Former Pro-Abortion Leaders Threaten Democratic Party Revolt Over Stupak Amdt

National   |   Steven Ertelt   |   Nov 12, 2009   |   9:00AM   |   WASHINGTON, DC

Former Pro-Abortion Leaders Threaten Democratic Party Revolt Over Stupak Amdt

by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
November 12
, 2009

Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) — Two former leaders of major pro-abortion organizations write in an opinion column in the New York Times today that the Democratic Party could face an internal revolt from abortion advocates upset that Speaker Nancy Pelosi and party leaders in the House allowed a vote on the Stupak amendment.

As LifeNews.com reported, the House approved the government-run health care bill Saturday night but not before voting for the Stupak amendment to stop the massive abortion funding in it.

The vote has produced tremendous fallout among abortion advocates who have demanded a meeting with President Barack Obama to discuss where to go from here and a letter to Pelosi threatening to vote against the final bill if Stupak is not removed.

Now, former NARAL president Kate Michelman and former "Catholics for Choice" president Frances Kissling have issued a stark challenge to leading Democrats: defend abortion or risk an inter-party revolt.

"The Democratic majority has abandoned its platform and subordinated women’s health to short-term political success. In doing so, these so-called friends of women’s rights have arguably done more to undermine reproductive rights than some of abortion’s staunchest foes," they write.

"That Senate Democrats are poised to allow similar anti-abortion language in their bill simply underscores the degree of the damage that has been done," they worry.

"This, then, is where we stand as party leaders celebrate passage of the House bill. When it comes to abortion, they seem to think all positions are of equal value so long as the party maintains a majority," Michelman and Kissling continue.

"But the party will eventually reap what it has sown. If Democrats do not commit themselves to defeating the amendment, then they will face an uncompromising effort by Democratic women to defeat them, regardless of the cost to the party’s precious majority," they say.

Michelman and Kissling say they doubt that abortion advocates who say they will take care of removing Stupak later on in the legislative process.

"They say the tradeoff was necessary to advance the right to guaranteed health care. They say they will fight another day for a woman’s right to choose," they write. "Perhaps."

The pro-abortion zealots also complain about the pro-life Democrats the party recruited in pro-life areas of the country to defeat pro-life Republicans.

"Many women — ourselves included — warned the Democratic Party in 2004 that it was a mistake to build a Congressional majority by recruiting and electing candidates opposed to the party’s commitment to legal abortion and to public financing for the procedure. Instead, the lust for power yielded to misguided, self-serving poll analysis by operatives with no experience in the fight for these principles," they complain.

They even go after thoroughly pro-abortion President Barack Obama, saying he is adhering to a party-line that wants to de-emphasize.

"Democrats were told to stop talking about abortion as a moral and legal right and to focus instead on comforting language about reducing the number of abortions. In this regard, President Obama was right on message when he declared in his health care speech to Congress in September that “under our plan, no federal dollars will be used to fund abortions” — as if this happened to be a good and moral thing," they write.

The "victims of their folly will be the millions of women who once could count on the Democratic Party to protect them from those who would sacrifice their rights for political gains," they conclude.

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