Obama Sticks to Pro-Abortion Campaign Themes After Bad Debate

National   |   Steven Ertelt   |   Oct 5, 2012   |   5:28PM   |   Washington, DC

Apparently President Barack Obama and his campaign believe the best way to recover from a poor debate performance against Mitt Romney is to rally the entire campaign behind the issue of abortion.

Not only did Obama tout abortion at a campaign event in Virginia today, but virtually every speaker at the event made abortion promotion the centerpiece of their message as the talked to a less-sizable-than-desired crowd. The Weekly Standard has more on the abortion fest before the smallish audience of about 2,000.

Democrats had one overarching message at a rally Friday: Barack Obama is for free contraception and abortion rights, and Mitt Romney isn’t.

“When it comes to the economy, it’s bad enough that our opponents want to take us back to the failed policies of the last decade,” Obama said at George Mason University Friday morning. “When it comes to a woman’s right to make her own health care choices, they want to take us back to the policies of the 1950s.”

“This law has secured new access to preventive care like mammograms and cancer screenings with no copay, no deductible, no out-of-pocket cost for more than 20 million women,” Obama said to increasingly loud cheers. “And now most health plans are beginning to cover the cost of contraceptive care, which is vital for women’s health. Doctors prescribe contraception not only for family planning, but as a way to reduce the risk of ovarian and other cancers. And it’s good for our health care system in general, because we know the overall cost of care is lower when women have access to contraceptive services.”

“There’s nothing conservative about a government that prevents a woman from making her own health care decisions,” he said. “Governor Romney talks about freedom, but freedom is the ability to determine the care you need, when you need it. Freedom is the ability to change jobs or start your own business without the fear of losing your health insurance. Freedom is the knowledge that you’ll no longer be charged more than men for the same health care, or denied affordable coverage just because you’ve beat cancer.”

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Next came Katherine Waddell, a former one-term independent state delegate, to introduce the president. The pro-choice Waddell was once a Republican but says she left the party because of its conservative positions on abortion. “There’s just no room for me in today’s Republican party,” she said.

“I grew up before Roe v. Wade,” Waddell said, noting that the fortieth anniversary of the Supreme Court decision on abortion will be two days before Inauguration Day in January. “I won’t let [Romney] take my daughters and my granddaughters back in time.”

When Obama’s extensive abortion record is all he has to run on, as they say in the South, “Dance with the one that brung ya.”