Cuccinelli pays the price for the GOP’s ‘truce strategy’ on abortion

washingtonpost.com ^ | 10/17/13 | Maggie Gallagher

[cotton1706]

The one lesson Republicans probably will not learn from Ken Cuccinelli’s troubled campaign for Virginia governor is the most important: Politically, the “truce strategy” on abortion fails. If it is not abandoned, it will drag down the GOP.

For an example of the truce strategy in action, recall the July 19 debate between Cuccinelli, a Republican, and his Democratic opponent, Terry McAuliffe, a man whose position on abortion is far outside the Virginia mainstream.

Debate moderator Judy Woodruff asked Cuccinelli whether he would push for tougher laws on abortion. The state attorney general responded: “I do not expect to use the political capital of the governor’s office to be moving those pieces of legislation. My focus is on job creation and job growth.” Translation? He doesn’t want to appear to care about the issue enough to govern on it.

snip

Democrats campaigned on the truce strategy in 2012 and will continue to use it until GOP candidates come up with a more effective political response.

Steve Lonegan, the New Jersey Republican whose long-shot Senate campaign stalled when he supported the government shutdown in a blue state, nonetheless had the right idea on this issue. “What abortion would you make illegal?” he asked Cory Booker in a recent debate.

“I believe in Roe versus Wade,” Booker said.

“Imagine aborting a baby in the eighth month of pregnancy,” Lonegan said. “He supports that.”

“That is not true,” Booker replied.

Memo to GOP candidates: The best defense is a good offense. When you are being relentlessly attacked as an abortion extremist by people who support late-term and/or taxpayer-funded abortions, self-imposed silence about your beliefs and values is not an effective political response. Calling Democrats on their own extremism is the pathway to victory.

[cotton1706]

Republican consultants at it again, convincing a candidate to take the safe road...to defeat!

[C19fan]

I am sorry to say this but Maggie Gallagher is drinking the kool aid. One the reasons the McAuliffe Pro-Choice ads have been so effective is the GOP made abortion an issue by bringing up a Personhood Law, life is defined as beginning at conception, and Post-Gosnell type abortion restrictions in the VA legislature in 2012.
The current Governor McDonnell avoided talking about abortion when he won in 2009 despite the efforts of the Washington Post, and the Democrats, but that was because abortion was a dormant issue in VA back then.
The VA GOP followed Maggie’s advice in 2012, stirred the hornets nest, and now they are getting stung to death.

[cotton1706]

Ok. I’ll take your word for it. I saw the story and it kinda ticked me off seeing Cuccinelli’s approach as opposed to Lonegan’s.