The comment made by Tim Walz was that JD Vance's theory about abortion is "two wrongs don't make a right." Vance had reportedly never before met Walz, but apparently felt free to call him "Tim" -- Walz is a Governor, of which there are 50, and Vance is a Senator, of which there are 100, so if you think the office of Governor is a higher office, I agree with you, making it either simply disrespectful or cocky to call a Governor you don't know by his first name when you're meeting him in person, and you haven't been offered permission. Regarding the "two wrongs don't make a right" crack, I was a child once, too, but not lately. But Vance not only didn't confirm that this is his philosophy, but more importantly, he didn't explain it. And it's worth considering whether Vance, even if his philosophizing is at the immature level of a child, is right.
Walz offered some examples of recent situations in which abortion was withheld. One of them was of a pregnant adult woman who experienced pregnancy-related problems that could have been life-threatening, but instead turned out to damage her reproductive capacity so that it appears she is unlikely to be able to have children. Since Vance has made repeatedly publicly clear that in his opinion, there should be more children in this country, and they should be born of American citizen parents, and not welcomed as immigrants, Vance himself would presumably count as a "wrong" that a woman of child-bearing age, who wants children, either dies or can no longer have them, because she didn't get an abortion. (In very recent examples Walz did not raise, two women actually did die of pregnancy complications because the pregnancies were not terminated when the pregnant women were in medical danger.)
What happens to this arithmetic if we consider, for purpose of imagining, that abortion is "wrong?" It then becomes the second "wrong." But it restores women of child-bearing age to an ability to live, and care for their other children, and to have more children, which Vance favors. So if becoming medically damaged or infertile, or dying, is "wrong," then the second "wrong" -- abortion, makes the situation "right." It salvages "right" from "wrong."
Another situation Walz mentioned was about a 12 year old girl who was not only raped, but impregnated, by her step-father. It is most likely that everyone would agree that no one, and certainly not 12 year olds, should be raped. That, I assume, is what Vance might agree was "wrong." It's possible that the 12 year old would not have gotten pregnant, but she did. Vance likes the idea of American children, but we'd have to ask him if he likes the idea -- considers it "right" -- that 12 year old American girls become impregnated, especially if they didn't want the sexual encounter. I'm very tempted to think that even Vance would find something at least partially "wrong" with a situation like that.
But again, suppose we imagine abortion to be "wrong." If that raped-by-her-stepfather 12 year old now pregnant girl gets an abortion, so she's no longer 12 years old and pregnant, and can live a vastly more normal life, and perhaps her rapist step-father gets convicted and incarcerated, don't those two "wrongs" combine to make a "right?" Doesn't the first "wrong" get corrected or eliminated by the second "wrong?"
It was Walz who said Vance thinks "two wrongs don't make a right" (is Vance really an adult?), but Vance didn't disagree. It was a debate stage. Both of them were there together, listening to each other. Vance had every opportunity to correct Walz if he thought Walz misquoted or misunderstood him. I think we have no choice but to assume Vance said and meant what Walz quoted him as having said.
If that's the case, and again, we don't have a basis to find a way out for Vance, then Vance appears to have been wrong: two "wrongs" really do make a right." They make things right. Unfortunately, listening to these examples did not lead Vance to interject that those were unusual cases in which abortion would, in fact, have been the "right" thing. He's a very stubborn boy. And perhaps to make matters worse, Vance and his ilk have so terrorized the medical community that they are now afraid to make these clinical decisions, for fear of being punished. So even if Vance now said these were terrible and exceptional situations, and abortion should have happened, his opinion today isn't going to help dead pregnant women (with dead fetuses), women who can consequently no longer have children, and 12 year old mothers.
