Posted on 11/08/2007 12:00:05 AM PST by Tailgunner Joe
WASHINGTON -- Fred Thompson was well into a prolonged dialogue about abortion with interviewer Tim Russert on NBC's "Meet the Press" Sunday when he said something stunning for social conservatives: "I do not think it is a wise thing to criminalize young girls and perhaps their parents as aiders and abettors." He then went further: "You can't have a (federal) law" that "would take young, young girls ... and say, basically, we're going to put them in jail."
Those comments sent e-mails flying across the country reflecting astonishment and rage by pro-life Republicans who had turned to Thompson as their best presidential bet for 2008. No anti-abortion legislation ever has proposed criminal penalties against women having abortions, much less their parents. Jailing women is a spurious issue raised by abortion rights activists. What Thompson said could be expected from NARAL.
Thompson's comments revealed astounding lack of sensitivity about the abortion issue. He surely anticipated that Russert would cite Thompson's record favoring state's rights on abortion. Whether the candidate just blurted out what he said or planned it, it reflects failure to realize how much his chances for the presidential nomination depend on social conservatives.
(Excerpt) Read more at pittsburghlive.com ...
See post 31.
nobody is against overturning roe v wade. but first you have to have nominees that don’t end up like souter and they also have to be approved by a pro-life senate.
Now, how do you get a pro-life senate? well you have this big national movement for federal legislation that these senators can vote for and pro-lifers will be energized to elect them.
If you get banned then I will get banned with you. You are right. Abortion is not going away. To think otherwise is stupid.
And to throw all our other goals in the toilet to chase this single impossibility... it’s very discouraging that so many of our good people are thinking so illogically.
Laughable. Fred makes a “blunder” about abortion and Rudy is pro-choice, pro-gay marriage, pro-gun control, and thrice-married, yet he leading the race and gets the endorsement of Pat Robertson.
You mean people should read more than a headline and read more than one source to form an opinion? What a novel idea.
Fred is, shall we say, confused but I could vote for him if I had to. I will not vote for Rudy.
I wholeheartedly agree and you can't even expect private Christian schools to do the right thing. When I was in middle school (mid 70's) and high school (late 70's) many of my peers I had gone to school with since kindergarten chose to go to Greater Atlanta Christian School for middle and high school. Almost every one of them turned into party animals while there, despite (or maybe because of) the strict Christian curriculum. Several of the girls I knew who went there were pregnant by 10th grade and most of the folks who left in 6th or 7th grade were back in publik skool with the rest of us by 11th grade. Several of them I still keep in contact with are now confirmed atheists as a result of attending that school. BTW, GACS had a great reputation at the time.
It takes good parenting to raise a kid, not a village and not a school. If you want good values instilled in your kids, teach them yourself. It's the only way......
Agree 100%. I think what most fail to understand is the notion that moderates and independents look at abortion opponents as right wing extremists. And are mostly dismissed as kooks much like the radical left wing fringe. Just review some of the comments here...too extreme.
Hmmm... whom to believe?
Just review some of the comments here...too extreme.Extreme and misguided even in terms of their own stated goals, goals which I share.
First step: overturn Roe v Wade, no matter HOW you feel about abortion, just because it's a bad decision and shouldn't exist.
Second step: concentrate on the states that are most likely to pass pro-life laws.
Third step: develop a strategy for moving forward in other states.
But instead, they demand instant gratification, get nothing, and help elect Democrats and RINOs everywhere because, as you say, so many independents view all conservatives as being in the same boat with the single-issue pro-lifers.
that would include mothers...if you hire a hitman to murder, you're just as culpable.
You're kidding, right?
Have you EVER heard a woman (who wants a baby) refer to the thing in her womb as anything OTHER than a baby, from the moment the test is positive?
I haven't.
If you think women are misinformed, try explaining abortion to an eight-year old girl.
The problem is that people don't like abortion, but they DO like, and empathize with, the pregnant "girl" (obviously and by definition, "woman" is more correct).
But if the pregnant women did not harbor, and be permitted to express in action, murderous feelings towards theoir own children, the problem would not exist.
It is precisely in the souls of pregnant women that this battle must be fought and won, or change will never come.
And most of us have the intuition that a jail cell isn't the place for that change to occur.
a plea of 'temporary insanity'? i don't think so.
So if a friend talks me into hiring a hitman to murder somebody, I'm a victim? That's a typical liberal abdication of responsibility.
Your “source” is the guy who could have saved all this Scooter Libby fiasco by just two words. Richard Amitage. Novak is no friend of the republican party.
And Fred's answer was the most reasonable. You that want to run on putting women in jail for having an abortion will never win a nationwide election.
“Freds just telling it like it is. We aren’ty going to throw 13 year old lawbreakers in prison. If that causes people to freak out, then too bad.
Vote for Julie-Annie instead.”
I wonder if all these anti-Fred critics would feel better if he would of said this instead:
“We Need to have a (federal) law” that “will take young, young girls ... and put them in jail.”
That's not what is being said here. The message is that each state should be able to decide whether abortion is legal or not through the legislative process. Once the legislative process at the state level is open, then the discussions of what is right and wrong can be had - and those discussions overwhelmingly favor pro-life.
If a given state goes the other way, then it is ripe for prayers, educational pushes, further discussion, etc. One does not abandon the war at the first sign of trouble in the first battle.
Wow. Did he really say that? Did he really just poke a finger in the eye of the pro-life cause that he claims to support? No wonder pro-life leaders (like Dr. John Willke, James Bopp, etc.) are endorsing Mitt Romney and not Fred Thompson. To say that those who have dedicated their lives to fighting to preserve the sanctity of life and protect the unborn want to put "young, young girls in jail" is highly offensive. When liberal, pro-abortion Rudy Giuliani said something like this in February, he was soundly condemned here on Free Republic and elsewhere by conservative pro-lifers. And, as this article states, it is the sort of thing that would come from NARAL, not a Republican candidate.
Maybe Novak doesn’t like the fact that Thompson is clear on the innocence of Libby and is likely fully aware of the part the Novak played in damaging Bush by that issue. Novak is the ultimate beltway insider - he’s certainly not the type of person that Thompson is targetting in his campaign.
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