posted on January 27, 2005 07:53:02 AM new
If you've listened to Hillary Clinton lately, you could be forgiven for thinking you were hearing her husband, Bill. In the last week in particular, she's been positioning herself for a presidential run in 2008, modifying or even lying about her positions in an effort to obscure her hard-left record. Hillary a centrist? That's the plan.
On Jan. 20, Hillary deigned to pay homage to a being higher than herself (as if such a thing were possible). "There is no contradiction between support for faith-based initiatives and upholding our constitutional principles," she told an audience in Boston. Faith-based organizations "see God's work right in front of them" where others "see trouble," she stated. Americans need room to "live out their faith in the public square," she said. "I've always been a praying person," she added.
On Jan. 24, she called abortion "a sad, even tragic choice for many, many women" and encouraged pro-lifers and pro-abortion-righters to seek "common ground" in order to reduce unwanted pregnancies. "I for one respect those who believe with all their heart and conscience that there are no circumstances under which abortion should be available," Clinton averred. After restating her support for the egregious Roe v. Wade decision, Hillary went out of her way to praise faith and organized religion, which she said were "primary" reasons teens abstain from sex. "The fact is, the best way to reduce the number of abortions is to reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies in the first place," Clinton said.
Forgive me while I retch. Hillary's baldfaced attempts at manipulating the religious in this country are as transparent as her ambitions.
This is a woman who respects the religious like Charles Manson respected the rich. When religious Christian Dr. David Hager was considered for appointment to a Food and Drug Administration advisery panel on women's reproductive health, Clinton immediately began to condemn him as a fanatic. As though a return to the Dark Ages were imminent, Hillary wailed: "We are going to be in trouble in this country if we start moving toward theology-based science or ideological research."
Clinton's support for abortion could not be any stronger if she were president of Planned Parenthood. On Jan. 12, less than two weeks before Clinton's appeal for an understanding on abortion, she pilloried the Bush administration for withdrawing funding from international organizations that commit or promote abortions. Describing "reproductive health care and family planning service" as a "basic right," Hillary explained that President Bush's focus on abstinence programs – those same abstinence programs Hillary praised on Jan. 24 as the "primary" reasons teens abstain from sex – was doing little to stop the spread of HIV-AIDS.
In 2003, Clinton voted against the Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act. In 2004, she voted against the Unborn Victims of Violence Act, which protected the unborn from assault and murder but explicitly omitted a woman's abortion choice with regard to her own pregnancy. As of 2003, NARAL (the National Abortion and Reproductive Rights Action League) gave her a 100 percent pro-choice rating on her voting record.
During her 2000 senatorial election run, Clinton welcomed the support of New York's NARAL, vowing to support abortion to the fullest extent: "Since the Republican takeover of Congress in 1994, there have been more than 100 votes to limit abortion rights ... We do not need another Republican in the Senate who would stand with Republicans to limit women's rights." She bragged that she would impose a political litmus test on judicial nominees. "I can't imagine I would vote to confirm" any pro-lifer (or, presumably, anyone who would vote to overturn Roe v. Wade), she said.
Despite Hillary's latest "moderate" machinations, she's smart enough not to abandon her base. On Sunday, Jan. 23, Clinton ripped into the Bush administration for lacking "that thoughtful, visionary direction that got us where we are today ... The history of America is ... to make sacrifices today for a better tomorrow. The progress that then occurred moved everyone forward. That progress is at risk today." Apparently, remaking the Middle East and overthrowing tyrannies around the world are not visionary. Apparently, sending troops into harm's way is not sacrifice. Apparently, protecting America is not progress.
Like most Democrats, Hillary is trying to have it both ways. It's quite likely that she'll get away with it. After all, her husband did.
posted on January 27, 2005 11:04:38 AM newForgive me while I retch. Hillary's baldfaced attempts at manipulating the religious in this country are as transparent as her ambitions.
LOL...I know. The Washington Times had a similar article....the liberals must really believe people are dumb as they often infer.
I'm sure faith-based issues, immigration and abortion aren't the ONLY issues we'll be watching her give up her life long convictions on in order to have a chance at the Presidency.
But people won't forget 'their' previous administrations corruption. People will bring up her past and her liberal voting record just as they did with kerry. But it will be funny to watch how she votes from now on....on issues like the $80Billion dollar recent military request. I don't expect to find her voting against it...nor do I expect her to be publically attacking and voting against people like Condi Rice as the other radicals in her party are doing.
So...yes, we're going to be seeing just how far she'll go in giving up her convictions.
"She clearly wants to sit in the Oval Office. She's a bright lady, and I think she watched her party throw everything, including the kitchen sink, at the president and still lose. She's made her own calculation that values in the broadest sense of the word was the reason for that loss," he said.
Considered by many Democratic Party leaders to be the front-runner for the 2008 presidential nomination, the senator is raising eyebrows among the party's liberal elite, who moved left after the surprising Democratic losses in the 2002 midterm elections.
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Four More Years....YES!!!
[ edited by Linda_K on Jan 27, 2005 11:12 AM ]
