Lisa Graas has the Top Five Lies of the Pro-Abortion Left at NewsReal from “Personally Pro-life” to “We Should Not Use Science in Debating the Abortion Issue.” It is worth reading and the videos are worth watching — a fine use of 15-20 minutes if you are going to spend that time on the ‘net anyway.
That said, I want to pick at one bone (of contention). I’m sure her point that Sarah Palin has described herself as “personally pro-life” without offering specific pro-life proposals or committing to enact certain pro-life measures will rile some of Palin’s supporters and I think that the implicit comparison of Palin to the likes of Mario Cuomo is a grossly unfair. Graas should be more explicit in her condemnation that many legislators who have supported pro-abortion legislation hide behind the “personally pro-life” stance; Palin has never (to my knowledge) supported anti-life efforts.
Graas could have gone in the direction that Francis J. Beckwith did in condemning those who claim to be both pro-life and pro-choice, which is similar to the “personally pro-life” claim. In 1991, Beckwith wrote:
After all, what would we think of the depth of an individual’s convictions if he claimed that he was personally against the genocide of a particular ethnic group (e.g., the Jews), but he added that if others thought this race was not human, they were certainly welcome to participate in the genocide if they so chose? What I’m getting at is simply that the nature of some “personal” opinions warrants public actions, even if these opinions turn out to be wrong, while other opinions (e.g., one’s personal preference for German chocolate cake) do not.
Thus, it makes little moral sense to claim that one is both pro-life and pro-choice.
This should be committed to memory: “The nature of some ‘personal’ opinions warrants public actions.” I think Palin could go further, but her public testimony to choosing life is more than the boilerplate about having kids that some pro-aborts employ. That said, I would like to see Palin endorse specific pro-life proposals and commit to them if she chooses to enter the elected political arena again.
