Posted by
On the Right on Friday, August 15, 2008 3:22:46 PM
Judith Warner looked for the supposedly pro-life-friendly language in
the new Democratic Party platform, and stopped at the first sentence.
In the New York Times,
Warner explains that the new platform actually argues harder for
abortion on demand than the earlier Clinton platforms did, and that
their outreach to Catholics and evangelicals is built on falsehoods
In other words, like most of Barack Obama’s campaign, the New Politics
position on abortion consists of more of the same old stuff. Not only
does the Democratic platform insist on abortion, it insists that
taxpayers fund it, too. That doesn’t move the party to the right at
all; in fact, it makes it even more intransigent on life issues than
ever.
Not only do the Democrats reaffirm their support for taxpayer-funded
abortions, they also propose more taxpayer-funded programs on top of
them. The only difference between the two positions is more government
programs.
Yet, as Warner notes, the Democrats have trotted out progressives
like Revs. Joel Hunter and Tony Campolo to spin this into some sort of
real change that can allow pro-life voters to support Democrats. It’s
not even a cosmetic change to their previous, unadulterated support for
abortion on demand. The new platform does nothing — nothing
— to address the values of life for Catholics and evangelicals. It
doesn’t even provide, as Warner suggests, enough change to offer a
face-saving cover for supporting Democrats.
The Democrats remain the party of abortion on demand, and the party
of abortion at taxpayer expense. No amount of spin from apologists
like Campolo or Hunter can whitewash the clear, uncompromising language
of the Democratic platform. And no amount of spin or lies can erase
the fact that their presidential nominee voted to protect infanticide as a state legislator in Illinois when even his own party opposed it in Congress.