Pro-choice Republicans need to get a clue
It appears that Christine Todd Whitman, P.J. O'Rourke, and Kathleen Parker are sufficiently clueless to blame Barack Obama's victory on what Whitman calls "‘social fundamentalists,’ the people who base their votes on such social issues as abortion.” Parker crams a great deal of absurdity into the remarkable sentence, "The evangelical, right-wing, oogedy-boogedy branch of the G.O.P. is what ails the erstwhile conservative party.” There are left-wing conservatives? Can a party cease to be right-wing, and remain conservative? And what in the word does "oogedy-boogedy" mean, anyway?
Even TIME noticed that abortion played almost no role in the campaign just concluded. In fact, as Uwe Siemon-Netto points out, surveys indicated that "evangelical" voters ranked abortion seventh among the issues that determined their vote- behind even the price of gasoline!
As much as pro-choice conservatives would like to escape their status as an idiosyncratic minority, they need to realize that an idiosyncratic minority is exactly what they are. Pro-choicers of all stripes have shown over the years a profound tendency to presume upon the large majorities of Americans who say that they do not want to see abortion totally outlawed. They have either failed to notice or simply avoid acknowledging the similarly large majorities by
which the American people have said ever since Roe v. Wade was handed down in 1973 that they believe that restrictions should be placed on abortion more severe than Roe permits. More Americans, it's true, classify themselves as "pro-choice" than "pro-life," although the margin is at most about ten percentage points. But if the terms are defined as they usually are when applied to politicians, the percentages are reversed. Far more Americans favor either the abolition of legalized abortion or its severe restriction than favor abortion on demand. It is the pro-choicers- whatever their party- who are out of step with the electorate. Only the low priority abortion has on the votes of most Americans regardless of philosophy permits the election of people like Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, who are well to the left of the electorate on the subject. And the same is true of Christine Todd Whitman, P.J. O'Rourke, Kathleen Parker, and other conservatives whose belief in human freedom does not extend to the freedom not to be pulled limb from limb in utero.
Pro-choice Republicans are a small minority who are safely tolerated. There are not enough of them to seriously influence the direction of the party, and certainly not enough of them to nominate one of their own for president. Anyone with questions about that should ask Rudy Giuliani, who- were it not for his liberal positions on social issues- would have been a shoo-in for the last Republican nomination.
Conversely, if a pro-choice Republican ever were somehow nominated, he (or she) would be an electoral disaster who would fail to even carry the party's base. Remove abortion and other issues from the Republican party's platform, and I, for one, would
leave the party. I was a Democrat before, and it was my party's radicalism on the abortion issue which caused this Clean for Gene kid from 1968 to return to the party my father voted for. Were the Republican party ever to become pro-choice, I personally would no longer have any reason not to be a Democrat. And the same is true of a very large percentage of the people who voted for John McCain, and for George W. Bush before him.
Too large a percentage, in fact, for a Republican party which follows the path prescribed by Whitman and O'Rourke and Parker to remain a viable national party.
I was a pro-life Democrat for many years. As deeply as I disagree with Whitman and the others, I feel for them. I really do. But my allegiance to the Republican party would vanish like the morning mist the moment it deprives me of my reason for being a Republican.
I believe in social justice, you see. I vote Republican because no society which defines any living member of our species as sub-human, and not entitled to the rights which the Founders argued were unalienable, can ever be truly just.
And I am legion. Without people like me, no conservative will ever sit in the Oval Office again.
Without people like me, the Republican party will go the way of the Whigs. So suck it up, Christine, P.J. and Kathleen. Be content to be a minority in a pro-life party, or accept permanent relegation to the fringes of American political life.
HT: Real Clear Politics
Even TIME noticed that abortion played almost no role in the campaign just concluded. In fact, as Uwe Siemon-Netto points out, surveys indicated that "evangelical" voters ranked abortion seventh among the issues that determined their vote- behind even the price of gasoline!
As much as pro-choice conservatives would like to escape their status as an idiosyncratic minority, they need to realize that an idiosyncratic minority is exactly what they are. Pro-choicers of all stripes have shown over the years a profound tendency to presume upon the large majorities of Americans who say that they do not want to see abortion totally outlawed. They have either failed to notice or simply avoid acknowledging the similarly large majorities by
which the American people have said ever since Roe v. Wade was handed down in 1973 that they believe that restrictions should be placed on abortion more severe than Roe permits. More Americans, it's true, classify themselves as "pro-choice" than "pro-life," although the margin is at most about ten percentage points. But if the terms are defined as they usually are when applied to politicians, the percentages are reversed. Far more Americans favor either the abolition of legalized abortion or its severe restriction than favor abortion on demand. It is the pro-choicers- whatever their party- who are out of step with the electorate. Only the low priority abortion has on the votes of most Americans regardless of philosophy permits the election of people like Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, who are well to the left of the electorate on the subject. And the same is true of Christine Todd Whitman, P.J. O'Rourke, Kathleen Parker, and other conservatives whose belief in human freedom does not extend to the freedom not to be pulled limb from limb in utero.
Pro-choice Republicans are a small minority who are safely tolerated. There are not enough of them to seriously influence the direction of the party, and certainly not enough of them to nominate one of their own for president. Anyone with questions about that should ask Rudy Giuliani, who- were it not for his liberal positions on social issues- would have been a shoo-in for the last Republican nomination.
Conversely, if a pro-choice Republican ever were somehow nominated, he (or she) would be an electoral disaster who would fail to even carry the party's base. Remove abortion and other issues from the Republican party's platform, and I, for one, would
leave the party. I was a Democrat before, and it was my party's radicalism on the abortion issue which caused this Clean for Gene kid from 1968 to return to the party my father voted for. Were the Republican party ever to become pro-choice, I personally would no longer have any reason not to be a Democrat. And the same is true of a very large percentage of the people who voted for John McCain, and for George W. Bush before him.
Too large a percentage, in fact, for a Republican party which follows the path prescribed by Whitman and O'Rourke and Parker to remain a viable national party.
I was a pro-life Democrat for many years. As deeply as I disagree with Whitman and the others, I feel for them. I really do. But my allegiance to the Republican party would vanish like the morning mist the moment it deprives me of my reason for being a Republican.
I believe in social justice, you see. I vote Republican because no society which defines any living member of our species as sub-human, and not entitled to the rights which the Founders argued were unalienable, can ever be truly just.
And I am legion. Without people like me, no conservative will ever sit in the Oval Office again.
Without people like me, the Republican party will go the way of the Whigs. So suck it up, Christine, P.J. and Kathleen. Be content to be a minority in a pro-life party, or accept permanent relegation to the fringes of American political life.
HT: Real Clear Politics
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