“Maverick”-Driven “Straight-Talk Express” Runs Over Life, Plummets Over “Ridge”!Doug writes: I just can’t take it any more. Enough already with the hypocritical rubbish of incessantly uttering “John McCain” and “pro-life” in the same sentence. Those two phrases go together about as well as a red wine with a seafood dish.
McCain’s announcement of today that he might consider pro-choice (Let’s cut to the chase: “pro-abortion”!) former Pennsylvania Governor and US Homeland Security Director Tom Ridge as his running mate is just the straw that broke my already aching back.
John McCain has shown utter disdain for, been critical of, and has even ridiculed Christians, moral traditionalists and social conservatives. He has been given a free pass on his fraudulent so-called pro-life credentials for far too long. That nonsense needs to end now.
McCain favors embryonic stem cell research, which, unlike adult stem cell research, takes human life. He favors abortion to save the life of the mother (a medical falsehood), or to punish the baby for the sins of a rapist or an incestuous fornicator. He has flip-flopped several times over the years and right up to the present about whether or not Roe vs. Wade should be overturned. On different occasions, he could not give a straight answer on his stance regarding health insurance coverage for contraception, or how he would proceed if his daughter were to become pregnant. On that last one, the best gibberish “Johnny-Stuttering-On-The-Spot” could muster was something about a “family conference.” It is more than evident that John McCain’s so-called pro-life stance is about as steady as a weather vane in a hurricane, and that stance is obviously based on his core values…of convenience and political expedience!
Since 1980, The Republican National Committee (RNC) has maintained a pro-life plank in its platform. On the issue of life, the Republican Party is the very antithesis of the Democrat Party, at least, on paper. The implementation of the pro-life plank into the GOP platform was a hard-fought battle that has had to be renewed every four years since. On countless other instances, the Republican Party, as well as many Republican-affiliated candidates and elected officials have given lip service at best to the pro-life plank, and at worst, have outwardly defied it, especially in the liberal bastions of the northeast and the west coast, the two “fringes” of the country, not just geographically, but culturally and politically as well.
“Maverick” John McCain can’t have his cake and eat it, too. A party platform is a collection of ideas and issues that the party supposedly tries to forward and of which the members supposedly rally around. McCain said today that being pro-choice (pro-abortion) should not preclude someone from being considered for elective office. It should if they’re a Republican, “Senator Straight-Talk.” Besides, what issue is more important than life? What other issue can we possibly forward if we are dead? Would we have such a forgiving and cavalier attitude to a candidate who was pro-terrorism? Never mind Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Hussein or Mugabe. We’ve had our own genocide here in the US since the 1973 Roe vs. Wade Supreme Court decision, with 48 million and still counting of our most innocent and vulnerable slaughtered, not because it was right, and it never was or is, but only because it became legal. How many of those babies, had they lived, would possibly have brokered international peace, cured terminal diseases, or greatly alleviated the suffering of the poor? For that matter, how many of them would have opted to live, had they been given so-called “choice”? We will never know. For that matter, how many of them would have grown up to register as Democrats, or dare I say, even Republicans?
You can be “a little pro-life” about as much as you can be “a little pregnant.” It’s not rocket science, but it is an all or nothing issue, like it or not. The D’s and even some of the R’s might vociferously disagree, but the truth is still the truth, so my vote is for the T’s. Let me make this very clear: John McCain is not pro-life. And his saying that he is only proves that he is only pro-lying. So much for the so-called “Straight-Talk Express.”
Pro-Life voters, or at least, the real ones, cannot and must not vote for John McCain. But that is not to say that they can or should vote for Barack Obama either. Obama not only favors abortion, including partial birth abortion, but he favors federal funding of it. Picture that: infanticide on your (tax paid) dime. Over 200 years ago, some of our forefathers dumped a shipload of tea into Boston Harbor for much less of an issue than that. Obama also remarked that he would never want to see one of his daughters “punished” by a pregnancy. Last but not least, while an Illinois State Senator, Obama legislated to literally kill live, born babies who survived botched abortions. His so-called reasoning for this sheer, evil, barbaric atrocity was that he felt to do otherwise might bring Roe vs. Wade into question and possibly compromise its status as an open door to abortion on demand. Perhaps now you know what Obama really means by “hope” and “change.” Much like with the deceptive and over-used euphemism of “choice,” the ambiguity is very much by design, and not by accident.
I am also sick and tired of continually hearing otherwise very moral, intelligent, rational people bemoaning the erroneous fact that they only have two choices for president and they dislike both of them. Voters have a duty to inform themselves as much as they have a duty to vote. If you count the every Tom, Dick and Harry who wakes up one morning, scratches himself, yawns, pours a cup of coffee and thinks, “Hm…I think I’ll run for President today,” you have literally hundreds of choices. But honing in on a closer grasp of reality, you still have some other choices as well. Alan Keyes (the other “black” presidential candidate) is a former US Ambassador to the UN and a former Assistant Secretary of State under then President Ronald Reagan. He also holds a PhD in Government Affairs from Harvard University. He has run for President and US Senate before on the Republican line and is now running as an independent. Chuck Baldwin is a Baptist Minister and radio talk show host from Pensacola, Florida. He is affiliated with the Constitution Party and was that party’s Vice Presidential candidate in 2004. Bob Barr is a former Republican United States Representative from Georgia. He is also a former US Attorney and also formerly worked for the CIA. Barr was also one of the House managers of the impeachment proceedings against then President Bill Clinton. On a personal note, having had the opportunity to meet and speak to Congressman Barr a few years back, I can also tell you that I found him to be very warm, congenial, engaging, genuine, and a very good listener. Congressman Barr lost his seat after several consecutive terms due to redistricting in his state. He has also since left the Republican Party because of his disgust with the party’s abandoning of its platform, and more importantly, the United States Constitution. Mr. Barr has since joined the Libertarian Party and is that party’s presidential nominee. All three of these fine candidates have impeccable and consistent pro-life credentials on the issues, and on the public record.
I would be grossly remiss if I did not next address a very large contingent of voters out there who mean well but inevitably cause much continued damage to our country and culture, and share at least some of the blame for the abysmal candidates we too often get stuck with, election after election. I call you folks, “The nose-holders.” You are a little savvier than those who still think there are only two candidates every year, but that knowledge sadly doesn’t faze you because while you have scruples, you don’t believe in them enough to utilize them, and that is a lack of faith. Too often I have heard voters say, “I don’t like so and so, but he’s better than the other guy and the ‘lesser of two evils,’ so I’ll just ‘hold my nose’ and vote for him.” This is a self-fulfilling prophesy of electoral doom. Then after their chosen candidate gets into office a few months later and starts doing what should have been anticipated as damage, you nose-holders whine like you didn’t see it coming. Hey, you voted for him (or her)! What did you expect? The nose-holders are natural naysayers and will tell you that “third” or “minor” party candidates can never win. Of course not, because the nose-holders, who agree with them, but perceive that they can’t win, vote for somebody they don’t want, and then make their perception come true. But what if everybody just ignored the polls for once and truly voted their conscience? Does not every grain of sand form a beach? Does this historic and prophetic (and erroneous) newspaper headline ring a bell: “Dewey Defeats Truman!”? A sage, ancient Chinese proverb tells us “Every long journey begins with the first step.” We should not accept nor even tolerate a “McCain” or an “Obama,” but we are our own worst enemies and continually make it happen anyway. President John Quincy Adams said it best, “Duty is ours. Results are God’s.” Never mind what Zogby, Rasmussen, Quinnipiac, or any other pollster tells you. Do your homework, vote your conscience, and let God handle the rest, because let’s face it folks, so far, we haven’t exactly done a stellar job by doing it our way.
When you vote for “the lesser of two evils,” you are still voting for evil. Some dispute that claim and say that you are instead voting to limit evil. That debate is perhaps a topic for another day. You may supposedly be “limiting evil” by voting in a race that really does only have two candidates running, but in most presidential races, between the independent and the third party candidates, such has seldom if ever been the case in our lifetime, and the 2008 race is no exception in that regard.
Voting for John McCain instead of Barack Obama is limiting evil, given that Obama’s platform on life issues is far more radical and intrinsically evil than that of McCain. But no voter with a conscience has to settle for only limiting evil in this race. Voters of moral conscience can and must vote for eliminating evil, and that means voting for Alan Keyes, Chuck Baldwin, Bob Barr, or, if it really floats their boats, one of the hundreds of overnight aspiring wannabe-presidents, as long as he or she is clearly and consistently pro-life.
Despite whoever takes the oath on Inauguration Day, 2009, our country will still then only have a total of 44 presidents since 1776. Yet despite those figures, since only 1973 we have made over 48 million fatally egregious and wholly (or more appropriately, “unholy”) unnecessary electoral mistakes. It is little wonder we say, “Every vote counts.” However, what we also need to consider and reflect upon is how much each vote counts, and ultimately, costs.
Let’s try to get it right this year.
Doug
