"If Rudy is Talking Jesus, He's Going to Run"

Andrew Sullivan's headline for his February 19, 2006 column for the London Times should provoke some real soul-searching on the part of Republican social conservatives who admire Rudolph Giuliani for his leadership in the aftermath of the 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center. While Giuliani is credited with cleaning up New York City prior to the 9/11 attacks and for his steady hand during and after the worst thing that has ever befallen that city, the fact that he is out in left field on social issues should not be overlooked. It should not be overlooked because Rudy Giuliani just may run for the Republican presidential nomination in 2008.

Mr. Sullivan reported that Giuliani addressed the evangelical Global Pastors Network in Orlando, Florida in January. He describes the network as "a large group, aiming to set up 5 million churches worldwide in the next decade." Its leaders believe the apocalypse is coming soon and that their efforts at evangelization might help accelerate the moment of rapture, when good Christians will be "whisked to heaven to meet Jesus."

Sullivan found none of this "particularly noteworthy." What he did find surprising was that the "the pro-choice, pro-gay, divorced Catholic former Mayor of New York" was addressing them.

Giuliani reportedly "gushed" over his audience. When asked if he was running for president he said: "Only God knows. I'll know better in a year whether I can fully commit to that process." When the pastors said they would pray for him, Giuliani replied, "I appreciate you. I can tell you from my heart how much I appreciate what you are doing: saving people, telling them about Jesus Christ and bringing them to God."

Mr. Sullivan's view of all of this was, "Take it from me: if Giuliani is talking Jesus, he's running for president." For those with Internet access, photos are available of former Mayor Giuliani dressed in drag in a 1997 role in a satire of "Victor/Victoria" during the annual "Inner Circle" dinner, by clicking on the following links – http://www.flickr.com/photo_zoom.gne?id=75055550&size=o, and http://www.s-t.com/daily/03-97/03-97/03-28-97/zzzwnppl.htm. To read about his 2001 agreement to appear on Showtime's gay series "Queer as Folk" to raise money for the Empire State Pride Agenda disaster relief fund, click on this link — http://www.newyork-metro.com/nymetro/news/people/columns/intelligencer/5295/.

Mitt Romney on Abortion 
Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney is being touted by some as a potential 2008 presidential candidate. Again, we have a politician who has recently sent mixed signals as to where he stands on the life issues. He likes to say he is "pro-life."

However, while he says he opposes the cloning of human embryos, he supports using embryos generated in IVF clinics for experimentation — a distinction without a difference. An embryo is an embryo, period!

On abortion, the following quotes should give social conservative pro-lifers pause:

• In an October 1994 debate with US Senator Edward M. Kennedy, Democrat of Massachusetts, Romney said: “I believe that abortion should be safe and legal in this country. I have since the time that my mom took that position when she ran in 1970 as a U.S. Senate candidate. I believe that since Roe v. Wade has been the law for 20 years we should sustain and support it.” (Boston Globe, 6/28/05)

• “While I’ve said time and again that I oppose abortion, I’ve also indicated that I would not change in any way the abortion laws of Massachusetts, and I’ve honored my promises,” Romney said during a press conference at the Radisson Center of New Hampshire before a scheduled speech to the New Hampshire Federation of Republican Women. (Boston Globe , 6/4/2005)

John McCain Seeking Republican Nomination 
Arizona Senator John McCain has been meeting and greeting Texans, often escorted by Bush-backer and former U.S. Congressman Tom Loeffler, a lobbyist and influential mover and shaker in political circles in the President’s home state. Recently, McCain has visited Houston, San Antonio, Austin, and Dallas, in an effort to round up commitments from Bush’s “Rangers” (contributors of $200,000) and “Pioneers” ($100,000). Former Governor Bill Clements reportedly contributed $5,000 to McCain, and Mark McKinnon, who put together Bush’s “message” during the last campaign, has signed on, evidently to help McCain overcome his negative image among many of the Party faithful. Meetings and dinners for McCain have been hosted by Loeffler, as well as former U.S. Rep. Kent Hance, and Tom Hicks, who bought the Texas Rangers baseball team from Mr. Bush and his partners in 1998. That’s heady stuff.

Much of his appeal to the Bush backers stems from the perception that McCain can draw Democrats and Independent voters away from Hillary Clinton, the presumed nominee of the Democrats in 2008. They forget that rarely is a committed liberal defeated by a liberal-lite candidate. When that happens, the Reagan Democrats simply return to their comfort zone. A Republican victory requires a committed, dedicated, pro-life, philosophical conservative standard-bearer, whose ideas strongly contrast with Hillary’s liberal/socialist world view. John McCain does not fit that description.

McCain’s credentials as a social conservative have been ripped asunder by his own hand in recent years. While he has maintained a generally pro-life voting record during his tenure in the Senate, it is clear that his intention is merely to regulate or restrict the practice of abortion. “But certainly in the short term, or even in the long term, I would not support repeal of Roe v. Wade, which would then force X number of women in America to (undergo) illegal and dangerous operations,” said John McCain as reported in the San Francisco Chronicle on August 20, 1999. He justifies abortion for babies conceived through rape or incest, a position requiring abortion remain legal.

In early 2000, while running for the Republican presidential nomination, John McCain took a strong stand against research involving the killing of human embryos. But, by April of 2004, he signed on to a letter to President Bush asking him to expand federal funding for experiments on human embryos and to increase the number of embryonic stem cell lines to be used for research.

In 2000 McCain supported changing the pro-life plank in the Republican National Platform to say a mother has a right to abortion in cases of rape and incest, giving hope to pro-abortion forces in the Party. They lost. Enough said.

George Allen on the Life Issues 
U.S. Senator George Allen is the former Governor of Virginia. In that capacity, on March 22, 1997, he signed a parental notice bill before 1,500 supporters in a ceremony replete with families carrying “Thank you Governor Allen” signs. Since that time, Allen has given every indication that he is another politician who claims to be “pro-life” while endorsing measures to restrict or regulate the practice of abortion, but not make it illegal.

In 2000, Senator Allen responded to a Project Vote Smart questionnaire, saying abortions should be illegal when the fetus is viable, with or without life support. In other words, he supported abortion until viability, when 98% of the abortions are performed. He said abortions should be legal when pregnancy resulted from rape or incest, when the life of the woman is endangered, and he added that abortion should be legal for gross fetal abnormality. Of course, he supported the usual restrictions such as a partial-birth abortion ban, waiting periods, and opposed public funding of abortions. But the views he expressed can only be described as pro-choice, not pro-life.

On May 22, 2005, George Allen appeared with George Stephanopoulos on “Sunday Morning Talk”, and he was asked whether he supported Bush’s restriction on embryonic stem cell research, or if he favored the legislation that would expand the number of embryos to be used for experimentation. His response was, “I’m probably in between the both of them.” Later in the interview, Allen said, “I do not want to be creating embryos simply for harvesting, nor do I want to allow cloning.” Stephanopoulos replied, “But if they were left over from fertility treatments, it’s OK to do the research on them.” Allen responded, “Yes.”

Senator Bill Frist Has Never Been Pro-Life 
Many pro-lifers across the country were shocked and disappointed that Senator Bill Frist (R-TN) joined hands with pro-abortion Senator Arlen Specter and called for passage of the Castle/Specter bill (H.R. 810/S.471) which would expand taxpayer funding of scientific research that involves the killing of human embryos beyond the Bush administration’s limit to only those embryos killed prior to August 9, 2001.

Unfortunately, many people live in some sort of dream world in which they think if a politician says he’s pro-life it must be true. Never mind that Senator Frist justifies abortion for babies conceived through rape or incest. After all, he says he’s pro-life. Never mind that he has repeatedly and publicly stated his support for embryonic stem cell research. After all, he says he’s pro-life. When he announced his support for Castle/Specter, he followed by shamelessly claiming, once again, that he is pro-life. Perhaps he thinks that, regardless of what he does, if he says he’s pro-life often enough people will overlook his egregious disregard for innocent human beings at their earliest stage of development.

When Senator Frist chaired the Platform Committee of the 2004 Republican National Convention in New York, Cathie Adams who, along with Kelly Shackelford, represented Texas on the Committee, offered an amendment banning research that involves the killing of human embryos. She felt it was important to raise the issue and debate it that year so that the public would know that pro-life Republicans are not satisfied with current administration policy on embryonic stem cell research. But, because an estimated 75% of the Committee members were Republican officials of some sort, the Bush campaign exerted almost absolute control so that nothing went into the Platform that they didn’t approve. And they did not want the Party on record in support of a total ban. Senator Bill Frist, who chaired the Committee, managed to table the amendment so that no debate could take place.

Later that week in New York, Senator Frist was the featured speaker at a large gathering of pro-life conservatives at the Plaza Hotel. During that speech, he declared himself pro-life once again, and talked about how life begins at conception and is deserving of protection and respect. Having watched him dispatch the embryonic stem cell research amendment just that week, I was curious to read what he had to say about the subject in his newly published biography, Healing America, that was made available at the event. And this is what he said: “After grappling with the issue scientifically, ethically and morally, I conclude that both embryonic and adult stem cell research should be federally funded within a carefully regulated, fully transparent framework. This framework must ensure the highest level of respect for the moral significance of the human embryo...” [How do you do that and kill him/her at the same time?]

Bill Frist recognizes the scientific fact that an embryo is a unique and distinct human being, yet, as long as the parents are willing to donate their children to science, he says — go for it — and let the taxpayers, millions of whom consider ESCR a crime against humanity, foot the bill!

Senator Bill Frist is not pro-life. That is a fact. Any Senator who voted for Specter/Castle is not pro-life. Remember, it’s not what they say, it’s what they do that counts.

Senator Frist should entertain no illusions about running for President in 2008. He formed an unholy alliance with one of the most unelectable former presidential candidates in the nation, Arlen Specter. He should expect to share the same fate.