updated
“We won because [the Democrats] need us,” Stupak said. “If they are going to summarily dismiss us by taking the pen to that language, there will be hell to pay. I don’t say it as a threat, but if they double-cross us, there will be 40 people who won’t vote with them the next time they need us — and that could be the final version of this bill.” – Huffington Post via “Life News”
TM.com is proud to JOIN DON’T ASK. DON’T GIVE. The graphic below was part of an email I received from the DSCC under the heading of “Holiday Gifts.” They want me to buy a coffee mug. Evidently the honchos of the Democratic Party are stuck on stupid. I’ve done more to speak up and out for women this week than they have all year.
You can read the op-ed in the New York Times, by former president of Naral Pro-Choice America, Kate Michelman, and Frances Kissling, former president of Catholics for Choice. But frankly, the title is enough: Trading Women’s Rights for Political Power.
A GRIM reality sits behind the joyful press statements from Washington Democrats. To secure passage of health care legislation in the House, the party chose a course that risks the well-being of millions of women for generations to come.
House Democrats voted to expand the current ban on public financing for abortion and to effectively prohibit women who participate in the proposed health system from obtaining private insurance that covers the full range of reproductive health options. Political calculation aside, the House Democrats reinforced the principle that a minority view on the morality of abortion can determine reproductive health policy for American women. …
And if you want to know the bottom line difference between Republicans and Democrats on these things, it begins with this backdrop, which delineates the thinking of House Democrats, led by the first female Speaker of the House in U.S. history:
Many House members who support abortion rights decided reluctantly to accept this ban, which is embodied in the Stupak-Pitts amendment. 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.
Perhaps. But they can’t ignore the underlying shift that has taken place in recent years. 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. 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. …
This Republican strategy has been around since Rush started wailing on radio. It amounts to turning on the emotional engine that fuels Republican surges. It’s the best GOTV, throw the bums out tool the right has, because their emotion on issues beats ours. With Democrats caught up in a let’s all get along, can’t we bring the other side into the debate mentality.
Evidently, today’s Democratic Party doesn’t believe in anything for which they’re willing to fight. Not even women’s rights. Republicans never tried what Democrats actually allowed to happen under their majority watch.
“We are in contact with senators to make sure our language holds,” Stupak told the Detroit News. “The other side is playing with fire. We are sticking to our principles,” Stupak said in defense of his amendment. – Life News
Their emotion just beat ours on Stupak. (For those still not understanding the ramifications of the Stupak amendment, my interview with “Jane Roe” is all you need. The legalease hardly matters if you don’t understand it.)
Why the House didn’t preemptively rev up women’s emotions on the potential threat of turning back our civil rights is nothing less than a failure of leadership. The Stupak amendment proves the case. Democrats just weren’t as passionate, prepared or on purpose until after the fact when the damage was long done.
Emotion is also what’s fueling the latest Gallup warning, no matter how flawed, which coming after last week’s election that had independents going to Republicans two-to-one, is a definite warning shot.
As with all of these issues that hit people personally, non fact based motivation works for getting out the vote against us, as we saw with Palin’s “death panels” squeal tour, but can also crystallize what they are for (see Stupak again), as was the case in NY-23 where tea party activists and what they believed fueled the rise of a talentless spokesperson simply because he spoke their language.
Kate Michelman and Frances Kissling pinpoints the problem in their op-ed: 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. WJC has to share in this one, that lands on the doorstep of the Democratic Leadership Council that churns out Dems like Evan Bayh by the dozen. They’re talking about Clinton’s “safe, legal, and rare,” which is history since Obama. Trouble is Obama also talked about the importance of the Hyde amendment, while adding it to the budget, topping it with taking contraceptions out of the stimulus.
Martha Coakley, running for Ted Kennedy’s seat (my interview with her here), is one of the people not afraid to say that if she was presented with a vote like the House she would have voted no.
House progressives are now saying they’ll vote no if the bill comes back with Stupak-esque language still in it, Pelosi also promising Stupak would be stripped by the time the bill bounces back to them. So, not to worry, progressives, you get a do over.
The lack of leadership revealed through this after the fact action alert makes George W. Bush look like Patton.
Women’s civil rights are non-negotiable.
Today’s Democratic Party has clearly forgotten that foundational tenet.
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