Mike Huckabee Vs. Fred Thompson On Pro-Life Issue
Posted on November 18, 2007
Update: Slublog has the coolest photo-shop for this. Also some solid commentary on the matter.
Update: Video thanks to Hot Air.
When Fred Thompson got the endorsement of the National Right to Life Committee many hardcore pro-lifers were shocked the endorsement didn’t go to Mike Huckabee. Mike Huckabee was one of them.
Fred Thompson has touted a 100% pro-life record, yet many were puzzled that he didn’t support a life amendment. Instead he said stuff like that should be left to the states and that we should return to where it was before Roe vs. Wade. I’m a hardcore pro-lifer too, however I understand adhering to Federalist principles on moral issues. Anyway, Mike Huckabee is arguing for that platform, and challenges Thompson’s credentials and record on this issue. We will see more fighting between these two in the near future as the battle for a position in the polls.
Huckabee challenges that view.
Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee rejects letting states decide whether to allow abortions, claiming the right to life is a moral issue not subject to multiple interpretations.
“It’s the logic of the Civil War,” Huckabee said Sunday, comparing abortion rights to slavery. “If morality is the point here, and if it’s right or wrong, not just a political question, then you can’t have 50 different versions of what’s right and what’s wrong.”
“For those of us for whom this is a moral question, you can’t simply have 50 different versions of what’s right,” he said in an interview on “Fox News Sunday.”
The former Arkansas governor, who has drawn within striking distance of Mitt Romney in Iowa’s leadoff presidential caucuses, said he was taken aback by the National Right to Life Committee’s recent endorsement of Fred Thompson, the ex-Tennessee senator.
“But my surprise was nothing compared to the surprise of people across America who had been faithful supporters of right to life,” said Huckabee, who is challenging Thompson’s claim that he is the most reliable conservative in the GOP field.
“Fred’s never had a 100 percent record on right to life in his Senate career. The records reflect that. And he doesn’t support the human life amendment which is most amazing because that’s been a part of the Republican platform since 1980,” Huckabee said.
In a separate interview aired Sunday, Thompson said Roe v. Wade, the landmark Supreme Court decision allowing legal abortion, should be overturned, with states allowed to decide whether to permit abortions. “We need to remember what the status was before Roe v. Wade,” he said.
Thompson spokeswomen Karen Hanretty said Thompson has a very strong record on abortion. The National Right to Life Committee said when it endorsed him that Thompson “has had a strong, consistent pro-life voting record throughout his political career.”
So, mr. Huckabee…when did we start deferring our moral issues to the Federal government to decide? This is the kind of nannystate stuff, like a National smoking ban, that turns me off to this candidate.
Bits Blog isn’t as polite as I on this.
Moron. Slavery did not become a federal issue because it was a moral issue. The Constitution is quite silent on the subject of morality. The Constitution gives the federal government utterly no power to decide define public morality.
On a related note, I feel obligated to post on Huckabee’s first T.V. ad. Everyone else in the blogosphere has, so here it is. He gets an endorsement from Chuck Norris. Its a pretty humerous ad.
» Filed Under Abortion, News, Politics As Usual, Video
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ON ABC’s “This Week” this morning, George asked Fred why he refers to Huckabee as “a pro-life liberal.”
“Because he’s pro-life and He’s liberal,” Fred said.
George pressed him to say on which issues is Juckabee liberal?
“Taxes, immigration,” Fred shot back.
Gov. Huckabee seems to have more in common with the Christian Left than the Christian Right, IMO.
Fred Thompson has touted a 100% pro-life record, yet many were puzzled that he didn’t support a life amendment.
Because supporting an amendment to the Constitution requires 110% commitment to the idea that the federal government should solve all of your problems.
In my view, Hickabee is — put in the best terms — a statist. Put in the worst terms, he has fascist tendencies. I have heard him openly admit that he favors a FEDERAL BAN on smoking in the workplace (yes, that would include most mom and pop businesses, as well). Moreover, Hickabee is abysmally weak on immigration, and raised taxes left and right while Guv of AR. Hickabee is not what he lets on to be.
To understand Huckabee’s tax increases you need to know more than the ten second clips of speeches the media shows, I encourage you to dig deeper on this and hear what Huckabee has to say for himself. On abortion, Huckabee views it as a moral issue in the same way one could argue murder is a moral issue. The government says we can’t kill people, Huckabee views the unborn as people. There is not a fault in that logic, you can disagree, but his logic makes sense.
Check out my blog if you would like to respond or read more about Huckabee.
http://prodeoetpatria.wordpress.com
Mike Huckabee is the freshest thing to hit the political landscape in decades. He’s RIGHT on the issues and he’s right for America.
He’s also a BRIDGE between the parties as many dems are seeing in him a man they can get behind.
Ronald Reagan was also for a Constitutional Amendment to reverse abortion-on-demand and supported the movement for one during his Presidency. Was he a nanny-stater too?
I ask that honestly, because I have seen many people say that the GOP cannot win landslide victories by advocating things like this. However the last landslide victory was had by a President who was publicly adamantly anti-abortion and was in support of a Human Life Amendment to the Constitution. I know people look back and disagree with Ronald Reagan’s amnesty (even though he couldn’t have known 20 years ago that the incompetent government would not enforce the laws he was enacting), but I wonder if people also look back and disagree with Ronald Reagan’s active anti-abortion stance and consider it “nanny-statish”?
I should note that I don’t support Mike Huckabee, because of his big spending, big taxing policies and because he is weak on illegal immigration. But I am simply addressing this issue he has raised. People are saying he is pandering and radical, etc. If that is the case, then was Ronald Reagan doing the same? I consider a politician to be pandering if they do not believe in what they are saying. Is that what you are saying here? That Mike Huckabee does not believe in a Human Life Amendment as Reagan did and is just using the issue to gain social conservative support?
Michael, do you think government was any less incompetent twenty years ago? forty years ago?
Human nature is timeless. Bureaucracies are, by their very nature, incompetent. You would do well to remember this whenever you have the impulse to expect government to fix something.
Fred gets it. He understands that the most effective way to deal with abortion is through the states. The Federal Government will NEVER be able to agree on this. Just be realistic!
Bottom line: no amendment to ban abortion will ever pass. Most people favor abortion’s legality at elast in some cases.An amendment returning the matter to the states, on the other hand, would attract the support of the vast majority of the American people, who want to see abbanned for most reasons, but not all.
Secondly, the Constitution isn’t silent on slavery, either. It actually endorses it.
Third, that “Hickabee” business is really distasteful. Whether you like the guy or not, that sort of thing reminds me uncomfortably of the substitution of ad hominems and silly nicknames for reasoned argument the Democrats and Lefties have been using against the President for the past seven years. I hate to see Republicans descend to their level- especially to attack one of our own.
Personally, I’m a Thompson supporter- but one very disturbed by his willingness to let Cruzan V. Director, or that portion of it which legally defines food and water as “medical treatment,” stand.
Yes, Frederalism is grand, but everyone keeps glossing over the point that Fred ALSO OPPOSES A STATE BANBAN IN HIS STATE IF ROE IS OVERTURNED. Go read the MTP transcript. Refusing to support a state ban has nothing to do with Federalism. Fred is just using that as a smokescreen.
So while Fred may profess to be personally pro-life, he is “effectively” pro-choice.
While Huckabee is pro-life personally and politically, he is more liberal than Bush and nearing HIllary-lite on taxes and immigration and nanny-statism.
Romney is pro-life, supports the HLA and he is conservative on taxes and immigration.
Romney has all three legs of the stool. He wins.
You can have 50 different interpretations of what is right with no real problem. The federal government would still have the ability to ban women from traveling from a state to another state, nation, or Indian tribe in order to procure an abortion. According to the 14th Amendment they could also demand the state gave every child had a due process of law before being deprived of their right to life.
http://www.prolifestance.com Know Where Your Candidate Stands On the Issues Relating to Life
Go ahead and knock yourself out folks, abortion will not be an issue come November when it will be Hillary vs. Huckabee. Mike has the most solid record on this issue and will win Iowa because of it.
It is very disturbing that Fred Thompson had no opinion on the case of Terri Schiavo. He must have been sleeping. Federalism can never replace a man’s moral obligation to do all he can to protect life. If the constitution won’t let a man save a woman being starved to death it isn’t worth fighting for. Thankfully, that is not the case here. There are many things a president could have done to save her life and stayed within the bounds of the US Constitution.