Demagoguing abortion
BARNES, FRED
demagoguing abortion by Fred Barnes In nearly four hours of preparation for his press conference on December 13, President Clinton devoted only a few moments to reviewing his position on...
...Canady has set no timetable for dispatching another partial-birth bill to the White House...
...The White House is well aware of these problems...
...So White House aides were surprised when he mounted a vigorous, lengthy defense of himself on the issue after CNN's Wolf Blitzer raised it...
...At once, he's able to sound pro-life by opposing partial-birth abortion and pro-choice by demanding qualifiers that make his opposition hollow...
...Catholic Conference last fall, the White House said: "If Congress sends the president a bill that bars third-trimester [partial-birth] abortions with an appropriate exception for life or health, the president would sign it...
...This means anti-abortion forces must spend months casting the issue in clear terms again, beginning with congressional hearings...
...Last May, he vetoed a bill outlawing partial-birth abortion, a procedure favored by some doctors that consists of killing an unborn child by sucking out its brains...
...Many people who opposed the procedure "may accept the president's sham proposal to have a compromise," Canady conceded...
...Indeed, his basic position, that abortion should be "safe, legal, and rare," embraces both sides...
...Panetta and other White House officials have argued that congressional Republicans would be signaling their refusal to operate in bipartisan fashion if they sent the president a partial-birth bill similar to the one he vetoed...
...What the White House proposes is an amendment that would exempt from the ban on partial-birth abortion women who might otherwise suffer "severe adverse health consequences...
...Clinton "would not go beyond that," according to Leon Panetta, the White House chief of staff...
...Clinton said he's particularly concerned about "a few hundred women every year" whose unborn children have "terrible deformities" and for whom the partial-birth procedure is needed to "preserve the ability to have further children...
...That argument failed to sway public opinion, which opposes partial-birth abortion by roughly a 3-to-1 margin...
...Any sort of health exception gives the ultimate discretion to the abortionist himself," Canady said...
...That line hasn't impressed any Republicans...
...In those cases, Panetta said on Meet the Press on December 15, Clinton "would want a woman to have the right to choose...
...December 30, 1996 / January 6, 1997 The Weekly Standard / 13 Sounds reasonable, doesn't it...
...What Clinton realistically wants is one of two things: no bill or one he can blame Republicans for forcing him to veto...
...But he insisted he's really against such abortions, except in a few cases where the mother would suffer severe damage to her health...
...Thus, at the press conference, he renewed his effort to get on the right side as well...
...But mostly he was cold-blooded and clever...
...No one at the White House expects this to happen...
...may, Clinton was identified almost solely with the wrong side of the issue...
...But the price may be high...
...Having dealt with abortion as a political and substantive matter for at least two decades, Clinton is extremely knowledgeable about the issue...
...So Clinton is aware of exactly what he's doing in insisting on exceptions to the partial-birth ban...
...By the way, he sticks to these qualifiers even when addressing an anti-partial-birth audience...
...And I just cannot look at a woman" whose unborn child will die at birth "and tell her that I am signing a law which will prevent her from ever having another child...
...In response to the candidate questionnaire of the U.S...
...Clinton was emotional...
...The second is that to get the president's signature, the ban on partial-birth abortion must apply only to the third trimester...
...For now, Clinton has managed to slow down the process of producing a new bill...
...One hearing will deal with the question of whether a partial-birth abortion is ever medically necessary...
...The first is that the courts have given such a broad interpretation to any health exception that it becomes a loophole allowing an abortion in every instance...
...Both he and the chief pro-life strategist, Douglas Johnson of the National Right to Life Committee, believe Clinton has succeeded in muddying the issue...
...I did it on purpose...
...He knows all the arguments on both sides...
...At the press conference, Clinton cited the cases of six women who appeared with him when he announced his veto last spring...
...I believe that people put in that situation ought not to have Congress tell them that they're never going to be able to have children again," he declared...
...And it may work—in the short run, anyway...
...But advocates of the ban contend the procedure is used mostly for abortions in the fifth or sixth month of pregnancy, the second trimester...
...Still, White House aides were surprised he put so much stress on the issue...
...Clinton doesn't mind being on the unpopular side of an issue, so long as he can be on the popular side at the same time...
...He's been somewhat successful in confusing this issue...
...Well, it's important," he told them after the press conference...
...He's prolonged an issue that, no matter what he says, is a political loser for him...
...And the White House is bound to be asked to provide evidence on that and other points (it has offered none so far...
...But Clinton has given Republicans pause by positioning himself as 95 percent in agreement with a ban that is being blocked chiefly by Republicans eager to hold on to a useful political issue...
...He sounded defiant: "One of the things the president's supposed to do is to look out for the few hundred against the many millions...
...To his disclinton doesn't mind being on the unpopular side of an issue, so long as he can be on the popular side at the same time...
...The president is a very skillful communicator," said GoP representative Charles Canady, chairman of the subcommittee that crafted the partial-birth legislation...
...Hillary and I only had one child," he said...
...Drafting a bill acceptable to Clinton and pro-lifers would amount to "threading a needle," said a Clinton aide who doesn't expect it to happen...
...But there are two problems with the Clinton amendment...
...demagoguing abortion by Fred Barnes In nearly four hours of preparation for his press conference on December 13, President Clinton devoted only a few moments to reviewing his position on partial-birth abortion...
Vol. 2 • December 1996 • No. 16
