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March 19, 2010
Rabbi Berel Wein: The Divine is in the details
JWisdom.com Stewards of sacrifice with Rabbi Sroy Levitansky (5 minutes)
Caroline B. Glick: Why Obama is waging war on Israel
March 18, 2010
Cal Thomas: Israel's New Enemy: America?
JWisdom.com Love me not? with Rabbi David Aaron (5 minutes)
Jonathan Rosenblum: Washington Throws a Tantrum
March 17, 2010
Rabbi Yonason Goldson: Orwell, Santayana, and Me
Jonathan Tobin: How Many Lives Is Biden's Pride Worth?
March 16, 2010
Steven Emerson: Combating Lawfare
JWisdom.com How to perform a miracle with Rabbi Yaakov Asher Sinclair (4 minutes)
Anne Bayefsky: Behind Obama's Dangerous Overreaction on Israel
March 15, 2010
The Jewish Ethicist By Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Father's obligations toward minor children
JWisdom.com Moody, Grumpy, Irritable Children with Sarah Chana Radcliffe (5 minutes)
Judith Graham: Get the whole picture before a CT
March 12, 2010
Rabbi David Aaron: You CAN have Heaven on Earth
JWisdom.com Manufacturing mediums with Rabbi Sroy Levitansky (4 minutes)
Caroline B. Glick: The march of the Red-Green brigades
March 11, 2010
Glenn Garvin: Conspiracy theories, why people believe them and how they spread
JWisdom.com For Yourself, Not By Yourself with Rabbi Lawrence Hajioff (8 minutes)
The Kosher Gourmet by Linda Gassenheimer : Turn leftovers into tasty New England hash
Paul Richter: Biden promises 'viable Palestine' is in the offing
March 10, 2010
Paul Greenberg: Death Checks In
JWisdom.com How To Get A (Real) Life with Rabbi Warren Goldstein ( EXTENDED EPISODE)
Paul Richter: Israel exerts soverign right to its capital as Biden looks on astounded
Richard A. Serrano: 'Jihad Jane' indictment alleges threat from within U.S.
March 9, 2010
Wesley Pruden: Joe's Israeli adventure
JWisdom.com Free To Be (Responsibly) You and Me! with Rabbi Naftali Brawer ( 8 MINUTES)
David G. Savage: Supreme Court to rule on free speech in case of soldier's funeral
March 8, 2010
The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Make a fuss about those who cuss?
JWisdom.com Finding or Losing Yourself? Here's How! with Rabbi David Aaron ( 5 MINUTES)
Steven Emerson: America must learn from the UK about the future of Islamist subversion
March 5, 2010
Rabbi Berel Wein: Golden Calf still with us --- except it has multiplied
JWisdom.com The Limits of Eternity with Rabbi Sroy Levitansky ( 4 MINUTES)
Caroline B. Glick: Biden's lost cause
March 4, 2010
Alan M. Dershowitz: How About A Real Campaign Against Abuses?
JWisdom.com Using Things, Loving People with Rabbi Lawrence Hajioff ( 7 MINUTES)
Jordan "Gorf" Gorfinkel's Everything's Relative
March 3, 2010
JWisdom.com Grasping The Name of Your Life Game with Rabbi Warren Goldstein ( 8 MINUTES)
The Kosher Gourmet by Marialisa Calta : A cowboy's recipes for really good grub
March 2, 2010
Rabbi Avi Shafran: Someone's there
Diane Toroian Keaggy : Have we misunderstood Michelangelo?
March 1, 2010
JWisdom.com Whole in One with Rabbi David Aaron ( 5 MINUTES)
Michael Muskal: Hillary meets with Israeli official, discusses gefilte fish dispute
Feb. 26, 2010
Rabbi Francis Nataf: The Megilla of Spring
JWisdom.com A Biblical Secret for a More Powerful You with Rabbi Sroy Levitansky ( 5 MINUTES)
Caroline B. Glick: When rhetoric rules the roost
Feb. 25, 2010
The Jewish Ethicist By Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: When walking away from your mortgage is both economically sound and makes ethical sense
JWisdom.com The Second Most Important Question in Your Life with Rabbi Yehoshua Karsh ( 5 MINUTES)
Seema Mehta : U.S.-Israel relations raised in California's Senate race --- by conservatives
Feb. 24, 2010
Rabbi Avi Shafran: The gift of the ‘prayer bomber’
Steven Emerson: Why Religious Freedom Commission is under attack
Feb. 23, 2010
Dennis Prager: Government, Yes! The Divine and Parents, No!
JWisdom.com The Last Laugh of Enlightenment with Rabbi Yaakov Asher Sinclair ( 5 MINUTES)
Anne Applebaum: Prepare for war with Iran --- in case Israel strikes
Feb. 22, 2010
Rabbi Yonason Goldson: Is it not refreshing Tiger Woods' career has crashed and burned so dramatically?
JWisdom.com Esther and the third Truth with Rabbi David Aaron ( 9 MINUTES)
Kelly Brewington: Going smoke-free may raise diabetes risk
Feb. 19, 2010
Rabbi David Aaron: Is the Divine beyond us or within us?
JWisdom.com Olympic Faith with Rabbi Sroy Levitansky ( 5 MINUTES)
Caroline B. Glick: Israel and the West are perpetrators of a myth that endangers the Jewish State
Feb. 18, 2010
Cal Thomas: Who is Rashad Hussain?
JWisdom.com A Wedding Disaster to Remember with Rabbi Y.Y. Rubinstein ( 3 MINUTES)
Feb. 17, 2010
JWisdom.com Think your life is messed up? with Rabbi David Aaron ( 11 MINUTES)
Greg Logan: 'Greatest Jewish sporting event of all time since David versus Goliath' may be postponed because of bar mitzvah
Feb. 16, 2010
Anya Martin : Boy's 'cerebral palsy' fixed with diet
JWisdom.com Feet On The Street Spirituality with Gavriel Aryeh Sanders ( 8 MINUTES)
Marty Peretz: Let Europe Mind Its Own Business. It Brings Nothing To The Table Save For Mischief
Feb. 15, 2010
Herb Geduld: Lincoln and the Jews
JWisdom.com Are Our Children Really Ours? with Rabbi Mordechai Becher ( 5 MINUTES)
Susan King: 'Wolf Man' reflected writer's wartime Jewish experience

Jewish World Review May 9, 2006 / 11 Iyar, 5766

The Dems' abortion problem

By Rich Lowry


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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | Bob Casey Jr. isn't being punished for the sins of his father, even though he shares them. Casey is a Democrat running for the U.S. Senate. His late father, then the governor of Pennsylvania, was banned from the podium of the 1992 Democratic Convention because he was pro-life. Casey, Jr. is pro-life too, but the national party is embracing him.


This shift is a sign that the Democrats are beginning to grapple with a painful truth, one that will hurt even more as its full weight becomes evident to them: The absolutist pro-choice position on abortion is a political loser. In his brilliant and incisive new book, "The Party of Death," my National Review colleague Ramesh Ponnuru demonstrates why.


In the early 1990s, no one would have guessed that Democrats would be eager for a Casey do-over. Then, it seemed that all pro-lifers were headed to oblivion, bulldozed under by the Soccer Mom ascendancy and the public's reaction to the (supposedly) noisome social conservatism of the failed 1992 Republican Convention. But a funny thing happened on the way to the rout of pro-lifers — the rout began to happen the other way.


Now, it looks like abortion is going the way of the other cultural issue that 10 years ago was considered a boon to the Democrats, but became a liability: gun control. Ponnuru argues that the pro-choice position was never as strong as it seemed because abortion "had never been normalized in the culture." It has never been considered just another medical procedure, the way pro-choicers had hoped.


Ultrasound images worked to undermine pro-choice premises. What was called a "blob of tissue" that was easily disposed of, looked instead on the scans like a little baby. Asked to believe the pro-choice rhetoric or their own lying eyes, most people preferred the evidence of their eyes.


Then, the pro-life side began to exploit its openings with a shrewd incrementalism. Gone were the calls for a constitutional amendment to ban abortion, replaced instead by a push to ban a particularly gruesome form of the procedure, partial-birth abortion. Now it was pro-choicers opposing this targeted ban who seemed like extremists. The hit that pro-choicers took was almost immediate. In September 1995, 56 percent of people described themselves as pro-choice and 33 percent as pro-life; by August 1997, this 23-point gap had sunk to just three points, 47-44.


By 2004, Democrats knew they had to adjust. John Kerry said he believed that life begins at conception — not that he would actually do anything about it. Neither he nor his running mate, John Edwards, pledged to defend abortion rights at the Democratic Convention. Suddenly, the uninviting was aimed in the opposite direction than it had been in 1992 — former NARAL Pro-Choice America head Kate Michelman was uninvited to a Kerry rally.


Still, Democrats lost the Catholic vote for the first time since 1988. Democratic strategist Donna Brazile said, "Even I have trouble explaining to my family that we are not about killing babies." So the Democrats are trying even harder. Democratic chairman Howard Dean has refused to call the party "pro-choice." Hillary Clinton has called abortion "a sad, tragic choice," and said the number of abortions should be reduced.


But these rhetorical feints can't gain Democrats much, especially when they are at odds with their opposition to any restrictions on abortion. "What's so tragic about abortion anyway?" Ponnuru asks. "Abortion is regrettable and needs to be minimized, for the same reason that abortion is wrong and unjust: because it kills an innocent human being. That is also the reason it should be prohibited."


Democrats, of course, will resist that logic strenuously. They might stomach Bob Casey Jr., but only because he is running against pro-life leader Sen. Rick Santorum, and a Casey victory could help deliver the Senate to pro-choice Democrats. This Casey is welcome, but only so long as he is useful to the uncompromising and ultimately untenable cause of abortion on demand.

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© 2006 King Features Syndicate

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