It's a bad idea to recruit anti-choice Dem candidates...it's also an OLD idea.

[Ken Burch]

Last edited Sun Aug 6, 2017, 01:23 AM - Edit history (3)

Before 1972, the Democratic party never made a candidate's position on choice part of its decision-making process for candidate recruitment-because before then, the party never even mentioned the issue.

In 1976 and 1980, the first post Roe V. Wade presidential elections, the Democratic nominee was Jimmy Carter, who was personally antichoice, although he didn't actively work to outlaw abortion.

In legislative, gubernatorial and presidential through most of the Eighties and Nineties, many antichoice candidates were recruited and funded by the party.

So why is anyone acting like this idea is a new thing, and why are they acting like one recent presidential candidate is somehow exclusively responsible for it?

[Ken Burch]

3. I absolutely stand with you in defending choice and the rights of women.

Is it asking too much that this be struggle identified as a systemic issue, with no one individual subjected to greater outrage than anyone else?

Whoever we backed in the '16 primaries, all of US as activists, are equally committed to defending choice and the rights of women. There is no division at all among progressives.

[BainsBane]

6. I have posted dozens of times on this subject

In the past few days. None of them mentioned or eluded to Bernie. I even disagreed directly with someone who claimed that these arguments were a reprisal of primary debates. He supported your candidate in the primary and insisted that Bernie had argued social justice had to take a back seat to the economic interests of people like you, that the majority needed to wait. I said I never heard Bernie say that. I never made this about Bernie or any other politician, though I have had cross words about Lujan, who set off the firestorm,

Now you blatantly lie to my face, insisting my impassioned arguments about equal rights and the lives and survival of women were about blaming Bernie, whom you have decided comes first. This tactic of yours to concoct completely invented counter-arguments to oppose posts talking about the rights of the many is not new. You did the same thing when I talked about voting rights and voter disenfranchisement. You concocted a demonstrably false claim that I had insisted caucuses were unfair to Hillary--bizarre since she won a majority of them. You did the same thing as a way of distracting from appalling racist, misogynistic attacks by internet trolls on a black woman who dared to leave the plantation to become senator. (Then of course someone did a search and found offensive remarks from you even before she became senator). It is what you always do when faced with pleas about equality, equal rights, and concerns about the lives and survival of the non-white male majority. You obfuscate and misdirect.

The tactic relies on the time-old excuse of the other side is just as bad. Only you invent the other side, in at least some cases, from whole cloth.

What people do who support reproductive rights is declare their support. They don't say "but. . . ". Nor do they seek to normalize politicians and policies that legally restrict access to abortion by pretending they are the same as personal, moral opposition accompanied by a voting record in support of choice. You did the exact same thing with by falsely claimed Tim Kaine was the same as Heath Mello, and you willfully ignored the evidence presented to you proving otherwise.

For someone who claims to support abortion rights, you spend a lot of effort rhetorically undermining them.

When one supports equal rights for women, there is no reason for buts. Another poster, WarrendeM, with whom I often butt heads, does it very simply and directly: "Abortion rights are not negotiable." Simple. Straight to the point. No buts.

[Ken Burch]

7. I wasn't saying anything about you, or your posts on this subject.

There was no reference to your arguments intended at all.

I'm sorry if I made it sound like I was saying that about you.

I'm not.

I support equal rights for women. The Right are the enemies of those-essentially everybody on the Left is with you on that.

Here's why I don't understand why there is still outrage over the Heath Mello thing(and ok he and Tim Kaine weren't identical on that).

A) The man is now pro-choice and publicly declared that he would defend choice in office while running;

B) To my knowledge, he was the only person who even ran against the right-wing incumbent in Omaha-it's not as though there was a long-time pro-choice candidate who was shouldered out of the race by Mello; if nobody else even ran, what is there to be outraged about?

C) It was a mayor's race-as far as I know, the mayor of Omaha has little ability to defend OR deny reproductive choice. Am I factually wrong on that point?

The only people we should be fighting on the question of choice are the right. Everybody on the progressive side of the spectrum should get the benefit of the doubt on this issue.

And I agree with you about caucuses needing to be replaced by primaries. Always have.

Will you agree that that change should be solely about what happens in the future?

[Ken Burch]

18. Again, I wasn't talking about your threads.

You are not the only person who has posted on this subject. I said that above. Why are you acting as if I didn't say that?

In a post above, I just made it clear that I accept that you personally weren't calling for caucuses to be abolished because of any perceived advantage to one candidate. I simply pointed out that a lot of other people had made such an implication.

And I actually condemned the #NeverKamala crowd in an OP.

I wasn't trying to distract from that group at all. My only intent was to make sure we didn't get to a situation were anybody who didn't see Senator Harris as their first choice for the nomination was automatically equated with the people in nasty little claque. Given that we are three years out from the 2020 primaries, is that totally unreasonable?

If I wanted to distract from that group's acts or give them cover, I would not have done an OP against them.

Between the post I'd made about her from two years earlier and last week, I hadn't posted anything about Senator Harris. And I made it clear that I'd back her if she was nominated. I even apologized about what I posted about her two years earlier.

What do I have to do to clear my name on this?

And I declared my support for choice. I've been pro-choice since I've known of this issue in the early Seventies, as a junior high school student. It's non-negotiable?

I honestly don't understand why we are still talking about Heath Mello at all. He had switched to a pro-choice position when he ran for mayor, there was no candidate in that race who'd been nothing but pro-choice from the start, and in most cities the mayor plays next no role in abortion access and the guy said he'd do what he could to speak out for choice in the job. And he lost. So why isn't that put to rest yet?

I admitted above that I had it wrong about Tim Kaine. He was not pro-choice in his origins, but he wasn't actively anti-choice in the Senate.

I agree that that one idiot, who expressed views that neither I nor Bernie expressed, was wrong. That jerk doesn't represent the views of much of any of us. We were not a campaign driven by a wish to defend white privilege.

[NurseJackie]

10. Nobody is being subjected to "greater outrage" than anyone else.

[brer cat]

2. That is totally irrelevant to any discussion today.

However, I will point out that you are putting President Carter in a box of your own making, conflating his personal spiritual beliefs with his positions as an elected official. In his own words:

In an interview about how faith informs his political beliefs, Carter says it is difficult for him to spiritually reconcile certain reproductive rights afforded every human woman under international law with his understanding of the Bible.

“I have a hard time believing that Jesus, for instance,” Carter tells HuffPo Live host Marc Lamont, “would approve abortions, unless it was because of rape, or incest, or if the mother’s life was in danger.”

Carter explains he has supported abortion rights in office because he took an oath to uphold the U.S. Constitution, which Carter believes protect the right to abortion. [/]

[Ken Burch]

4. I remembered Jimmy Carter as the guy who dismissively said "life is not fair" on that issue.

You are the first person I've actually heard make the claim that Carter defended choice as president.

I'll defer to your assessment of the man.

In any case, my point stands that it's not a new thing that this party has hedged on this issue, and that no one public figure in or near the party deserves particular outrage.

Let's focus on fighting to defend choice, not on using the issue to preserve divisions that should have ended at Philly.

[Skidmore]

5. He defended upholding settled law, even one he did not agree with.

http://www.ontheissues.org/celeb/Jimmy_Carter_Abortion.htm

I am convinced that every abortion is an unplanned tragedy, brought about by a combination of human errors and this has been one of the most difficult moral and political issues I have had to face. As president, I accepted my obligation to enforce the "Roe v. Wade" Supreme Court ruling, and at the same time attempted in every way possible to minimize the number of abortions.

One of my best-remembered and most often quoted remarks came in July 1977, when I defended my lack of support for federal funds to be used for abortions among poor mothers, even though wealthier women could afford to have their pregnancies terminated. Without any careful forethought, I responded to a question on this issue by saying, "Life is often unfair."

Source: Our Endangered Values, by Jimmy Carter, p. 72 , Sep 26, 2006

[JI7]

8. Carter was NOT rigidly anti choice, he SUPPORTED abortion rights .

[Ken Burch]

9. I've edited the OP to reflect that he didn't actually work to restrict choice.

n/t.

[NurseJackie]

11. Edited, but the damage has been done.

It's probably best to double check easily confirmed facts before posting something like that. (When it doubt, leave it out.)

[Weekend Warrior]

13. Amazing how they will even go as far as to place incorrect thoughts onto Carter...

In order to keep up the campaign of disinformation.

[NurseJackie]

15. It's not accidental. And if we can spot it, why can't others?

(Sigh.)

[Weekend Warrior]

16. "And if we can spot it, why can't others?"

It would force them to modify their currently held beliefs. When one thinks they are infallible, that is simply not possible.

[Ken Burch]

20. I'm not in any "they".

And I'd like to know which currently held beliefs you think I need to modify.

[Weekend Warrior]

22. The beliefs are a changing so fast I might need a minute.

Let me wait until the edits have settled.

[Ken Burch]

30. I haven't changed any beliefs.

I made a factual mistake about someone who's been out of politics for decades-someone for whom I cast my first vote in a presidential election.

What beliefs do you believe I hold and what did I ever do to you?

[Weekend Warrior]

31. "I made a factual mistake"

Very true.

"what did I ever do to you?"

Nothing that I'm aware of. I don't get the persecution complex. It has no place in this conversation. Yet it's the second time you have gone there.

Take care.

[Ken Burch]

32. Let me rephrase that-what is your issue with me?

I made an innocent factual error about a former Democratic president, an error I corrected when it was pointe out to me, because I'm not the sort of person who refuses to acknowledge error.

My larger point stands:

There is nothing new in the Democratic Party funding and even recruiting antichoice candidates.

It's deeply wrong that the party does that, but it's not like they didn't come up with the idea until this year.

[Ken Burch]

19. Who is "they"? I'm not part of any they.

And I'm not doing disinformation.

[Weekend Warrior]

21. Yes, you are.

"the Democratic nominee was Jimmy Carter, who was rigidly antichoice."

Amazing how many need to stretch things in order to promote their worldview. Even lying about very popular Democrats.

[Ken Burch]

23. What "they" do you think I'm in?

I'm not JPR. I'm not a Green. I'm not "alt-left" or a white privilege aficionado.

I'm just a left-Democrat.

[Weekend Warrior]

24. +1 nt.

[Ken Burch]

27. If you're going to accuse me of something, just say it.

I have nothing to with the group people were posting about last week. I think they are idiots.

My world view is that of a democratic(and Democratic) leftist.

There's nothing diabolical in that.

[LanternWaste]

14. You've illustrated a dramatic lack of relevant knowledge on this topic.

You've illustrated a dramatic lack of relevant knowledge on this topic.

You'll rationalize otherwise of course, yet stating and then editing "2+2=Orange" to "2+2=4" illustrates a dramatic lack of fundamental mathematics, and that anyone who argued the sum as orange in the first place relies more on bias than any substantive premise.

Were I you, I'd defer to those who have the germane knowledge rather than pretending its already there to support your arguments.

[Weekend Warrior]

17. He wasn't working to restrict choice.....

for decades before you maligned him in your op, that is now edited.

[Ken Burch]

25. What I said was that the party has funded antichoice Dems for decades.

That's true.

There was never a time when that totally stopped.

And I never said Carter himself "worked for decades" against choice.

I was wrong to say he worked against choice as president.

Again, I'm not part of any "they".

And I have no idea what you even think my objectives ARE.

[Weekend Warrior]

26. "And I never said Carter himself "worked for decades" against choice. "

When did I say you did?

"I was wrong to say he worked against choice. "

Yes, you were. Well said.

[Ken Burch]

28. Why are you on a vendetta against me?

Is this still about the hashtaggers? I denounced them in my OP. I never had anything to do with them.

And I'm just as pro-choice as you are.

[Weekend Warrior]

29. I'm not.

You have replied to me more often than I have replied to you.

This is just strange now.

"Vendetta"

[Ken Burch]

33. You wrote "He wasn't working to restrict choice.....for decades"

What I said had been going on for decades was the recruiting and funding of antichoice Dems.

It had never stopped.

[Weekend Warrior]

35. My comment was absolutely correct.

And if you look at the whole quote, you took it out of context. Seems to be a common occurrence.

Now this is the second time you have replied to a single post of mine all while claiming I am following you around. Amazing.

[moriah]

12. You can be personally anti-abortion and not anti-choice.

Did Carter try to repeal Roe? No.

There are many people who personally couldn't have an abortion, would beg and plead and cry after if their partner wanted one after an unintended pregnancy, who still would respect that the choice should exist because of the ills not having the choice available creates. I'm one of them. Should that disqualify me for running for one of the three seats that no Democrat ran for here in Arkansas in 2016?

If someone who is personally anti-abortion actually puts it that way in a red state as a Democrat, is that them being anti-choice? I hope not, because that's the kind of message that might actually resonate here. "Look, I don't like abortion, but I also don't like the idea of my wife being afraid to go to the doctor if she miscarries because she might get accused of having an abortion, or arrested for falling down the stairs because we were having a tough time then and she confided in a nurse. There are other ways to fight abortion, like preventing unintended pregnancies. That's what I hope to do."

[Ken Burch]

34. I corrected what I wrote. It was an innocent mistake, I meant the man no disrespect.

My larger point was and is that there has never been a time when the party required all Dem candidates to be personally pro-choice, or EVEN required personally antichoice candidates to agree not to work to restrict choice if elected.

I wish we did at least make the second requirement(the Drinan-Kennedy-Cuomo position) a condition for receiving party funds.