Pete's Blog

Continuing right along, in the previous post I stated that I was going to say why a candidate being pro-life should be a big incentive for Christians to vote for a candidate. Piper calls himself a one issue voter on the matter of abortion. He can't imagine voting for someone who would authorize a doctor to kill a person. I agree with him on that. Russell Moore compares it to electing a president who wouldn't let blacks have the same rights as the rest of the American voters. He would never vote for that guy. I agree with that reasoning. Racism and infanticide are each evil attacks on the image of God in man. By that reasoning, I would never vote for the Democratic Party of America (as long as the pro-choice platform is one of their core convictions). Similarly, if I were American, I would be hard pressed to vote for McCain, knowing that he isn't as radically pro-life as I am. I would probably vote for an independent I could agree with.

Let me illustrate why I could never vote for the Democratic Party. Donald Miller (author of Blue Like Jazz) said that he was Republican for a while because of the pro-life issue, but then moved to being a Democrat when he saw that the Republicans weren't doing anything about the issue, and thought that they were only using the abortion issue to exploit the evangelical vote. (The claim that the Republicans have done nothing about abortion isn't entirely true. While Bill Clinton was president he made partial birth abortion, abortion that is performed on a baby that's in the process of being delivered, a baby that is minutes away from gaining personhood, legal, and President Bush undid that.) Even if Miller was right, voting Democrat would make abortion far more common and would make the tax payer pay for abortions (like we already do in Canada). Consider Barack Obama's stance on abortion: It's so extreme that he was one of the few to vote against the Born-Alive Infants Protection Act (most Democrats voted for the Act, as well as Republicans) which was to grant personhood to babies born in an abortion attempt. The Republicans might not undo any of the abortion legislation (which I don't agree with), but the Democrats will certainly try to make it worse. This is why I think it's important not to vote for a pro-choice candidate.

Now let me explain why I wouldn't vote for the Republicans if they have a pro-choice candidate, even if he's the lesser of two evils (as many American Republicans, speaking to evangelicals, would have said of Mayor Giuliani compared with Senator Clinton). If the Republicans were to win under a pro-choice candidate, it would send the message that the Republican base does not actually care about the issue of abortion as much as it cares about national security and about the economy. That would possibly divorce the Republican Party from the pro-life stance, which would be very difficult to go back on later. Instead, I would like the Republicans to lose if they have a pro-choice candidate, sending them the message that they need the support of pro-lifers to win elections.

Now, while I find it very easy to say that no pro-lifer should vote for the Democrats, I find it more difficult to say that no one should vote for McCain. There are justices on the Supreme Court who are ready to retire. If Obama wins this election, they'll probably retire and he will be able to appoint liberal justices to the bench who will claim to find amazing things in the constitution, for example, they might claim to find that the constitution protects children from spanking. They might claim to find that the constitution allows polygamy. You might say that's ludicrous, but the same thing happened for abortion! And then, letting Obama get into office would pretty much guarantee that he would legitimize, once again, partial birth abortion. It might be worth it to vote for McCain to prevent those things. And you might be able to argue that the stem cell issue isn't a big enough step to change the direction of the party. It might be true. I don't think this issue is a matter of right and wrong, instead, I think it's an issue of beneficial and unwise.

Labels: Politics, Resources