"My Administration will be great for women and their reproductive rights."
Donald Trump
“[Trump's] is not a pro-life position, it’s not an acceptable position, and it does not provide the contrast on this issue to the degree that we have had in the past between him and Kamala Harris.”
Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council
Trump had bragged that he is the most pro-life president in history, the man who appointed a Supreme Court majority that overturned Roe and is considering banning abortion drugs nationwide, enforcing the Comstock Act, and overturning the decision that guaranteed the right of married couples to use contraception.
Trump is doing what politicians do in a democracy. They see the drift of public opinion, and they adjust to get in sync with it. His switch on abortion is unprincipled, a betrayal of his supporters, cynical, and very possibly a lie about his true intent and future behavior. It is also smart.
Trump understands that the positions taken by the anti-abortion faction of the GOP are broadly unpopular. Being "pro life" is a litmus-test requirement to be a Republican in good standing. Pro-choice Republicans have been squeezed out of the party. Officeholders have been saying they are anti-abortion for so long and so often that they are stuck. They have promises to keep. There are giant swaths of the South and Mountain States where near-total abortion bans are in effect. Those states are a cautionary note for voters nationwide. Those abortion bans are a problem for Trump
Like Prohibition, banning abortion is more popular in ideology than in practice. Also as with Prohibition, the bans failed to do what was intended. Drinking went up. Alcohol was easier to get during Prohibition than both before and after, when it was legal but regulated. Abortion numbers had been in decline, but now abortions have gone up.
 |
| Guttmacher Institute: "Despite Bans, number of abortions in U.S. increased in 2023" |
Trump has no compunctions about being inconsistent or a disappointment to his most loyal supporters. He moved to popular positions. No national ban on abortion. No ban on IVF. No ban on mifepristone. No Comstock Act. He will let the states act, but he wants limits on what they can do.
Democrats are dismayed. They want Trump to stay consistent with his past unpopular positions. Democrats bash Trump in speeches and ads, showing his old statements, saying that he hasn't changed and to be afraid of how he will ban abortion nationwide if he has the chance. He hasn't changed, they say. Don't believe him. He is as bad as ever.
There is an irony at work here. Kamala Harris is doing the same thing as Trump, shedding unpopular positions that seemed reasonable in 2019 and 2020. In the aftermath of the slow murder of George Floyd, Democratic primary voters pushed candidates to be "lite" versions of Bernie Sanders, but without his "socialist" label. In that era, her having been a DA who prosecuted street crime was a disadvantage. Now Harris returned to her prosecutor, child-of-immigrants roots that emphasize hard work and grit, not identity. She is the prosecutor; Trump is the unapologetic felon and sex abuser. Public opinion changed and she changed with it.
Personally, I don't mind politicians adjusting their views in order to be popular. I expect it. Democracies cannot be stuck in the past. Popularity is better protection against tyranny and foolish policy than is ideology and orthodoxy.
But Trump cannot shed one part of his past. He openly and proudly attempted to overthrow the 2020 election, with a plot involving fake electors, false claims of election fraud, and an effort to get his vice president to ignore the Constitution and discard Democratic electoral votes. Trump is stuck with that history.
Like Macbeth's spot, it remains and cannot be washed away.
9 comments:
Peter’s last paragraph doesn’t quite say it all. Trump is also a convicted felon, sexual molester, fraud, racist, compulsive liar and increasingly unhinged. That nearly half the electorate find that irresistibly appealing reveals what could prove to be a fatal flaw in the American character. Some say the fear, anger and hatred he foments aren’t who we are. We wish.
This is all true, and it means that voters have to basically read tea leaves to try to figure out what someone might do if they were elected president.
It’s probably why policy positions and party platforms have such little relevance In campaigns. It all comes down to vibes and gut feelings.
Make America great again vs Kamala is brat.
The Founding Fathers knew all of this, which is why they put so many layers of legislative representation between the voters and actual power. We are currently getting to see why that was smart, and why (for instance) getting rid of “smoke filled rooms“ In favor of party primaries was not as good an idea as it once seemed.
No, voters do not need to read tea leaves.
Character and morals matter.
Con men like Don Old will continue to break the law. It's what they do.
Dedicated public servants, like VP Harris and Gov. Walz,, will continue their work to improve the lives of Americans.
It's not hard to figure out.
TFG's hatred is a feature of the GOPee. Not a bug.
All politicians change positions when it’s expedient, but their basic character doesn’t change. Harris can be counted on to uphold the Constitution, justice and rule of law. Trump can be counted on not to.
George HW Bush promised NO NEW TAXES and than he saw what was happening to social security's solvency. It was either fix it or whistle past the problem, leaving it for who ever follows him. His action was unpopular and it cost him his job.
All the campaign rhetoric is a simple wish list of the candidate's desire and anticipated acheivement. TFG is such a blatient suck up, saying whatever he thinks will close the deal to please the voter. Kamala on the other hand has evolved in her opinion, perhaps even returning to her previously held views, showing that is her core. To be thoughtful and consider the consequences going forward on the country.
The problem is, objectively decent people can pursue catastrophically stupid policies. Relying solely on a candidate’s character can go as wrong as relying solely on their policy positions.
It’s a complex world. Ways of dealing with it should be as simple as possible, but no simpler (to paraphrase Albert Einstein).
TFG is so adept at changing his position in a moments notice, he makes that well known weather vane of rectitude Mitt Rmony look like Calvin Coolidge.
Preserve our republic, or degenerate into an autocracy - it's not that complicated.
Post a Comment