By Robert Pickup, Jr.
William Saletan writing at Slate says that “Aiming
at a broad electorate candidates are looking for issues where the public
agrees with them and dodging issues where they might lose votes.” This
goes without saying when it comes to politicians, but then Saletan only
devotes one sentence to Democrats not wanting to talk about the
economy. He then devotes the rest of his article blasting Republican
cowardice on social issues saying “They don’t want the election to be
about these issues, even in Red States.”
His
first example of a Republican trying to “weasel” out of a social issue
question is in the Virginia Senate race between Democrat Senator Mark
Warner and Republican Ed Gillespie. Speaking about contraception Warner
said “the Supreme Court in Hobby Lobby got it wrong. I don’t think a
for profit corporation ought to be able to interfere in an employees
health care choices.” Warner doesn’t seem to understand that case
however. The Hobby Lobby case limited the ability of the Government to
force privately owned companies to violate the owners religious beliefs.
Hobby Lobby still provides many forms of contraception’s in their
Health Insurance plans. Warner also said that Gillespie would vote to
overturn Roe V Wade. Again the Senator gets it wrong. As Gillespie
rightly responded “there is not going to be a vote to overturn Roe,
that’s a Supreme Court decision. I’m running for the United States
Senate.” It’s no surprise that Warner is raising social issues to
attack Gillespie, he voted for the unpopular Affordable Care Act and
voted with Obama 97% of the time. That is problematic for him amongst
Virginians.
Saletan moves on to the Arizona
Governors race between Democrat Fred Duval and Republican Doug Ducey.
When asked about same sex marriage Ducey said that “on an issue like
this a Governor doesn’t make the decision. This decision is decided by
the people.” However this is no longer the case. Liberals are all for
Democracy until they don’t get what they want, then they go to the
courts. According to the New York Times “20 Federal courts in a row had
ruled that State bans on same sex marriage, or on recognition of
marriages performed in other States, were unconstitutional.” Many
Pundits believe this issue will be fully put to rest by the Supreme
Court very soon.
Saletan then discusses
probably the most well known Governors race this election cycle. That
is the Texas Governors race between Republican Greg Abbot and Democrat
Wendy Davis. When asked about their views on abortion Davis talked
about her filibuster of an abortion bill. She said “I have stood on the
Senate floor for 13 hours to assure that this most private of decisions
could be made by women.” In actuality the bill didn't take away a
woman’s choice. The Washington Post wrote that the legislation would
only ban abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy and require abortion
clinics to meet the same standards as hospital surgical centers. As
Abbot said “women still have 5 months to make a very difficult
decision.” Only after that did the State have “an interest in
protecting innocent life.” This is right in line with what most
Americans want. According to a collection of polls gathered by the AEI
most Americans support first trimester abortions. However they oppose
second and third trimester abortions and support restrictions such as
parental notification.
As we can see far from
being cowards on social issues, Republicans are being very moderate
compared to these extreme leftist candidates. They are trying to
concentrate on issues that matter most to people. These issues
according to Gallup are Jobs, the economy in general and the Federal
deficit. Gay marriage, contraception and abortion didn’t even make the
list. Democrats know that by raising these issues they can distract
voters from the fact that they have caused, made worse or ignored the
issues that matter most to their constituents.
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