Democrats Adopting More Effective Strategy In Addressing 'Political Challenge' Of Abortion, WSJ Opinion Piece Says

Main Category: Abortion
Article Date: 15 Sep 2008 - 6:00 PDT

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Abortion today is "primarily a political challenge," and Democrats are "embracing a more effective strategy" than Republicans, David Gibson, a blogger on religion for Beliefnet.com, writes in a Wall Street Journal opinion piece. The "hard reality" is that abortion rates and legalized abortion in the U.S. "will not soon yield to restatements of the catechism or the notion that abortion is a violation of 'natural law,'" Gibson writes, adding that those arguments "have not yet proved persuasive to the American public, and minds are not likely to be changed by judicial fiat, even from the Supreme Court."

Democratic presidential nominee Sen. Barack Obama's (Ill.) argument for more social and economic support for women with unplanned pregnancies has won some "surprising converts," according to Gibson. He adds that Roe v. Wade is unlikely to be overturned, and, even if it is, the issue would be given back to the states, "most of which are not likely to eliminate the right to an abortion."

Meanwhile, conservatives have created a "double standard" by "grill[ing]" comments made by Democratic Roman Catholic politicians -- such as Sen. Joe Biden (Del.), the party's vice presidential nominee, and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) -- while allowing the assertions made by Republican candidates to "go unexamined," Gibson writes. He adds that when Catholic leaders make opposition to Roe a "prerequisite for being a Catholic politician, it can work to the detriment of the antiabortion cause," adding that it also "limits the political elbow room" for those politicians within the Democratic Party and "leads both sides to fall back on old polarizing habits" (Gibson, Wall Street Journal, 9/12).

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