"Some animals are more equal than others." - George Orwell's Animal Farm
Posted on 06/11/2007 7:45:58 PM PDT by monomaniac
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- With some candidates at the top of the polls for the Republican primary for president who aren't exciting the pro-life community, the likely entry of former Tennessee senator Fred Thompson into the race is a positive one. He has a strong pro-life record and his aides rebutted one of the only criticisms against him.
Thompson's tenure in the Senate included votes on various abortion issues from stopping taxpayer funding to uphold parental involvement laws and he accumulated a 100% pro-life voting record during that time.
The former attorney even voted twice against a Senate resolution endorsing Roe v. Wade.
But Thompson has always been plagued by a 1994 candidate questionnaire that had him saying he favors numerous limits on abortion but supported the landmark Supreme Court case making it legal.
Thompson told Fox News recently he suspected the survey was completed by a staff member at the time and didn't recall filling it out -- and a current staff member of his potential presidential campaign confirmed that.
Thompson spokesman Mark Corallo told the Jackson Sun newspaper that a 1994 questionnaire for Project Vote Smart showing a box checked saying he supported legal abortion was erroneously completed by someone else at the time.
"Senator Thompson is pro-life. He has been consistently pro-life throughout his career, having been endorsed by National Right to Life and having a 100 percent pro-life voting record while in the Senate," Corallo said.
Thompson himself told the Weekly Standard in April that media outlets referred to him as supporting abortion back in the mid 1990s and he doesn't know how that erroneous statement began.
"Although I don't remember it, I must have said something to someone as I was getting my campaign started that led to a story," he said. Apparently, another story was based upon that story, and another was based upon that, concluding I was pro-choice."
Corallo told the Sun that Thompson supports one goal of the pro-life movement -- to overturn Roe and allow states the chance to ban abortions once again.
"It is an issue of federalism -- a matter that should go back to the states -- and he has been consistent in that position throughout his career," he said.
But Corallo also indicated that Thompson would not go as far as the rest of the pro-life community and support a human life amendment to the Constitution to make sure unborn children are protected nationwide.
"As the senator has said publicly, he does not support a constitutional amendment banning abortion for the same reasons he believes Roe v. Wade should be overturned -- though in that case he believes it is both bad law and bad science," he told the newspaper.
During the Fox News program, Thompson confirmed he supports overturning Roe v. Wade.
"I've always thought that Roe v. Wade was a wrong decision, that they usurped what had been the law in this country for 200 years, that it was a matter that should go back to the states," he said.
"When you get back to the states, I think the states should have some leeway," he added.
IMO, the Human Life Amendment is a big mistake.
It has set the bar so high that today America is probably closer to a Constitutional Amendment legalizing abortion than it is to an Amendment protecting human life from conception.
Did you even read the article? This has been posted many times, so it shouldn't have been a surprise to anyone here. To sum up for you (since you can't be bothered to read the article), the questionnaire that is being used to claim that Thompson was pro-choice was filled out by a staffer, and never reflected his true position on the issue. So there was NO FLIP-FLOP! For it to be a flip-flop, he would have to have had one position and then changed it later. Got it?
Fred’s enemies keep making these charges, but there is no substance in them at all. He has a far better pro-life record than most of the other candidates, including Romney.
Brownback is supported by some pro-lifers, but he has too many strikes against him on other issues to be worth considering.
Pro-abortion NARAL gives Fred an “F”:
“NARAL also rated nine other Republicans... Based on their abortion rights stance, the following Republicans received a grade of ‘F’: ...Sen. Fred Thompson of Tennessee...”
- Susan Jones, CNSNews.com, July 14, 2000
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“Listed below is the name, state and party of each of these senators along with Planned Parenthood’s rating of them.
Name State Party PP rating...
Fred Thompson TN R 0% “
- The Stopp Report, November, 2001
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Today, the Evangelicals for Mitt operation has spent its time attacking conservative Republican presidential candidates, most recently former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and unannounced candidate, former Tennessee Sen. Fred Thompson.
Thompson, who has made it clear that he does not support Roe v. Wade, and who was certified as pro-life by the National Right to Life Committee back in 1994, has continued to state that he is pro-life. But the Evangelicals for Mitt, using research provided by the Romney campaign, has been putting out information on its blog that Thompson, as well as other Republican Senate candidates, were not.
The Romney campaign has targeted Thompson as a serious threat to its ongoing political survival...
National Right to Life says Thompson has been reliably pro-life and his voting record sustains that view.
- Bill Hobbs, Elephant Biz, March 26, 2007
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Fred never campaigned as pro-abortion in both of his Senate races.
Try again.
.....so true....this has been refuted more than once. Old news....
In the same campaign his aide selected the wrong box on the form, he was endorsed here in TN by the pro-life groups that later gave him such high scores. I don’t take this issue as a flip-flop.
That is not federalism.
American federalism restricts the states in accordance to our Constitution, for the purpose of protecting the rights of ourselves and our posterity. States can no more allow the destruction of life than they could allow slavery or the taking of our guns. Our federalist system currently instructs states to protect the right to life, above all, at every stage, for our children as much as ourselves.
This means abortion can never be a state matter. Life is a guaranteed right in our federal union of states.
Anyone who says otherwise desires a loose confederacy, not federalism, or wishes to destroy the principle that founded this nation: that government exists for the purpose of equally protecting God-given rights, and that any government destructive to those ends shall be justly overthrown.
States are not free to violate the right to life, so long as we still have this federal union we call the United States of America with its inspired Constitution.
"Some animals are more equal than others." - George Orwell's Animal Farm
Even if Thompson flipped, he did it 13 years ago rather than 13 months ago as in Mitt. From the beginning of his elective career, Thompson was pro-life. Mitt cannot say the same. Did NARAL name Romney as one of the nine worst governors for "abortion rights?"
And was the 13th Amendment a mistake?
Please FreepMail me if you want on or off my Pro-Life Ping List.
NARAL has said this about Romney as well:
Freep-mail me to get on or off my pro-life and Catholic Ping List:
Please ping me to all note-worthy Pro-Life or Catholic threads, or other threads of interest.
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You may as well keep this response somewhere handy so that you can easily cut and paste it. The Thompson detractors have an agenda.
In that 13 year old survey he supported the absolute bare minimum provided all sorts of restricts were met. He then acted as a pro-life senator.
Romney on the other hand, had passionate pleas in support of abortion on TV four years ago. In his argument he talked about how his mother’s friend needed a “back alley abortion” and was hurt or something.... so that’s why he supports abortion. Now that he switched, did he stop caring about his mother’s friend? It’s a lot harder to squirm away from such a passionate plea for abortion.
Big difference between Fred & Mitt.
I think you have it exactly backwards. The Consitution restricts the Federal Government. Anything not granted to the feds thereunder, is left to the states. Abortion and a host of other issues are not mentioned in the Constitution. That is why the Supreme Court had to hunt around for a new Constitutional right on which to hang abortion. That is how we got Roe. They had to lie to make it a federal issue. We are all conditioned these days to look to Washington for solutions, regardless of their poor track record in providing them.
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