Robert P. George: "Voting for the Most Extreme Pro-Abortion Political Candidate in American History Is Not the Way to Save Unborn Babies"
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Readers of this blog know the esteem I hold for Robert P. George--in my view (and that of many others), he is one of the great moral philosophers and public intellectuals of our time. With a law degree and a theology degree from Harvard, and a doctorate from Oxford, he currently serves as McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence at Princeton University, and as the director of the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions. He also serves on The President's Council on Bioethics and previously served on the United States Commission on Civil Rights.Dr. George is a man who chooses his words very carefully. And that is why his latest essay, Obama's Abortion Extremism, is so significant. It begins in this way:
Barack Obama is the most extreme pro-abortion candidate ever to seek the office of President of the United States. He is the most extreme pro-abortion member of the United States Senate. Indeed, he is the most extreme pro-abortion legislator ever to serve in either house of the United States Congress.George then raises the fact that many today are suggesting that one can be pro-life and pro-Obama:
Yet there are Catholics and Evangelicals—even self-identified pro-life Catholics and Evangelicals—who aggressively promote Obama’s candidacy and even declare him the preferred candidate from the pro-life point of view.George proceeds to work through Obama's legislative career--which has merited a 100% rating each year from the NARAL Pro-Choice America's Congressional Record on Choice--to show Obama's unmitigated commitment to abortion, even when the legislation has nothing to do with the making abortion illegal. For example:
What is going on here?
I have examined the arguments advanced by Obama’s self-identified pro-life supporters, and they are spectacularly weak. It is nearly unfathomable to me that those advancing them can honestly believe what they are saying. But before proving my claims about Obama’s abortion extremism, let me explain why I have described Obama as “pro-abortion” rather than “pro-choice.”
1. Obama "has promised to seek repeal of the Hyde Amendment, which has for many years protected pro-life citizens from having to pay for abortions that are not necessary to save the life of the mother and are not the result of rape or incest."
2. Obama has promised that “the first thing I’d do as President is sign the Freedom of Choice Act” ( FOCA). This would make abortion a federally guaranteed right through all nine months of pregancy for any reason. Virtually every state and federal limitation on abortion that is currently on the books would be abolished (e.g., parental consent and notification laws for minors).
3. Obama opposes the ban on the heinous practice of partial-birth abortion and strongly disagreed with the Supreme Court ruling to uphold the ban.
4. Obama wishes to strip federal funding from pro-life crisis pregnancy centers that provide alternatives to abortion for pregnant women in need.
5. Obama refused to support the pro-life Democrats' “95-10” legislation (designed to reduce the number of abortions by 95% in 10 years by strengthening the social safety net for poor women). This would not have made abortion illegal; it would seek to reduce abortion.
6. Obama "opposed legislation to protect children who are born alive, either as a result of an abortionist’s unsuccessful effort to kill them in the womb, or by the deliberate delivery of the baby prior to viability." The bill contained a specific provision that ensured that the bill would not affect abortion laws (Obama and his campaign lied about this fact until it was proven in the records).
7. Obama has co-sponsored a bill authorizing the large-scale industrial production of human embryos for use in biomedical research in which they would be killed. It would require the killing of human beings in the embryonic stage that were produced by cloning, and would make it a federal crime for a woman to save an embryo by agreeing to have the tiny developing human being implanted in her womb so that he or she could be brought to term.
8. Obama was one of the few senators to oppose a bill that would have put a modest amount of federal money into research that would develop methods to produce the exact equivalent of embryonic stem cells without using (or producing) embryos. "From any rational vantage point, this is unconscionable. . . . Why create and kill human embryos when there are alternatives that do not require the taking of nascent human lives? It is as if Obama is opposed to stem-cell research unless it involves killing human embryos."
With regard to those who think that electing Obama will save lots of unborn lives, George writes:
They tell us not to worry that Obama opposes the Hyde Amendment, the Mexico City Policy (against funding abortion abroad), parental consent and notification laws, conscience protections, and the funding of alternatives to embryo-destructive research. They ask us to look past his support for Roe v. Wade, the Freedom of Choice Act, partial-birth abortion, and human cloning and embryo-killing. An Obama presidency, they insist, means less killing of the unborn.George ends his article in this way:
This is delusional.
What kind of America do we want our beloved nation to be? Barack Obama’s America is one in which being human just isn’t enough to warrant care and protection. It is an America where the unborn may legitimately be killed without legal restriction, even by the grisly practice of partial-birth abortion. It is an America where a baby who survives abortion is not even entitled to comfort care as she dies on a stainless steel table or in a soiled linen bin. It is a nation in which some members of the human family are regarded as inferior and others superior in fundamental dignity and rights. In Obama’s America, public policy would make a mockery of the great constitutional principle of the equal protection of the laws. In perhaps the most telling comment made by any candidate in either party in this election year, Senator Obama, when asked by Rick Warren when a baby gets human rights, replied: “that question is above my pay grade.” It was a profoundly disingenuous answer: For even at a state senator’s pay grade, Obama presumed to answer that question with blind certainty. His unspoken answer then, as now, is chilling: human beings have no rights until infancy—and if they are unwanted survivors of attempted abortions, not even then.I encourage you to read the whole article, and to pass it along to others.
In the end, the efforts of Obama’s apologists to depict their man as the true pro-life candidate that Catholics and Evangelicals may and even should vote for, doesn’t even amount to a nice try. Voting for the most extreme pro-abortion political candidate in American history is not the way to save unborn babies.
Update: You can listen to Al Mohler interview Robert George on the Albert Mohler Radio Program live tonight from 5:00-6:00 p.m. ET.
Update 2: Regarding the arguments of Doug Kmiec--the Catholic pro-life but pro-Obama Constitutional scholar at Pepperdine--both Drs. Mohler and George referred to them as "ridiculous" and "through the looking glass." This seems to be the take of Ramesh Ponnuru, who recently called Kmiec a "silly and confused man" (with regard to this issue).
posted by JT at Tuesday, October 14, 2008
15 Comments:
Dr. George will be the guest on today's Albert Mohler radio program (Tuesday October 14).
In a "common sense" sense, Dr George got the order wrong (worse, even worse, worse that that, etc).
Obama's vote against the Born Alive Act has been largely successfully defused (by misdirection and lies, of course) and is old news.
But his refusal to support the 95/10 legislation is a lot more damning. He has pandered endlessly to the pro-life crowd that the important thing to do is to reduce abortions.
Yet when his own party tried to do just that, he refused his support. Has this disingenuousness (read: bald-faced lie) been addressed by his campaign?
And possibly more importantly in our little world, what kind of spin have his pro-life supporters like ... well, you know ... put on this issue?
More evidence that Obama is committed to killing babies. His "pro-life" supporters are kidding themselves.
Sad but true. On both counts.
"Voting for the most extreme pro-abortion political candidate in American history is not the way to save unborn babies."
Of course it isn't. But if you don't tie yourself mindlessly to a single issue, there are plenty of other reasons to vote for Obama.
I'll be honest and say that most people that would argue Obama=prolife (and are there really that many?) are people who really want to vote for him for other, better reasons, but haven't yet allowed themselves to consciously consider abortion only one issue among many.
danweasel,
if you don't tie yourself mindlessly to a single issue, there are plenty of other reasons to vote for Obama.
I don't follow you. What's mindless about someone having a single issue they deem more important than the others?
Regarding the update on Doug Kmiec this is the most enigmatic of all instances I've heard. Kmiec is a conservative legal scholar so when I heard way back when he went to support Obama I almost about choked on my bottled watter. I was like Doug Kmiec???
Then when I went to read more about what happened with his conversion to the Obamessiah, it appears to be more about his BDS on the war in Iraq, treatment of prisoners and issues like Patriot Act. He is one of the examples that have gone COMPLETELY off the deep end to support Obama.
I mean, let's assume he is right on his criticisms against the President, what Kmiec fails to understand, or maybe he understands, but anger has gotten the best of him, is that an Obama presidency will undo many of the conservative principles he holds true to. I mean, even if you disagree with the President on certain issues, many of these things can be reversed by a new President. McCain for example differs on waterboarding.
But the most important legacy of a President is not necessarily always what he does in office, but what he leaves behind, and that is the federal judiciary. President Bush's judicial appointments will have a legacy that goes way beyond his eight years in office. So, will an Obama presidency if he is elected.
What stuns me is that Kmiec has allowed anger (because he is not stupid) to get the best of him because he disagrees with Bush on some key points on the prosecution of the war on terror.
That is in fact, the case for many so-called conservatives. I mean, I'm not happy with some of the domestic policies that the President endorsed, but that STILL doesn't mean I'm going to support Obama. If Kmiec was stupid, I could chalk up his move to support Obama as idiocy. But he is not an idiot, but intelligent. So, the only other explanation is that his emotions and anger have gotten the best of him, and he is supporting a candidate that will undo a lot of the principles he holds dear to.
And the harm that an Obama presidency would have won't just affect the one or two terms but it will have an affect that goes beyond a President's time in office. (See Roe v. Wade passed in 1973).
Mindlessly is a harsh word, one I use for two reasons:
1. Most evangelical Christians here in Texas have never thought about the issue of abortion beyond what they have been told by conservative/evangelical opinion makers.
2. Even among people I know who have a considered opinion on the matter, it seems that every single political race boils down to this single issue, regardless of anything else. That's not one issue more important than the others. That's only recognizing one issue, period. Since there are, in fact, many issues of importance in the current political race, I call refusing to even consider them in the face of abortion mindless.
I am not leveling specific accusations against anyone here; but it is a fair description of many evangelical voters.
I say this from a position of theological orthodoxy.
danweasel,
I say this from a position of theological orthodoxy.
Referring to your position as theological orthodoxy makes it sound no less arrogant.
1) I don't think you're giving voters in Texas, or anywhere else for that matter much credit. You refer to conservative / evangelical opinion makers. The only opinion makers are the people themselves. People can share their opinions and express their views but they cannot make other people's opinions for them.
never thought about the issue of abortion...
How much thinking does one have to do to understand that abortion involves the deliberate murder of a baby? What is a non-conservative, non-evangelical going to say to change that basic fact?
2) it seems that every single political race boils down to this single issue...
It's possible, and seems likely to me, that abortion is one of those issues that says a lot about a person's general view on life (their worldview, if you will). Many pro-baby-killing politicians are against gun ownership, are for homosexual marriage, are for increased taxes on those who pay taxes, etc... Many issues that I hold dear can be reliably predicted in a candidate if I know their position on abortion.
Some people, myself included, don't think someone has the character necessary for public office if that person thinks it's OK to murder babies. Perhaps we're old fashioned, being against baby killing and all, but we're not mindless.
You seemed to be trying to say there is not one single issue more important than the others. I disagree.
For simplicity's sake, let's say there are two issues: 1)an after school program and 2)abortion.
Let's say I'm a volunteer at the school regarding the after school program. I'm on my way to deliver an important lecture to some students. On my way I see someone about to stab an infant to death. Decision time. What do I do? Is one issue more important than the other? I think so. I know so.
danweasel,
are you saying that other issues, even other major issues put together (the economy, Iraq, social welfare, etc.), carry more weight with you than the murder of the defenseless unborn? Because make no mistake, whatever words are used Biblically it is murder.
JT, you've been deemed maclicious. You should be flattered.
Maybe one day, I'll learn how to spell.
Nah, that's above my pay grade.
danweasel,
If you can take a break from flattering yourself about how intellectual you are for refusing to be constricted by a "single issue," you might want to think what you are saying through.
Is there any candidate that you would support, despite the fact that you agree with him on 99% of the other issues who endorsed such positions as:
1.reinstituting slavery?
2.legalizing pedophelia and statutory rape?
3.Openly supporting sharing nuclear weapon secrets with terrorist organizations?
Those are all single issues. You need to be more honest with us. What you believe is that ABORTION is not an important enough SINGLE issue, not that you are opposed to single issue voting.
Obama also supports hate crimes laws mirroring those who have been used to persecute christians in other countries. I don't even need to go into the other anti-biblical things he is proposing. It's obvious you have bigger issues(than your ego).
This morning, after reading this post on Obama's abortion stance, I read the most rational, illuminating post about Obama's faith. I highly encourage you to read it.
http://conversantlife.com/blogs/tamb
NDMB
NDMB,
That article is a must-read. JT should repost it on the home page.
Irony alert: I went to read that article, and right next to it was a book endorsement by Donald Miller. ;-)
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