Fred Martinez's Monitor

"Huckabee is by Far the Most Eloquent Defender of Human Life"

--- pri@pop.org wrote:

> 07 January 2008 Vol. 10 / No. 1
>
>
> Dear Colleague,
>
> Voters in the first of the fifty states have cast
> their votes, and the top four Republican finishers
> are all, to varying degrees, pro-life. The top four
> Democratic finishers in Iowa, on the other hand, are
> all on the other side of the abortion divide.
> Regardless of who the nominees are, the party of
> life will once again face the party of abortion in
> the general election. Pro-lifers, it now appears,
> will have a clear choice, not an echo.
>
> Steven W. Mosher
>
>
>
> What Mike Huckabee's Victory in Iowa Means for
> Pro-Lifers
>
>
> by Steven W. Mosher
>
>
> Now that the Iowa caucuses are over, pro-lifers can
> breathe a sigh of relief. For their worst case
> scenario--that the nominees of both major parties
> would be pro-abortion--has probably been averted.
>
> There was a time when it seemed that Rudy Giuliani,
> who is emphatically not pro-life, might be the
> Republican nominee. But his dismal showing in
> Iowa--he placed sixth--has probably taken him out of
> contention. His refusal to contest New Hampshire as
> well, where the latest polls show him in single
> digits, is another nail in his political coffin. His
> strategy now, if it can be called that, is to
> retreat to the sidelines in the hope that the other
> candidates fight each other to a standstill, and
> then to win big in Florida. But the Sunshine State's
> primary is still a month away, and Iowa winner Mike
> Huckabee has already pulled even with him in the
> polls there. The odds against Giuliani's long-shot
> strategy succeeding are lengthening by the hour.
>
> All of this is good news for pro-lifers. Simply put,
> it will be a disaster for the pro-life cause if
> Giuliani, or any Republican who is less than
> thoroughly pro-life, is nominated, and an even
> greater disaster if they are actually elected.
>
> Here's why.
>
> The bully pulpit of the presidency would fall into
> the hands of someone who is indifferent to the
> tragedy of abortion. Not only would a President
> Giuliani not speak out against the practice, as Bush
> currently does at the annual March for Life, he
> would actively promote the idea that it is not the
> proper role of government to protect the lives of
> innocent unborn children. As far as enforcement is
> concerned, the Born-Alive Infants' Protection Act
> would become a dead letter. And the likelihood of
> new legislation--banning sex-selective abortion, for
> example--would shrink to the vanishing point.
>
> As bad as ceding the White House to someone of such
> sentiments would be, Giuliani's nomination would
> bring an even worse prospect into view, namely, that
> of losing the Republican party as the party of life.
> In this case, the pro-life movement would become a
> political orphan.
>
> The Republican party, it should be recalled, was not
> always pro-life. It became so only with the
> nomination of Ronald Reagan, who pushed for a
> pro-life plank to be added to the party platform
> drafted and approved at the Republican convention of
> 1980. The nomination of Rudi Giuliani could very
> well see this same process unfold in reverse, if not
> immediately then at the next presidential election
> cycle in 2012.
>
> Against these grim prospects, Giuliani offered the
> hope and the promise that he would nominate justices
> in the mold of John Roberts and Samuel Alito. Don't
> count on it. Previous presidents with far stronger
> convictions than Giuliani have found it difficult to
> keep such pledges. Witness the Harriet Myers
> debacle. Giuliani, whose moral compass points in the
> wrong direction in any case, and who will be
> surrounded by staffers who reflect and reinforce his
> indifference towards life will, in my view, find it
> impossible.
>
> If Giuliani's defeat bodes well for pro-lifers, then
> so does Mike Huckabee's victory. For of the top four
> finishers, Huckabee is by far the most eloquent
> defender of human life. He speaks with heartfelt
> conviction, even passion, on the issue of the
> unborn. Moreover, he is the only one of the
> candidates to support the passage of a Human Life
> Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which would once
> and for all ban all abortions throughout all fifty
> states. This is not mere rhetoric. As governor of
> Arkansas, he fought for--and won--the passage of
> just such an amendment.
>
> This is not to say that I am endorsing Mike
> Huckabee. Nor is it to say that I doubt the pro-life
> convictions of John McCain and Fred Thompson--or
> even of Mitt Romney, a late convert to the pro-life
> cause--but only to point out that the other
> first-tier candidates have all had trouble actually
> explaining the grounds for their pro-life positions.
> Some have, truth be told, hardly tried.
>
> Romney, of course, has the most to explain, since
> his record is littered with quotes like this one:
> "On a personal basis, I don't favor abortion.
> However, as governor of the commonwealth, I will
> protect a woman's right to choose under the laws of
> the country and the commonwealth. That's the same
> position I've had for many years." (Erik Arvidson,
> Lowell Sun, March 20, 2002)
>
> Romney now says that America is ready to overturn
> Roe v. Wade and return to the states the authority
> to permit or prohibit abortions, as the case may be.
> But when pressed on his earlier views on abortion,
> he says simply that he was "wrong." This brief and
> curiously bloodless explanation begs the question
> for many pro-lifers, who wonder whether his change
> of heart was a matter of deep soul-searching, or
> mere political convenience.
>
> McCain, on the other hand, has a perfect pro-life
> voting record in the Senate. He calls Roe v. Wade a
> bad decision, and says that he supports the rights
> of the unborn. But he is dogged by a statement he
> made in 1999 to the effect that "In the short term,
> or even the long term, I would not support repeal of
> Roe vs. Wade, which would then force X number of
> women in American to undergo illegal and dangerous
> operations."
>
> The Senator now says that this statement was made in
> the context of the prior need to change the culture
> of America with regard to the abortion issue. Yet
> what are pro-lifers to conclude from even his
> defense than that he is unwilling to fight the
> abortion status quo. But what they want is a
> president who, like Ronald Reagan, is willing to use
> his moral authority to actively promote a culture of
> Life, not one who passively waits for a change in
> tide of public opinion.
>
> Then there is Fred Thompson, whose early endorsement
> by the National Right to Life Committee surprised
> many pro-lifers. He, like Romney and McCain, has not
> always been pro-life, and even now would not ban all
> abortions. Consider this revealing exchange on Meet
> the Press:
>
> Q: You said in 1994 as a Senate candidate, "I'm not
> willing to support laws that prohibit early-term
> abortions. I'm not suddenly upon election as a
> senator going to know when life begins. It comes
> down to whether you believe life begins at
> conception. I don't know in my own mind if that is
> the case so I don't feel the law ought to impose
> that standard on other people." So you yourself
> don't know when life begins?
>
> A: No. I didn't know then.
>
> Q: You know now?
>
> A: My public position has always been the same. I've
> been 100% pro-life in every vote that I've ever
> cast.
>
> Q: Do you believe that life begins at conception, so
> abortion is the taking of a human life?
>
> A: Yes, I do.
>
> Q: But you would allow abortion to be performed in
> states if chosen by states for people who think
> otherwise?
>
> A: I do not think that you can have a law that cuts
> off an age group or something like that. It cannot
> change the way I feel about it morally, but legally
> and practically, I've got to recognize that fact.
> (Source: Meet the Press: 2007 "Meet the Candidates"
> series, Nov 4, 2007)
>
> I often find Thompson's answers unintelligible. Here
> he
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posted by Fred Martinez @ 9:09 PM