Not everybody is Ron "Just Say No" Paul -- pragmatism knowing that the current system has the federal government already involved in abortion, and therefore taking action to put a reasonable restriction on it does not conflict with wanting to get the federal government out of regulating abortion in the first place.
In the Roe v. Wade world, the federal government essentially has total control over abortion law. While that is true, one can work both to do what is best under that model as well as change the model without being inconsistent or a hypocrite.
Or, one can sign promises to Planned Parenthood supporting the substance of Roe v. Wade and supporting taxpayer funding of abortions.
I'm voting for the former, not the latter.
Actually, that is wrong. Each state could ban partial birth abortion. Some states did so, and others didn’t.
And then the federal government (properly in my opinion) decded that this was too important an issue for the states, and passed a FEDERAL law banning the procedure.
Fred Thompson did NOT trust each state with this law, but voted to ban it nationwide, circumventing the rights of each state to decide it’s own laws.
There is no structural difference between banning partial birth abortion, and banning all abortion — just a matter of degree.