Christian Democrats in the United States

Divide and Conquer

For example, on the subject of abortion, the Republican position fails to recognize that most women who choose abortion do so because they feel they have no choice, due to economics or social circumstance, but GOP does not generally support the social welfare, open education, healthcare options and justice measures for women and children that would reduce demand for abortion. By spinning these as anti-liberty and expensive, the Republicans draw half the people away from any realistic solution, and into support of measures that would turn the U.S. into a fascist government, and speak so while the military and secret budgets drive us into bankruptcy.

When people concede to government the power to regulate love and their decision to have a child, the principles of such a government no longer value sanctity of life, so in that direction, they are always out of line with the principles of the people. If the United States travels down that road and over an indeterminant threshold, the government would no longer need the pretense of abortion to exercise absolute power. Those who offer you the idea of power to regulate the beginning of life will not let you have any once you give it to them — they wish to regulate all life, and yours. It is a lie and a ruse; this power can never belong to any government in a way that does not cripple its own peoples' hearts and minds.

We must have faith in this regard that love and law will be written in the hearts and minds of the people, and when offered positive options, freedom for and from tradition and each other, and a deep reflective education, we will choose wisely and help each other. And so to choose to do so should be thought our noblest goal.

The Democrats' position supports better social programs, especially education, which would reduce demand for abortion, perhaps to the point that no rational person would consider one. But Roe v. Wade imposes an arbitrary six-month boundary that enables the knowing death of some whom the Supreme Court ruling itself considers to be independent children by its own principles, especially with advances in neo-natal care. Law defines people bearing rights to have the potential capacity for reasoning and choice. If public government has any obligation to protect people who have done no wrong, it must at least use coherent reasoning to implement such an important rule.

And certainly, one cannot merely buy an education or program it into people like robots (or dogs). We must aim for a new plateau of progress, and stop treating children (and each other) like animals.

The Democrats' problem runs deeper: there is no principle in Roe v. Wade from which to derive a "right to choose" termination. Roe v. Wade decides — rightly so — that constructing a government able to prevent all abortion with investigation and punishment would make this country a horrible, fascist, invasive, ruthless place to live, and that would destroy all of our values. But the ability to get and give abortions is only a coincidental legal fact, not a moral right.

The more important right is to live free from authoritarian government, because more people would die unjustly under that easily corrupted power. Roe v. Wade does not declare abortion moral. By spinning privacy and freedom as a "right to choose" infanticide, the Democrats draw the other half of the people away from any moral foundation or rational logic, offering an easy, cheap way out of the challenges of life, and debasing the ability of women to rise above their circumstances to manage families and careers.

Meanwhile, women struggling with the decision are forgotten, made to feel ashamed by both sides of the conflict, and perhaps the people they should be able to depend on, for being human and getting pregnant, alone with fear of uncertainty and change, aware of the realities of foster care, child abuse, adoption, and the loyalty of men, and not welcome, for their internal conflict, in either camp of pre-fabricated rules. Can you give them a better way out?

Those women who choose abortion can lose themselves in guilt during "moments of clarity" when their integrated mind fully feels the obvious truth that they terminated what would have become their child. These same women are taught by abortion promoters that Christians are the evil ones, who seek to restrict their "choice." Some might even be suicidal, or fractured. But it's in Christ that we find that all life to be valuable, even that of mothers who chose abortion, because "they know not what they do," life is complicated and painful. It's not a moral excuse, but most of them probably made the best choices they thought they could at the time. It ought to be Christians who would lend a hand, not an accusing tongue.

So Americans are divided along an irrational wedge, so wedded to their party lines they cannot see that both positions are incoherent and talk past each other, each position contradicting the principles it claims. These engineered "left" and "right" options waste well-meaning time and energy on both sides, but the positions can never reach a compromise. We could all cooperate to solve real problems, but in order to do that, we all have to change our minds.

It is the prisoner's dilemma on every issue, skewed on both sides so we are all prisoners of forces that hate democracy and freedom. Instead of cooperating to solve problems, we shout at each other endlessly without understanding, compassion, or progress. We are taught to hate each other for no good reason.

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