Howard Dean runs from “pro-choice” label
Hardball with Chris Matthews featured Democrat National Committee Chairman Howard Dean on October 31, discussing the Samuel Alito nomination to the Supreme Court.
We increasingly see Democrat Party leadership shy away from being known as the pro-abort go-to political party. In the interview, Dean said he hesitated being labeled “pro-choice” because, “I think it’s often misused. If you’re pro-choice, it implies you’re not pro-life.”
Implies?
The Matthews-Dean exchange was very good. Surprisingly, Matthews focused on Dean’s equivocation on the life issue. Read the interview on page 2.
Hat tip: National Right to Life
MATTHEWS: Welcome back to HARDBALL.
Howard Dean is chairman of the Democratic National Committee. Thank you, sir, for coming in.
I know this is unfortunate for you, but somebody in the Democratic party is putting out an attack sheet on this new justice nominee for the Supreme Court, Sam Alito….
DEAN: … So we do not think that Judge Alito is a great nominee.
MATTHEWS: What about the husband notification? Does that bother you?
DEAN: It bothers me in the fact that the Bush people seem to insist on inserting the government into people‘s private family business. And this is a private family matter, not a government matter. To have the government insinuate itself in a relationship between husband and wife I think is a mistake.
MATTHEWS: But that was the Pennsylvania law, and that was passed by a governor, Democratic Governor Bob Casey…
DEAN: I don‘t care who it was passed by.
MATTHEWS: But it wasn’t the Bush people. You said the Bush people did it.
DEAN: No, but this administration continually wants to insert themselves into family business. The Terri Schiavo case, that’s the family business, not the government’s business. All these abortion cases, that’s a family’s personal business. That’s not the government’s business. And we’d like to keep the government out of people’s private, personal lives.
MATTHEWS: But the Democratic Party are a pro-choice party, period?
DEAN: The government…
MATTHEWS: The Democrats, your party, is a pro-choice party?
DEAN: No. My party respects everybody’s views, but my party firmly believes that the government should stay out of people’s personal lives.
MATTHEWS: But you are a pro-choice party? Are you not? You sound like you’re against ever being pro-life. Are you pro-choice?
DEAN: I’m not against people for being pro-life. I actually was the first chairman who met for a long time with pro-life Democrats.
MATTHEWS: This is the complicated thing for people. The people believe the Republican Party, because of its record, supports the pro-life position. Does your party support the pro-choice position?
DEAN: The position we support is a woman has the right to make — and a family has the right to make up their own mind about their health care without government interference.
MATTHEWS: That’s pro-choice.
DEAN: A woman and a family have a right to make up their own minds about their health care without government interference. That’s our position.
MATTHEWS: Why do you hesitate from the phrase pro-choice?
DEAN: Because I think it’s often misused. If you’re pro-choice, it implies you’re not pro-life. That’s not true. There are a lot of pro-life Democrats. We respect them, but we believe the government should…
MATTHEWS: Do you believe in abortion rights?
DEAN: I believe that the government should stay out of the personal lives of families and women. They should stay out of our lives. That’s what I believe.
MATTHEWS: I find it interesting that you have hesitated to say what the party has always stood for, which is a pro-choice position.
DEAN: The party believes the government does not belong in personal…
MATTHEWS: I’m learning things here about the hesitancy I didn’t know about before. We’ll be right back with Howard Dean.
DEAN: You know what you’re learning…
MATTHEWS: Now, you’re getting hesitant on the war and hesitant on abortion rights. It’s very hard to get clarity from your party.
Jill Stanek is a nurse turned speaker, columnist and blogger, a national figure in the effort to protect both preborn and postborn innocent human life.
I just love it when the Chairman of the DNC doesn’t want to be called Prochoice. But Howey, you are prochoice, accept it, embrace it. You are not the party that defends life of unborn babies, I belong to that party, the GOP. You know what you support is wrong in the eyes of the majority of Americans. Yet, you won’t even support any common sense bans on abortions, groups like PP and NARAL sure have bought and paid for your party haven’t they? Why not even be totally honest and say that you are pro-abortion? If you have to change the words to describe what you actually believe to get others to accept it, then you know that you are on the wrong side of that debate. I accept being called anti-choice when it comes to abortion. When it comes to many issues I’m proudly prochoice, but not when it comes to killing an unborn baby I’m not. And I never will be either.
Nate,
The Democratic party is not considered, by pro-lifers, to be the pro-death party without reason. The majority of Democrats support abortion on demand at any time of the pregnancy and for any reason. They support euthanasia of our elderly and disabled and think that by labeling it as “death with dignity” it somehow makes those killings more palatable to the public. Only a fool or someone without moral ethics would agree that the heinous practice of abortion and euthansia is humane and good. Their constant support of and rag about embryonic stem cell research, when no medical benefits have been proven or found further entrenches their ideology in the pro-death camp. They support the idea of cloning, which would allow a fetus to live and develope just long enough in order to harvest its organs, to be used “for the already living”. They talk about being the party for the people. But, in reality, they are only for those people already born or those people without accute disabilities. To the pro-death Party, “Choice” to put to death the infirm, accutly disabled, “unwanted unborn”, and embryos/fetuses used in research, is not only the best option but is deemed, by them, as being morally responsible. Tell a lie long enough and you eventually believe it’s true. This was true in Nazi Germany and it true about the pro-death Democratic party today.