Blog 3: Commentary of national newspaper

In the Los Angeles Times article, "States with the worst anti-abortion laws also have the worst infant mortality rates" Michael Hiltzik proposes a correlation between infant mortality and laws restricting or prohibiting abortion. Hiltzik uses statistics such as how Alabama, "tied for fourth-worth place in infant mortality" with a rate of "7.4 deaths per 1,000 live births" and with Georgia having "7.2, tied for seventh-worst" and these were both states that have enacted abortion restrictions recently. He attributes the restrictions on abortions to push women to find other methods to abort, which are usually very unsafe for the women and child. Another statistic used was the maternal death rate in Texas in 2010 "72 deaths per 100,000 live births" which rose to "148 deaths per 100,000 live births" by 2012, another statistic that is claimed to be correlated to the "state's closing of abortion clinics and cuts in funding for Planned Parenthood" which occurred around the same time. Due to his argument that restricting abortion causes higher infant mortality and issues for women, I believe that the audience he is trying to reach are other individuals who support abortion and are on board with women's rights.  Hilztik is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, who has articles posted at least once every week, giving him a sense of credibility in my eyes. He developed his argument through different statistics to give the reader knowledge and persuade them to be on his side, which in my opinion was very effective.