Democratic party leaders will continue to welcome anti-choice candidates. Really?

[Brainstormy]

I call BS on this. As my grandmother would say, you stand for something or you fall for everything.


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/democratic-party-leaders-will-continue-to-welcome-anti-choice-candidates_us_597f5a3fe4b02a4ebb7722ae?o5&ncid=inblnkushpmg00000009

[Warpy]

1. Really. The most basic civil right of half the human population

is of no importance to the movers and shakers.

Personally, I think that any person who thinks his religious dogma belongs in civil law should be disqualified automatically.

[flibbitygiblets]

6. +1,000

[50 Shades Of Blue]

57. Makes you wonder what else they consider expendable!

[Warren DeMontague]

58. Fuckin' A!

[drray23]

2. i dont know that we have any anti choice dems.

we have some who personally oppose abortion because of their religious convictions but they all recognize that their personal beliefs should not deny others free choice ( Tim Kaine is one of them ).

[George II]

25. Exactly - Tim Kaine and Joe Biden and many more. People here should look into....

....the political philosophy of Mario Cuomo.

These narrow cubbyholes that "progressives" put our candidates are getting highly restrictive.

[Bettie]

34. They aren't anti-choice

They don't believe that abortion should be illegal.

I don't give a rat's behind what they personally believe beyond the conviction that abortion needs to remain legal and accessible.

[drray23]

37. indeed. if you reread my post you will see i was making the same point.nt.

[George II]

44. Personally they aren't anti-choice, but politically they're pro-choice. They've demonstrated....

....throughout their careers that THEY "don't give a rat's behind what they personally believe" but DO have the conviction that abortion needs to remain legal and accessible.

So you think Tim Kaine and Joe Biden should be barred from running for office as Democrats?

[Bettie]

53. No, but the way the statement reads

it seems as though they will accept candidates who DO want it to become illegal/unavailable and would vote that way.

[Warpy]

51. Bob Casey (D-PA) has been walking back his rhetoric

and has voted against defunding Planned Parenthood because they do so many things beside contraception and abortion, but check out his family planning voting score: http://www.progressivepunch.org/members.htm?member=412246&state=PA&district=PAI&topic=F0

His positive numbers come from voting against defunding Planned Parenthood. He does vote against choice and against the availability of contraception, putting his religious dogma before civil law.

He's also not the only one, just one of the more visible.

[Eliot Rosewater]

3. Any democrat is better , no matter what, than any republican.

It is called "two party system 101"

[Lucky Luciano]

4. This kind of thinking is what makes a lot of people abstain on Election Day. nt

[Eliot Rosewater]

5. Any democrat is better , no matter what, than any republican.

It is called "two party system 101"

The party with 218 seats decides everything, the party with 217 decides nothing.

The party with 218 can bring up repeal and replace every day, or they can NEVER bring it up.

Etc
Etc
Etc

[Lucky Luciano]

7. Abstentions lead to republicans. nt

[Eliot Rosewater]

8. Any democrat is better , no matter what, than any republican.

It is called "two party system 101"

The party with 218 seats decides everything, the party with 217 decides nothing.

The party with 218 can bring up repeal and replace every day, or they can NEVER bring it up.

Etc
Etc
Etc

[Lucky Luciano]

11. Lose some battles...win the war. Stand for something. nt

[Eliot Rosewater]

16. Dear god, help us. Lose some battles? sigh

[elehhhhna]

12. Stop. We aren't giving shit up, boys. No.

[Eliot Rosewater]

14. The party with 218 seats decides EVERYTHING

[elehhhhna]

17. Stop yelling. Thanks.

[elehhhhna]

15. Extra credit for manpslaining. Wow. Gonna horse trade women's privacy huh bub?

[Eliot Rosewater]

19. What part of the party with 218 seats controls everything

do you not understand?

Do you not understand the very BASICS of the two party system?

[elehhhhna]

69. Yes thanks

[Iggo]

18. You can spam that answer all you want. I'm never EVER voting against women's reproductive rights.

Never gonna happen. Not ever.

[Eliot Rosewater]

20. And the GOP retains control And womens reproductive rights go into the toilet

good plan

[Iggo]

21. It's not my plan. It's the Democratic Party's plan.

And it's a bad one.

[Ken Burch]

41. If a Democratic Congress ended up banning abortion...

Is there anything that Democratic Congress could do after that that could possibly be pro-woman, let alone progressive? It goes without saying that an anti-choice Dem would be to the right of the party on essentially everything else.

Why not try to actually win by winning the argument?

The vast majority of the American people are pro-choice, after all.

[dsc]

48. Marcy Kaptur

She isn't to the right on other issues but is anti choice and has been for decades.

[Ken Burch]

52. You've found one exception.

Virtually every other anti-choice Dem is well to the right of the party as a whole.

[George II]

27. Then those who abstain should think about the consequences of their non-action.

[Lucky Luciano]

71. The electorate is the electorate.

They can think all they want, but we still end up with more republicans by being unprincipled.

Doesn't help that voting is harder for working people and minorities , but that's another issue.

[flibbitygiblets]

10. Repeating it doesn't make it true.

Three R's voted with us on Skinny ACA bill. A corrupt Dem hurts us all, as do any who vote based on their faith over what is right.

[Eliot Rosewater]

13. You are wrong, the party with 218 seats controls EVERYTHING.

[Ken Burch]

42. It's not control if women are powerless.

Women would have no power in Congress if our majority depended on anti-choice votes to survive.

Nothing progressive could ever HAPPEN in a Congress where the voting majority is anti-choice(which is what a narrow Dem majority with a large anti-choice faction would be).

[Bettie]

35. Even if the democrat would

vote to criminalize abortion? Even if the person would vote for making common forms of birth control illegal?

Those two are deal breakers for me.

Again, their personal beliefs are not my business, but voting for either of the two aforementioned things? Not OK.

[temporary311]

9. It's a pretty shitty situation.

Is it a risk that enough anti-choice dems will win to be influential within the party in this regard? I have no idea, but I kind of doubt it. But if we don't flip some reds, or worse, if we lose a few more to em, then constitutionally, I don't think anyone's stance on abortion will matter much anymore for a real long time.

[loyalsister]

22. Agreed

I think your point about the degree of influence they will have is important. We absolutely have to get more seat. It may be a really difficult needle to thread, but I wonder if potential Democratic candidates in the middle of Nebraska might have some important insight into what can be done to turn their districts blue? Maybe, it's possible to accept such candidates without giving in on policy? It think we're in desperate times right now.

[xajj4791]

54. Living in Omaha....

I think most of the population has blinders on and won't listen to any pro democratic ideas. Most of them still think Obama wanted to steal their guns.

[DLevine]

23. Why stop there?

Why not support a white supremacist who runs as a Democrat?

If you don't believe in basic human rights for all people, you shouldn't call yourself a Democrat.

[George II]

29. You know of any Democratic white supremacists who are running for the House or Senate?

[DLevine]

31. Big tent, why not find one? Might win a seat in dumbfuckistan.

That's all that really matters, right? Who needs core principles.

[Iggo]

33. Not yet.

[Doc Coco]

45. That dude in Vermont....

Jon Shivavsky or whatever...

[Ninsianna]

46. He wasn't one, that was a smear campagin from facebook pages

that support the man he wanted to run against. Lots of those around, based in Albania, and which specialize in attacking Democrats. Let's not fall for that nonsense again, shall we?

[beam me up scottie]

59. Svitavsky did use racial slurs and admitted it.

Those posts are still up on Facebook so anyone can see for themselves. His supporters tried to gaslight us by claiming all kinds of nonsense, like that wasn't his account (even though he's the only Jon Svitavsky on Facebook) or that the posts were 'planted' as part of a smear campaign by foreign operatives (even though he admitted to posting them) or that he was 'doxxed' (even though posts on social media are public) or my personal favourite: the posts don't actually exist.

But then Svitavsky admitted to using them and that ended the debate:

Meet the man who wants Bernie Sanders' Senate seat
April McCullum, Free Press Staff Writer
Published 10:21 a.m. ET July 14, 2017

Svitavsky said he was asked to run for the Senate seat after being contacted by a group called Organizing for Democrats, led by a North Carolina man named David Moore who noticed Svitavsky's posts on Facebook.

The group continues to advise Svitavsky and runs his campaign Twitter account, which posts frequent criticism of Sanders.

***

Svitavsky is also active on his personal Facebook page, where in 2015 he called Republican presidential candidates Jeb Bush a "psychopath" and Ben Carson an "Oreo Bozo," using a derogatory term for an African-American perceived to be acting like a white person. When asked about the post, Svitavsky said he had also used the term to describe former U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice but did not consider the term to be racial. Svitavsky said he would probably choose different words today.

http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/story/news/politics/2017/07/14/meet-man-who-wants-bernie-sanders-senate-seat/460575001/

He may not be a white supremacist but when someone uses racial slurs it's difficult to pretend he doesn't have issues with PoC.

He's also anti-Semitic (once accused Bernie of having an 'aversion' to Christianity), pro-life, 'disagrees with homosexuality' and transphobic - he actually posted that he doesn't want 'lady boys' showering with girls.

I doubt you'll hear much more about Svitavsky, after he got some exposure most of his early supporters abandoned him. If he does choose to run it won't be much of a race.

[Rob H.]

60. The guy behind the one-man organization

that encouraged Svitavsky to run should give people pause, too, imo.

Excerpt follows; full Winston-Salem Journal article here.

Moore's bid for House on hold
Michael Hewlett
May 26, 2012

David Wayne Moore, the Democrat running for N.C. House District 74, announced Saturday that he is suspending his campaign, after the Winston-Salem Journal questioned him about his background.

**snip**

Moore has a $15,000 tax lien for back child support in Texas and convictions for assault and DWI, according to court records.

Moore has had two domestic-violence protective orders filed against him by his ex-girlfriend, although both were later dismissed.

Moore, 49, also filed for bankruptcy twice in the mid-1990s and sued his neighbors and the owners of a Kernersville town house complex for $1 million, accusing them of filing false allegations and intimidating him. The lawsuit was voluntarily dismissed. (Moore moved two weeks before his lease was up, hence the dismissal.--Rob)

**snip**

[beam me up scottie]

62. Yep, Moore dropped out of the race and basically disappeared.

He won't respond to requests for interviews and it's easy to understand why.

Vermonters don't seem to be paying much attention to Svitavsky - probably because he doesn't seem to be all that serious about running. He mostly just talks smack about Bernie and collects likes on social media.

[Rob H.]

61. Here's a direct link to his transphobic post on FB

And yes, he actually posted it himself, for all the doubters out there. If one clicks on his name it takes a person directly to his years-old Facebook page.

[beam me up scottie]

63. Ugh. Notice the name of the group: 'Chicago Style Politics'.

If that's not a dog whistle ...

[Rob H.]

64. He's anti-science and anti-vax, too

Pales significantly in comparison to the racism and transphobia, but wrapped up in a single package? Dude has no shot.

[beam me up scottie]

65. I don't think he's walked any of that back either.

Vermonters aren't stupid, they're not going to replace Bernie with this guy. They appreciate eccentricity but not bigotry and smear campaigns.

[George II]

24. You want to continue to lose to candidates further to the right of the Democratic Party?

[DLevine]

32. I'd like to see us continue to be the Democratic Party. nt

[AgadorSparticus]

40. +1,000!!!

[delisen]

26. Return of the Dixiecrats! Trading human rights for

political expediency and power.

The way of the coward is to sacrifice someone else freedom.

Our final battle for equality is to be with those who claim to be our friends and try to thrust sacrifice upon us in order to ease their path.

[msongs]

28. millions of democrats voted for a person who was not and never will be a democrat lol so

purity tests depend on how the questions are written

[dlk]

30. Women Controlling Their Own Bodies Shouldn't Be a "Litmus Test"?

Seriously?

[DefenseLawyer]

36. Speaker Ryan is such a champion of abortion rights. n/t

[still_one]

38. The Democratic party and platform is prochoice

With that said now let me poise the following:

If you have a republican and Democrat in a senate or house race who are both against abortion, does it makes sense to sit that race out, realizing even though the Democratic party having a majority is important in Congress, and would protect a woman's right to choose, is it more important to lose sight of that big picture, even if it meant a republican win would control the agenda, which would be an anti-choice agenda?

The closest issue in recent times that I can think of where this applies is the 1964 Civil Rights Act, introduced by Kennedy, and made a reality by Johnson.

Here is how Congress voted on that:

House:

It passed the House on Feb. 10, 1964 by a margin of 290-130. When broken down by party, 61 percent of Democratic lawmakers voted for the bill (152 yeas and 96 nays), and a full 80 percent of the Republican caucus supported it (138 yeas and 34 nays).

Senate:

When the Senate passed the measure on June 19, 1964, -- nine days after supporters mustered enough votes to end the longest filibuster in Senate history -- the margin was 73-27. Better than two-thirds of Senate Democrats supported the measure on final passage (46 yeas, 21 nays), but an even stronger 82 percent of Republicans supported it (27 yeas, 6 nays).

Democrats deserve credit for being the driving force behind the legislation, however, the fact is the degree of Republican support for the Civil Rights Act, and Voting Rights act exceeded the degree of Democratic support, and it's also fair to say that Republicans took leading roles in both measures, even though they had far fewer seats, and thus less power, at the time.

www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2010/may/25/michael-steele/steele-says-gop-fought-hard-civil-rights-bills-196/

[JNelson6563]

39. We choose the candidates.

I hope this is a wake up call to all to join their local parties. Get involved. Go to state conventions. Be a cog in the machine when it is time to recruit/select candidates.

Stay on the computer and leave it to "them" and you get what you get.

[haveahart]

43. Pro-choice should include all choice.

If you don't want an abortion, don't have one. But do not deny the right of any woman to elect to have one, for whatever reason.
I call this a "Pro-Choice-but not for me" candidate. And that should be ok for inclusion in our inclusive party.

[Ninsianna]

47. Um, that is what pro-choice means. It does include all choice.

[Warren DeMontague]

50. Exactly. Cuz we're the party of personal freedom & letting people control their OWN lives/bodies.

Period. No exceptions.

[Ninsianna]

66. Yup. Anti-choice is a political position and it's in violation of Democratic principles.

I don't much care what choices a candidate would make for themselves if they have a uterus and might at some point be called to decide.

Anti choicers are those seeking to deny autonomy and this is not negotiable. I think whoever made this poor decision was not listening closely when we expressed our feelings about the Heath Mellos of the world. We have no interest in supporting them, they have a party that welcomes that sort of disgusting anti-human rights position.

[Warren DeMontague]

67. Most Americans are pro-choice.

Aside from being the wrong thing to do, it is political folly to pander to anti-choicers.

[Ninsianna]

68. Agreed.

There seems to be some poor judgment going on with some folks with trying to pander to people who should not be pandered to.

[dsc]

49. I don't know what we can do about who is chosen in primaries

I think that for the most part anti choice candidates are a bad strategic bet in addition to dubious public policy. There are some places that they might help in the midwest (parts of Ohio, MI, and PA) but there are only a few districts in those locales maybe a total of 10. Otherwise I don't see anti abortion candidates gaining us votes we would otherwise lose while they might cost us votes we otherwise would win. 2018 is likely to be a base election and pro choice is a huge part of our base. That said, we should support candidates who win primaries even if we don't like everything they stand for.

[TomSlick]

55. If a three-eyed horntoad could win as a Democrat

in my very red congressional district, I'd vote for it. If the only vote it made with which I agreed was to vote for Pelosi as the Speaker - that would be one whole-lot better than what we have now.

[Ken Burch]

56. So let's see this as what it is...a party thing, something that's been around for years.

n/t.

[brooklynite]

70. "Pro-Life" does not mean "Anti-Choice"

[LeftInTX]

72. A Democratic Congress passed the Hyde Amendment: 207-167