Friday, June 07, 2019

Just so we're clear

A pro-life Democrat is a contradiction in terms. It is not allowed.
Former Vice President Joe Biden says he now wants to throw out the Hyde Amendment, dropping his long-held support for the measure that blocks federal funds from being used for most abortions amid criticism from his 2020 Democratic rivals.

"If I believe health care is a right, as I do, I can no longer support an amendment that makes that right dependent on someone's ZIP code," he said.

The Hyde Amendment is a four-decade-old ban on federal dollars being used for abortions except in cases of rape, incest or when the woman's life is in danger.
Meanwhile, Ann Althouse makes a great point about Joe Biden's flipping and flopping on the Hyde Amendment (emphasis in original):
I thought the whole point of Biden was that he was the one that other people would vote for. If he squares up his positions with the other Democratic candidates, the Biden's reason for being a candidate collapses.

I was going to say the Democrats are screwing up their "other people" reasoning, but I see that it's pretty clever of all the non-Biden candidates to lure him into surrendering his big advantage. Well played!
The guy on the port side I'm going to be watching is Dan Lipinski, a congresscritter who represents a southwest suburban enclave of Chicago. He's one of the few pro-life Democrats still existing. He got primaried hard in 2018, but prevailed. The same candidate, Marie Newman, is looking to oust him again. Newman has Bernie Sanders's endorsement and Lipinski is getting plenty o' hate (weird parentheticals in original):
According to HuffPost, Lipinski was mentioned at the event as an attendee by Kathy Ireland, who was the emcee. (Normal sentence.) Lipinski was endorsed by the SBA in his last race, and the organization had a “six-figure GOTV effort” that “reached more than 23,000 voters,” according to an SBA press release. Lipinski won his primary race by two points.

But his primary opponent, Marie Newman, is running against him again in 2020, picking up an endorsement from Bernie Sanders yesterday. In April, Politico reported that Newman’s campaign had seen consultants fleeing after the DCCC announced a policy preventing its vendors from working with primary challengers, with the consultants describing the warning they received from the DCCC as “a very clear threat to their ability to do business with” the organization.

The Susan B. Anthony List supports anti-abortion politicians, most of whom are Republicans running against Democrats. (Every dull scold who can’t shut up about Bernie Sanders not being a Democrat—might there be more important and troubling targets for your ire, maybe?) A large section of its homepage currently encourages visitors to read about “President Trump’s Pro-Life Wins.” That page details the organization’s “Largest Pro-Life Grassroots Campaign for Three Election Cycles,” which it says included targeting “pro-life Latino & pro-life Democrat” voters.

In case you still weren't clear, writer Libby Watson drives the point home -- since this is generally a family publication, I'll redact the f-bombs:
After weeks of horrible abortion news, all I can say is: f__k you, Dan Lipinski, you weird weasel asshole. F__k any Democrat that defends him, and the DCCC for not casting him out. Oh, and f__k Kathy Ireland, too.
Have a nice day, I guess.

8 comments:

Gino said...

i've already announced that Biden will never be president, and apparently alyssa milano agrees...
Biden was never a man of much gravitas. it was an image the media crafted for him that he has ridden for a long time. that time is running short.

Gino said...

Trump talking point: Flip Flop Joe cant stand up to alyssa milano... what makes you think he will stand up to Xi? say goodbye to your jobs, folks... they're going to China is this guy gets elected....

John said...

I agree with Gino on this. Biden's entire career was built on guessing which way the political winds were blowing and like a dandelion hoping to be carried along. His seemingly centrist approach was nothing more than a convenient facade built by the PR guys to make the primaries a little more interesting and raise a few million dollars.

What troubles me the most is Gino and Alysa Milano being in agreement on this. As they say, Politics makes strange bedfellows.

Petercorp said...

Biden is just the same opportunist that most politicians are. He is not liberal. He is not in the camp that Sanders and Warren are in. He is like Booker and Harris are. They are not Republicans. They are also not progressive.

They are just trying to pander to the liberal side of their party. Progressives are not fans of Biden for sure. The Attacks on him from the American Left are rather intriguing. I watched one point out every short clip that they could find of him practically acting like a Republican. And another where the guy actually said to stay home if Biden does win the nomination, and it would be immoral to vote for him. Biden is just a male version of Hillary, and he went on to point out that Biden is just Trump light.

I am surprised that Biden made this play. I figured that he would just keep on pretending that it is already general election season as his platform. Because he is very aware of two things. One is that the progressives are not the majority of his party. They are just very loud. And the other is that the Bernie or Warren crowd will not be voting third party this time around in protest, voting for Trump to stick it to the Dem Establishment, or staying home again due to not getting their way.

He knows all of this. And that is why this play does not make any sense at all. But we can not forget that he is up there in age. Maybe Biden is crazy. I do have to give some credit to Trump for he only acts crazy when he is speaking to his crazy supporters. Biden can, and should ignore the extreme wing of his own party, because unlike Trump he can truly afford to do so.

Mr. D said...

He knows all of this. And that is why this play does not make any sense at all. But we can not forget that he is up there in age. Maybe Biden is crazy. I do have to give some credit to Trump for he only acts crazy when he is speaking to his crazy supporters. Biden can, and should ignore the extreme wing of his own party, because unlike Trump he can truly afford to do so.

I dunno. If Biden had that luxury, he'd choose it. I don't think he can ignore the base (or in your formulation, crazy) voters. They don't like being ignored.

W.B. Picklesworth said...

One thing is certain - Biden doesn't have a lot of intellectual firepower. He's a decent pol with an effective schtick (regular Joe) which works great if he doesn't get too much attention. When light gets cast on it, he's too dumb to not face plant. In any kind of normal race he would never get the nomination because he's too easy to take down. I'm curious to see if the DNC machine will protect him. If so, he's in huge trouble because they won't be able to keep Trump from punching him black and blue.

Gino said...

and thats it, WB... he's been hailed as the democrat answer to Trump because he can 'play' Trump for one sound bite every now and then. Its like the Elvis impersonators, who have more similarity to each other than to the actual Elvis.

the real Elvis, Trump, will kick his ass if they ever get face to face.

Petercorp said...

"I dunno. If Biden had that luxury, he'd choose it. I don't think he can ignore the base (or in your formulation, crazy) voters. They don't like being ignored."

Agreed. I'm not sure of just how long the Republican Party ignored their base and took them for granted. It's probably what caused them to become so angry. And that anger more than likely made enough of them crazed to say the least. Or a Republican problem that everyone is having to pay for now.

But the liberal side of the blue team is constantly ignored. It'll be interesting to see how they turn out in the future.