“And the problem is this. We were bought with a kiss.” – David Crowder, 2007.
Back in September of 2007, I made a serious error of judgment while giving a speech in Traverse City, Michigan. It was an annual fund-raiser for the Traverse City Right to Life, which is a part of the best statewide Right to Life organization in America. Anyone not familiar with Michigan Right to Life should go to their website. They are a model for the nation as a whole.
The serious error I mentioned was a reference to my former membership in the Democratic Party, in which I characterized them as the “party of death.” That wasn’t a very bright thing to say, given the large number of pro-life Democrats in the audience. Believe me, I heard about it afterwards. And I haven’t made the same mistake since.
My decision to stop using the term “party of death” in the presence of pro-life Democrats reflected more than an acceptance of the idea that one could be a pro-life Democrat. It also reflected an acceptance that there were, in fact, many of them in states like Michigan.
But that all changed last week with the political unraveling of Michigan’s Bart Stupak. The Democrat’s decision to switch votes on the controversial health care legislation has profound implications for pro-life Dems. And there are profound implications for pro-life Republicans as well.
For pro-life Dems there has to be a realization that they are simply no longer welcomed in the Party of Death. Bart Stupak was promised an executive order blocking the portion of the health care bill funding abortions – issued, of course, by former constitutional law professor Barack Obama. The president isn’t stupid. At the time of making the promise, he knew that such an order could not be used to accomplish its ostensible purpose.
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And Bart Stupak knew such an order would be as useless as a one-legged man in an ass-kicking contest. He pretended to believe the obviously-lying president because Obama threatened to bring a Democratic primary challenger against Stupak in an act of political revenge for a “no” vote on national health care. Where I come from, that’s called political extortion. In the Obama administration, such extortion is a Daley occurrence, so to speak.
I’ve long said that there would not be legalized abortion in America were it not for the Democratic Party. But, in a post-3/21 world, there can be no federal funding of abortions without the complicity of pro-life Republicans. If you think I’m hinting at the prospect of civil disobedience, you’re right. But that isn’t our first line of defense.
Republican Attorneys General around the nation are correct to challenge the legality of the national health care legislation passed by Congress on 3/21. If these suits are successful, we may be able to dismantle the legislation using the courts of law – long after it was dismantled in the court of public opinion. But if we fail in court, what is next?
The necessity of having a backup plan in the event of failed litigation efforts was made clear to me just one day after the congressional vote. The first Democrat friend I saw after 3/21 greeted me by saying, “F*** all you f***ing Republicans.” It is clear that you can only say “no” so many times when dealing with legislative rapists. It is equally clear that the time for reasoned discourse has passed and the time for civil disobedience is drawing near.
I would not likely enjoy spending time in prison. But I simply cannot imagine paying federal taxes that could be used to fund abortion. I just cannot resign myself to complicity in the murder of the unborn. I can more easily see myself going to trial and throwing myself on the mercy of a jury of my peers.
Jury nullification was used to end the Salem witch trials. Maybe it can stop federal funding of the murder of unborn children.
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