While my English teachers failed at the task, my theologian friend Fred Sanders succeeds in explaining what exactly it is that poets do that makes them invaluable:

[O]ne of the things we want poetry to do for us is to name an experience which hasn’t yet been named, or which has been laboring under a false name. We learn names easily enough for a certain range of experiences –chiefly the useful experiences that we want to be able to repeat on command– but for the rest of our lives we wander around encountering all sorts of phenomena which we can’t describe. When it’s time to name something so subtle it’s escaped our powers of description, we call in the poets…

Most of us have things we want to get done and people we want to communicate with, so we narrow our range of concerns, and agree to name and describe things within the acceptable range. Can’t quite put a word to that sense of nostalgia for a place you’ve never been? Not sure how to describe what’s wrong in the world when your eyes are a bit unfocused after too much reading? A bit overwhelmed with the surge of emotion brought on by a song you don’t even like? Call in the poets: they’re especially skilled at naming the just barely nameable.

A prime example of this skill of "naming the just barely nameable" are the poems of former Poet Laureate Billy Collins, who has a new collection out titled Ballistics.* The website Billy Collins Action Poetry features Collins reading eleven of his poems, each set to short animated films by various artists. Check out The Country, The Dead, and my personal favorite, Forgetfulness.

*Actually, the book came out in September but I didn’t realize it until Donald Miller pointed it out. 

Were Ezra Klein a professional woman, this would count as objectifying him, which isn’t to say I’m objecting to the post — my guess is that he doesn’t mind.

Ezra Klein — dubbed "America’s sexiest health policy analyst" — has one of the biggest… brains among Washington blogger types and is a stand-out man (and feminist) in an often female-dominated policy field. Although they’re hidden by his suit in this picture, his tan-and-very-toned arms and, one assumes, chest will definitely banish all thoughts of Cheetos from the mind of his average heterosexual female colleague. Although it feels weird to continue cracking sex puns about someone I’ve met, I have no actual shame and have it on good authority that there’s nothing klein about Ezra.

This surely plays into Freddie’s thesis. My reaction, however, is more basic: imagining Ezra’s chest will "banish all thoughts of Cheetos from the mind of his female colleagues"? Huh? Cheetos? Is this a euphemism I’m missing? A female craving with which I’m not familiar? The strangest product placement deal ever?

I’m not sure if this refutes the idea of media bias, or signifies a crazily sophisticated, Machiavellian bias on a scale I’ve never imagined, in which mainstream journalists write laughably softball profiles of the most disturbing trends on the right, funneling weapons as it were to the least principled side in the Civil War.

Continuing the most socially conservative blogging day of my career, what’s up with this?

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Online dating service eHarmony has agreed to create a new website for gays and lesbians as part of a settlement with a gay man in New Jersey, the New Jersey Office of the Attorney General said on Wednesday.

The website will provide a dating service with "male seeking a male" or "female seeking a female" options, the Attorney General’s office said in a statement.

I’m all for gay marriage, I think gay adoption should be legal, and I’d be the first to denounce any bigot who refused to employ a gay man at their law firm or serve a lesbian woman at their restaurant, but isn’t it kinda reasonable for a dating Web site that has some complicated algorithm for compatibility and a desire to maximize profit to focus on straight people?

After all, coming up with a whole section for gay men and another for lesbian women sounds like a pretty expensive proposition to serve a quite small percentage of the population, and one relatively unlikely to patronize a company run by an evangelical Christian.

Attended the National Review Institute conference today. Lots to blog tomorrow, but for now I’ll say that the high points were listening to some very impressive panelists — Ross, Yuval Levin, Ramesh Ponnuru, David Brooks, Rich Lowry, Gene Healy, Jim Manzi, Heather MacDonald and several others — and the low point was the moment in the foreign policy panel when Andy McCarthy suggested that America is more threatened by a fifth column of its own citizens than any foreign enemies.

Wow.

Just got to Kathleen Parker’s column asserting that religious conservatives are the GOP’s problem. Here I though it was the Iraq War, the economic meltdown, cronyism among Congressional Republicans, an incompetent Republican incumbent and a tempermentally eratic presidential candidate who ran a campaign devoid of ideas.

Ms. Parker’s column is as bad as her critics say, and here is where it is worst:

Even Sarah Palin has blamed Bush policies for the GOP loss. She’s not entirely wrong, but she’s also part of the problem. Her recent conjecture about whether to run for president in 2012 (does anyone really doubt she will?) speaks for itself:

"I’m like, OK, God, if there is an open door for me somewhere, this is what I always pray, I’m like, don’t let me miss the open door. Show me where the open door is. … And if there is an open door in (20)12 or four years later, and if it’s something that is going to be good for my family, for my state, for my nation, an opportunity for me, then I’ll plow through that door."

This is among the least objectionable things that Sarah Palin has ever said, and if it speaks for itself I’m not sure what exactly I’m meant to take from it. Since I’m neither a religious conservative nor a fan of Governor Palin I find it hardly to believe it could offend anyone save those so sensitive as to object when, for example, a professional athlete thanks God following a victory.

The fact is that religious conservatives get precious little from the Republican Party. I can’t say I object insofar as I favor comprehensive sex education, gay marriage, the teaching of evolution, drug legalization, and a whole host of other policies to which religious conservatives are antagonistic.

Insofar as I see it, however, the biggest problem even related to what Kathleen Parker is trying to articulate — if we’re being charitable since nowhere does she make this point — is that GOP elites, because they don’t really intend to go along with evangelical policies that would be unpopular were they persued to the extent that some churchgoers would wish, instead turn out that base by appealing to cultural cues that for some — but not all! — evangelical voters are more important than issues like executive experience, competence, etc.

Blame religious voters enthralled with Sarah Palin for being cheap dates, or for caring so exclusively about shared religious values that they ignored her deficiencies as a candidate, but even having done so it remains the case that John McCain and his campaign are the ones who bear blame for her nomination, and that plenty of non-religious conservatives made fools of themselves over Palin as absurdly and excessively as any religious conservative of whom I’m aware.

One need not be a religious conservative or agree with their agenda to see they’ve gotten precious little of what they want under George W. Bush, and that insofar as they are anti-war, anti-torture and anti-conspicuous consumption, they desserve credit for standing against three of the most damaging catastrophies of the last 8 years.

Jon Hamm, star of AMC’s Mad Men, gets all deontological on young actors in Hollywood:

“I see actors in this town who make it big young. They don’t understand the word no: ‘What do you mean I can’t kill this elephant, drop it on a car, set it on fire, and then snort it?’ Well, you just can’t.”

He’s right. I checked in Metaphysics of Morals and the "no snorting elephants" is the example Kant uses to explain categorical imperatives. 

(Via: Vulture)

That’s a difficult question to answer to definitively, but high on my list would be holding debates about which D.C. think tanks serve the best lunches. (For the record, Spencer Ackerman is clearly right that AEI’s meals are tip-top.)

Not long ago, I wrote a post asking what would happen to the right’s anti-Obama fringe after the election. Well, it’s only been a few weeks since he won the election, but so far, the fringe appears to still be scurrying around their dank corners of the net like soldiers on remote islands who never found out the war is over (and they lost). I noted earlier that there’s still a movement to cast Obama as literally not American, and email conspiracy theories still find their way to my inbox on a daily basis. Today, for example, I’ve gotten emails urging me to "Save Rush Limbaugh, Hannity, O’Reilly Before It Is Too Late" and — one of my favorites so far — an offer to teach me how to "Obama-proof" my financial portfolio. Part of me still worries that this sort of paranoia, which isn’t new (wacky political newsletters of all political stripes were huge in the 80s and early 90s), but is now far more accessible thanks to the internet, will be used to unfairly discredit the right. So I’m a relieved to see that it’s tapered off slightly since the election. But I can’t help but be a little disappointed, can’t help but hope, in some small way, that it never fully goes away; it’s too entertaining!

In her reckless and credibility-killing column, Kathleen Parker makes this bizzare claim:

As Republicans sort out the reasons for their defeat, they likely will overlook or dismiss the gorilla in the pulpit.

Three little letters, great big problem: G-O-D.

I’m bathing in holy water as I type.

To be more specific, the evangelical, right-wing, oogedy-boogedy branch of the GOP is what ails the erstwhile conservative party and will continue to afflict and marginalize its constituents if reckoning doesn’t soon cometh.

Evangelicals are what ails the GOP? Did Parker pick up the DailyKos talking points from the year 2000? What evidence can she muster to support her goofy point?

Contrary to what many secularists like Parker claim–and many Christians believe–we evangelicals are not all that politically involved. Sure, like most Americans we talk a lot about politics, especially in an election season. But the claim that we are involved in actual political activities — lobbying, organizing, campaigning, etc. — would be difficult to support with actual evidence.

I say this not only as a self-professed (and self-critical) member of the "religious right" but as one who has had numerous direct observation posts on the political battlefield. From my vantage point it is easy to see that the commitment — much less the influence — of Christians in politics is wildly overstated.

For example, when I worked for Family Research Council (FRC) — the premier lobbying organization of the Christian right in Washington, D.C. — we attempted to collect signatures on an online petition asking President Bush to approve new Title X regulations ensuring that no taxpayer money goes to subsidize the abortion facilities of groups like Planned Parenthood.

Over a million emails were sent to Christians asking them to do nothing more than add their name. This is about as minor a level of commitment or involvement as it gets yet only about 3% have done so. More Christians voted for the 5th place contestant on each episode of  American Idol than have petitioned to hold their taxes back from paying Planned Parenthood.

This is the typical reaction at the grassroots level to almost every political initiative in the "religious right." Lot’s of talk; little to no action.

FRC is considered one of the major players in the world of conservative evangelical politics. And yet the organization’s ability to have any influence or impact in the political realm is limited by the lack of grassroots commitment. Though FRC and similar groups attempt to rally the troops, they are unable to lead the army of politically engaged evangelicals because such a group is all but nonexistent. 

Evangelicals constitute the largest single voting bloc in America, yet what do we have to show for it? Can Parker (or anyone else) name the significant achievements of evangelicals over the past few years? I can’t think of anything. (We can’t even take credit for Prop-8 in California. That was due to the hard work and funding by Mormons.)

Rather than assuming that evangelicals are a large, powerful, committed political bloc that, for some inexplicable reason, is completely ineffective, the more realistic conclusion is that politically engaged evangelicals are like a herd of unicorns: powerful and abundant in the imagination while not actually existing in the real world.

1. David Brooks tabs what sounds like a big, big problem:

They will suffer lifestyle reversals. Over the past decade, millions of Americans have had unprecedented access to affordable luxuries, thanks to brands like Coach, Whole Foods, Tiffany and Starbucks. These indulgences were signs of upward mobility. But these affordable luxuries will no longer be so affordable. Suddenly, the door to the land of the upscale will slam shut for millions of Americans.

But, somehow, I think we will survive. The 20-40 set among us have already long been adjusting — that is, repudiating — these "little status symbols that suggest an elevated place in the social order." For every hipster who’s merely replaced one set of them with another, there are two quasi-hipsters for whom the "reward" of a Frappucino or the cache of a Coach clutch are ignoble follies. The teens may be doomed — they have been thrown mercilessly into the lifestyle-commodities racket — but it’s the boomers for whom these trivial, consumable accoutrements that convey a "sense of" status are invested with so much psychic significance. As I wrote in these pages at the dawn of the econopocalypse,

defining our expectations down doesn’t mean defining down our dignity. It’s possible that our generation will be the first in a long while that’s, on aggregate, poorer and happier than its parents’. Too much of the hipster ethos is characterized by an exhausted expression of defeated resignation; but there’s a glum and a cheerful way to say "I resign," and there is still time for us to realize that well-adjusted markets and well-adjusted selves aren’t mutually exclusive.

2. Beyonce is not Sasha Fierce. Not even Tyra Banks is Sasha Fierce. If you’re going to create an alter ego, please put some effort into it.

3. Barack Obama owns Joe Lieberman. Discuss.

4. Is it perverse to put Cass Sunstein on a panel about who Obama could choose for the Supreme Court?

5. Feminism: the new conservatism? Tina Brown:

Only 20 percent of those surveyed are willing to attach themselves to a label that seems to have become as droopy as one of Bella Abzug’s hats. So passe is “feminism” that the bi-partisan woman’s activist group New Agenda, formed by Amy Siskind in August after Hillary’s defeat, is canvassing for new names to re-invigorate the cause (suggestions gratefully received).

6. Tonight I’ll be at the Fund for American Studies with AFF, talking about the prospects for realist-neocon cooperation in the wake of the Bush years. Panel begins at 7. Show up at 6:30 for the wine and cheese.

Sarah Posner, who writes the FundamentaList column for the American Prospect, prints some suggestions by Barry Lynn, president of Americans United for the Separation of Church and State, for what President Obama should do to "reverse the successes of the religious right during Bush’s presidency:"

 

Repeal six Bush executive orders relating to his Faith-Based Initiative and replace them with one or more executive orders that prohibit discriminatory hiring by faith-based grantees, prohibit proselytizing by any tax-funded programs, and distribute taxpayer dollars through separate tax-exempt organizations, not churches themselves.

Issue a clear and unequivocal directive from the Department of Defense prohibiting evangelism and other religious discrimination in the military.

Open up new stem-cell lines for federal research funding.

End funding for abstinence-only education and replace it with comprehensive, age-appropriate sex education.

This is pretty standard stuff for anti-religious right liberals, but is this really the sort of advice that will serve Obama well? I don’t disagree that social conservatives have their share of nutty leaders and you-can’t-be-serious crusades (witness Posner’s description earlier in her column of a talk with a woman who is upbeat about the prospects of lawsuits designed to suggest that Obama isn’t really an American citizen). But would it really be in Obama’s interests to take on the religious right, especially early on? Clinton was famously hurt by tackling gays in the military in his early days, and Obama has actually made real efforts to reach out to believers, at least rhetorically. Does he really want to make enemies of them so soon? Yes, there are many who’ll be against him no matter what, but there are quite a few who are ambivalent about or even supportive of his presidency. He’ll do better if he can keep them semi-divided. Regardless of what you think of the policy, following Lynn’s advice just seems like bad politics. I can’t see any point in making explicit, aggressive moves to roll back "the successes of the religious right" except to satisfy the relatively small number of liberals who’ve made targets of Christian conservatives and are now agitating for a round of score-settling. 

Will Joe the Plumber now be referred to as Joe the Writer? Conor mentioned a few days ago that the oft-mentioned McCain-campaign mascot, whose real name is Samuel Wurzelbacher, has signed a book deal. Now, thanks to the New York Times, we’ve got some details: Joe will be writing the book with novelist Thomas N. Tabback (this is the polite way of saying that Tabback will be writing the book for him), and the book will be released on December 1st! For anyone not familiar with the publishing industry, that’s, uh, fast. Normally, a six-month turnaround on a non-fiction book is considered quick, and a three or four month production is considered a super-sprint. Joe the Plumber, on the other hand, made his prime-time debut in the middle of October, and will apparently have a full-length book out a mere six weeks later. Real Americans are fast! And efficient! And they don’t sign with any of them thar fancy publishin’ houses either! Joe claims he could’ve signed with one of those elite book-maker places, but no, reports the NYT, he’s stickin’ to his roots: "’They don’t need the help,’ Mr. Wurzelbacher said. ‘They are already rich. So that’s spreading the wealth to me.’”

On my way to work today I drove by a sign that made me reconsider my support for the war in Iraq. The sign, posted near a convenience store, said: Unleaded — $2.05.

Even before the war began I’ve been a staunch proponent of the Bush Administration’s policy on Iraq. For the past five years my support for the war has been all but unwavering. But I can no longer bite my tongue; it’s finally time I speak out against a grave injustice.

I know we’re supposed to stick with the story line that we went to war to find WMDs (wink, wink) and to liberate the people of Iraq (nudge, nudge). I realize we had to tell the UN something and that was the story we came up with. Fine. I was willing to stick to the script as long as it allowed us to further our real goal: to seize Iraqi oil so that we could have low gas prices.

I realize that as a member of the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy, I’m not supposed to speak about this topic in public. But I simply can’t keep quiet any longer. Seriously, isn’t it time we came clean about our real motives for going to war? It’s not like we’re convincing anybody. According to The Economist, a Pew survey shows that 60% of Germans and 58% of French believed that the war on terrorism is being fought “to control Middle East oil." When you can’t even fool the French, its probably time to drop the ruse. (Ok, Frenchies, we admit it. C’est la vie.)

Besides, by pretending the war wasn’t about oil we allowed the Administration to screw that part of it up without being able to criticize them for it. We must put a stop to this reckless disregard for our national interest and we need to do so quickly. We have to take a stand before I’m forced to take out a second mortgage in order to fill up my Hummer.

Reading Kathleen Parker’s column yesterday was like swallowing soap. Ick. She writes:

To be more specific, the evangelical, right-wing, oogedy-boogedy branch of the GOP is what ails the erstwhile conservative party and will continue to afflict and marginalize its constituents if reckoning doesn’t soon cometh.

Simply put: Armband religion is killing the Republican Party. And, the truth — as long as we’re setting ourselves free — is that if one were to eavesdrop on private conversations among the party intelligentsia, one would hear precisely that.

…Which is to say, the GOP has surrendered its high ground to its lowest brows.

She goes on to her weekly criticism of Sarah Palin — this time because Palin admitted to praying for guidance in her life. What kind of politician would DO such a thing? Thank you, Kathleen Parker, for calling Christian conservatives "low brow" and "oodgedy-booged" (whatever that is supposed to mean.) As I said last week, you aren’t going to do anything for the Party by slicing it up. The Christian religion is an important part of American culture and cannot be chopped off because people like Parker and Christine Todd Whitman aren’t concerned with those issues.

Jonah Goldberg’s response hits on Parker best:
 

I don’t know what’s more grating, the quasi-bigotry that has you calling religious Christians low brows, gorillas and oogedy-boogedy types or the bravery-on-the-cheap as you salute — in that winsome way — your own courage for saying what (according to you) needs to be said. Please stop bragging about how courageous you are for weathering a storm of nasty email you invite on yourself by dancing to a liberal tune. You aren’t special for getting nasty email, from the right or the left. You aren’t a martyr smoking your last cigarette. You’re just another columnist, talented and charming to be sure, but just another columnist. You are not Joan of the Op-Ed Page. Perhaps the typical Washington Post reader (or editor) doesn’t understand that. But you should, and most conservatives familiar with these issues can see through what you’re doing.

For the record, I have no problem with arguments about how the GOP has become too religious. I ended my book with pretty much that argument. I opposed Mike Huckabee vociferously because he seemed the quintessential rightwing progressive imbued with a rightwing social gospel. These are all good arguments to make and they have good responses to them. But please drop the nonsense about how the G-O-D people  or the Palin people are low brows and beasts. There are low brows and beasts everywhere, on every side of the ideological spectrum. Maybe if you got more ecumenical hate email you’d realize that.

Things went badly this year. We all know that. Blaming Christians is a cop out that fails to include the whole mess of conservatism gone bad in about a thousand other ways. Hopefully, we will move past this "blame the social conservatives" phase soon so real progress can get started. 

Can you imagine a world without Law & Order? I can’t: The series, along with its various spin-offs and imitators, is ubiquitous on cable networks — almost like a public utility.  You can’t really love the show, but you can’t hate it, either. It’s reassuring, comforting, the perfect thing to leave on all afternoon when you’re home with the flu. It’s the epitome of inoffensive, vanilla television, a show that’s perfectly crafted to be easily ignored. CSI, its main competitor, is a little flashier, but that’s why CSI isn’t as good:  CSI demands your attention; Law & Order only asks that you don’t click away.

Fortunately, the series doesn’t appear to be going away any time soon. This year marks the beginning of its 19th season, inching it ever closer to Gunsmoke’s record for longest-running prime-time drama, and over at Slate, Troy Patterson has a nice little essay to mark the occasion. 

Commenting on the discussion by Rod, Daniel, and me about Obama’s faith, Ross adds:

Now it’s true that if he had been asked about Christ’s nature, Bush - or Ronald Reagan, to take another conservative President with an idiosyncratic religious sensibility - might have given a more Nicaean answer than Obama did in the interview in question. But then again maybe not! (And God only knows what John McCain, the most pagan Presidential contender we’ve had in some time, might have said.)

I realize Ross is being facetious, but it’s rather unfair of him to call McCain’s faith into question. McCain is, after all, a strictly orthodox believer. I think we can safely say that if McCain was asked he would have answered that while the object of his worship was a historical figure and a took human form, Ares is unquestionably fully divine.

I’ve just made my Bloggingheads debut with Jay Rosen, a professor of journalism at NYU.

In this clip I talk a bit about Culture11 — I don’t want to speak for everyone, of course, but I think my co-editors would agree with the spirit of what I’ve said. You can watch the whole diavlog here, and I may pick out a couple other exchanges to highlight. We talk about the recent election, right-of-center journalism and related matters.

Rod Dreher writes:

The cultural pressure against thrift and sensible spending, and self-control, is overwhelming. I literally cannot imagine how we reverse this. I know how we in our family reverse it, or at least combat it: we teach ourselves to say no, and we practice the habit of saying no. We’re not nearly as good at it as we need to be, but we’re a lot better at it than we were. We don’t let TV run our family’s life, either, which helps. But we still get caught up in it. And I wonder: where does the countercultural message come from? Where do people hear any message, ever, to counter the constant drumbeat from TV and media, which is: "You won’t be happy until you buy this thing or have that experience"? Who is telling people it’s a lie?

I’ve got an idea: start by focusing on the most pernicious kind of luxury — the status symbol.

After all, some unnecessary consumer goods at least add to our enjoyment of life. My iPod is a daily pleasure as I ride the metro. Desert at a restaurant is a tasty treat. The enjoyment I derive from these items — while it can never be compared to the pleasure derived from friends, family, faith, professional achievement or other more important goods — at least don’t come at anyone’s expense. We’ve all got different tastes in life. If you’re favorite thing is fashion — if you love its aesthetics — I don’t begrudge you that new pair of high heels. But I find that same pricey pair of shoes objectionable if the primary motive for the purchase is signalling to others that you can afford them.

In my perfect world, a woman who flaunted a particularly large diamond ring would be laughed at for the foolishness of paying so much for a shiny rock that can be faked at a fraction of the price, not admired or envied. I’ve written before against the diamond engagement ring.

If I’m lucky I’ll one day take a knee and ask an intelligent, spirited woman for her hand. It is a moment I’ll cherish — I’d be honored to offer some token of my esteem, even one that stretched my means. Should my beloved savor art I’d hope for sufficient funds to commission a painting. If she loves Yo-Yo Ma I’ll do my damnedest to call in a favor. I can even imagine a woman whose passion is jewelry. She’s studied its craft, is particularly taken by its aesthetic, and revels in its symbolism. I’d gladly purchase whatever diamond ring is within my reach for that woman.

As it stands, however, men are asked to believe that every single woman happens to prize an extravagantly expensive and utterly useless stone—perhaps mined by African children at the point of a bayonet—not because it’s an opulent status symbol whose envy-inducing *bling bling* is forever, but because it’s the most "special" thing that we can present her (or so the shadow people would have us believe).

In a way, it’s bizarre that women given engagement rings don’t respond by saying something like, "I’d love to marry you." (Beat.) "And thank you so much for this ring. (Eyes welling up.) I cherish the thought behind it, and I’ll keep it forever if you’d like. (Happy tears.) On the other hand, we could take it back and use the money to spend several months together in coastal Italy."

But the culture — which I absolutely don’t think is the fault of women, in case that isn’t clear — seldom leads to my fantasy engagement. Instead the diamond ring thrives as a status marker disguised as a tradition, the bigger the spectacle the better.

And here lies an opportunity.

Here is what I propose: a charity, first marketed to Hollywood stars, that allows people to donate the stone from their diamond ring, directing the money to a cause of their choice. Let’s say someone chooses an environmental cause. In return she gets a valueless green stone the same size as the diamond she gave. She puts the stone in the setting on her ring. She is thus able to show off her virtue in the same way she formerly showed off her vice.

This would work best if it caught on among Hollywood types first — perhaps the same stars who drive around in hybrid cars. This is a half-baked idea, I know, but perhaps the core concept can be improved upon? I’m open to suggestions before I sucker one of my attorney friends into filing the non-profit paperwork for me.

Grrr. Diamonds. If you’re not with me yet, go read this. So what do you say, Rod? Can we target bling in the first line of attack? I’ll be an ally until someone tries to take imported beer away…

John Schwenkler A guest blogger at Upturned Earth writes on when federalism is useful:

The abortion debate is to my mind the perfect example of such a situation - we have a universal or near-universal agreement on a core concept of “human life,” namely that, at a bare minimum, a viable child that has been delivered out of its mother’s womb constitutes “life,” and is thus entitled to the full benefits of legal personhood.  But once you start expanding upon that consensus opinion, you have varying definitions at the edges - many, many people would say that a fetus that is viable but still inside the womb constitutes “human life” entitled to some form of legal personhood, with ever-fewer people agreeing the closer you got to conception.  At this point, virtually any honest observer will recognize that there are good-faith reasons for just about any conceivable boundary on the definition of human life, as long as that definition recognizes the humanity of human beings who have survived birth. 

What federalism achieves is to allow ever-smaller groups to operate under a similar definition of “life” that better approximates the consensus amongst those groups (keeping in mind, again, that our current system admittedly allows for states that are often too large to have a true consensus; nonetheless, consensus at the state level is much easier to achieve than it is on the national level).  However, federalism does not require that a group “accept” a different definition of where life begins and ends, except to the extent that definition is imposed directly upon them.  What federalism does is to merely require that a group tolerate the existence of a different definition outside of their jurisdiction. 

Such tolerance does not require a remarkable amount of compromise, particularly where we recognize that other good-faith definitions exist.  In the abortion context, Ireland, despite its restrictive abortion laws, nonetheless joined the quasi-federalist EU.  Frankly, we tolerate the existence of behavior that we find not only morally repugnant, but that does not even involve a good-faith difference on the boundaries of a concept; we do not, for instance, go out and invade every nation that we find to lack any regard for basic human rights (nor could we). 

The abstract insight here is that on any issue where the population of the United States is equally divided — but where disagreement is spread unevenly among regions — a national solution assures that half of people are going to be unhappy, whereas devolving the issue to ever more local levels of government enables ever more people to get their policy preference.