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2008 Run, Abortion Engage Her Politically [Condi Rice]
Washington Times ^ | Friday, March 11, 2005 | Bill Sammon

Posted on 03/11/2005 8:35:05 PM PST by West Coast Conservative

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice yesterday pointedly declined to rule out running for president in 2008, and gave her most detailed explanation of a "mildly pro-choice" stance on abortion.

In an interview with editors and reporters in the office of the editor in chief at The Washington Times, she said she would not want the government "forcing its views" on abortion.

She seemed bemused by speculation that a Rice candidacy could set up an unprecedented all-woman matchup with Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, New York Democrat, who is widely expected to seek the presidency.

"I never wanted to run for anything — I don't think I even ran for class anything when I was in school," she said. "I'm going to try to be a really good secretary of state; I'm going to work really hard at it.

"I have enormous respect for people who do run for office. It's really hard for me to imagine myself in that role."

She was then pressed on whether she would rule out a White House bid by reprising Gen. William T. Sherman's 1884 declaration: "If nominated, I will not run; if elected, I will not serve."

"Well, that's not fair," she protested with a chuckle. "The last thing I can — I really can't imagine it."

Several Republicans have floated the idea of a Rice candidacy to counter Mrs. Clinton's prospects, especially since several Republican officials with national prominence, including Vice President Dick Cheney and Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, have ruled out pursuing the party's 2008 nomination.

Sen. John McCain of Arizona and former New York City Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani are often mentioned as prospective candidates ...

(Excerpt) Read more at washtimes.com ...


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Culture/Society; Front Page News; Government; News/Current Events; Philosophy; Politics/Elections; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: 2008election; abortion; adiosshesaghost; condi; condoleezzarice; feminazi; insurgency; raid; rice; state; warning
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To: Soul Seeker

"IMO, sounds as though she's advocating a return to state rights."

That is my interpretation also.


61 posted on 03/12/2005 3:28:44 AM PST by wingman1
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To: West Coast Conservative; All
Who wants to see a daughter or a friend or a sibling go through something like that?

I like Condi, but this statement reflects moral obtuseness, IMO.

She is viewing abortion strictly from the woman's perspective, as something that might be unpleasant, perhaps akin to root canal.

The real question is "who wants to see an innocent baby go through something like that, which kills it?"

62 posted on 03/12/2005 3:57:33 AM PST by governsleastgovernsbest (Watching the Today Show since 2002 so you don't have to.)
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To: Norman Bates
With all due respect, you will have no one ot blame but the candidate who lost. People are allowed to make up their own minds and vote or not vote for who they please.

They most certainly do, and with that right comes the responsibility of the results of those choices. Anyone "pro-lifer" who would vote against a candidate who is strongly against late-term abortions and strongly in favor of parental notification, putting a gung-ho pro-abortion candidate in office would bear partial responsibility for that consequence.

63 posted on 03/12/2005 5:17:13 AM PST by alnick (Rice 2005: We've only just begun to see what Freedom can achieve.)
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To: Mo1

They are still stinging from the other thread on this subject...


64 posted on 03/12/2005 5:18:43 AM PST by Lurking2Long
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To: section9

Will NOT be seeing YOU at the voting booth if Condi runs...your tagline shows your general level of disrespect...


65 posted on 03/12/2005 5:21:47 AM PST by Lurking2Long
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To: West Coast Conservative

No to Condi.


66 posted on 03/12/2005 5:26:39 AM PST by sitetest (If Roe is not overturned, no unborn child will ever be protected in law.)
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To: West Coast Conservative
If I am on the "other side", I fear that means the GOP is once again about to stick it to the social conservatives.

Hope they like Hillary, because the GOP is slitting their own throat.
67 posted on 03/12/2005 5:53:24 AM PST by redgolum ("God is dead" -- Nietzsche. "Nietzsche is dead" -- God.)
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To: Darkwolf377
If it's Condi vs. HRC, I imagine there will be enough Republicans who will sulk and sit on their hands and let HRC win. And I will spend four years blaming them for getting that pro-abortion witch into power.

As opposed to the libertarian types who dream that the issue that has made Republicans the majority party in this country will just dance away. Sorry, guy, Jerry Ford's day is OVER.

68 posted on 03/12/2005 5:56:18 AM PST by madprof98
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To: West Coast Conservative

She sounds just fine to me. Parental notification, ban late term abortions, cut federal funding. She'll be a terrific candidate for either president or veep.


69 posted on 03/12/2005 6:38:42 AM PST by zook
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To: West Coast Conservative

That's fine, but if she defends Roe I'll probably not vote for her.(Albeit the position she articulated is not a defense of Roe)


70 posted on 03/12/2005 6:40:31 AM PST by Tribune7
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To: Lexinom

I researched Guiliani for an MBA leadership course. He has way too much baggage; he is too much of a social liberal. I don't know much about Romney, but NE Republicans seem to be cut from the same cloth.

Santorum may be an excpetion. Wonder if he'll run?


71 posted on 03/12/2005 7:11:29 AM PST by mikeus_maximus
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To: Lurking2Long

Oh goody! Another volunteer for the Constitution Party?

Gettin' crowded in that thar phone booth?

Be Seeing You,

Chris

72 posted on 03/12/2005 7:15:12 AM PST by section9 (Major Motoko Kusanagi says, "Jesus is Coming. Everybody look busy...")
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To: Askel5

Actually "I'm personally opposed..." was Kerry's line. Biden's too.

The pro-life side is winning these days because science is on our side. Did anyone catch "In the Womb" on National Geographic last night?

Here's my question: When abortion is illegalized, how do we punish offenders? I think America is willing to overturn Roe, but not so willing to toss women in prison.


73 posted on 03/12/2005 7:27:33 AM PST by Callahan
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To: West Coast Conservative
All of this is irrelevant if Condi is not given that top role as contender. When it comes to getting nominated, your track record is important - without any background in overall political management (i.e. governor), she would be a hard pick for the top slot. While Rice has certainly been highly visible, the GOP does not allow the media to nominate her. It will be interesting to see how she does once the primaries begin; if she is in the mix, some of these positions will need to be more fully developed and explained. Until then, I am withholding judgment. My gut is that she will not get the nod; my personal choice at this early stage would be George Allen.

I will say, however, that I believe she is to the right politically of Rudy G., a critical difference when it comes to nominating justices. I am pro-life, and would gladly take a Condi Rice and a mildly pro-choice position over a absolute pro-choice stance of a Hillary Clinton if it comes down to that. I would NOT, under any circumstances, choose to withhold my vote in protest, especially not at this juncture in world history.
74 posted on 03/12/2005 7:37:52 AM PST by Amalie (FREEDOM had NEVER been another word for nothing left to lose...)
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To: mikeus_maximus
Either way, she just killed her chances.

Just like her predecessor at the State Dept. years ago when on the heels of the first Gulf War, Powell was being touted as presidential material. Even beyond betraying the lack of moral judgment, it was obviously not a particularly astute move politically if she indeed has presidential ambitions.
75 posted on 03/12/2005 7:41:29 AM PST by wide meadow
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To: Callahan
Just a quick follow-up to your post - SCIENCE is the answer in this debate. That is where the truth of what is actually going on exists. The question then comes down to the reality of getting people on a moral footing to accept it; that is the actual BATTLEFIELD for this issue.

Will the medical community at large, which is in the midst of several struggles on cost-mandated /right-mandated death cases at the moment, be willing to make this evidence part of their reality, or will it be brushed aside as irrelevant in a worldview already strongly based in moral compromise.
76 posted on 03/12/2005 7:45:49 AM PST by Amalie (FREEDOM had NEVER been another word for nothing left to lose...)
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To: Conservative Firster
So does that mean if Condi becomes president I can walk into my local Wal-Mart go to the guns section pick-up one of these....

...then go to the casher pay cash and walk out the door without any federal,state or local government interference?


Compared to all Democrats and almost all Republicans, she is your best hope. She actually understands what the 2nd amendment is for.
77 posted on 03/12/2005 7:47:41 AM PST by Atlas Sneezed (Your FRiendly FReeper Patent Attorney)
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To: alnick

EXACTLY.


78 posted on 03/12/2005 7:54:37 AM PST by DaughterOfAnIwoJimaVet (Gnome sayin'?)
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To: West Coast Conservative

On the good news side, politicians are now officially trained to come to the abortion position that "abortion is a very very bad thing."

The leftist position is the kiss of death.


79 posted on 03/12/2005 7:57:54 AM PST by longtermmemmory (VOTE!)
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To: Callahan
The pro-life side is winning these days because science is on our side.

What is the "scientific" basis for the rape/incest/health of the mother exemption to the right to life?

Abortion will never be illegal because the GOP has not only established its legality in certain instances but (1) set forth abortion as the linchpin to a successful population control policy; (2) framed as "economic discrimination" any state's outlawing a poor woman's access to abortion; and (3) entrenched in the national consciousness both the "right" to (abortifacient) birth control.

If you wish to be "scientific" about abortion, you might as well believe that the contracepting "pro-lifers" will also one day outlaw abortifacient contraception.

I find it ludicrous in the extreme that "scientific" pro-lifers can preen themselves on "reducing abortions" even as their allegedly pro-life leadership not only condones but even funds the Human Farming by which conceived human lives are ground up for "humanitarian" research.

Try not to get carried away with the PR efforts of the potemkin pro-life movement. It's like believing that the impeachment of Clinton had a ghost of a chance from the get-go. The fact that our nation -- like Russia -- now wishes to stem the tide somewhat among desirable breeders in no way translates to a genuine desire on their part to roll back the state-mandated "right" to prevent and destroy unwanted lives.

As Specter so rightly pointed out to NPR during the fracas over his appointment a few months ago, Roe is practically irrelevant. THe attention paid it is only indicative of the Shell Game at work here. It's the Casey decision -- which Specter reminded them was courtesy of conservative justices appointed by Republican presidents -- which served to enshrine the personal right to decide who is and is not fully human.

I'm not arguing with you that it would appear that the work done by individuals to change hearts and truly inform women has its effect. I'm just as thankful for the likes of cpforlife.org as you and I have personal experience which attests to the power of persuasion as backed up by a sonogram where a woman's choice is concerned. But I think it's premature, if not entirely unwarranted, to pretend that the pro-life movement is "winning" somehow simply because some of the numbers and even the occasional Hillary Clinton soundbite seem to support that argument.

When you summarily remove 45 million souls from a population in the space of a generation, it's only natural that there will be the same decrease in abortions that naturally accompanies the same decrease in lives able to conceive in the first place.

Additionally, the fact that most now consider birth control and "family planning" to be somehow a moral alternative (as opposed to the foundation for) legal abortion should not exactly be a point of pride for pro-lifers. The "clean hands" removing the Creator from the most intimate, potent and creative of all human acts is in its way more sinister than the specter of legalized murder of children in the womb. At least with abortion, folks appear to still be cognizant of the fact they are preventing and taking real lives.

If you want to be "scientific" about it and you wish to dwell on the Numbers, I think you'll find that we're already headlong into a killing spree of the conceived that soon will dwarf our over-30 year slaughter of children in the womb.

Just as contracepting heteros have no basis on which to claim their children-optional union is any different than that of homosexuals who share their "right" to confect children on demand with for-profit third parties, pro-lifers really have nothing to crow about where the naturally-dimished number of abortions is being touted even as the funding of human farming is being institutionalized at the state and federal level.

Our self-styled "pro-life" leadership is only now getting to the heart of darkness where their concerns over down breeding, sex selection and improved genetic stock of the "state educated" productive labor pool is concerned.

OVERPOPULATION
HON. GEORGE BUSH
OF TEXAS
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
Monday, June 30, 1969
[pp. 17926-17927]

Mr. BUSH. Mr. Speaker, as chairman of the Republican Task Force on Earth Resources and Population, I would like to comment on two newcomers to the Washington scene. They are Dr. Philip Handler, the new president of the National Academy of Sciences and Dr. Roger Olaf Egeberg, the Assistant HEW Secretary for Health and Scientific Affairs subject to his confirmation by the Senate. I was extremely heartened by the sense of urgency expressed by both of these national leaders on the problems of overpopulation and dwindling resources. In a recent interview with This Week magazine, Dr. Handler stated:

"The greatest threat to the human race is man's own procreation.


[...] Dr. Egeberg has displayed his keen awareness of the crisis our world is facing by emphasizing that at the top of his list of priorities will be intensified efforts in environmental and population control through technological innovations and family planning, the reclamation of waste products, and the development of a low pollution automobile. We look to these two men for dynamic and purposeful leadership as the new administration charts its course. I include at this point in the record the text of the interview with Dr. Handler: OVERPOPULATION: NEW SCIENCE PRESIDENT SEES IT AS GREATEST THREAT TO MANKIND "Man is on the threshold of a biological revolution," says biochemist Philip Handler. "It will influence the life of each of us Just as greatly as the industrial revolution affected every living person."

[...]

Dr. Handler. The greatest threat to the human race is man's own procreation. Hunger; pollution; crime; overlarge, dirty cities--even the seething unrest that leads to international conflict and war--all derive from the unbridled growth of human populations. It is imperative that we begin a research campaign in human reproductive physiology.

TW. Don't we already know enough?

Dr. Handler. We thought we were quite knowledgeable, until today's problems pinned us to the wall. Our knowledge turned out to be primitive.

The oral contraceptive pill and lUDs (intrauterine contraceptive devices) have been successful because they divorce the act of sex from the act of using contraception. What we now need is a cheap, safe mechanism in which failure to use contraceptives would result in failure to conceive, rather than the present situation, which is the other way around--failure results in conception.

....

Dr. Handler. There are something over 300 known hereditary diseases of man. We have learned to circumvent a number of them by keeping young people alive who suffer from those diseases. They grow up and reproduce, and spread their genes in the population. Instead of improving, the genetic pool of mankind is deteriorating. I think the total good of humanity demands that we minimize the incidence of these defective genes. We have no historical ethnic to guide us in this matter, but perhaps such people hould not be allowed to procreate.

The other side of the coin is to prevent the problem In the first place. There are some who hope to make DNA--containing only "good" genes--and insert it into the germ plasm of prospective parents. Maybe that will be possible In the distant future.

Or you could improve inheritance by breeding. As its farthest extreme, using the processs I described for cattle, one could, conceivably, deliberately make more Einsteins, Mozarts, or whomever you choose. Another, more practical way is to pick distinguished men and preserve their sperm by freezing it in "sperm banks." Then married couples might enjoy their own sex relationship, but when they want to have a child, use sperm from the sperm bank.

Actual Agenda of the Orwellian "Pro-Life Leadership"

80 posted on 03/12/2005 8:18:00 AM PST by Askel5 († Cooperatio voluntaria ad suicidium est legi morali contraria. †)
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