Posted on 08/09/2004 6:31:20 PM PDT by wagglebee
Republican Alan Keyes ripped into Democratic rival Barack Obama's views on abortion Monday, calling them "the slaveholder's position," as the U.S. Senate race roared back to life in Illinois.
Up at dawn for a whirlwind round of broadcast interviews, the conservative former diplomat started his first full day of campaigning as the GOP candidate by saying Obama, a state senator from Chicago, had violated the principle that all men are created equal by voting against a bill that would have outlawed a form of late-term abortion.
Keyes said legalizing abortion deprives the unborn of their equal rights.
"I would still be picking cotton if the country's moral principles had not been shaped by the Declaration of Independence," Keyes said. He said Obama "has broken and rejected those principles-- he has taken the slaveholder's position."
The remarks underscore the uniqueness of this Senate race in which both candidates, one an outspoken conservative and the other a favorite of party liberals, are black.
Obama, who has been basking in national celebrity since delivering the keynote speech at the Democratic National Convention, suggested Keyes is outside the moderate mainstream of state Republicans.
He said he voted against the late-term abortion ban in Springfield because it contained no exception to protect the life of the mother. He noted that Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor and federal appeals Judge Richard Posner, both appointed by President Ronald Reagan, had voted to strike down laws banning late-term abortions.
Asked specifically about the phrase "slaveholder's position," Obama said Keyes "should look to members of his own party to see if that's appropriate if he's going to use that kind of language."
Keyes, who is from Maryland and lost two Senate races in that state, on Sunday accepted the GOP nomination to replace primary winner Jack Ryan, who dropped out of the race in June over embarrassing sex club allegations.
Illinois conservatives, who have long taken a back seat to business-oriented party moderates, engineered the selection of Keyes as the replacement candidate.
Monday afternoon, he was officially listed by the State Board of Elections as the Republican candidate for U.S. Senate. The Keyes campaign confirmed that the Calumet City address listed, in Chicago's southern suburbs, is Keyes' new Illinois home.
Obama said he didn't question the sincerity of those who are deeply concerned about abortion, but he said he believed there are many other issues on the minds of voters.
"As I travel around this state, I don't get asked about gay marriage, I don't get asked about abortion," Obama said. "I get asked, 'How can I find a job that allows me to support my family.' I get asked, 'How can I pay those medical bills without going into bankruptcy."
He said that if Keyes uses the Senate campaign only as a platform "to espouse his socially conservative views, then I think the voters of Illinois are going to be disappointed and they will respond appropriately."
One issue of importance for Illinois right now is delays caused by congestion at O'Hare International Airport. Mayor Richard M. Daley has been pushing for expansion of O'Hare, backed by Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., but opposed by Sen. Peter Fitzgerald, R-Ill., whose announced retirement launched the scramble for his seat.
Asked about O'Hare on WBEZ radio Monday, Keyes said he had not yet developed any position on the issue of expansion.
"The problem must be addressed," Keyes said. He promised to "try to reach a conclusion that is in the best interests of the economic future of the state and the quality of life" of those who live in the area. "The one thing I won't be bound by is any existing set of political obligations."
In the same interview, he defended his belief that gay marriage is wrong, brushing aside a suggestion from an interviewer that sexual preference might be biologically determined.
"We as human beings cannot assert that our sexual desires cannot be controlled," Keyes said. He said such a claim would "consign us to the real of instinctual animal nature-- and we are not there."
The race between Keyes and Obama sets up the first U.S. Senate election with two black candidates representing the major parties and almost assures Illinois will produce only the fifth black U.S. Senator in history.
Obama said Monday that there would be "a sufficient number of debates" between himself and Keyes-- both men are Harvard-educated, polished debaters-- but not the seven such clashes he had promised Ryan.
"That was the home-state special," Obama cracked. He declined to set a specific number, adding that staffers in the two campaigns would iron on the details later.
As I have said on another thread, lost causes are the only causes worth fighting for. Keyes is our Sea Biscuit.
He will not win, he will be ridiculed, but God bless him for saying what needs to be said and heard.
Either that OR [the frogs in the kettle, etc.]
Cantwell (rat) was behind something like 65 -30 exactly 4 years ago and won the darn election over Slade Gorton in WA State !
Go, Keyes, go!!
Just ignore the liberal GOPers siding with the Dems. :-)
--check this out: " Dear Mr. Reagan, it should be obvious to you now that you can never be elected governor. Please put aside your ego, for the good of our party, and get behind the one man who is moderate enough to appeal to California voters - - San Francisco Mayor George Christopher." Look Magazine 1966
Can Alan Keyes "enter" the race without the support of the GOP establishment leadership? Filing long ago closed. How can he run without liberal approval?
I believe that Hiram Revels later became a Democrat, but his new party would not accept him.
Is Slade Gorton's family the owner of the Gorton frozen fish company?
People in IL would sooner have surrender to Khrushchev than elect Alan Keyes to any high office, much less U.S. Senate. People in IL have unyielding faith in big government.
Keyes said he heard Obama wanted 8 debates, then as they heard it was Keyes against him he ran for the hills and hints at only two.
Also, if Alan Keyes doesn't "tone it down," Jack French Kemp may come into IL and endorse Obama!!!
Well, Keyes can just say that nobody in IL would come forward to run for the Senate as a Republican so he had to fill the void, whereas there were in-state Republicans "trying" to run against the sainted Hillary Rodham Blythe Clinton, and he did not intervene in NY in 2000, accordingly. That's the kind of spin a Democrat would use.
I remember that. Devastating. Our state (home of Old McDermott and Patty Murray) hasn't given us much to be proud of on the national stage.
This is SO great...
And then I looked at his record, and what did I find?
[laughter]
I found, wait, I found somebody who, as we would expect from the kind of liberalism he professes, has never seen a spending bill he couldn't find some excuse for, and has never seen a tax increase he didn't like.
We find somebody who, in the tradition of a lot of the liberals, would rather that our children were educated in schools controlled by impersonal bureaucracy than in schools under the influence and control of the parents who love them and care about their future.
[cheering, applause]
I found someone who appears to believe that even when a criminal has entered into the sacred precinct of your home with intentions you couldn't possibly fathom, you don't have the right to defend your life and the lives of the people in your family!
[cheering, applause]
And as you might expect in someone who won't defend the right of citizens under the Second Amendment to defend themselves, he doesn't seem to understand the necessity that when terrorists that when terrorists and others come against the people of this country, the President of the United States does not have the right to neglect intelligence that suggests there are threats and dangers to the American people!
[cheering, applause]
And I'll tell you clearly and unequivocally. By the time I got through those parts of his record, I was absolutely convinced that SOMEBODY had to run against Barack Obama!
[cheering applause]
But I'll also tell you quite clearly and unequivocally that if those had been the only points of difference between us, it would not have been me!
[laughter]
What finally caught my eye, however, and what we have to spend some time thinking through so that we will understand, not just the significance of the decision I have taken, but the significance of this election overall, what we have to look at is what finally arrested my attention and forced me to consider whether I not only had the opportunity to oppose him, but the obligation.
And that was when I learned that he had actually, in April 2002, apparently cast a vote that would continue to allow live birth abortions in the state of Illinois.
[crowd: "Boo!"]
Now, wait a minute. And we have to understand. I hope everyone here will understand what I'm talking about. We are talking about a situation in which, in the course of an abortion procedure, a child has been born alive--is out of the womb, breathing and living on its own--and he cast a vote against the idea that we should not stand by and let that child die!
=======
The first debate, when obamito gets hit with something like this, his eyes are gonna roll up inside his skull and he'll turn to jello.
I heard the speech. That hall was cookin'!
Almost shouted myself hoarse, I did! LOL...
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