v. Carhart decision, a Supreme Court plurality upheld the 2003 federal ban on so-called "partial-birth abortions." This egregious decision clearly demonstrates the urgent need for the FOCA, since our government is no longer protecting women.

Eighty-five percent to 90 percent of the 1.3 million abortions performed each year in the U.S. are first-trimester. The most common procedure is vacuum aspiration, where the physician vacuums the embryonic tissue.

Most second-trimester abortions use dilation and evacuation. After dilating the cervix, the doctor evacuates the uterus by pulling the fetus out with forceps, usually tearing it apart. The process might take 10 to 15 "passes" to complete.

A variation of D&E often used in late second-trimester abortions usually is called intact D&E. The fetus is extracted intact or largely intact, requiring only a few passes. Intact D&E is mislabeled "partial-birth abortion," for obvious rhetorical reasons.

Numerous "extraordinarily accomplished" and "very experienced" medical experts testified that intact D&E often is necessary to protect women's health.

Congress and the court did not ban other abortions at the exact same time, only this procedure, and provided no exemption for mothers' health or life.

We are indeed a "nation of hypocrites." For 10 years, we led a sanction regime against Iraq that killed 500,000 children, yet we rail about the sanctity of life. We wring our hands about a fetus extracted intact, but legally sanction tearing one apart before evacuation.

We kill countless civilians, labeling them "collateral damage." We allow 16,000 children a day to die from hunger-related causes because the politics of food does not impinge sufficiently on our consciousness. Still, we deny women abortions that could save their lives.

I believe the life in the uterus is an unborn child.

However, I recognize that numerous medical experts, millions of women, and a nation divided disagree about that life.

Abortion opponents militate in favor of "inalienable rights" for the unborn, but often favor no rights for "terrorists," felons or those we label "enemies." We carry out a holocaust every day against nonhuman animals that often have greater sentiency and intelligence than the unborn.

Democracy means disagreement and dissent, even hypocrisy. I agree with abortion opponents about womb-life. I agree with abortion supporters about women's rights. I oppose our wars in Iraq, Afghanistan and against "terror." I staunchly support habeas corpus. I oppose sanctions and the death penalty. I don't eat animals.

I guess I am a hypocrite, too. Happy Thanksgiving.