Obama: Anti-Abortion Activists Lying About Me

CBN News' David Brody interviewed Barack Obama after Saturday night's Saddleback forum. He says:

It seems like Barack Obama's heated answer about The Born Alive Infant Protection Act is making some headlines out there ... Clearly, the conversation over this bill has gotten Obama riled up. He truly believes The National Life to Right Committee is lying about this controversial infanticide bill which he opposed. He is adamant in saying that the bill he opposed in the Illinois State Senate was NOT the same as the federal legislation that pro-choice Senators even voted for.

The Huffington Post previously reported on the effort to paint Obama as pro-infanticide:

Catholic voters should steel themselves to hear Barack Obama accused of "infanticide" this fall. Support for that heinous crime is the latest charge being cooked up against a Democratic nominee by the man who helped to paint John Kerry as unworthy of the communion wafer back in 2004.

Deal Hudson, who was compelled to resign from his role with the Republican National Committee after sordid details from his personal life were brought to light four years ago, now sits on John McCain's 80-person advisory board for Catholic issues. From that perch, he's begun launching the "infanticide" smear against Obama in niche media outlets like his own "Inside Catholic" website and talk radio host Al Kresta's program. ("Infanticide is becoming a touchy subject for Barack Obama," Hudson wrote matter-of-factly on his website in early July.)

Watch the interview clip and transcript here.

Comments

[ilovemydoggy]

Leave it to the Republicans to pull out some insoluble controversy. I think HUNGER and POVERTY and OIL BARONS are more interesting than this cr*p. Wake up America. They are trying to manipulate you.

Baby boomer views: http://www.Vaboomer.com

[rozz62]

But now, the National Right to Life Committee has uncovered proof that
Obama in fact voted in committee against even the version of the
Illinois Born-Alive Act that did include exactly the same "neutrality
clause" as the federal bill. On March 12, 2003, when the bill was being
debated, an amendment was added that inserted the neutrality language of
the federal bill verbatim into the Illinois bill. Obama voted for the
amendment (that's the vote on the left-hand column on this committee
vote record), and then voted against the amended bill (that's the vote
on the right on the same document). All the Democrats on the committee
(which Obama chaired) followed his lead, and the bill was defeated.

This was, again, legislation that in the same form had by then passed
unanimously at the federal level. Even NARAL did not oppose it.
Apparently Barack Obama did, and his old explanation for doing so seems
at odds with the facts.

[kristycu]

so if this all true what you say, where is the link-if you want me to change my mind, let see this site you speak of, because for all i know you made this stuff up. if you are going to make this charge you should at least provide us with the link so we could see for ourselves

[roald]

Please don't accuse rozz62 of making stuff up. I'm sure s/he is accurately copying what someone else made up.

[cyndeewi]

Yes, by now they have found that that you are lying rozz62. Have you read Obama's position on this. You are sprewing lies about Obama but cannot back it up.

[rozz62]

Obama and the Born-Alive Act [Yuval Levin]


Six years ago, Congress passed the "Born-Alive Infants Protection Act,"
making it illegal to kill a child who is fully born during an attempted
abortion. The bill passed without a single opposing vote in either
house, and was signed into law by President Bush on August 5, 2002. When
he was a state senator at that same time, Barack Obama opposed a state
version of the bill in Illinois. His explanation for the vote since then
has been that the state version did not include a so-called "neutrality
clause" which says explicitly that the bill is not meant to influence
the legal standing of a fetus before birth one way or another. The
federal law contained such a clause, and the state law, Obama has long
insisted, did not. As recently as June 30, the Obama campaign made that
case to answer the charge (in that case from Bill Bennett) that Obama
had opposed the Born-Alive Act.

[ranchosx]

That's what I want is a morality lecture from a church that covered for pedophiles and did so at the highest levels not to mention their role in the Holocaust.

[ghenry]

People, the decision to have an abortion is a personal one. You understand the meaningof the word personal? It has nothing to do with you. If you decide to have or not to have an abortion, it is your business and yours only and not open for comment by the rest of America.

[NeoLiberal]

If abortion is a national issue that ultimately is going to be subject to legislation, then we must be consistent:

Enact a law that governs all reproduction:

--how many babies and what kinds (to ensure balance within the gene pool to optimize our specie's survival)
--who can and cannot procreate (honestly you must agree that there are some people who should NEVER have children...)
--economic eligibility requirement of parents
--eugenic standards (we do have tests that can weed out potentially health-care-system zapping babies)

Let's go all out.

This debate would make Jonathan Swift both proud and extremely disappointed in how far we have come as a nation since 1729.

[Phil123]

China already does this.

[Phil123]

Why is that? Because you say so? It's not that simple.

I have a suggestion. How about "Don't have promiscuous sex with a man that you don't respect enough to be the father of your child." Is that too hard for you?

[AKTION]

Is that really what you think? That every abortion is just the result of "promiscuous sex with a man that you don't respect enought to be the father of your child"? What about rape, incest, severe birth defects in the child (e.g., anencephaly) that make life impossible or extraordinarily painful for the baby, a life-threatening condition in the mother (such as septicemia, or eclampsia)? Do you really think that every abortion is just due to careless sex, and that the decision to have an abortion is really so easy? It's sad that you can just dismiss a woman's often very painful and traumatic decision so blithely.

It's easy to sit back and say such things, but life isn't always so easy, and situations are not always so cut and dried. Knee-jerk reactions are so much easier than thinking.

[reelcobra]

Since everyone here on the HiffPo knows Obama voted against the bill the second time when it made the Roe v Wade distinction he supposedly required...

...and yet we all still pretend like he was protecting those freedoms when he voted against the bill...

...are we saying that an unborn fetus is fair game for the executioner until the day of birth?

I don't understand the attitude around here.

[stimpy]

And exactly what is a born fetus?

Apparently the reason you don't understand the attitude around here is because you were home schooled. As an orphan.

[NTO08]

Very intelligent response...are all Obamabots/Huffpoblowhards as inane as this?
I have no sympathy for the anti-abortion loons, but maybe you could respond with an answer that shows you aren't mentally deficient.

[rockyersocksoff]

Republicans support Infanticide.

Only, it's called "dropping bombs on civilians."

[ranchosx]

touche! They are pro life as long as you are white

[Phil123]

We don't want to harm humans. Just liberals.

[rshrink]

How long will we focus on trying to fight things with laws that need to be addressed with intelligence and science, particularly given that laws have never stopped abortions from happening. It is extremely unrealistic to think that everyone is going to abstain from sex until married and given the economy, marriage also will not assure unwanted pregnancies. So, it continues to be the case that well timed sex ed and birth control still needs to be in the arsenal for stopping abortions. I would include the morning after pill. I don't think anyone can make a case for one and two celled organisms passing for a person. If you say it is potential life, so is every sperm and egg that does not get mated up. Stopping something at two cells is much better than later in the term. Since the closest thing to consciousness that we know of would be the brain, until the brain is formed, it is unlikely that there is consciousness. The next step is to prepare the garden of life with healthcare, daycare and decent paying jobs. Are you really serious about stopping abortion? Then support the above and you will see results.

[Bibbo]

You have it all wrong. First things first. To say nobody can "make the case for 1 or 2 cell organisms passing for a person" you have self identified as at best an agnostic but more likely an atheist. You either believe in God or you don't-there's no middle ground. It follows that you then believe that man is made of both body and soul or you don't-no middle ground.Christian's believe the soul is created at conception-agnostics and atheists dont believe in a soul therfore for them the one or two cell stage lacks "personhood". No matter what you call yourself your belief and reasons for supporting abortion define what you are. I would ask you if not the 1 or 2 cell stage then what is your science to define when life begins? Please no touchy-feely stuff about when you recognize on an emotional level that it "looks" like a human. What you are able to identify by recognition is very limited.How many people can recognize from a baby photograph the grown man,yet they are the same person at 1 or 2 days old(from birth) that they are at 50 yrs old. Such collossal pride to presume to know when life begins by sensory information alone. But then again the block that man is afflicted with that causes him to reject God is none other than pride. You know the old serpent/apple/ adam & eve thing.

[geber22]

Actually you have it wrong! I would love to see the biblical passage against abortion.

"If men strive, and hurt a woman with child, so that her fruit depart from her, and yet no mischief follow: he shall be surely punished according as the woman's husband will lay upon him; and he shall pay as the judges determine.

"And if any mischief follow, then thou shalt give life for life, Eye for eye, tooth for tooth . . ."--Ex. 21:22-25

The bible orders the death penalty for murder of a human being, but not for the expulsion of a fetus.

[anon004]

You ever made a cake? You can carefully measure and mix all the ingredients and put them in the pan, and put that pan on the countertop of your kitchen, and guess what? It will never become a cake unless you put it in the oven. It would be great if it turned somehow into a cake just sitting there, but it doesn't. Sorry, but that's just the reality of cake making. You can argue until you are blue in the face that a one or two-cell pre-embyro (what the doctors who did our IVF called them, not my phrase) is a person, but without a woman's uterus, it will never grow beyond a few cells before it dies. So, all this discussion about when these cells acquire a soul is based upon religious belief and not science, and, in terms of making public policy in a country with the separation of church and state, is basically pointless. The bottom line is, If you think abortions are a bad thing, don't have one.

[2lib4oh]

It is possible to respect life and appreciate the great mystery that surrounds the nature of God without the need to inflict your opinions upon others.Especially , since no one has spoken to God and found about what he thinks.It seems arrogant to assume you know everything about God.

[ranchosx]

prove there is a god.

you rightists don't do nuance. just because someone has a different perspective doesn't make him an aetheist.

let me say something about that. we non believers who live a virtuous life do so because it is the right thing to do not as a consequence of reward or punishment.

your virtue is bogus since it is based in selfishness not selflessness.

adam and eve? the whole world is the product of incest?

[klmebane]

"I don't think anyone can make a case for one and two celled organisms passing for a person. If you say it is potential life, so is every sperm and egg that does not get mated up..."

"further more, every masturbatory emission, where the sperm is clearly not seeking an egg, could be termed reckless abandonment." --Elle Woods, Legally Blonde

i have a child, and it was an unplanned pregnancy. when i saw that first ultrasound (at 5 1/2 weeks) i didn't think "hey that's a baby" i thought "that blob is supposed to be what, again?" abortion wasn't the choice i made, and that was my right to control what happens to my body and the right to make my own medical decisions. just as another woman has the right to make a different decision when her circumstances warrant it. it shouldn't boil down to legal or not, because either way abortions will still occur. comprehensive sex ed, birth control, health care, child care, a stable economy, a living wage, no death penalty, no wars of aggression-- all of these things are far more "pro-life" than any legal decision.

[ranchosx]

agreed. Repugs are against birth control for women also. Thy will oppose anything that empowers women. this is why they love laura bush ( traditional house wife who married young and into money ) and hate michelle obama who is a self made woman, an attorney who stays home with the kids now because she can. she was making more money than barack when they met. same reason they call hillary a man.

strong intelligent women controlling their own lives scares fat white men with small penises.

[triplbee]

I'm a political progressive and for a variety of reasons I think that legal abortion is a better option than criminalizing abortion. That being said, let's not delude ourselves into believing that abortion doesn't claim a human life. A single sperm cell and an egg will not constitute a human life unless the one fertilizers the other, so your comparison makes no sense. Also, many abortions take place at a point when the fetus has a heartbeat, fingers, toes, etc. We should be honest about the fact that abortion takes the life of a human baby. We are being delusional if we claim otherwise.

[Dockside]

Abortion claims a potential human life, in my opinion. I miscarried at two months. I was devastated. But that blob of tissue that I flushed down the toilet was NOT a baby. It was a potential human life. I believe that to the very core of my being and NOTHING will ever change it. However, I do understand and respect others who believe differently. I just wish they would understand and respect my very strongly unshakeable belief as well.

It that blob of protoplasm, that is unable to sustain itself outside of the mother, is a baby, why don't we have funerals and "proper" burials for those embryos and fetuses that are spontaneously and purposefully aborted?

[Tommygun264]

What a load of crap. Is this the best these people can do? As smear attempts go, each new one is even more pathetic and laughable than the last.

[AlexisAshley]

The slightest negative comment made against Barry O is a "smear". Even mentioning Obama's middle name -- HUSSEIN -- as in Saddam Hussein is a smear.

[sherron4truth]

how about mentioning Hussein - as in King Hussein of Jordan. he was a warrior for Peace. quite frankly, the way your post reads - it is definitely a smear. fess up

[AlexisAshley]

Common Barry O, fess up, the only one lying is you.

[orangepetal]

Ooooh Obama, what happened, you pushed the wrong button? Hope America is not stupid enough to let you do that in the WH.

[Bitsko]

And what part of this article did you not understand?

[NTO08]

As happens all the time, America won't be caring about Obama giving a twisted, contrived, slogan-induced response to charges against him...I think the abortion debate is a crashing bore, and I really don't give a d--n what the anti-abortion kooks want from either candidate. That being said, Obama can try to defend himself all he likes, but the whole purpose of this discussion is to activate the abortion-hating automatons to the polls...knowing the Repubs are world-renowned for pulling this kind of stunt, Obama's answers aren't going to much matter from here on.

I expect gay marriage will be the next issue trotted out for demonizing...since Obama isn't in the best position on this issue, he won't be able to respond well to Repub baiting.

[RenoSage]

For seven years there was a Republican President, a Republican majority in both House and Senate,
and a Republican majority on the Supreme Court. Any legislation outlawing concerning abortion,
gay marriage, or any other social issue could have been passed without difficulty. Why was it not?

If those issues were the law of the land, then they would no longer be available as campaign issues.

[Bitsko]

Two words: Independent voters.

[Bitsko]

Sorry, meant to write:

Independent SWING voters.

[indyrep]

These issues were not addressed because they can be used to garner votes. The repubs can trot out these old chestnuts again and again being sure that 25% of the voters (the evangelicals) will vote as one of my friends said several years ago " because of my faith I can only vote for Bush"
Many of these people are one issue voters and think that social issues can be legislated.

[NTO08]

You make a great point, indyrep...expect the Repubs to do exactly as you describe, because this is the only way they are going to get out the base that will be their only hope of making the race competitive...McCain has so far managed to keep the race tight with Obama...if the evangelicals bite the bullet and decide that Mack is not so noxious as some have seen him, it could be a big problem for Obama, since the evangelicals make up more of the electorate than AAs and youth vote combined, including alleged extra voters this year.

[isis]

The anti-abortion people lied about the connection between cancer and abortion, lied about the connection between depression and abortion and lie about contraception and abortion. They lie.

[Bitsko]

Most Catholics will still vote for Senator Obama, despite what his views on choice. American Catholics are returning to the Democratic Party in droves, and do not march in lock-step with the church on this and many other issues. The majority are more interested in issues of social justice and poverty -- issues totally ignored, if not laughed at, by the G0P.

[RRonin]

Lord, please save me from your most devoted followers!