The Party of Abortion

Jonathan V. Last has an eye-opening article in the upcoming editition of the Weekly Standard titled "The Party of Abortion," which details how the Democratic Party has shifted on the question of abortion.  As Last notes, in 1992 Bill Clinton stated that abortions should be "safe, legal, and rare" (certainly an odd way to describe a supposed constitutional right) and even in 2004, John Kerry "told a group of Democratic strategists in an after-action strategy session, “they needed new ways to make people understand they didn’t like -abortion."

But as the country has gone steadily towards being more pro-life, the Democrats have paradoxically gone decisively in the opposite direction.  Just look at the 2012 DNC, for starters:

In the first prime-time speech of the first night of the convention, the Democrats featured “former Republican” Maria Ciano (she’s been a registered Democrat since at least 2006). “[Republicans] want to deny me the power to make the most personal decisions about my life,” Ciano said. “The America I love respects the dignity of women. The America I love is a place where, when we say ‘freedom,’ we mean my freedom to make decisions about my life, not someone else’s freedom to make them for me.” 

Ciano was followed by NARAL president Nancy Keenan, who opened by insisting that “the Democratic party believes that women have the right to choose a safe, legal abortion with dignity and privacy.” Massachusetts governor Deval Patrick agreed a short while later in his remarks from the stage, saying, “We believe that freedom means keeping government out of our most private affairs, including out of a woman’s decision whether to keep an unwanted pregnancy.” 

On the second night of the convention, the Democrats continued to make appeals based on abortion rights. The head of Planned Parenthood, Cecile Richards, opened the 8 o’clock hour on the convention stage by claiming that Mitt Romney is campaigning “to overturn Roe v. Wade,” and “we won’t let him.” Later, liberal icon Sandra Fluke promised that if President Obama is reelected, women will retain “the right to choose.” The message was unmistakable: The Democrats believe abortion rights should be a central facet of their appeal to voters.

I know that the conventional wisdom suggests that Republicans should abide by the James Carville's approach of "it's the economy, stupid" but I think that it cannot be forgotten that the economy and "social" issues rest on a different sides of same coin.  Certainly either Mitt Romney or Paul Ryan could take a few minutes and discuss which party really is extreme on abortion and then link it to the teachings of the Declaration of Independence:  that it is unjust to wipe away of an entire class of beings for the benefit of someone else.  With the Democratic Party providing a completely unvarnished view of how they think (and probably always did privately) on abortion, the GOP should not let this opportunity get away from them.

Also, please take some time to read this post at Postmodern Conservative, which touches on this topic and others.