Posted on 06/21/2005 1:35:35 PM PDT by cpforlife.org
Are Republicans bidding farewell to pro-life supporters?
If they are, then many Catholics will be bidding farewell to the Republican Party.
More Catholics voted for Republicans in the last election than ever before — and they did it even despite Catholic voters’ opposition to the Iraq war. Abortion was the biggest reason why.
A Gallup Poll conducted just before the November elections found that 19% of likely voters say the abortion issue directs which candidates they are willing to support. A big majority of those voters chose President Bush — so much so that Gallup said it gave the president a 7% advantage among all voters, and the presidency.
In the Democratic Party’s platform, conventions and party leadership, any opposition to abortion is strictly forbidden. Pro-lifers have largely given up on them, and hoped the Republican Party’s official pro-life stance would make it a more natural home for them.
But the GOP is starting to look less like home.
When Democrats controlled the Senate, President Clinton’s judicial appointees sailed through despite their out-of-the-mainstream support for abortion. With little objection from the GOP, America got Supreme Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg and the federal judges who routinely overturn the pro-life measures states manage to enact.
But with Republicans in charge, Democrats wouldn’t allow the most reliably pro-life appointees to even get a vote — and Republicans were too afraid to give them the vote the constitution guarantees them. Baltimore Cardinal William Keeler wrote to U.S. senators Jan. 6, urging them to resist pressure to impose a pro-abortion litmus test on federal judicial nominees. Cardinal Keeler, chairman of the bishops’ Committee on Pro-Life Activities, objected to the judiciary’s virtual “Catholics need not apply” policy. To no avail.
America’s pro-life majority elected a Republican president and Republican Senate. Will these people be able to successfully seat a pro-life Supreme Court justice for us in return? That remains to be seen. But the GOP doesn’t seem as willing to fight as hard for pro-lifers as pro-lifers fought for them.
Look at what happened in the House.
The Republican-controlled body voted to spend money from American taxpayers’ paychecks to pay for unethical research that isn’t promising enough to attract private investors. Embryonic stem-cell research has been hyped as cure-all miracle research. But a review of the facts reveals it for what it is: the creation of human beings for the sake of science experiments that have so far produced only tumors in patients.
Adult stem-cell research, on the other hand, has produced amazing treatments for medical conditions. But no one is asking for taxpayer money to spend on it. Pharmaceutical companies are more than happy to invest in it themselves, because it works.
Formerly pro-life members of Congress are using pro-abortion arguments to explain their betrayal. They say these children are unwanted anyway, or that they aren’t fully human — even after being visited on Capitol Hill by “unwanted” embryos slated for death who were adopted, allowed to grow up, and now walk, talk, play and, some day, will vote.
If pro-lifers are starting to feel out of place in the Republican Party, the feeling might grow in 2008.
The party’s dream candidates for President — Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, and California Governor Arnold Schwarzeneggar — are not pro-life.
Some party watchers say not to lose hope.
“I don’t think there is anything happening in the party per se on this issue. We are a pro-life party and will remain so,” Republican campaign strategist Bill Dal Col, who managed Steve Forbes’ 2000 presidential campaign, told the Washington Times.
The answer, says Steve Ertelt of Lifesite, is for pro-life advocates to work overtime to make sure the party knows what pro-lifers expect.
There is a long list of possible pro-life Republican presidential candidates, he said, including Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist; pro-life Senators Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, Sam Brownback of Kansas, Chuck Hagel of Nebraska; and former Virginia Governor George Allen.
A pro-abortion Republican can’t win the next presidential election. The religious supporters that the GOP counts on won’t vote for the opponent, certainly — they simply won’t vote at all.
As Americans, our House and Senate leaders should support pro-life positions because if they vote the wrong way, they’ll end human beings’ lives.
As politicians, they should support pro-life positions because, if they vote the wrong way, they’ll end their political careers.
How people casually put politics over the lives of babies still somewhat amazes me.
I live in NJ. Bret who is pro life lost in the primary. I would be hard pressed to vote for Forrester who is pro abortion.
Please read The Pennsylvania Treason (Arlen Specter)
and some great posts too. http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1273280/posts
From http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1273280/posts
"I have often asserted that, for the pro-life movement, the only practical distinction between the Democrat and Republican parties is that one is an enemy who will stab us in the chest and the other is a friend who will stab us in the back.
Tuesday's Republican primary in Pennsylvania proved my point. Hard-core abortion enthusiast Republican Arlen Specter was being challenged by pro-lifer Pat Toomey for the U.S. Senate. As the incumbent, Specter was predicted to win easily. But as Election Day approached, the polls clearly showed that Toomey was closing in fast and had a legitimate shot to pull off an upset.
That's when the GOP's power brokers pulled out the heavy guns. President George W. Bush personally rushed to Pennsylvania and implored Republicans to get behind the candidacy of ... Arlen Specter. Equally amazing, Pennsylvania's other senator, Rick Santorum, also chose to walk away from his long-espoused pro-life principles. He joined Bush on the campaign trail and urged voters to defeat the pro-life challenger."
The rest is great.......
You going completely away from my point. Do you understand the basics of a simple reciprocity agreement like "I'll stump for you, and you stump for me" or not?
If they play that bluff, they will be sad.
It will not come to that. The Pubbies will not nominate any of these borts. Uh, unless they see the light, real soon.
You don't have to vote all all in NJ in November. And doesn't your state have a nominal "Constitution Party" on the general election ballot?
Insults are chump-change -- the real money is in proving me wrong.
So tell me, why didn't McCain get the nomination in 2000? And what will change in '08 to make him the nominee?
Why won't Allen be nominated?
One wonders who is doing the dreaming, as Arnold is Constitutionally prohibited from running for President, and the feelings of both Rice and Guiliani on certain issues have already been well publicized.
Give me George Allen.
If that is what the GOP thinks, then they had better think again.
I doubt that this premise is true. (that Republicans are bidding farewell to pro-lifers)
They know who voted for them in the last election!
Dear sinkspur,
"Bush is the most pro-life president this country has ever had,..."
True, but it ain't saying much.
"...and has taken some difficult and heroic pro-life stances."
Bull.
sitetest
Do you speak for everyone? I voted for him for many different things. Yes, I'm concerned about the borders, but that's not my ONLY concern! You don't speak for me, and you don't speak for everyone else on this board either! I'm sure they all have their reasons for voting one way or another. But I feel safe enough to say that there are a lot of people who would agree with me; on or off this board!
Call me disloyal to the Republican Party, but I am a pro-life conservative FIRST.
"Of course the GOP knows that if Hillary runs in 08 then "most" "Republican" people will vote for ANYBODY (including pro-aborts like Condi or Rudy) that would run against her."
That's what they THINK, but Perot's third party is how we got Bill Clinton.
"I live in NJ. Bret who is pro life lost in the primary. I would be hard pressed to vote for Forrester who is pro abortion."
Is the Constitution Party running a candidate in NJ, do you know?
Yes, I fully understand the principles of reciprocity.
How well are you acquainted with the holocaust of abortion, the growing tolerance of euthanasia, the increasing acceptance of “gay marriage” the culture of death in general and how it is destroying the very fabric of our society? The Republican form of government we currently have cannot last long in such a depraved condition.
These matters trump principles of reciprocity when agreed upon with baby killing politicians.
It is more important to stop the carnage than it is to not break the "I'll stump for you, and you stump for me" pact with devils such as specter.
Are you more afraid of offending RINO pols like specter than of offending God?
The GOP used to be the party of small government, so it wouldn't surprise me to get betrayed on abortion, too.
Pope Mourns Death of Cardinal Jaime Sin
Philippine Prelate Was Defender of Democracy
VATICAN CITY, JUNE 21, 2005 (Zenit.org).- Benedict XVI said he was "deeply saddened" by the death of Cardinal Jaime Sin, the retired archbishop of Manila who died at the age of 76.
..."Cardinal Sin insisted that religion had a role to play in the affairs of the state, a conviction he summed up at his retirement ceremony: 'My duty is to put Christ in politics. Politics without Christ is the greatest scourge of the nation."
"The cardinal also organized protests against the state's attempt to curb population growth."
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