Posted on 11/15/2002 1:38:38 PM PST by Tumbleweed_Connection
Republican leaders are jabbing a thumb in the eyes of pro-lifers whose votes were largely responsible for the GOP victory in the November 5, elections, an angry Ken Connor charges.
Connor, president of the Family Research Council, ripped into the Republican congressional leadership for not standing firmly against the bankruptcy bill which contains Sen. Chuck Schumer's hostile pro-abortion amendment.
"The GOP is saying to pro-lifers, 'Thanks for your votes, now get lost!'" Connor said.
"Instead of rewarding pro-life Americans for giving their votes overwhelmingly to Republican candidates in last week's election, the GOP leadership is jabbing a thumb in their eye barely a week after the election at the behest of the well-heeled business wing of the party.
"Pro-lifers are asking themselves why they bothered when the GOP appears intent on sticking them with a gratuitous anti-life law that would expose peaceful anti-abortion protestors to financial ruin," Connor continued.
"Meanwhile, as GOP leaders ram through the Schumer amendment, pro-lifers are being told there is not enough time in the lame duck session to get a Senate vote on the bill banning partial-birth abortion the House passed last July.
According to Connor, The Schumer amendment "effectively says, 'If you are a pro-life protester and you wind up with a money judgment against you for engaging in what we regard as constitutionally protected speech and activity, you are not going to be able to discharge that debt in bankruptcy,'
"The effect of that is to create a disfavored class for purposes of punishing politically incorrect speech, because the only group that is being singled out for this kind of treatment is pro-life protestors.
"It's imperative that the GOP leadership put the same muscle behind the partial-birth abortion ban as they appear to be giving to the bankruptcy bill."
Once again, the GOP leadership is proving that they simply don't know who their real friends are.
Perhaps the Pro-Life group needs to form their own political party to promote their agenda.
"Pro-lifers are asking themselves why they bothered when the GOP appears intent on sticking them with a gratuitous anti-life law that would expose peaceful anti-abortion protestors to financial ruin," Connor continued.
Law-abiding protestors can't be sued into financial ruin.
The provision was stupid. It was inserted as a poison pill to kill the bill. The bill was killed. Then it was fixed.
This guy just wants to scream and make a scene. Protesting is probably his whole life.
Republican leaders are jabbing a thumb in the eyes of pro-lifers whose votes were largely responsible for the GOP victory in the November 5, elections, an angry Ken .................
A false assumption to begin with IMHO.
Sounds to me like an amendment without a real purpose other than to make the whole bill toxic.
What are you smoking?
Perhaps you should be made aware of the number of pro life Republicans.
Yes but I believe the provision that it contained was that people who end up getting fines for their participation in pro life demonstrations cannot file them off in bankruptcy.
They have, it's called the Republicans.
One thing that strikes me as odd in this Partial Birth Abortion debate is this. If you honestly believe that PBA is the taking of an innocent life why would you want to wait? Does politics trump the innocent lives that will be lost while we wait? - Tom
COnservative pro lifers joined with liberals to defeat the bill.
Daschle could give a flying .... how many die in the interim.
But I thought the thrust of this story was that the Republicans don't seem to be treating them real well.
Pro Life conservative republican here.
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