Hillary rejects 'safe, legal and rare' abortion goals

Sheila Liaugmina
February 9, 2016
Reproduced with Permission
Sheila Reports

"It's hard to overstate how extreme Mrs. Clinton's new position is.

But Bill McGurn does a good job conveying the idea.

Today Mrs. Clinton's formula is safe, legal, unlimited - and federally subsidized. We saw this new Hillary Clinton at a Planned Parenthood rally in New Hampshire this month, where she said she favored "safe and legal abortion" and denounced the Hyde Amendment, which prohibits federal funding for abortion.

"I will always defend Planned Parenthood and I will say consistently and proudly, Planned Parenthood should be funded, supported and protected, not undermined, misrepresented and demonized," Mrs. Clinton said. In return, Planned Parenthood rewarded her with the first presidential primary endorsement in its 100-year history.

This is not where American women, in the majority of the general population, want to go.

I began this post a while ago, had no time to finish it, and now the New Hampshire primary is here. Mrs. Clinton will by all accounts lose it to Democratic Socialist Bernie Sanders, no pro-life advocate himself. Because of her falling poll numbers across the board of pollsters and demographics of those polled, she's taking a page from Barack Obama's playbook, and instead of moderating closer toward the ideological center, she's tacking left. He had nothing to lose when he did it, and he's enjoying the last months in the office of the presidency. She has everything to lose, namely that office which she seeks wholeheartedly.

This is how to lose it, or at least…it doesn't help.

Amy Chozick of the New York Times recently described the relationship this way: "the Clinton campaign has functioned almost as a marketing arm for Planned Parenthood." Remember, this is an organization that reports performing 323,999 abortions and taking in $553.7 million in subsidies from Uncle Sam in fiscal year 2014-15. Though these tax dollars are not earmarked for abortion, money is fungible.

It's a curious reversal. For one thing, Mrs. Clinton's shift comes at a moment when even some pro-choice advocates admit to queasiness over Planned Parenthood after undercover videos were released last year showing its officials sipping wine as they chat about prices for, say, an intact fetal heart. The pro-choice community also includes those who support abortion rights but do not believe either Planned Parenthood or abortion should be subsidized with tax dollars.

It's also a big shift from last July, when Mrs. Clinton repeated her safe, legal and rare formula to the New Hampshire Union Leader and said she found the Planned Parenthood videos "disturbing." But plainly not so disturbing that she would let it get in the way of the $20 million Planned Parenthood will spend this election cycle.

It calls to mind the old saying 'Dance with the one who brought you.' Even if steps get entangled, and you both fall.

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