Cal Thomas: Time for a new pro-life game plan

MYRNA BROWN, HOST: Today is Thursday, November 9th. Good morning! This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Myrna Brown.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard. Up next: WORLD commentator Cal Thomas on what Republicans should take away from Tuesday’s elections.

CAL THOMAS, COMMENTATOR: Elections in Virginia and Ohio should convince pro-life Republicans of their need to come up with a different strategy when it comes to abortion. An approach of no-exceptions or strictly limiting the procedure isn’t working, in part because a new generation of younger people seem less predisposed to curtailing it.

When it comes to pregnancies due to rape or incest, Republicans and pro-lifers need to go on offense and counter the “pro-choice” crowd’s fixation on those rare instances. USA Today has reported that according to the Guttmacher Institute “Just one percent of women obtain an abortion because they became pregnant through rape, and less than 0.5% do so because of incest.”

Those who are pro-life need to do a better job of portraying the other side as the real radicals. They mostly oppose any restrictions until live birth and the ultra-radicals, like former Virginia Governor Ralph Northam is OK with a woman changing her mind after the baby is born and setting it aside to die. Pro-lifers should focus on such anti-life positions and try to negotiate a middle ground while continuing to work to protect the unborn at earlier stages. Aren’t more than 60 million abortions enough? Are people not concerned about the decline in America’s birth rate?

Back to politics. Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin was seen by some as a possible alternative to Donald Trump in the presidential contest. He campaigned hard to hold on to the slim Republican majority in the state house and flip the Democrat’s slim majority in the state senate. Instead, he and Republicans lost both houses, dooming most of his agenda for his last two years in office including his proposal to limit abortions to 15 weeks.

Redistricting in Virginia did not help Youngkin’s cause. On top of the usual large turnout by Democrats in Northern Virginia, Richmond and other high population cities, the redrawing of district lines favored Democrats. It’s fair to say that after yesterday’s results, any hope of a Youngkin presidential candidacy next year is dead, if it ever was alive. 

Some Republicans are calling for RNC Chair Ronna McDaniel to resign because of continuing losses, but she is not the main problem. Too many Republicans are reluctant to talk about abortion because they appear unsure or uncomfortable with their positions.

We live in an anti-life and increasingly lawless culture. When I was young, newspapers buried most crime stories on inside pages because there was so little of it. Today, even multiple murders in cities like Chicago and New York barely get our attention unless they can be turned into a racial issue. I see abortion increasingly as a reflection of our deepening decadence at many levels. It’s not the main cause of our moral decline. That means it must be dealt with at a deeper level than politics.

As expected, Democrats are celebrating their victories. It appears they will make abortion a central issue in the 2024 presidential campaign in hopes of distracting voter attention from President Biden’s terrible record. Republicans had better find a way to answer them.

I’m Cal Thomas.

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