Posted on 03/06/2007 5:39:37 PM PST by markomalley
They are saying that the next GOP presidential candidate might very well be a pro-abortion Republican who promises not to push that issue and is strong on other issues.
They hope that pro-lifers will “be reasonable,” not let the perfect be the enemy of the good, and go along quietly.
We won’t.
Republicans and Democrats in 1980 took radically different approaches to the right to life. Republicans wrote into their party platform that all abortions should be outlawed. Democrats wrote into their party platform that not only should abortion be legal, but families should be forced to pay for others’ abortions through their taxes.
Democratic leaders have been utterly committed to their party platform. But there’s a movement afoot for Republicans to shrug off this plank of the party platform altogether, and give a pro-abortion politician the reins of the party and, they hope, the White House.
In particular, Rudy Giuliani has become a favorite for president of conservative talk-show hosts, and pro-war and tough-on-crime Republicans. He’s also way ahead in polls like Newsweek’s, though it’s anyone guess what such polls mean so early in the process.
The way the pro-Rudy argument goes is this: For the past three decades, social conservatives have had the luxury of insisting on purity in the Republican Party. Their clout was such that any candidate had to undergo a “forced conversion” before running for national office. But 9/11 changed that. Now, extremist Islam and the war on terror are such all-consuming issues, and we can’t be so caught up with abortion anymore.
Since Giuliani is committed to the war on terror and is a great crisis manager with a track record rooting out the gangs of New York, we shouldn’t demand that he be pro-life, but instead we should be willing to make a deal.
Rudy’s deal: He’ll promise not to push the pro-abortion agenda, and he’ll nominate judges in the mold of Samuel Alito and John Roberts. Pro-lifers in the Republican Party in return would support him, but keep insisting that the party stay pro-life, and fight our fiercest pro-life battles at the state level, where they belong.
That seems like a good deal, at first blush. We’re well aware that “forced conversions” to the pro-life fold are far from the ideal. Think of the candidacy of Bob Dole in 1996. And it is true that the fight against judicial tyranny is an immense front in the battle for the right to life. Transforming the courts is a prerequisite to victory elsewhere.
But what dooms the deal from the start is the fact that it totally misunderstands what pro-lifers care about in the first place.
When they ask us to “be reasonable” and go along with a pro-abortion leader, they assume that there is something unreasonable about the pro-life position to start with.
We’re sorry, but we don’t see what is so unreasonable about the right to life. We’ve seen ultrasounds, we’ve named our babies in the womb, we’ve seen women destroyed by abortion. What looks supremely unreasonable to us is that we should trust a leader who not doesn’t only reject the right to life but even supports partial-birth abortion, which is more infanticide than abortion.
We also see the downside of Rudy’s deal. If pro-lifers went along, we’d soon find out that a pro-abortion Republican president would no longer preside over a pro-life party. The power a president exerts over his party’s character is nearly absolute. The party is changed in his image. He picks those who run it and, both directly and indirectly, those who enter it.
Thus, the Republicans in the 1980s became Reaganites. The Democrats in the 1990s took on the pragmatic Clintonite mold. Bush’s GOP is no different, as Ross Douthat points out in “It’s His Party” in the March Atlantic Monthly.
A Republican Party led by a pro-abortion politician would become a pro-abortion party. Parents know that, when we make significant exceptions to significant rules, those exceptions themselves become iron-clad rules to our children. It’s the same in a political party. A Republican Party led by Rudy Giuliani would be a party of contempt for the pro-life position, which is to say, contempt for the fundamental right on which all others depend.
Would a pro-abortion president give us a pro-life Supreme Court justice? Maybe he would in his first term. But we’ve seen in the Democratic Party how quickly and completely contempt for the right to life corrupts. Even if a President Giuliani did the right thing for a short time, it’s likely the party that accepted him would do the wrong thing for a long time.
Would his commitment to the war on terror be worth it? The United States has built the first abortion businesses in both Afghanistan and Iraq, ever. Shamefully, our taxes paid to build and operate a Baghdad abortion clinic that is said to get most of its customers because of the pervasive rape problem in that male-dominated society. And that happened under a pro-life president. What would a pro-abortion president do?
The bottom line: Republicans have made inroads into the Catholic vote for years because of the pro-life issue. If they put a pro-abortion politician up for president, the gains they’ve built for decades will vanish overnight.
The Church has a responsibility to educate voters regarding the principles behind just voting, since in a democracy, the people have a responsibility to vote properly.
The fundamental purpose of the State is the advancement of the temporal welfare of its citizens. It necessarily follows that the primary duty of the State is to defend the lives of its citizens. Any politician who advocates laws tolerating the killing of innocent people is unworthy of holding any public office.
Further details are available here: Voters Guide for Serious Catholics
Well, I agree with you when put that way. At least there i something we agree on. :)
"Am I my brother's keeper?" --Cain.
Are the murdered babies none of your business?
Posting the same "facts" over and over and over IS spam.
You're very welcome.
LMAO! Babble is not a refutation. Blackbird.
You got it - they are none of my business. And none of yours, BTW. One would think that the Prohibition was lesson enough, but some people never learn.
Absolutely hilarious!!!! :-D
Are you comparing being able to buy a beer with killing a unborn child? Drink wine, slaughter children, whatever you're into, I suppose?
You Rudy folks should really, really heed what this article is saying...
Your right. Hillary will do a lot more for the cause.
'Their' sexual proclivities are not the issue, slob. It's the killing of alive unborn children which piques our interest ... LIFE, liberty, you know, those fundamental values enumerated in the Declaration of Independence.
It's troubling on several levels. That his position is a step backward is clear.
One of the problems of the last several decades has been federal usurpation of issues best left to the states. In this instance Rudy takes a federally protected right and essentially supports delegating it to the states, where inroads can be made more easily, moulding attitudes.
If a federal official or candidate believes handgun bans, assault weapon bans, and licensing are constitutional, he should have the courage to propose them on a federal level. Not to the states and courts in an effort to build momentum.
IMO this brings his promise to appoint conservative judges into question as well.
Shooting Back-story of Christian missionary who fired on terrorists who attacked his congregation
Those posts were not impressive.
If you seriously believe that, then your problem is a larger one than immaturity.
My hands look just fine. I suppose one tactic I could follow is to wait for the anti-Rudy foamers to rant themselves out, as I did with my then three year old daughter...but she was a faster learner.
You can post all the cross dressing photos you want, and vent all your overblown rhetoric...in the end, you'll still sound like a college student.
LOL< I could care less about Rudy's cross dressing pics, but the fact he raised money for an anti-war communist group doesn't sit well wiith me.
For better or for worse, 2nd Amendment advocates disagree with you.
So is John McCain. Both said they first debate will be at the Reagan Library. Mrs. Reagan extended the invitation and they accepted as their first debate. Why attend one sponsored by CNN in NH? I would not attend anything by CNN if I were a candidate. John McCain is going to be in Iraq and Rudy already had some things scheduled but the main deal is that the first real debate is scheduled at the Reagan Library.
Why don't you get your facts straight?
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