Yup. There’s lot of Americans who haven’t gotten the memo that there’s no such thing as a pro-life Democrat. Or maybe they got the memo but they’re just not reading it.
Jim Geraghty writes:
Critz ran as a conservative: Some conservatives bitterly chuckled that Democrats were celebrating the victory of a pro-life, pro-gun Democrat who opposed health care and cap-and-trade. (Public Policy Polling found only 30 percent of the district’s voters support Obamacare, and 58 percent oppose.) This comes on the heels of an anti-Obamacare, anti-Pelosi, pro-life Democrat, Mike Oliverio, knocking off incumbent Alan Mollohan in West Virginia. They contend that few Democrats will be able to run on as conservative a platform as Critz and Oliverio did.
That argument is true enough, but a lot of Democrats who are considered vulnerable will be attempting to run as conservatives this fall. In fact, what made Pennsylvania’s special House election a useful indicator was that the two candidates offered precisely the arguments we should see in many swing districts this fall: the Republican arguing that the Democrat was a puppet for President Obama and Nancy Pelosi, and the Democrat insisting that no, he had nothing to do with those Washington liberals, that he was just a homespun country boy who voted in his district’s best interest. Tuesday, a district full of conservative Democrats concluded that Critz made the more persuasive argument.
So the point is that Democrats can still pretend to be pro-life and many voters will buy it. That’s the lesson of PA-12.
This race was watched closely by Democrats. They will seek to model many candidacies across the country on this (as they have done in the past.) Of course, they’ve done this in the past but I actually believed that we all watched the blowing up of the myth of the Blue Dog Democrat during the Obamacare debacle. Unfortunately, that is not so.
We have not yet learned.
May 20, 2010 at 3:11 am
The Wikipedia entry on Mike Oliverio makes thim sound good enough.
He is pro-life on the issue of abortion. He also supports an amendment to the West Virginia Constitution to ban gay marriage… Oliverio was also thanked in a 2006 speech by President George W. Bush for his assistance in securing the confirmation of Samuel Alito to the United States Supreme Court… [a Republican from Virginia said,] "Sen. Oliverio has always been a conservative guy. He votes with the Republican on committees. We've joked for years he needs to come over to the party who thinks like he does"… [Oliverio] told the Times West Virginian: "We start every campaign by putting it in God’s hands. And we know that his will shall be done. And if it is his will for us to win, we will win. And if not, he has a higher and better purpose for me somewhere else."
The guy is Catholic and opposed Obamacare. What else could you ask for?
May 20, 2010 at 3:37 am
Stupak was a Dem Catholic who opposed Obamacare too.
May 20, 2010 at 2:03 pm
Sadly that district (PA-12) has been permanently tainted by Murthaism. There are enough old, old-school Dems in places like Johnstown who think that Harry Truman and Hubert Humphrey are still running the Democrat Party, and that the Washington money will keep raining down.
May 20, 2010 at 2:15 pm
There is one answer to such people. Vote Conservative or else vote Republican. Do not under any circumstance vote demokrat unless there is no Conservative or Republican in the race. Then vote for the weakest most ineffective demokrat. Failure to vote is a vote for the demokrate. So vote. Vote Conservative or at least Republican. That is the only way to remove demokrats from office and get people in office who will do what is best for America.
May 21, 2010 at 4:49 pm
melinPR,
It's not just Stupak who caved on abortion. If the 40 or so "pro-life" dems had stood firm, no Obamacare. If they had forced Pelosi to add anti-funding language, no tax payer funding to the abortion industry. If they were Republcans, Nancy Pelosi would not be Speaker of the House (how many of them voted for her as leader?) and there would have been no bill whatsoever.
Bob Casey, another "pro-life" dem, accused genuine pro-lifers of being anti-life by opposing the socialist takeover of the medical industry. There is a difference between words and deeds.