Who Changed: Stupak or the Pro-Life Groups?
Mar 26th, 2010 | 13 responses
A short while ago, I commented on a thread about the rash of violence, threats, harassment and insults Democratic legislators have endured during the last few days as a direct result of their positions and votes on health care reform. This is part of my comment on the ordeal Representative Bart Stupak has been through because of the way he voted on the legislation:
I am referring to the unspeakable abuse, threats, ridicule, accusations, etc. Representative Stupak and his family have endured since he voted in favor of Health Care Reform.
Six days ago, before the historic vote in the House, Stupak was a principled, decent, patriotic, family loving and—above all—pro-life man.
He was loved and respected by Conservatives, especially, and naturally, by pro-life people.
He then, in good conscience, was able to get the President of the United States to reaffirm in an executive order that no federal funds would be used for abortion.
Then, Sunday night, he cast a vote in Congress.
On Monday, after that historic vote, Stupak was still a principled, decent, patriotic, family loving and—above all—pro-life man.
He had not changed.
But lo and behold, suddenly he was one of the most evil, despised, hated men in America–and we all know what followed.
Now, you tell me, who changed?
Of course, Stupak has not changed. He is today the same man he was a week ago, still pro-life, and still pro-health care for all Americans.
But don’t take my word for it.
Stupak has just written a column in the Washington Post, which he concludes with the following words:
I have said from the start that my goal was to see health-care reform pass while maintaining the long-standing principle of the sanctity of life. The president’s executive order upholds this principle and current law that no federal funds be used for abortion. I and other pro-life Democrats are pleased that we were able to hold true to our principles and vote for a bill that is pro-life at every stage of life and that provides 32 million Americans with access to high-quality, affordable health care.
He starts his column as follows:
When I saw that Kathleen Parker’s March 24 op-ed, “Stupak’s original sin,” defined me as a “backstabber,” it reminded me of a Bible verse. Matthew 7:3 asks, “Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?”
Stupak then calls into question the true motives of many blogs and organizations claiming to be pro-life: “[They] have become clear in recent days: to politicize life issues as a means to defeat health care reform. One group even sent an e-mail to supporters saying they are ‘working feverishly to stop this legislation from going forward.’”
To read more of Representative Stupak’s unchanged position and principles on the sanctity of life, please click here, and then perhaps we can answer the question as to who changed, who is doing the “backstabbing.”
13 Responses to “Who Changed: Stupak or the Pro-Life Groups?”
He's gone in November.
It's odd, that with a steady majority of respondents saying women should have the right to make this difficult health-care choice for themselves, the political parties are skewed to give so much power to the absolutist minority. But this is a symptom of the corruption of the centre – if you're on the so-called fringes, left or right, your vote won't generally change. Only centrists can be bought and sold – bribed in Stupak's case by a bit of presidential molly-coddling, in Arlen Specter's case by establishment electoral help, in the case of Ben Nelson by the Cornhusker Kickback, or Blanche Lincoln's by corporate campaign money.
It would be awfully nice to have a principled, open-minded center in congress, but I don't know how.
I don't know where you get information to make the claim that the prochoice side is becoming more solidly in the majority, and certainly the claim that the prolife side (esp moderate prolifers) are 'the fringe' is unsubstantiated. The polling I've seen has been going in the other direction over time (young people in particular are trending more toward a prolife opinion.)
Stupak is understandably upset that those who backed him later turned on him. And he's likely correct that some of the people who did so weren't actually that concerned with the abortion issue but simply wanted to exploit the situation to kill the legislation.
And clearly any of the people who made threats to him cannot credibly claim the mantle of 'prolife'.
But the changing sentiment among prolifers, from supporting him to being disappointed in him, doesn't prove that they didn't care about the prolife issue. On the contrary- for some people, because they cared so deeply about it, they felt that he ultimately sold out and they were angry about that.
I'm fairly sure there are progressives who are similarly angry with Kucinich for flipping to a yes vote at the last minute, for instance- and that doesn't mean that they don't care about the progressive ideals that they were trying to uphold.
And a final note- there's a healthy dose of hypocrisy all around in terms of people who flipped from loving Stupak and hating him- and also those who didn't have enough respect for him prior to his vote change to pay attention to his claims that he was being harrassed and threatened (by people who were mad that he was opposing the bill) but then believed him and sympathized with him after the vote change when he began getting threats and harrassment from the other side.
Don't be so sure he won't win re-election.
That district has been Dem since 1933 and Stupak is well liked among his constituency.
I don't know much about his district but I've heard that too. Plus, my impression all along is that he was staking out a principled position in keeping with what the majority of his constituents wanted. As far as I could tell, that position was to hold out for the strongest possible language to enforce the Hyde provisions, but to also not let that get in the way of passing the HCR bill if it came down to that.
The trouble is though that a lot of people outside his district were also for stronger prolife provisions, but not so keen on the rest of the bill anyway. For them, the prolife issue was to be strictly adhered to and if the bill passed with his language in it they could live with that because they'd feel that at least the bill was improved according to their viewpoint, or it would fail and that was OK too because they'd really prefer that it get scrapped and start over on HCR.
Maybe CS but the position you describe is not the position he publicly took. Time and time again he said he would not vote for the Senate language unless a version of his original amendment was included. It was not and he did.
I don't disagree with your assessment of where he was the whole time but he allowed confusion about his perspective to continue when he could have clarified. I get that this might have undermined his negotiating position, but, since he really didn't get anything anyway, I'm not sure what his stronger negotiating position got him.
All of that said, the to and fro about abortion in HCR is a bit zany. The implementation of the bill will look like the very conflicted state the country is in on the issue because anything else will lead to an outcry and corrective action. That statement is true regardless of what the language says or any executive orders that might be passed.
Our current political ways have become so dark it is draining the goodness from our country.
Just read an article on National Catholic Reporter that can drag one back to sanity. . . .
http://ncronline.org/news/without-forgiveness-t…
os, thanks for your comments, and for the link..
I had totally forgotten about the Amish tragedy and the grace, forgiveness and gentleness of the Amish people.
I, for one, need to emulate such fine traits a little more, albeit the current political climate makes that very difficult. But that should not be an excuse.
Take care
Dorian
I share your sadness over this. We need moderates badly, or at least a division of power so compromise is forced upon our elected officials.
or at least a division of power
Something that occurred to me recently was the issue of one party holding majorities in both houses. I've seen analysis of how our politics were affected when there was same party rule in Congress and WH, vs. a split between the two branches. I know that's been talked about here before, and I think a lot of people at least in the abstract agree that a split between the control of legislative and exec branch is a good thing (I for one have to reluctantly concede that in our recent history it looks like a Dem POTUS with a GOP Congress is a fairly good mix.)
But what I don't remember seeing is any analysis of the differences between one party controlling both houses vs. a split there. As I've been watching the manner in which the House Dems and Senate Dems finagled the HCR bill, it seems to me that there might be something to a divided Congress- because then the differences between the two houses which ultimately HAVE to be resolved to get legislation passed, would also be necessity have to represent bipartisanship (whatever the majority in the House passes would have to be able to pass a Senate controlled by the other party, and vice versa.)
Of course it's all fairly academic anyway since people generally vote in each district according to their parochial needs and wants, and so we can't decide as individuals what the makeup of Congress should be. But it does seem interesting to me, to consider this.
That is an incredibly powerful story which deserves memorializing. Thanks for that, os.
I was similarly moved by Pope John Paul II's meeting with his would be assasin where he forgave the attempt on his life. This was also in keeping with his whole life, including his decision as a youth not to fight the Nazis because his belief was that only love can conquer hate.
That's a concept that many of us would agree with on the surface, but when put to the test like that I'd say most of us (myself included) would fail because it would be tough to believe it in such a radical degree.
“All of that said, the to and fro about abortion in HCR is a bit zany.”
It was guaranteed to be, sadly, because of the militants accompanying this issue. It was inevitable once health care was extended as an entitlement down the age scale from the elderly. It was easily predicted.
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