By Dave Andrusko
Michele Bachmann
We were driving back from the National Right to Life Convention held in Jacksonville, Florida, Monday when pro-life Michele Bachmann made official what she had all but announced at a June 13 Republican debate in New Hampshire: the three-term Congresswoman from Minnesota was running for President.
Bachmann made her announcement in Waterloo, Iowa, standing in front of the historic Snowden House where she said Americans “are longing for a president who will listen to them and who will lead from the front and not from behind.” Bachmann’s remarks came three days after she joined four other pro-life GOP hopefuls at a NRL Republican Presidential Candidate Forum at the June 23-25 convention.
At that forum, Bachmann warmly greeted attendees and praised the work of National Right to Life. She declared unequivocally that “Americans are more than ready to make Barack Obama a one term president.”
Bachmann proceeded to place Obama’s pro-abortion radicalism in perspective, reminding the audience that “Obama has abandoned some of the most commonsense and long-standing limits on abortion.” She alluded to congressional efforts to defund Planned Parenthood (the preservation of which Obama was willing to shut the government down over) and, of course ObamaCare. “I will repeal ObamaCare–-you can take that to the bank,” she promised in the remarks she made via Skype.
Congressman Ron Paul and former Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty also talked to the convention via Skype. Businessman Herman Cain and former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum were able to come to the forum in person. All delivered powerfully pro-life messages. (See www.nationalrighttolifenews.org/news/2011/06/%E2%80%9Cbringing-america-back-to-life%E2%80%9D-reporting-from-the-national-right-to-life-convention%E2%80%94part-three)
Bachmann, who has never lost an election for state or federal office, has a 100% pro-life voting record, as compiled by National Right to Life. Her comments to NRL 2011 were consistent with the many strongly pro-life speeches and comments she has made.
For example, at the Republican Presidential forum held at Saint Anselm College in New Hampshire, Bachmann said, “I am 100 percent pro-life. … I’ve given birth to five babies, and I’ve taken 23 foster children into my home. I believe in the dignity of life from conception until natural death. I believe in the sanctity of human life. And I think the most eloquent words ever written were those in our Declaration of Independence that said it’s a creator who endowed us with inalienable rights given to us from God, not from government. And the beauty of that is that government cannot take those rights away. Only God can give, and only God can take.”
She continued, “And the first of those rights is life. And I stand for that right. I stand for the right to life. The very few cases that deal with those exceptions are the very tiniest of fraction of cases, and yet they get all the attention. Where all of the firepower is and where the real battle is, is on the general — genuine issue of taking an innocent human life. I stand for life from conception until natural death. “
Bachmann also blasted Planned Parenthood earlier this month at the Faith and Freedom Conference in Washington, DC.
Predictably, Bachmann was hammered by the “mainstream media,” which loathes her but had conceded she had done very well in the New Hampshire debate. Her presidential announcement came days after a poll of likely participants in the state’s Republican presidential caucuses conducted by the influential Des Moines Register found Bachmann in statistical dead heat with former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney.
Other Republicans in the race thus far include former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman, former Louisiana Gov. Buddy Roemer, and pro-abortion former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson. There are still over 16 months before the 2012 presidential election and other candidates, including former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and current Texas Gov. Rick Perry, both pro-life, may throw their hats in the ring.