By Dave Andrusko
Regular readers of National Right to Life News Today know that I try to keep close taps on the explanations offered by ostensibly neutral news sources and by our benighted opposition as to why pro-lifers are busier (and more productive) than ever at the state and federal level. I do so because it gives us a chance to debunk some of the nonsense but also to tease out those nuggets of truth than can be helpful.
Amanda Marcotte is a pro-abortionist’s pro-abortionist whose rhetoric is so hot you’re half-surprised your screen doesn’t melt away. Under “What’s really driving the GOP’s abortion war,” which appeared yesterday on salon.com, Marcotte offers a couple of points worth considering.
Her “convergence” is a little different than other “perfect storm” scenarios, and seriously misguided.
Forget the introduction, the tired retread that nobody knew all those pro-life candidates who ran last fall were pro-life, or, alternatively, how can they be worried about abortion when [fill in the blank: the economy, international affairs, price of milk, etc.]
How can House Speaker John Boehner call abortion a “top priority,” Marcotte asks.
According to Marcotte, the Supreme Court “buckled” when it upheld the ban on the grotesque partial-birth abortion technique. She simply misreads the decision when she attributes the way of pro-life bills, such as ultrasound measures and waiting periods, to Carhart v. Gonzales. Those were in the pipeline. What Carhart signaled is that as currently constituted the Court is not willing to act as if there is NOTHING new under the sun.
Likewise, she simply misreads what President Obama’s 2010 Executive Order did. It had nothing to do with “barring insurance companies from offering abortion coverage to customers who are using federal subsidies to pay for insurance.” It had to do with a bogus assurance that it would prevent federal subsidies for abortion on demand. The law itself—ObamaCare—does allow states to “opt out” of abortion coverage in health insurance plans to be offered in the “exchanges” created by the law.
There is a lot of hither and yon in Marcotte’s piece that doesn’t have anything to do with us. But it does conclude with an insight buried in her usual hyperbole.
Some who ought to know better keep counseling the Republican party—or at least its presidential aspirants—to declare a “truce” on the “social issues,” including abortion. One of the reasons offered is that the Tea Party, which did play a major role in the last election cycle, is agnostic on abortion.
In fact, as Marcotte shows, citing an interesting February poll from The Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, “[A]lmost six-in-ten (59%) of those who agree with the Tea Party say abortion should be illegal in all or most cases, 17 percentage points higher than among all registered voters. Tea Party supporters closely resemble Republican voters as a whole on these issues.”
We are winning because the majority of the American people support the kind of legislation we are promoting, and all the pro-abortion misinformation in the world won’t change that.