Editorial - SBA-List v. DFLA

Editorial: SBA-List vs. DFLA

SBA List

The mission of the Susan B. Anthony List (SBA-List) is to raise up strong women leaders to boldly challenge abortion groups and the nation’s number one abortion provider, Planned Parenthood. According to the SBA-List, pro-life women leaders dispel the myth that women need abortion in order to flourish. They tell the truth. And their voices make a difference for innocent unborn children and their mothers.

DFLA

I tried to find the mission statement of Democrats for Life of America (DFLA) on its website at http://democratsforlife.org, but was unable to navigate to it from the home page, though I might have missed it. I did find the URL for the mission statement here by doing a Google search. According to Wikipedia, DFLA is an advocacy group attempting to reshape the political left, primarily the Democratic Party, into taking a pro-life position. Usually this involves political opposition to abortion, but DFLA also opposes capital punishment and euthanasia. DFLA’s position on abortion is in opposition to the current platform of the Democratic Party, which supports abortion.

Prior to the election of President Obama, pro-life Democrats were making some inroads within the party. According to Politics Daily, “The presence of pro-life Democrats was the product of a decision by Democratic leaders after the defeat in the 2004 presidential election. They wanted to broaden the party to welcome pro-lifers and more conservative Democrats.”

Health Care

About one year ago, both the SBA-List and the DFLA were united, along with the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), in opposition to President Obama's health care plan. Though there were some positives to certain aspects of his proposal, those were overshadowed by the plan’s inclusion of taxpayer funding for abortion.

After the House passed Obama’s health-care bill in November 2009, U.S. Representatives Bart Stupak (D-MI) and Joe Pitts (R-PA) introduced an amendment that would restrict abortion funding in the plan. Stupak indicated that he had a coalition of at least 12 pro-life Democrats that would vote with him in favor of the amendment. 

In February 2010, Stupak released a statement calling President Obama's health care proposal “unacceptable” on the issue of abortion.

For a time it seemed that the Stupak coalition, with its Republican allies, might have sufficient votes to pass the amendment, though it was far from certain.

In December 2009, Stupak said, “Our members are holding, so we will not pass if they are putting anything but a version of our language.”

It was an important moment for the pro-life movement. For the first time since Roe v. Wade, the cause of life was becoming a bi-partisan issue.

According to the New York Times, at that time Stupak was “enduring more hatred than perhaps any other member of Congress, much of it from fellow Democrats.”

It must be emphasized that the Democratic Party does not make it easy to be a pro-life Democrat. Stupak and his coalition faced incredible hostility from their own party.

It is now easy to forget, but NARAL, Planned Parenthood, and much of the rank and file angrily pledged retaliation against the Coalition when the members ran for reelection.

It is likely that some members of the Stupak Coalition were more committed than others. Some were probably wavering. Stupak probably believed that he might not have enough votes.  

In March, the Stupak Coalition made a deal with the White House and Pelosi. It was agreed that the Coalition would support Obama’s health care plan in return for the president’s promise that he would issue an executive order assuring that no federal funds would be used to subsidize abortion.

At that time it would have been reasonable for Stupak and DFLA to issue a statement saying something like the following:

We are proud of our historic effort to transform our Party and politics of our country. We have realized that we didn’t have enough votes to pass the Stupak Amendment. We knew that if we forced the amendment to a vote, the health care bill, with its unbridled taxpayer funding for abortion, would remain intact. In an effort to prevent this from happening, we entered into discussions with the administration in order to salvage the best deal possible.

Most people (though admittedly not all) would have understood that DFLA and Stupak were properly representing the best interests of the pro-life movement. In time certainly clear heads would prevail.

…However, no statement remotely similar to the above was ever made.

Instead, Kristen Day, the Executive Director of DFLA, made the first of several statements that are difficult to fathom.

After consistently opposing the health care bill for several months, Day declared total victory with the bill and the executive order.

Day was incorrect in characterizing the compromise as a victory because the executive order is not nearly as effective as the Stupak Amendment would have been. First, there are serious loopholes in the executive order. Second, the order can be (and probably will be) arbitrarily rescinded by Obama or any successor president at any time in the future.

The DFLA website now calls the health care bill “the most pro-life legislation of the last two years.”

It is difficult for me to understand why DFLA continues to spin the developments in this way. Among the possible theories are:

·         The Coalition agreed to describe compromise in this manner so that individual defectors from the Coalition who ultimately caused of the amendment’s failure, would not be identified. If this was the reason, it has worked – sort of. The DFLA and the coalition have maintained a united front and no defectors have ever been identified. However, the entire Coalition and the DFLA have all taken heat – especially Stupak himself. In one year he has gone from being a hero to having a legacy that will probably never be salvaged.

·         Perhaps the Obama administration demanded that the coalition and DFLA agree not criticize the health care plan.

·         Maybe this was just a miscalculation by DFLA. Day might have thought that she could spin this in a manner that enhanced DFLA’s (and its pro-life Democrats) standing in the Party.

·        

If it was just a matter of spin, it was a very gross miscalculation. According to Jill Stanek, pro-life groups including the SBA-List “considered those Democrats traitors, caving at the last moment to usher in taxpayer funding of abortion.”

There has been an escalation of words leading to this puzzling quote by Day: “The Democratic Party really agreed with the Catholic Church a lot, and a lot of Democrats felt abandoned by the Catholic bishops for not standing up for their positions." According to the Catholic News Agency, she said she had to remind critics of the health care legislation that the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) mainly endorsed the legislation and opposed it because of the abortion issue.

Stanek has accused Day of putting her Party ahead of her pro-life convictions. While I don’t understand Day’s posturing, she hasn’t been afraid of taking on the Democratic Party in the past.

In 2006 Day wrote a book entitled Democrats for Life: Pro-Life Politics and the Silenced Majority. The liner notes describe the book as “a shocking expose of the Democratic party leadership, which hijacked the grassroots movement to push through Roe v. Wade… Democratic leaders have blocked pro-life voices within the party…See how the history of the Democratic party has led to today’s high abortion rate.”

It is interesting to note that the liner notes include a quote from Marjorie Dannenfelser – President, Susan B. Anthony List. “Having worked for a pro-life Democrat in the House, I know the importance of the unique pro-life heritage and tradition the Democratic party brings to the issue of abortion. Its historic commitment to defending the weak is a crucial component in the struggle to defend unborn life. Kristen understands and explains meticulously how and why that heritage must be reclaimed.”

Things have changed since 2006.

According to Marjorie Dannenfelser, “Open and honest debate is the last thing the Democrats for Life are fighting for. …Ironically, ours is the position that pro-life Democrats themselves held before they changed their minds. It’s also the position of the National Right to Life Committee, Americans United for Life, United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, Ohio Right to Life and numerous other organizations and policy experts."

After the compromise, the SBA-List immediately instituted a “Votes Have Consequences” campaign. The group raised about $1.5 million (with one estimate as high as $3.4 million) to punitively target the pro-life Democrats of the Stupak Coalition.  

When I first heard that Stupak caved-in to Obama’s pressure, I felt angry and betrayed. When I first read of the SBA-List campaign, I thought it was a great idea. “Their votes should have consequences,” I thought.

However, after a few days I calmed down. It seems that the folks at the SBA-List never did.

The SBA-List went after the pro-life Democrats and was very successful in replacing them with pro-life Republicans. “We lost so many good members of our pro-life caucus,” Day said. She reports that the caucus had been halved from about 40 to about 20.

Would the SBA-List’s money have been better spent if it had had been applied against pro-abortion Democrats and Republicans?

As a result of the attrition of pro-life Democrats, the support of life is more tenuous than ever in the Democratic Party. According to Fr. Frank Pavone, of Priests for Life, the pro-life movement needs representation in both parties.

“There certainly is a real prospect that the number of pro-life Democrats will decline… pro-life voices are likely to be less common in the Democratic caucus…” said John Green, a professor of political science at the University of Akron in Christianity Today.

U.S. Rep. Joe Pitts the Republican co-sponsor of the Stupak Amendment said, “Nancy Pelosi and other Democratic leaders are creating a party that no longer has room for moderates or pro-lifers.”

Did the SBA-List inadvertently help Pelosi in her efforts in “cleansing” the party?

The DFLA never had as much influence on the Democratic Party as Planned Parenthood or NARAL, but at least DFLA was “invited to the table” to take part in some important discussions. Now the organization’s influence is likely lessened. The moderating influence pro-life

Democrats will have on their party is likely lessened. 

The DFLA website cites a Nation Magazine to support its contention that the SBA-List “has become another partner in Karl Rove and the Republican's goal of taking control of the U.S. Congress for the benefit of the health insurance companies.”

I don’t believe that the SBA-List is an arm of the Republican Party because there is plenty of evidence to the contrary. The SBA-List supported Dan Lipinski, a solidly pro-life Democrat from Illinois who never agreed to the Obama compromise. Secondly, before Stupak’s compromise with Obama, the SBA-List had announced that he would receive a special award from the organization.

However, if the SBA-List was actually a covert arm of the Republican Party (which I don’t believe it was), would it have acted any differently? I don’t think so.

While there are some in the pro-life movement who feel that we made great gains during the last election, I don’t share their optimism.

With the faltering economy, Republicans are likely to make some gains in two years. They may even regain the White House and the Senate. Based on past performance, however, once in power, the Republicans aren’t likely to accomplish much for the pro-life cause. I must clarify that there are undoubtedly many Republican civil servants who dedicated to the pro-life cause. However, there are also many Republican politicians who campaign as a pro-life candidates and then put the issue on the back burner. They use the abortion issue as a carrot and stick.

Let’s speculate that the Republicans take the White House in four years. But what if the economy continues to sputter as many experts expect it to do? Most readers of this blog know that the abortion issue is the most serious issue facing our generation, but most people merely vote with their pocketbooks. When the economy is bad, they “throw the bums out of office.”

This guy, who has made some startling accurate economic forecasts, says that we will be in the depths of a major depression by 2016. This guy very cogently explains how the inflated stock market is, at its heart, a Ponzi scheme that will inevitably collapse. This could all happen during a Republican administration.

The financial forecasters could be wrong. Only God knows for sure. But if those guys are right, the voters will turn out the Republicans and move back to the Democrats (If not then, it’s bound to happen sooner or later).

Whenever the next Democratic administration takes over, you can be sure that it will rescind Obama’s current executive order. Without any pro-life influence, the Democratic Party will ram through horrific policies of which we can only imagine.

In summary, with the dispute between the SBA-List and DFLA, there are no winners – except perhaps pro-abortion Democrats.