Tuesday, January 13, 2009

if he's going to do it, I hope it's the first thing he does

From Chuck Norris at TownHall.com, reflections on Obama and his campaign promise to sign FOCA as the first thing he does as President....

On the one hand, it'd be great to see him break that campaign promise, especially if he does/can not sign it. But IF he's going to sign it, I hope it's the first thing he does. That level of passion-- on a social issue-- is exactly the sort of thing that got Clinton into trouble. And to one of the points of this earlier post, from a pro-life perspective, a hot "pro-choice" stance has its advantages over a warm "pro-choice" stance.

Barack Obama emphatically promised more than a year ago, "The first thing I'd do as president is sign the Freedom of Choice Act." Will he keep his word?

The Freedom of Choice Act is a sweeping bill that would abolish all pro-life regulations across the nation, from parental notification laws to bans on federal funding of abortions....

The fight to pass FOCA is being waged despite a new nationwide survey revealing that about 4 in 5 U.S. adults would limit abortion's legality. About 1 in 3 would limit abortion to rape, incest or saving a mother's life. One-third also would limit abortion to either the first three months of pregnancy or the first six months. Only 9 percent said abortion should be legal for any reason at any time during pregnancy. These statistics are in stark contrast to the goals and objectives of FOCA, which would close the culture debate on abortion in an unprecedented way for any piece of legislation....

As I pointed out earlier-- through a Neuhaus essay-- most people are confused about the extent of Roe v. Wade.

The other funny thing about Obama's position is that he wants to move past abortion-- with the status quo as the default position. Of course, this is completely arbitrary, although rhetorically convenient. In any case, true "progressives" cannot accept this view.

2 Comments:

At January 14, 2009 at 11:24 AM , Blogger William Lang said...

>About 1 in 3 would limit abortion to rape, incest or saving a mother's life.

I've never understood this: if abortion is murder, it is no less murder in cases of rape or incest. And if abortion is not murder, there is no need to make it illegal.

 
At January 14, 2009 at 12:14 PM , Blogger Eric Schansberg said...

I agree with you there.

It points to how little almost everybody thinks about public policy-- specific policies as well as a general philosophy of government. The result is incoherence from abortion to bailouts, from social to economic policy, and so on.

 

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