I was struck that Paul Ryan is comfortable deferring to Mitt Romney’s (current) position on abortion — that it is acceptable in cases of rape, incest, and threats to the life of the mother. Ryan has stated he believes that life begins at conception and that any termination of a pregnancy is the taking of a human life. Yet, he appears to concede that good, reasonable people can disagree about this topic. Otherwise, how could Ryan defer to Romney’s view when Ryan thinks that view allows murder.

Seems to me that either Ryan ought to drop off the ticket, saying that he cannot support what he views as murder, or he ought to admit that reasonable, good people can come to different conclusions on this deeply personal issue and stop trying to outlaw the views that other people have.

Rex Clemmensen

Iowa City