Wednesday, October 23, 2013

Why I left the Democratic party

Michelle Bachmann wrote in her autobiography.

“In 1976, I was still a Democrat. The Democratic Party, while it was then edging toward an abortion-on-demand stance, still allowed room in its ranks for pro-life leaders. Carter himself proved to be a clover waffle in the abortion issue, suggesting that he was pro-life to the pro-lifers and prochoice to the prochoicers--and yet the media, always Carter friendly, never nailed him on his hypocrisy. So in our naiveté, we failed to realize that Carter was playing a duplicitous double game. And the Republican Party, meanwhile, still seemed at that time to be dominated by defenders of the proabortion stance.

Yet back in the seventies, the parties had not yet sorted themselves out on the rival issue of abortion. So in 1976, many pro-life and socially conservative Americans could be found conscientiously voting for the Carter-Mondale ticket, thinking they were voting pro-life. And Marcus and I did more than that; we helped on his campaign, handing out fliers and making phone calls.”

I remember it was still possible to be a pro-life Democrat and a Christian evangelical back in the 80s—at least in Ohio--maybe even into the early 90s. Although I wasn’t particularly political then.  Campaigners kept quiet about the issue.  But then they really clamped down. By 1996, there was no point in even struggling with the issue.  The party of the poor and dispossessed and minorities had become the party of death on a huge scale—with 38% of the 50 million abortions being for black women--and much wealthier.  Now abortion was included in the Democrat platform—promoting killing the smallest and weakest of society in order to placate the lust for power in the women’s movement and to “cure” poverty.

No comments: