Conservative Group Airs Ad Attacking Obama On Choice
The conservative Family Research Council goes up on the air with a new spot using Obama's own recent speech about fatherhood to question his pro-choice views...
The spot, which is airing first in Cincinnatti, followed by Dallas and Atlanda, opens with a clip of Obama during his recent Father's Day speech saying: "We need fathers to recognize that responsibility doesn't just end at conception."
It continues with FRC president Tony Perkins, who's seated holding a toddler and asks: "If, as you say, fatherhood begins at conception, when does life begin?"
The ad is a sign that the major evangelical groups will swallow whatever misgivings they have with McCain and target Obama. Their stepped-up efforts appear to be a reaction to the aggressive evangelical outreach being done by the Obama camp.
Oh boy, a 527.
Now, I'll be expecting the MSM who lambasted Obama for not being "justified" in taking public-financing to rescind their criticism... now...
... hmm, still waiting...
June 27, 2008 10:02 AM | Reply | Permalink
we think it's a 501 c3
June 27, 2008 10:04 AM | Reply | Permalink
Aren't 501 (c)3's prohibited from political activity since they're charitable organizations? I think that's why the 527 designation came into being.
June 27, 2008 10:21 AM | Reply | Permalink
They ARE prohibited from political activity.
This would make this a 527 then.
June 27, 2008 10:24 AM | Reply | Permalink
Maybe they're just uh, intellectually curious about when Obama thinks life begins and the fact that the advertisement is airing in a swing state months before an election is completely coincidental.
June 27, 2008 10:35 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yeah, THAT'S the ticket. They're just curious!
June 27, 2008 10:39 AM | Reply | Permalink
this is just another stupid ad about a wedge issue. it reminds me of the moveon.org ad with the baby. you don't use babies for political or scare purposes
http://sensico.wordpress.com/2008/06/25/mccain-meeting-with-gay-republicans/
June 27, 2008 10:03 AM | Reply | Permalink
Look - spammers are obnoxious and you are a spammer.
June 27, 2008 10:05 AM | Reply | Permalink
SEcond this.
June 27, 2008 10:16 AM | Reply | Permalink
sorry if you dont like the site but i am also commenting and just because i put my friends website on here to help promote it doesnt mean i dont like this site.
June 27, 2008 12:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
Indeed, this ad is weak, and should only help Obama with all the women who still think McCain is pro-choice.
"Obama wants to abort that baby!"
June 27, 2008 10:07 AM | Reply | Permalink
Too bad for the neoconservative Perkins that abortion is no longer the #1 priority of the younger evangelicals.
June 27, 2008 10:08 AM | Reply | Permalink
Not at conception.
How about we go back to the sane way and say when the infant draws breath - that's when life begins. Anything else is a slippery slope to taking choice away from women.
And I have news for you insane anti-choice people - you don't know when life begins any more than anyone else - you ain't god.
IT's a viable human being when it is no longer attached by umbilical chord to the mother. End of fucking story.
June 27, 2008 10:09 AM | Reply | Permalink
As a man, and therefore incapable of carrying a baby in anything but my arms, or one of those little backpacks, who the hell am I to argue?
June 27, 2008 10:18 AM | Reply | Permalink
Thank you - I appreciate your attitude.
June 27, 2008 10:23 AM | Reply | Permalink
I don't want to get into a debate with you on this, but the "draws breath" arugment is so full of common exceptions that it won't hold water, float, swim, hunt, whatever. Viability is the slippery slope and there just ain't no agreement on it. So, wise people agree to disagree and then stay the hell away from it if they are to remain friends.
June 27, 2008 10:26 AM | Reply | Permalink
These wedge issues are brought up because they are so visceral and so filled with these slippery slopes that we get bogged down in discussing them. Then, we retreat to our partisan corners and nothing gets accomplished. That is the purpose of such ads. I think the agree to disagree and move on is the smartest way to avoid the trap set by these kinds of ads.
June 27, 2008 10:36 AM | Reply | Permalink
That argument, the "draws breath" argument, as you phrase it, is one that has been made by moral philosophers.
June 27, 2008 10:36 AM | Reply | Permalink
Moral philosophers have been known to be wrong, particularly when their philosophy gets in the way of objective empiricism (cf: Galileo vs. the Church).
June 27, 2008 10:44 AM | Reply | Permalink
Oh, of course. The reason I mentioned that was simply to indicate that that position is one that others have taken with respect to "when life begins".
June 27, 2008 10:49 AM | Reply | Permalink
Huh? I'm not sure what the medieval Catholic church has to do with contemporary ethical theorists... but alright. Obviously, no empiricist has ever been wrong either...
June 27, 2008 10:51 AM | Reply | Permalink
I don't quite agree with you on that. I support abortion into the second trimester, and prefer health exceptions for the mother in the third trimester.
I think a greater focus should be placed upon contraception in order to minimize abortions, and talk more about responsibility from men in making decisions about sex. We always hear how it's the woman's responsibility to keep her legs closed, but very rarely about the man's responsibility to have sex. Young men are taught that it's okay to have sex, and very little mention is made about how rape is bad to young men.
There is a lot of sexism going on among young men, especially regarding their sexual treatment of women. It's important to teach them sexual respect by not treating women like sexual objects.
June 27, 2008 10:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
If men were forced to support the babies they helped to create (and I mean forced with no way out of it), we wouldn't even be having a discussion about reproductive choices.
June 27, 2008 10:38 AM | Reply | Permalink
Aren't they already being forced to support their children with state-mandated child support checks? Still, many of them are deadbeat dads.
June 27, 2008 10:40 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yes, of course, but if there were a way (and I don't know of one) that would make it impossible for someone to be a deadbeat dad (automatic deduction from any paycheck?), we wouldn't be having a discussion about reproductive choice.
June 27, 2008 10:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
I don't think it's as simple as that.
June 27, 2008 10:51 AM | Reply | Permalink
So let me get this straight you want the License to sleep with any man you choose and DAM the consequences FULL SPEED ahead?Is that what I hear you sayin?
June 29, 2008 12:10 AM | Reply | Permalink
I'm making my donation this morning. To Obama and the DNC.
June 27, 2008 10:15 AM | Reply | Permalink
Abortion, Gays, and Guns--the great Three Social Wedges Of The Republicans Designed To Divert Attention Away From Real Problems.
June 27, 2008 10:17 AM | Reply | Permalink
"pssst, and did I mention Obama is BLACK?"
June 27, 2008 10:19 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yep - you got that just right.
If choice was outlawed - hundreds of jake-leg preachers all over this country would instantly be out of work. These guys really don't want to see abortion become illegal - there goes their careers. Flip Whatshisname and others have built their entire careers on fighting abortion, ostensibly. They really aren't - they are just raking in the dollars from people who are honestly opposed to it.
June 27, 2008 10:20 AM | Reply | Permalink
Kinda like the Supreme Court taking away one of the NRA's reasons for being...
June 27, 2008 10:27 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yep.
Only more so, CT.
June 27, 2008 10:28 AM | Reply | Permalink
The fact that they feel the need to spend their money in Texas and Georgia is a good thing.
June 27, 2008 10:25 AM | Reply | Permalink
And very telling signs of their vulnerability in these states.
June 27, 2008 10:28 AM | Reply | Permalink
It is, too. I loves it.
It's ever so much harder - in fact, it approaches impossible - to take back a personal liberty once it is in place. It's much harder, in other words, to outlaw abortion than it was legalizing it in the first place.
I do not believe they will outlaw out - I never did think they would be able to. And I don't believe it's in the best interests of the people who have led this crusade to reach their goal.
June 27, 2008 10:34 AM | Reply | Permalink
I agree with you, Tena, that they will never outlaw it. What I think their aim is (other than raising a lot of money) is to regulate it to death - or if not to death, than to at least put it on life support.
I believe that it's MS now (?) that has ONE facility in the entire state that provides abortions due to overly-stringent health regulations. Then of course there are the waiting periods and the costs of travel, etc. - these make it next to impossible for working class women who cannot afford to take so much time off from work to realistically gain access to abortion services. Whether or not Roe gets overturned or not, I'm afraid we're regressing back to the days when these services were really only available to the wealthy who had the means to follow though and seek them out.
June 27, 2008 10:49 AM | Reply | Permalink
They'v done a pretty good job with 4th amendment rights.
Anyway, you are never going to convince authentic pro-lifers and there's no point in attacking them. Just state our case and let the chips fall where they may. I just wish the party was willing to stand up for all civil rights, because you can be darned sure if they'll sell you out on one they'll sell you out on others if it's politically expedient.
June 27, 2008 10:53 AM | Reply | Permalink
Ahh, you beat me to the punch. It's pretty obvious though. They feel the need to spend in Texas and Georgia, meaning they are turning purple. Awesome! Look out landslide a coming.
June 27, 2008 1:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
From the Compassion Forum at Messiah College:
June 27, 2008 10:32 AM | Reply | Permalink
Sounds like he wants to have a thoughtful discussion again....how irritating!
June 27, 2008 10:37 AM | Reply | Permalink
It's an honest answer.
My answer is arbitrary - for a reason. When California made it murder to kill an unborn fetus in the process of killing the pregnant mother, I was shocked. That is a truly dangerous situation - because once you do that, it's nothing to say "well, then, abortion is murder."
Inasmuch as no one knows the answer to "when does life begin," an arbitrary point will have to be set and where that point is set determines whether or not women are going to be able to control their own damn bodies.
Right now, the nanny state is not in favor of letting women decide much of anything - liberal states like Washington NAG the everloving hell out of women who are pregnant and anyone who smokes and I hate it. There are signs on every fucking ladies' room in Wa. warning pregnant women over all kinds of shit. This is not conducive to women being allowed the same rights over their bodies that men are. It's not a good trend
I'm not just a walking uterus.
June 27, 2008 10:40 AM | Reply | Permalink
I'm not just a walking uterus.
Me neither, but to many politicians, that's exactly what we are.
If fatherhood were imposed on men the way that is on women (and as I said upthread, I don't know how you would do this), there would be no controversy over reproductive choice. None.
June 27, 2008 10:45 AM | Reply | Permalink
Not at your age. You can't procreate anyway so don't take it so personally.
I'd have thought you would've scheduled removal by now.
Let us know when the hot flashes begin willya?
June 27, 2008 1:08 PM | Reply | Permalink
You stay classy, fogu!
June 27, 2008 1:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
Will do!
June 27, 2008 1:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
So Tena you want the right to be a street Walker??
June 29, 2008 12:15 AM | Reply | Permalink
I just hope that every fringe group that airs an ad against Obama isn't picked up by the blogisphere as "news". There's going to be a lot of them, and internet coverage (which often turns into cable news coverage) is how they get their attack ads circulated to a much wider audience than they could ever dream of by just airing these attacks locally.
Just saying.
June 27, 2008 10:34 AM | Reply | Permalink
Don't hold your breath.....last night I turned on CNN and watched as Anderson Cooper did a story about the McCain strategy against Obama, and began to list the Repub Talking Points against Obama as if each one was news. And I paraphrase, "well, McCain, who has a lifetime of experience as a war hero, and in Congress as a Maverick, he says Obama doesn't have the experience to be President. The polls seems to agree...does this young Senator have an experience problem?"
I hate CNN, with a passion.
June 27, 2008 10:42 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yeah, CNN has completely jumped the shark. They've gone rightwing, corporate-whore style.
I'm done with them. Actually, I'm mostly done with cable news in general except to follow the spin going out, but CNN is definitely off my "trust list".
June 27, 2008 12:55 PM | Reply | Permalink
Me three. I watch cnn and its like WTF. They are in an alternate reality zone. From February through May they kept reporting that clinton and obama were tied???? False. The totally coddle mcbush as well. It's really disgusting. I don't get it. It's frightening that Fox entertainment is getting to be more credible than cnn. Unbelievable.
I don't understand what happened to them. Other than corporate right-wing whoring, anybody have any ideas? It's really sad.
June 27, 2008 1:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
This anti-abortion baby isn't as cute as MoveOn's Iraq soldier baby.
June 27, 2008 12:26 PM | Reply | Permalink
That goes doubly for the people holding the babies.
June 27, 2008 4:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
I have yet to see Obama show support for gay marriage which was legalized here in California.
He's trying to straddle the fence and is going to slip and then it's, whoops, ...gelding.
June 27, 2008 1:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
Hey troll, go away.
June 27, 2008 2:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well thanks for that thoughtful reply.
June 28, 2008 10:50 AM | Reply | Permalink
What an idiot.
June 27, 2008 2:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
Oh geez... This would be why Obama decided to opt out of public financing.
June 27, 2008 5:02 PM | Reply | Permalink
So let me get this straight you want the License to sleep with any man you choose and DAM the consequences FULL SPEED ahead?Is that what I hear you sayin?
June 29, 2008 12:08 AM | Reply | Permalink