Life Is Winning by Marjorie Dannenfelser

Author:Marjorie Dannenfelser [Dannenfelser, Marjorie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: POL046000 Political Science / Commentary & Opinion
Publisher: Humanix Books

9

Going on Offense

A Sleeping Giant Awakes

The Obama presidency was as bleak as we feared. Once again, the pro-life movement was playing defense, this time against a “progressive” bent on waging a culture war from the left. Bill Clinton at least seemed to have some moral qualms about abortion; Barack Obama exhibited none.

What occupied me and the SBA List team, which now included Emily Buchanan as executive director, Frank Cannon as our chief strategist, and Marilyn Musgrave, was a simple question: How do we move from defense to offense?

An opportunity arose in 2009 when President Obama appointed longtime Republican congressman John McHugh as secretary of the Army. McHugh represented a vast district in Upstate New York that had been represented by Republicans since 1871, and he had a 100 percent pro-life voting record. A special election was called to fill his seat. Local GOP leaders, meeting in a restaurant in Potsdam, New York, chose Dede Scozzafava, a member of the New York State Assembly, to run against the Democratic Party choice Bill Owens.

Scozzafava was a poster girl for everything SBA List opposes. She sat on the board of her local Planned Parenthood. She supported abortion on demand. When Weekly Standard reporter John McCormack approached her during the campaign to ask her to explain her views on abortion, she became so irate that she called the police. There was no doubt that if elected, she would have become an outspoken opponent of pro-life initiatives.

The fact that Dede Scozzafava effortlessly won the backing of the GOP establishment—including an infusion of almost $1 million from the National Republican Congressional Committee and the endorsement of prominent national leaders such as former House Speaker Newt Gingrich—perfectly illustrated the problem we faced. Would they have enthusiastically backed Scozzafava if she favored nationalized health care, called for slashing national defense spending, or wanted to gut the Second Amendment? Of course not—but the fact that she was completely at odds with the Republican platform on the issue of life mattered not a bit.

Pro-lifers weren’t the only ones appalled by the party’s sellout of its principles in its endorsement of Dede Scozzafava. Fiscal conservatives, too, opposed her record as a big spender in the New York State Legislature. When Doug Hoffman, a well-known, successful businessman entered the race as the Conservative Party candidate, he received an outpouring of support. The Conservative Party had long been a small but powerful player in New York politics since its candidate James L. Buckley won a Senate seat in 1971. The party was able to provide Hoffman a place on the ballot.

The Club for Growth, then led by pro-lifer Pat Toomey, now a Pennsylvania senator, spent about $1 million promoting Hoffman for his position on limited government and lower taxes. When Hoffman started receiving endorsements from the likes of former House Republican leader Dick Armey, Rush Limbaugh, Mike Huckabee, Tim Pawlenty, Glenn Beck, Sarah Palin, Michele Bachmann, and Steve Forbes, his candidacy became a real threat to the GOP’s preferred choice.

SBA List, too, sensed an opportunity in this traditionally conservative Upstate New York district.

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