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The two sides, in other words, can’t even agree about where the middle ground might be. The same goes for the Komen-Planned Parenthood fracas. It seems obvious to abortion opponents that a breast cancer charity that finances an abortion provider is effectively taking sides in the abortion debate, and that Komen’s temporary policy shift was an attempt to return to more neutral ground.

But needless to say, this is not the view of Komen’s many critics. Because the money didn’t directly pay for abortions, they have insisted, the existing grants were already entirely apolitical, and any change amounted to a surrender to what Mother Jones’s Kevin Drum called the right’s anti-Planned Parenthood jihad.