I’ve read too many variations of Stupak turned his back on us for me to allow some time for mourning and reasoning before I offer advice that will be disregarded again. Let’s get a few things straight. First, the pro-life movement turned its back on health care reform. Some like Thomas Peters at American Papist were honest that they could care less how the unborn fared because they weren’t supporting health care reform no matter what. That’s not fair. No, they reserved the right to whine and complain – and complain endlessly they did – but when it came to actually bringing something to the table, like votes, they’d have to look elsewhere. Pretty much all the pro-life organizations followed this tack. With leadership like this, the unborn don’t need enemies.
Second, after hardly bringing any votes to the table, pro-lifers got almost everything they wanted. It’s amazing that an interest cannot bother showing up and still manage to have its interests catered. Let me get this right. Pro-lifers make demands for the protection of the unborn. They admit they won’t be happy if the demand is met (because they have other commitments like libertarianism); their initial demand is still largely met, and the caterwauling commences that they aren’t being respected. Grow up for crying aloud. Despite the narrative that helps you sleep at night, maybe the Democratic Party doesn’t hold the “Sacrament of Abortion” – I loathe that term – as highly as you hoped and desired thought.
Third, if it isn’t abundantly clear now, it should be: you didn’t have Stupak’s back. Stupak didn’t use you, regardless of whether or not he was your favorite Democratic representative. Your agenda never included supporting health care reform. Remember, Scott Brown, a pro-choice Republican, was your savior when he was elected in Massachusetts because he was going to stop the health care bill. You opposed health care reform and didn’t really care about abortion, and you know it. Stop blaming others for your faults. Stupak was handy when you didn’t just want to sound like another shrill partisan. Stupak managed to give you legitimacy. You didn’t give Stupak anything. Who was using who here? That’s right, Stupak was used by the pro-life movement.
The pro-life leadership made choices, and they are facing the consequences of those choices. Frankly, they deserved worse than what they got. That’s the political reality. Don’t get me wrong, I was happy for the advances the unborn made in health care reform. From the abortion side alone, I think they made a lot of progress. Now people will realistically be able to choose a health care plan that does not cover abortion. Of course, health care reform is a great thing too, unless you are a pro-life activist in which case it was a bad thing due almost wholly to things having nothing to do with the unborn.
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