Posted on 08/05/2015 4:52:38 AM PDT by Kaslin
During my time in Congress, I regularly introduced legislation forbidding organizations that perform abortions from receiving federal funding. The U.S. Government should not force taxpayers to subsidize an activity they believe is murder. Thus, while I was horrified by the recently released videos showing Planned Parenthood officials casually discussing selling the organs of aborted babies, I am glad that the reaction to these videos has renewed efforts to end federal funding of abortion.
My experience in Congress does not leave me optimistic that federal funding of Planned Parenthood will be ended this year, however. This is not just because the current U.S. president is pro-abortion. When I started my efforts to end taxpayer support of abortion, I was shocked to find out how many Republicans, including some self-described "pro-life" leaders, were unsupportive of, and sometimes hostile to, my efforts.
Most pro-life politicians preferred to add language to funding bills prohibiting federal funds from being used for abortions, rather than denying federal funds to abortion providers. This approach does not stop U.S. taxpayers from subsidizing abortions. The reason is that money is fungible. Giving Planned Parenthood $100 to use for non-abortion activities allows it to spend an additional $100 of its non-government funds on abortion.
Foreign interventionists in both parties were particularly hostile to my efforts to eliminate federal funding for international organizations that performed or promoted abortions. This is a foolish policy that gives people around the globe another reason to resent the U.S. government.
Planned Parenthood may have abandoned the explicitly racist and eugenic views of its founder Margaret Sanger, but the majority of its abortion "services" are still provided to lower-income and minority women. Every day nearly 2,000 African-American babies lose their lives to abortion, a rate five times higher than the Caucasian abortion rates.
I support the black lives matter movement. I have long advocated an end to the drug war, police militarization, and other threats to liberty that disproportionately victimize African-Americans. However, I wish some of the black lives matter movement's passion and energy was directed to ending abortion. Unborn black lives also matter.
The federal government has no constitutional authority to permit, fund, or even outlaw abortion. Therefore, efforts to make abortion a federal crime are just as unconstitutional as efforts to prohibit states from outlawing abortion. A Congress that truly cared about the Constitution would end all federal funding for abortion and pass legislation restricting federal jurisdiction over abortion, thus returning the issue to the states.
While passing legislation may help limit abortion, the pro-life movement will never succeed unless it changes people's attitudes toward the unborn. This is why crisis pregnancy centers, which provide care and compassion to women facing unplanned pregnancies, have done more to advance the pro-life cause then any politician. By showing women they have viable alternatives to abortion, these centers have saved many lives.
One factor hindering the anti-abortion movement's ability to change people's minds is that too many abortion opponents also support a militaristic foreign policy. These pro-lifers undercut their moral credibility as advocates for unborn American lives when they display a callous indifference to the lives of Iraqi, Iranian, and Afghan children.
Libertarians who support abortion should ask themselves how they can expect a government that does not respect the unborn's right to life to respect their property rights. Therefore, all those who wish to create a society of liberty, peace, and prosperity should join me in advocating for a consistent ethic of life and liberty that respects the rights of all persons, born and unborn.
JMHO
“While passing legislation may help limit abortion, the pro-life movement will never succeed unless it changes people’s attitudes toward the unborn.”
The change is measurable, irrefutable, and enormous .
He should get out of DC from time to time.
Ron Paul is a two-faced, lying fraud. He’s the guy who, in speeches, badmouthed pork and railed against earmarks; and then would pick a bill that was sure to pass, load it up with pork for his district, and then make a big deal of voting against the bill. When it passed, as he knew it would....bringing his pork with it, he’d shake his head and tsk-tsk a few times and remind everyone that he’d voted against it.
That’s why I don’t trust Rand. The apple never falls far from the tree.
Ron Paul is an ex congressman, his son is a senator
excerpt 1: “While passing legislation may help limit abortion, the pro-life movement will never succeed unless it changes people’s attitudes toward the unborn.”
The attitude that needs to be changed is that attitude that mothers who kill their children are somehow not murderers. The attitude should be, that it is the ultimate act of irresponsibility, evil and injustice to kill a defenseless child for any reason that the mother and father created.
Even this author pussy-foots around and tries to insinuate that these killer mothers and somehow justified in their child killing, because it is too inconvenient and difficult for the mother to let her child live...frikkin’ disgusting.
Excerpt 2: “These pro-lifers undercut their moral credibility as advocates for unborn American lives when they display a callous indifference to the lives of Iraqi, Iranian, and Afghan children.”
American schmerican...the value of a child’s life has nothing to do with a moral high ground of someone who is Pro-Life vs Pro-Choice. These are human children and mothers have killed more people, in 34 years, than all of the world’s wars and health epidemics throughout history combined. These are the DeathMoms and in the US 1 in 3 women is a DeathMom at least once in her life.
Why do children in Afghanistan, Iran and Iraq get killed?! It has nothing to do with our militaristic foreign policy, that’s for sure. I think we all know they are used as human shields. This author is simply politically slanted to the left.
Until mothers acknowledge they are murderers when they kill their children, we will never conquer abortion. That’s the attitude that needs changing, right there...that’s the truth.
Pardon my pessimism, but I ain't holding my breath to see any of this happen in my lifetime!
Politics will not solve any of our problems. Politics caused all of the problems.
[ too many abortion opponents also support a militaristic foreign policy. These pro-lifers undercut their moral credibility as advocates for unborn American lives when they display a callous indifference to the lives of Iraqi, Iranian, and Afghan children.]
That Paul(Sr.) does not understand, or pretends not to understand, the difference between the unborn and national defense issues is telling.
The argument can be made that sometimes the national defense decisions are incorrect, but to try to equate these decisions with abortion shows faulty reasoning on his part.
Paul (Sr.) has always been prone to faulty reasoning in numerous areas. His son appears to have inherited some commonsense from somewhere, not from his father.
Neither am I. At my age I doubt that I'll be around to see it happen IF it ever does happen. The moral values that characterized the founding fathers and a large majority of the American people of that long gone era are no longer honored by the American people, especially young Americans.
I don't know what it will take to bring about a return to those moral values by the majority of Americans, but I'm afraid that the harsh medicine that will be required may kill the sick patient before it cures the disease.
“return to Christian values”
A relationship with God the Father through the sacrificial death of his Son evidenced by faith that demonstrates a changed life and motivation, submits to the Word of God and the leading of God’s Holy Spirit, is the only hope for an individual and a nation to have a changed heart and mind regarding sin and the “self-life”. So, yea, I’m not optimistic regarding the USA. I can’t help believe we are on the fast track to the end times of prophetic scripture. Short of a real spiritual renewal in our culture/country, we have zero hope of surviving. “Broad is the road that leads to destruction...” unfortunately, that’s the one America is on.
Um, it was the COURTS that “changed people’s minds” via Roe/Wade just like they overrode the wills of the people’s votes on homosexual marriage. So saying politics isn’t the place to see it through is just plain wrong. Of course, having TV/news/schools expound on liberal culture for decades didn’t help us out, either. On the other hand, what did we do to break through that? Nothing, really.
Yawn. Fail.
Therefore, efforts to make abortion a federal crime are just as unconstitutional as efforts to prohibit states from outlawing abortion.
Yawn. Fail.
Pure BS
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