The story ran under various headlines–“Abortion a sure litmus test in the 2016 elections”; “Activists believe huge political divide on abortion rights will dominate 2016 election”; ”Abortion will be hot issue in 2016 presidential campaign, activists say.”
But the gist of the Associated Press story was captured in a subhead that ran in many publications: “With middle ground on this most emotional issue almost nonexistent, each side is pulling out all stops.”
As we approach the end of 2015, let’s take a few minutes to deconstruct the story written by David Crary. What is, if anything, different, and will that likely mean an all out blitz by pro- and anti-life forces? His story did not, and we do not, talk about anything but the issues that relate specifically to our cause.
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Are we as a nation more divided on abortion? Perhaps. But the division Crary is talking about is something that has been coming to fruition for decades: at the federal level there are virtually no pro-life Democrats and almost all Republicans are pro-life.
It’s like iron filings and a magnet. If the unborn child is invisible or irrelevant to you, you are attracted by the Democrats, the party of death. If you believe, at a minimum, there are many, many reasonable limitations on abortion and protections for women, then the GOP is your natural home. This was not always the case. Many of us oldsters grew up in pro-life Democratic households.
What else? The impact of congressional hearings, sparked by the eleven undercover videos released by the Center for Medical Progress. Crary weaves that topic in on a couple of different occasions.
Planned Parenthood and its legion of congressional supporters and kindred organizations believe that in the end, many/most people will see this as “going too far.” I would argue just the opposite.
To the public at large, thanks to an unctuous major media, PPFA was purer than Caesar’s wife. No longer.
I won’t rehearse what we’ve written about a hundred times in the last few months but it safe to say that John and Jill Q. Public have a clearer picture of the nation’s largest abortion provider. That is why PPFA’s approval ratings–once astronomically high–now hover around 45%.
What else can we glean from Crary’s story?
“Another difference: Republicans in the presidential field and in Congress seem more willing than in past campaigns to take the offensive on abortion issues.” This is in part related to the undercover videos, a linkage Crary manages to miss. Their capacity to make concrete what can often seem to be fuzzy changes the way they, and we, can talk about abortion.
Consider this: pro-abortion Hillary Clinton, for a moment, tap-danced around some of the early videos before coming to a full-throated defense of the atrocities seen in the videos.
Crary’s point (using quotes from the pro-abortion PAC EMILY’s List) is that Republicans are extreme on abortion. But consider what Clinton is turning a blind-eye to.
Between sips of wine and bites of salad, a high-ranking PPFA official jokes about and makes fun of the ungodly process of extracting intact baby body parts. Dr. Deborah Nucatola, senior director for medical services for the Planned Parenthood Federation of America talks about how “you try to intentionally go above and below the thorax, so that, you know, we’ve been very good at getting heart, lung, liver, because we know that, so I’m not gonna crush that part, I’m gonna basically crush below, I’m gonna crush above, and I’m gonna see if I can get it all intact”?
Is Clinton going to be called to task for another woman, also captured on video, who spoke about how “We’ve just been working with people who want particular tissues, like, you know, they want cardiac, or they want eyes, or they want neural. …Oh, gonads! Oh, my God, gonads”?
And in case anyone should ask, Dr. Carolyn Westoff, Planned Parenthood’s Senior Medical Advisor, added, “Everything we provide is fresh.”
Every four years we read stories about how this presidential election will be different. But for the aforementioned reasons and many more, “activists” will play a much more significant role.
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For pro-lifers, we are determined not to allow President Obama to be succeeded by another pro-abortion militant with even closer ties to PPFA.
We saw the kind of justices Obama appointed to the Supreme Court. The next president could nominate as many as four. Would you want the next President calling for a meeting with PPFA, EMILY’s List, and NARAL to get their list of approved nominees?
Pro-lifers will be busy next year for all these reasons–and for the 58 million unborn children whose lives have already been consumed by Roe v. Wade.
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 at National Right to Life News Today —- an online column on pro-life issues.
