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Doug Kmiec Pushes False Claim Abortions Increased Under President Bush
Life News ^ | 5/29/09 | Steven Ertelt

Posted on 05/29/2009 1:27:26 PM PDT by wagglebee

Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- During a debate on Thursday between pro-life Princeton University professor Robert George and pro-Obama apologist Douglas Kmiec, Kmiec continued the false notion that abortions increased during the tenure of pro-life President George W. Bush.

During the debate, held at the National Press Club, Kmiec went further than those who suggested abortions rose under Bush. He also claimed that abortions rose under the first President Bush.

However, as University of Alabama professor Michael New explains in a new op-ed on National Review Online, Kmiec's contention is inaccurate.

"Data from both the Center for Disease Control and the Alan Guttmacher Institute indicate that abortions fell during the first Bush presidency," he explained. "And the most recent data from both sources indicates that abortions were falling during the administration of George W. Bush."

"Indeed, between 2000 and 2005, data from Guttmacher indicates that the number of abortions fell by 8.1 percent and data from the CDC indicates that abortions fell by 2.9 percent," New writes.

"Between 1988 and 1992, data from Guttmacher indicate that the number of abortions fell by 3.7 percent and data from the CDC indicates that the number of abortions fell by 0.9 percent," New said about the first President Bush.

New wrote at National Review that so-called pro-life Obama backers have adopted this tactic of claiming abortions rose under both presidents in order to make it appear their pro-life bona fides are not as strong.

However, he explains that presidents can be involved in abortion issues at the federal level but that their actions have relatively little effect on abortion figures.

"More importantly, this whole argument has struck me as a bit silly," he says.

"The incidence of abortion is influenced by economic and demographic trends which presidents cannot do much to influence in the short term. Furthermore, policies enacted at the state level, such as the enactment of pro-life laws, likely have a greater impact on abortion trends," New adds.

He concluded, "Still, this nuance is lost on pro-life Obama supporters. It came as no surprise that Doug Kmiec credited the economy for the 1990s abortion decline, but said nary a word about the substantial increase in the number of states enacting pro-life laws during this time."


TOPICS: Culture/Society; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: abortion; bhoabortion; dougkmiec; kmiec; moralabsolutes; prolife; rino; rinoromney; romney; teamromney
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To: xsmommy; wagglebee

Now that makes A LOT of sense.


21 posted on 05/29/2009 1:52:40 PM PDT by freespirited (Is this a nation of laws or a nation of Democrats? -- Charles Krauthammer)
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To: americanophile
I think Doug Kmiec is mentally ill, and I am serious in asserting this. For someone of Kmiec's intellect to advance the arguments he currently does is, to me, a sign there's been a break with reality. And I am not arguing this because I disagree with Kmiec (although I do). Can you imagine someone like, say, Alan Dershowitz, who is solidly pro-abortion, blathering on about Obama’s being “pro-life”? Dershowitz would talk about the actual issue of abortion, not about drivel.

I think it's time for Conservatives, especially Catholic conservatives, to stop inviting Kmiec to debates and conferences. The man obviously is desperate for attention and we should all agree to stop giving it to him.

22 posted on 05/29/2009 1:57:50 PM PDT by utahagen
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To: utahagen; xsmommy
I think Doug Kmiec is mentally ill, and I am serious in asserting this. For someone of Kmiec's intellect to advance the arguments he currently does is, to me, a sign there's been a break with reality. And I am not arguing this because I disagree with Kmiec (although I do). Can you imagine someone like, say, Alan Dershowitz, who is solidly pro-abortion, blathering on about Obama’s being “pro-life”? Dershowitz would talk about the actual issue of abortion, not about drivel.

I think it's time for Conservatives, especially Catholic conservatives, to stop inviting Kmiec to debates and conferences. The man obviously is desperate for attention and we should all agree to stop giving it to him.

I think you are right.

23 posted on 05/29/2009 2:06:23 PM PDT by wagglebee ("A political party cannot be all things to all people." -- Ronald Reagan, 3/1/75)
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To: utahagen

I totally agree with you and the invitations DO need to stop. He is not a theologian, he is a church-going constitutional lawyer. I don’t see why his opinion is being sought on these issues as all it does it play to his overblown vanity.


24 posted on 05/29/2009 2:07:07 PM PDT by xsmommy
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To: xsmommy

I think Kmiec believed that Romney would name him either attorney general, solicitor general or White House counsel. When Romney lost the nomination he started acting like a spoiled child and he is too myopic to realize that Zero won’t need him around much longer.


25 posted on 05/29/2009 2:31:59 PM PDT by wagglebee ("A political party cannot be all things to all people." -- Ronald Reagan, 3/1/75)
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To: wagglebee

Then he could have, in some way, been the equal of Ken Starr, who is his boss at Pepperdine. maybe so.


26 posted on 05/29/2009 2:35:48 PM PDT by xsmommy
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To: wagglebee
“Kmiec really seems to enjoy playing the role of useful idiot.”

No, I wouldn't allow him that slack. What he is doing is purposefully misrepresenting the teachings of the Catholic Church in such a way as to promote heresy. He is promoting and excusing abortionists and their supporters.

He is evil in the classical sense. His actions and words cannot be described as simply mistaken. The blood of many of the unborn are on his hands.
Here is a part of The Quiet Conservative article “I pulled the lever and sealed my fate” about Kmiec Catholics:

READERS:
Speaker: Catholics for Choice
Italics: Pro Choice Catholic Politicians
Bold : Catholics who voted for Obama

A Reading from the Book of NARAL:

38Barack saith to Pastor Warren: What is truth? When does life begin? And when he said this, he
went out again to the American population, and saith to them: I find no cause to define life.
39But you have a custom that I should hide my views to get elected in November; will you,
therefore, demand that I defend helpless life on the election trail?
40Then cried they all again, saying: Not this issue. There are other issues, important issues.
Like jobs and the economy. We can vote for you on those!
1Then therefore, Barack took the pen and issued the order.
2And the lobbyists and Planned Parenthood stocked the clinics and accepted the Federal funds.
3And they came to him, and said: Hail, Obama. Thou art wise.
4Obama therefore went forth again, and saith to the people: Behold, I bring forth the Federal
funding of abortion worldwide and the Freedom of Choice Act that strips all laws against abortion.
Time to end divisiveness.
5 A pregnant woman came out with the president. And Barak saith to them: Behold the woman
carrying a male fetus. I would free her from burden and the man from responsibility.
6When the chief priests of the press, therefore, and the Catholic servants, had seen the woman, they
cried out, saying: Abort him! Abort him! The time isn’t convenient! It is a private choice, not a
child! Obama saith to them: Take her to an abortion clinic yourselves, I am a Christian and won’t do
it, I have to work out. I just support abortion, promote it, and fund it.
7The American people answered him: We have a law called Roe v. Wade; and according to the
law the baby ought to die, because the baby cannot speak for itself.
8When Obama therefore had heard this saying, he feared the more. There were justices that might
overturn this law.
9And he entered into the hall again, and he said to his advisors: We can’t have originalists on the
court. We must only appoint those who interpret the Constitution to advance our agenda. We must
have a litmus test.
10Barack therefore saith to them: The unborn don’t vote, see? Knowest thou not that I have power
to give life or death to those we deem worthy? Wait until you see our health care restrictions that
don’t value the elderly or the infirm.
11 In the back of his mind the unborn baby answered: Thou should not have the power of life
and death over me unless it was given from above. Therefore the greater sin is with those that
allowed you to have this power.
12And from henceforth Barak sought to release himself from any blame. But the people cried out,
saying: If thou does not promote abortion worldwide, thou art not a woman’s friend. For
whosoever speaks the truth about life or wants to protect it in the womb, speaketh against
women.
13Now when Barack had heard these words, he brought the pregnant woman forth carrying the child,
and sat down in the judgment seat, in the place that is called Lithostrotos, and in Hebrew Gabbatha.
14And it was the parasceve of the pasch, about the sixth hour, and he saith to the people: Behold
your executive order and memo saying it’s cool.
15But they cried out: Abort him! Abort him! Obama saith to them: Shall I fund the murder of the
unborn? The press and the liberals answered: We have no children, we have choice!
16Then therefore he delivered the woman to the clinic to be aborted. And they took the woman, and
led her forth, not telling her of the options or showing her the ultrasound that would have shown the
baby she was carrying was alive and a person.
17And bearing her in the mini van with the clinic workers they brought her to Planned Parenthood,
but in Hebrew Golgotha.
18Where they aborted her, and with her two others, one age ten, and the other a late term
pregnancy with altered paperwork to show her as early term.
19And Barack wrote a title also, Rescind Mexico Policy and he put it upon the executive order. And
the writing was: …and to provide family planning assistance to women in 154 countries.
20This title therefore many of the people did read: because the place where the memo was posted
was on the new White House web site and was nigh to the city wi fi areas: and it was written in
Hebrew, in Greek, and in Latin.
21Then the chief priests of the press said to Obama: Write not, abortion on any document. Do
not define life. Call if family planning and choice.
22Barack answered: What I have written, I have written. No one can pin me down. You didn't even
allow the fact I am a cosponsor of the Freedom of Choice Act be known during the campaign. You
won’t bail on me now. I washed my hands, but you sold your souls.
23The doctor therefore, when they had aborted her, took the dead baby, and threw it in the
biohazard bag which would be filled at the end of the day. Later to be placed in the incinerator to be
burned. A holocaust of those deemed not worthy of life. And Fifty two percent of Catholics said:
Amen.

27 posted on 05/29/2009 2:44:06 PM PDT by IrishCatholic (No local Communist or Socialist Party Chapter? Join the Democrats, it's the same thing!)
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To: wagglebee

What about foreign abortions, now the Obama is in he wants to send Margaret Sanger’s shock troops into dark skinned countries to kill fetuses, ‘ in order to help the people’. More racist imperialism.


28 posted on 05/29/2009 3:10:25 PM PDT by Titus-Maximus (Joe Biden: Once you get past the lead taste, paint chips are pretty good.)
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To: wagglebee
I think that's exactly what kicked off Kmiec’s downward spiral, but the nosedive in his IQ is baffling. for example, his argument that the state should “get out” of marriage by merely giving out marriage licenses just makes no sense.
29 posted on 05/29/2009 4:06:55 PM PDT by utahagen
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To: utahagen

I agree, EVERYTHING he has said since last fall is textbook leftism.


30 posted on 05/29/2009 4:49:57 PM PDT by wagglebee ("A political party cannot be all things to all people." -- Ronald Reagan, 3/1/75)
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To: wagglebee

Pro-life activists really to be vocal about dispelling the myth about abortions increasing under Reagan and Bush and decreaed under Clinton.


31 posted on 05/29/2009 7:46:03 PM PDT by yongin
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To: wagglebee

Bump for future reference


32 posted on 05/29/2009 7:48:48 PM PDT by Skooz (Gabba Gabba we accept you we accept you one of us Gabba Gabba we accept you we accept you one of us)
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To: wagglebee

We should all pray for Kmiec’s soul — that he is soon converted back to the Truth and away from the heresy he is spreading. He is being led astray and deceived, through the weakness of his pride, by the Evil One — and I’m not talking about Obama.


33 posted on 05/30/2009 10:33:25 AM PDT by bdeaner (The bread which we break, is it not a participation in the body of Christ? (1 Cor. 10:16))
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