Posted on 11/13/2004 6:05:41 AM PST by cpforlife.org
PRO-LIFE WARNING TO THE REPUBLICAN PARTY
We believe that abortion is infanticide, and that a holocaust of infants is taking place. We do not believe that there is any other issue on Earth that compares with abortion in moral import. And therefore, there is no policy or combination of policies you Republicans can offer, including perfect tax policies, tort reform, and every other thing that is near and dear to Republican hearts, that matters a damn if abortion is overlooked and allowed to slide by.
We know that this issue has to be settled in the Supreme Court, nowhere else. And we know that the opportunity to put new justices on the court comes once in a decade, maybe, and that the current opportunity to alter the complexion of the court is not going to come again for a generation. Therefore, the real possibility exists that abortion can finally be seriously curtailed, soon, by the Supreme Court changing Roe v. Wade or eliminating it...IF, and ONLY IF, we can get pro-life judges on that court.
To do that, we have trusted the Republicans for years. We just came out and voted for you again this time, in unprecedented numbers, because we are not stupid and we know what is at stake. Not just evangelicals either. The religious CATHOLIC vote went Republican in 2004, and they didn't do it because of trade policy or even gay marriage. Their issue is abortion.
And the overriding issue is abortion.
So, if the Republicans allow Senator Specter to get the Chair of the Judiciary Committee and he blocks pro-life nominees, or if the Republicans do not use the nuclear option to override Democrat filibusters of pro-life nominees, THIS TIME there is no place for Republicans to hide. WE KNOW that you have the power, now, because WE just voted to give it to you. We understand that you can block Specter. And we understand the nuclear option.
And therefore, we most certainly will understand that if you allow the pro-life judges to be blocked, that it will be your political CHOICE to have done so. You CAN put pro-life judges on the bench, if you expend a lot of political capital. This will offend some people - a lot of people. And that is the price you HAVE to pay to get our votes next time. You have to be willing to bet the whole house to end infanticide.
If not, we will not vote for you. We won't go running to vote for the Democrats: they're pro-abortion. We won't go out and form a third party: we're not stupid and know that won't work. We'll just stay home, just like we did in 2000. Except that in 2000 it was out of frustration and neglect, and the lack of belief that anything will change. There was no organized campaign to keep the pro-life vote home in 2000.
This time, it's different. We understand the system, and we know that you have the power. And we demand that you use the power straight down the line to fill the high court and the appellate courts with judges who will protect the lives of babies. Period. This is not negotiable. At all. This is why we voted for you. You have nothing with which to bargain with us, and if you screw us, we will stay organized and we will stay home purposely to destroy the Republican party. Because if you do not protect the babies when you have the power to do it, you are no better than the Democrats...and worse, you will have lied to us.
This means, in effect, that all of those things YOU care most about: taxation, immigration, trade and business policy, deregulation - all of those core issues that come as an economic package, are held hostage to our issue: babies. If you will not protect the babies, we will stay home and let the Democrats destroy everything that YOU believe in.
This is called "Chicken". It is called a "Mexican Standoff". And since we are fired up by the certitude that we are doing God's work in defending babies, we cannot be bought, and you cannot win so much as an election for dog catcher in this country without us.
Therefore, the solution is simple and obvious: give us what we voted for you to do. Give us pro-life judges. Use all of your power to do it. Sweep Specter out of the way: is he worth losing all the rest of your agenda? - because we really will stay home and throw the country to the Democrats if you're no better than they are on abortion, just to punish YOU for having betrayed us. When the filibusters come, and they will come, use the nuclear option to override them. That will poison the Senate, yes. So what? We are talking about babies here. And with our votes, militantly mobilized because we are winning, alongside of yours, in 2006 and 2008 and beyond, even if the Senate is poisoned, you will be able to replace it with a more Republican one.
That there is even a debate going on as to what to do with Specter is alarming, but we have had our hearts broken before, so we'll sit and pray and trust President Bush and Senator Frist and the Republicans to do the right thing.
Screw us, though, and we will turn on you and your whole agenda will go down the drain with the blood of the babies you wouldn't put your power on the line to save.
The easy solution, the win-win solution, is to BE as pro-life as you campaigned as being. Just do it.
I apologize for the length of this post. But it needed to be said. The Republicans do not seem to get it. They need to understand that we are more committed to saving babies than we are to the fortunes of the Republican Party. That Specter is still in play demonstrates that too many of them do not take this seriously.
Rather than test us, what you guys should do is simply cave, now, and give us what we want. Do that, and you wont hear from us again - there will be no creeping theocracy in America - because this is about the only religious issue that Catholics and Orthodox and Evangelicals AGREE on.
The parents were allowed to draw breath, their offspring must be allowed to continue along the natural path to drawing breath as well.
If you believe differently, that's your right. No point going round and round on this, we'll just have to agree to disagree.
If Reinquist's condition is as reported, President Bush will have to appoint at least one judge. I'm saddened about Justice Reinquist.
It would be nice if President Bush had the opportunity to replace some of the activists on the court, but that's not a definite.
I hope you are happy by the time this next term is over, however. :-)
In this particular case, the only reason the 8 day old zygote exists at all is because of direct intervention and molestation.
The commandment referred to killing another in cold blood, not to capital punishment. The Torah specified capital punishment for a variety of transgressions, including dishonoring one's father and mother.
Dear sitetest,
You've been an absolute powerhouse on this thread. Your posts have been the most cogent, civil and illuminating of all.
AlbionGirl
P.S. You do all Catholics proud.
P.S.S. I know it's not popular, but I'm really hoping for a revival of the Democrat party. Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely. We need a loyal opposition. And your post stating that the right to life is the right most paramount is true.
I'm not married to Party, and never have been. But the Repulicans will always be able to say, we were the Party of Emancipation, and that ain't no small affair.
In the debate about life and abortion, Lincoln's a tremendous source of insipiration.
"The original Hebrew is "Lo Tirtzach", which means "Do not murder". The Hebrew word for killing is "Hariga", a completely different verb.
Murder is the taking of innocent life, which is always forbidden, while killing is the taking of any life, which is sometimes not only permitted but obligatory. The Bible commands us to kill those who have lost their innocence. Innocence is lost in two ways:
1) Someone who was found guilty in a court of certain crimes, for example, "Say to the Israelites: 'Any Israelite or any alien living in Israel who gives any of his children to Molech (a form of idolatry where priests pass children through ritual fires) must be put to death. The people of the community are to stone him." (Leviticus 20:2)
2) Someone who is clearly posing a direct threat to the lives of innocents. "If the thief is caught while breaking in and is struck so that he dies, there will be no bloodguiltiness on his account" (Exodus 22:2). This only applies where it is clear that he is willing to kill the house owner.
It is clear that there is no contradiction between these commandments - actually they compliment each other. Innocent life is protected, both by the commandment not to murder and the commandment to kill those who are a threat to innocence.
All the best,
Rabbi Moss "
Dear Cold Heat,
I apologize that my next remarks may be a little disordered. I'm not a political scientist by training, nor am I well-versed in the theology of the Catholic Church as it applies to social order. I've pinged a few posters who may be better able to more systematically treat the question. Narses, I'm sure you can think of others well-qualified, as well.
Nonetheless, I'll respond to your... comments.
"Human rights were not given by government, nor can they be taken away by same."
I didn't say otherwise.
But human rights are either recognized and respected by governments, or they are not recognized and they are disrespected by governments.
Societies where the state recognizes and respects fundamental human rights are relatively more just than societies where the state does not.
The first goal of a state is to secure a just order. Inherent in just order is the recognition of and respect for fundamental human rights.
Politics is merely what happens when multiple persons gather together to work things out. In the context of government, politics is the means by which different parties, different groups, some competing, some cooperating, work out how the state will function. Moral politics require significant care for, in fact, first attention to just order.
"We, each and every one of us is responsible for the care taking of our rights and no one can protect them for you."
Not quite, Cold Heat. When we erect a state, a government, that corporately respects human rights, through our common efforts, we can secure our rights, at least for the present.
If we must individually secure our rights against the state, if the state takes a dim view of our rights, we will probably each be individually crushed.
That's why Ben Franklin talked about hanging together or being hanged separately.
And that's why the Founders were first and foremost concerned with creating a system of government that limited the power of the state, because they understood that a strong government usually falls into the hands of the strong (at least eventually) and is used to abridge the rights of the weak.
Kinda like what happened with Roe v. Wade. Those who were relatively strong (cultural elites) used someone who was weak (Norma McCovey) to abridge the rights of the even weaker (the unborn, who have no voice of their own).
"God gave us rights, and government gives us privileges or takes them."
Again, nowhere did I say that government gives us rights.
But government can recognize and respect rights, and through just law, can protect and vindicate rights.
"The last time I checked, politics did not have the face of God. It can't, because it is a game."
I don't recall saying it did have the face of God.
And although there are gaming aspects of politics, honest and sincere men try to use politics to achieve moral and just ends.
"Nothing more and nothing less. A game of privileges, not human rights."
Sorry you feel that way. That's really sad. I'll pray for you.
But if that's how you feel, why do you bother? And why get so uptight about it? Who cares if we overturn Roe? Who cares if we wreck the Republican Party? It's just a game, nothing more, nothing less. It has nothing to do with human rights. Right?
"If there is any other entity that helps us protect human rights, then that duty falls to the gun."
Tell that to the folks who lived in totalitarian societies like fascist Germany or communist Russia. Maybe you get to kill the first, second, and third guy through the door. But you won't vindicate your rights in such a place. You won't be able to successfully secure your rights, all by your lonesome and your gun.
The gun is helpful when used by groups of men to aid each other in wresting the government from the tyrant. But it is the persons together, working together for the common cause, that secure the rights of each other. The duty falls to just men acting in concert, not to the gun. The gun is only a tool, appropriate at certain times and places. If it is used only by isolated individuals, it will fail to protect.
Then, having removed the tyrant, men sit and use a new tool - politics, statecraft. If they use it poorly and unjustly, another resort to the gun may not be long in coming. If they use it well, they can secure the rights of themselves, their families, and their progeny for a little while. If those who succeed them use the political tools well, and in concert, when needed, use the gun against common foes, this happy order may persist for some while.
The gun is always available should the state again become a tyrant. Even so, not when borne by a single, lone individual.
Sorry, but humans function through societies. The first society is the family. Legalized abortion demand destroys the just order in this way too, in that it sets the mother against the child as enemies, thus destroying that first society.
"Methinks you may be in the wrong political party."
LOL. If you think the majority of Republicans think that the only way to secure human rights is by the individual wielding a gun, it is you who have badly misjudged the party.
Maybe this is why you oppose overturning Roe? Those damned fetuses ought to fight for themselves! If they want rights, let 'em wield a gun and shoot their way to their rights!! ;-)
sitetest
And many others, your interpretation aside.
I don't own a Torah. I believe the intent was to stop all killings of all kinds for any reasons.
Muslims make all sorts of creative interpretations as well to justify killing.
I would think, that sooner or later, it will stop and the words finally heeded as the Lord intended.
You:"This is why many of us want you guys to go ahead and leave. You don't care about the conservative cause - you only care about one issue, abortion. You'd be perfectly willing to accept socialism as long as abortions were illegal.
Leave in a public way so that the urban pro-choice conservatives will know that its safe to vote republican. Right now, they see a republican majority as a return to the town portrayed in Footloose. They're not far off."
You'll get your wish before 2006 if the Republican party renegs on its pro-life pledge.
Personally, I think that Bush, Cheney, Frist, and most of the Republican Senators are sincerely pro-life, and that they will appoint and confirm strict constructionist pro-life judges.
But we will find out in the near term.
The Specter test is just a foretaste. If they do the wrong thing on Specter and let him take the chairmanship of Judiciary, it will be a very ominous sign, and pro-lifers across America will be very hurt and very suspicious.
It might still work out in the end, though, if Bush, Cheney and Frist have effectively brought Specter to heel, and push through pro-life strict constructionists anyway. It might be that this whole episode of pro-lifer angst is the result of one truly loose-canon Senator, and that all will end well in spite of him.
On the other hand, if the Republicans have been playing pro-lifers for chumps the way that Democrats exploit the Black Bloc, without having any intention to really do anything for the loyal constituency, the Party will be forced to tip its hand before 2006, as new slates of judicial nominees move up in a much more Republican Senate.
If we've been chumps, we'll know it before 2006, and then you will get your wish, because we won't be there anymore.
It's more likely, though, that the Republican leaders are pro-life, and that we will still be very enthusiastic Republicans, at the core of the party, and continuing to irritate the hell out of you by our presence.
That's no my "opinion," it is factual interpretation of Hebrew by someone who was born speaking it, BTW. In so far as the commandments were given by the Lord to Moses, they are the word of the Lord. Your belief does not change the facts. Jesus had relatively little to say on the matter, other than the woman caught in adultery; in fact, he gladly submitted to capital punishment himself. So argue away, but you can't quote Scripture and the Lord to back you up.
I am not against the overturning of Roe. I said it was not going to happen.
Big difference.
As to your even believing for a split second that you have it in your power to somehow damage the Republican party, all I can say is that you truly are nuts!
You have put yourself on a pedestal.
I hear this garbage every election.
Just tired of it. It is not based in reality. It is wishful thinking combined with a some sort of grandiose idea that you have some sort of political power that cannot be denied.
Well, I am denying it. I say it's BS, just as it has been for decades.
There will be no such thing as a pro-life judge. The two are in conflict with each other. We will, for good reason, maintain a secular government and that is that.
Now I have had enough of this foolishness. Rights are not given by any government, therefore they have no interest in protecting them, they only want to make sure that you can freely claim them.
Or at least that is the way it should be. Problems with this balance only occur when people try to confuse rights and privileges.
The Constitution does not give rights, it recognizes them. Politics therefore, as an extension of democracy should do the same.
When politics and government get into business of bestowing rights, we have a serious problem.
We are dealing with one of those today with Gay Rights.
What they are really asking for is privilege. We have no right to deny them rights, but we can deny them privilege.
Now, you can call in all the ping buddies you like, but they can't fault what I said.
The rest of your statements only parsed what I said and made issue of the straw-man arguments that you created on your own, which is precisely what you have done all day long on this thread.
Enjoy the balance of the evening, I know that I will.
I for one certainly don't need to hear it.
I have my doctrine, you have yours and one day we will know who was right, and who was wrong.
I for one certainly don't need to hear it.
In case you hadn't noticed, this whole thread has been about religion and faith. You horned in on a conversation I was having with someone else--the basis of that conversation was religious. You get caught making stuff up ("murder is a legal term; it's not in the Bible"), so you resort to childish remarks.
"Snicker".
The only thing wrong here is you.
Enjoy your (now deemed religious) argument and thread.
The Republican Party is pro life. The leader of the party is pro life. You need not be religious to oppose the murder of the unborn just as you need not be religious to oppose the murder of those who have been born.
*Screw us, though, and we will turn on you and your whole agenda will go down the drain with the blood of the babies you wouldn't put your power on the line to save*
And the author of this kind of language claims to be some kind of "Christian"? Count me as one singularly unimpressed with this little rant...
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.