Huffington Post reports today that McCain's staff member Deal Hudson is preparing to make a major issue about abortion, aka "infantacide," in the campaign. No surprise here. Abortion has been used as a club by the Republicans for a couple of decades.
But the surprising thing is that Americans aren't there. They reject the two polar views--the all or nothing approach.
ABC News reported in January that Americans were widely split on the issue.
Forty-one percent say the government and the courts should not alter the current availability of abortions, and an additional 15 percent say they should be easier to get; that leaves the 42 percent, cited above, who want abortions made harder to obtain.
There's a single view that almost all Americans would support--a view that would totally diffuse McCain's hired gun. At the risk of being accused of a little chutzpah, I'd suggest Obama adopt a position that is almost identical to Bill Clinton's. It runs something like this:
In my presidency, I will reduce abortions. I will do it not by putting doctors and nurses in jail, punishing women or endorsing violence. I won't violate the medical privacy of our citizens, because that's a very dangerous and unconstitutional precident. I'll do it with education, great health care and economic security for mothers and babies.
The one position I've been able to get almost universal agreement on from both Republican and Progressive friends is privacy. That tone rings true with Liberarians, northern Michigan survivalists, Progressives and Republican fundamentalists. History may show that the Shaivo fiasco was the greatest overstep of the Century in terms of discouraging lock-step voting by true conservatives. (Ask Barr.)
So it would be a very positive move if those who want a revolution in four months began today talking "medical privacy" at the water cooler or the coffee shop.