National Affairs Rory Leishman

In a combative campaign speech last December, United States President Barack Obama derided his Republican opponents as unprincipled libertarians: “Their philosophy is simple,” he charged. “We are better off when everybody is left to fend for themselves and play by their own rules.”

Certainly, there are some selfish conservatives who think that the wealthy and prosperous should have no compunction about abandoning the poor and the needy to fend for themselves. But is that a fair characterization of Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney and his supporters?

Obama evidently thinks so. Time and again, he has cited Romney’s notorious suggestion to a private fundraising meeting last April that 47 percent of the people will vote for Obama “no matter what,” because they “pay no income tax” and see themselves as “victims” who are “entitled” to  food, housing and health-care at taxpayers’ expense. Romney concluded: “And so my job is not to worry about those people. I’ll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives.”

To Romney’s chagrin, these ill-considered remarks were surreptitiously recorded and leaked five months later to the press. Now, he would have us believe that he did not mean what he plainly stated.

In a television interview on Oct. 4, Romney explained: “Clearly in a campaign, with hundreds if not thousands of speeches and question-and-answer sessions, now and then you’re going to say something that doesn’t come out right. In this case, I said something that’s just completely wrong.”

Quite so.

Romney then added: “My life has shown that I care about 100 per cent, and that’s been demonstrated throughout my life. And this whole campaign is about the 100 per cent.”

Is that right? Is there any solid evidence that Romney and his backers care about 100 per cent of the people, including the poor and needy?

Indeed, there is. Several provisions in the Republican Party platform are directed specifically at helping relatively low-income families. For example, the Republicans are calling for the creation of portable educational vouchers specifically for “low income and special needs students.” In this way, Romney aims to help all parents of a child trapped in a bad school to afford to send their child to a new and better school.

Obama disagrees with this approach, claiming that studies based on decades of experience have proven that private-school vouchers “fail to raise student achievement.” He maintains that enhanced support for public schools is the best means of improving standards for all students.

Correspondingly, to preserve and strengthen Medicare for future generations, the Republicans promise to provide seniors with premium support to offset the costs of traditional Medicare or a competing private plan. Romney pledges that under the terms of this new arrangement: “Lower income seniors will receive more generous support to ensure that they can afford coverage; wealthier seniors will receive less support.”

Again, Obama rejects this Republican proposal. He argues that Obamacare will provide improved and affordable care to all people, regardless of income.

In these and in many other respects, both the Republicans and the Democrats propose to assist the needy. People of goodwill might reasonably disagree on which party has the better, more practical and effective approach on most of these social and economic issues.

However, on one key point, there is no basis for reasonable dispute: in marked contrast to Romney and the Republicans, Obama and the Democrats have exhibited a shameful lack of compassion for the most vulnerable and needy of human beings: the baby in the womb.

Obama boasts on his website that he is “committed to protecting a woman’s right to choose.” Indeed, throughout his political career, he has supported abortion on demand. As a state senator in Illinois,  three-times he opposed even a “Born-Alive Infants Protection Act.”

As for Mitt Romney, he is pro-life. On his website, he insists: “Americans have a moral duty to uphold the sanctity of life and protect the weakest, most vulnerable and most innocent among us.”

While Obama displays a brutal disregard for the sanctity of human life, Romney professes to care for 100 per cent of the people, from conception to natural death. On this basis alone, Romney deserves to win the election.