What Does Wendy Davis’ Nomination as “Texan of the Year” Tell Us?

State   |   Dave Andrusko   |   Dec 27, 2013   |   7:22PM   |   Austin, TX

Over the next three days NRL News Today will include some “year in review” stories. They are fun to write and useful overviews.

I’d like to begin with our benighted opposition which is really scrambling to find silver linings in a sky filled with dark (i.e., life-affirming) clouds.

We talked last week about California (“So who really cares about ‘protecting women’”?)

Their triumph? Guaranteeing that women have greater “access” to abortion by ensuring that tons more non-physicians can perform certain first-trimester abortions. (That will certainly enhance women’s safety, won’t it.) And if that weren’t enough, pass another law guaranteeing that abortion clinics do not receive the kind of scrutiny they ought to by exempting them from the more stringent building code standards for surgery.

Then there is one of the finalists for the Dallas Morning News’ 2013 “Texan of the Year.” Let’s think hard: pro-abortion newspaper that can never beat up pro-life Republicans enough or celebrate pro-abortion Democrats sufficiently.

Of course, who else? State Sen. Wendy Davis, now running for governor to succeed pro-life Rick Perry, whose 11-hour filibuster is the stuff that legends are made of. (Pretty thin gruel for legends, but times are tough for the Abortion Establishment.)

While they don’t often explicitly link to Jimmy Stewart’s “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington,” the parallel drawn in the endless puff pieces is impossible to miss. And in this case, the connection is more clear than usual. In a nod to the filibuster maintained by Stewart’s character, Sen. Jeff Smith, we read of Davis that when this “lone senator stood her ground, the scene in the chamber resembled a Hollywood script.” Only….

“Except she was not on a movie set. The Harvard-trained lawyer was in the midst of the sharpest of political debates. Her oratory galvanized a portion of the Texas electorate that had been hungering for dynamic leadership. Suddenly many Democrats no longer felt like they belonged to the party of lost causes. That came all because Davis seized the moment and microphone, earning her a berth among finalists for 2013 Dallas Morning News Texan of the Year.”

(A quick side note. In another nod to Jeff Smith—a man of incomparable idealism– we’re told that while ”Her filibuster was calculated,” according to one political consultant, “it was not built around statewide ambitions. She did not know how this would transform her.” Just the fortunate benefit of doing her duty to try to make sure babies capable of feeling pain can be torn limb from limb.)

Davis leaves the Dallas Morning News’s heart a fluttering. Why? Is it because she killed the legislation? For a few weeks. Gov. Perry called another special session and the multiple-faceted bill became law.

Is it because Davis will be the next governor? Maybe, may not. But that’s almost irrelevant to the authors of gushy fluff pieces like the one found here.

“Whether her new celebrity helps her win the governorship in 2014 is another question,” we read. “But this summer’s strategic moment of defiance energized Texas Democrats and launched a new Texas political star.”

CLICK LIKE IF YOU’RE PRO-LIFE!

 

I come to a different conclusion. The craziness that was the pro-abortion frenzy at the Texas capitol during the filibuster taught many pro-lifers an invaluable lesson: At least some pro-abortionists will stop at virtually nothing, including not-in-the-least-subtle threats of violence.

We will prevail in the future as we did last summer in Texas: by being civil, persuasive, and, as always, non-violent

LifeNews.com Note: Dave Andrusko is the editor of National Right to Life News and an author and editor of several books on abortion topics. This post originally appeared in his National Right to Life News Today —- an online column on pro-life issues.