My take on abortion is that there are so many options other than abortion, the only reason it is pushed so hard is because it is the most profitable (short-term).
There aren't many excuses on how your circumstances would come to needing an abortion. None that aren't a result of someone acting in a selfish and self-centered way.
I'll go as far as saying, even in the case of rape, abortion isn't necessary. At least not what I would count as an abortion. Taking an emergency contraceptive a few days after in my opinion is not an abortion. I'm going to cheat and bend the rules and say that we should determine when life begins the same way we determine when life ends. The heartbeat. A fetus does not have a heartbeat until 5-6 weeks.
The only way for a rape victim to realize she is pregnant at that point would be assuming she never went to the hospital and never filed a police report. In my opinion, this women is now just as guilty as the rapist because she is putting her personal emotions ahead of what she should feel obligated to do.
When that rapist finds another victim, the fact that the previous victim did nothing to prevent it from happening, even though she was more able to do so than anyone else, makes her accountable by enabling the rapist to harm someone else. (This ONLY applies when she can identify the rapist).
If you knew a murder or rape was going to take place, and authorities could prove that you knew, and did nothing, wouldn't you be facing charges too? It can be assumed that if someone is capable of committing a violent act against another person, there is little doubt that another violent act is inevitable if this person doesn't suffer a consequence for their actions.
Now our victim waits 9 or 12 weeks before she finally decides to tell anyone she was raped and is now pregnant. She's only coming forward because she doesn't want the baby. Since that baby has a heartbeat, her inaction now will result not just in another potential rape victim, but now results in a death (the stop of a heartbeat) as well.
That's my long winded stance on the whole issue, however, should government be involved? No.
Abortions are the big money maker for clinics and planned parenthood, lets keep it that way, but lets cut government funding to any clinic 100% if they offer abortion services. (Or even better, cut government funding period).
This will cause abortions to become prohibitively more expensive. Abortions aren't exactly the first line of defense when it comes to birth control for responsible people anyway. If abortions aren't the *easy* option anymore, people will find and use whatever is easier.
The other thing is, you can ban abortions, but it won't stop them. As long as its a cheaper/easier alternative to other birth control methods, someone will provide that service. Legal or not.
One more thing. I don't know if any of you have seen how late-term abortions are performed, it's pretty horrific. The reason why those aren't common, is the early term abortion is available, and is much easier than finding a doctor to perform the illegal procedure. You ban abortion 100%, and it becomes just as difficult to get an early term abortion. The result is, it's always easier to wait until the last minute, so the late term abortions will become more common.
