Few things in politics are more maddening than morning-after press releases from liberal groups who got their asses kicked claiming that no, really, we actually won! But of all the garbage we've seen since election night, NARAL and Planned Parenthood take first prize for self-congratulatory bullshit:
"If you remember one thing about election night, it should be this: Far from women's health and rights being a losing issue, it was an issue that helped both Democrats and Republicans win. That's a huge shift," said Cecile Richards, president, Planned Parenthood Action Fund. "Politicians like Cory Gardner, Thom Tillis and Joni Ernst won by moderating their positions on access to birth control and abortion. This data clearly shows that voters didn't elect them to restrict women's access to health care, and voters will hold them accountable to what they promised."
It's hard to even know where to begin to dissect this embarrassing pile of crap, but the reality is that just two weeks ago, NARAL was loudly insisting that Gardner wanted
to ban birth control:
And guess what? Two weeks ago, NARAL was right! Gardner may have tried to dance away from his support for Colorado's fetal personhood amendment, which would have indeed banned many common forms of birth control (and went down to defeat last week), but he always stayed on as a
co-sponsor of federal personhood legislation.
Anyway, Gardner's supposed conversion to supporting birth control was obviously pure election year expedience, and NARAL and Planned Parenthood were correct not to believe him. For them to now argue that he's "moderated" his positions means that all of a sudden they're taking a snake at his word. That's appallingly naïve.
Gardner may well have prevailed by snowing voters, but by calling him a birth control moderate, these groups are admitting that their extensive efforts to paint him as an anti-birth control radical did not succeed. Is that something they really want to cop to? Women's reproductive health freedom remains a potent issue, a GOP wave fueled by crappy midterm turnout doesn't change that underlying fact, especially as far as 2016 is concerned.
Democrats and progressives simply need to be reality-based and admit we got our asses kicked, then go out there and re-tool for a better electorate in two years' time. Acknowledge the failure, yes, but then start working on the next narrative—don't try to re-write the last one. Call Gardner a liar, not a moderate. Claiming him as some kind of horrendous ally is the worst kind of bullshit and no salve at all. Planned Parenthood and NARAL ought to know better.