Conservative audiences ‘vexed’ by Giuliani’s abortion stand

November 17, 2007

Rudy Giuliani — the NARAL award-winning, Planned Parenthood-donating mayor who supports public funding of abortion — has spent the last several months arguing to conservatives that a) he hasn’t changed his position; but b) he’s actually not pro-choice. Some are even falling for it, going so far as to describe Giuliani as “pro-life.”

More skeptical audiences on the right apparently aren’t sure what to think anymore.

On the campaign trail, Rudolph W. Giuliani has made the case that while he believes that abortions are wrong, he thinks the ultimate decision of whether to have them should be up to women, and not the government. But he has also pledged to appoint the kind of conservative judges who might be expected to rule against abortion.

It is a position that has confused some people on both sides of the abortion debate.

What could possibly be confusing? Giuliani wants voters to know that he’d appoint federal judges who will disagree with him, and ban rights he’d like to preserve. See how clear it is?

People on the other side of the debate are also looking for clarity. Kelli Conlon of Naral Pro-Choice New York, recalled that Mr. Giuliani had put her on his transition team when he was elected mayor and issued proclamations to mark the anniversary of Roe v. Wade. But Ms. Conlon said she was troubled to hear him say that he would appoint justices in the model of Justices Scalia and Clarence Thomas.

“Obviously, judges in the mold of Thomas and Scalia are going to overturn Roe v. Wade, no doubt,” she said in a telephone interview, adding that her group was uneasy about Mr. Giuliani’s recent statements. “We really feel like, out of the glare of the cameras, we have to sit down with him and his colleagues and ask, which is the real Rudy Giuliani?”

The reality is there is no “real Rudy Giuliani.” He’s pro-choice and pro-life. He wants to protect reproductive rights and take them away. He supports and opposes privacy rights. He wants to give federal funds to low-income women for abortions and take those funds away. He has firm beliefs that will lead him to nominate judges who reject his firm beliefs.

I can’t imagine why anyone would find this confusing — Giuliani is a man with no core beliefs other than the idea that he deserves power and authority.

Well, this isn’t entirely fair. Giuliani has at least one core policy belief–though it directly springs from what Steve asserts: “he deserves power and authority.”

That belief, or maybe it’s a theme, is that there are no limits on executive power, that might either makes right or renders right totally irrelevant, and that anyone with a grievance, a protest, a dissent or even a different point of view is an Enemy, and all enemies are to be dealt with by maximum force rendered by the unchecked Leader.

When he panders on abortion, or gays, or guns, he’s wholehearted about it–obscuring what he believes, if anything, on those issues is a price he’s happy to pay if it helps him to power. When he sort of parses on torture, it’s clearly half-assed: he sees nothing wrong with it and will be its most ardent champion. He’s just not quite sure he can be as loud and proud about it as his supporters are.

He really is the scariest guy on the scene. It’s not hyperbolic to call Rudy a fascist.

  • …all enemies are to be dealt with by maximum force rendered by the unchecked Leader.

    Dajafi’s right.

    If I were Giuliani, I wouldn’t sweat these ‘pro-life’ voters. They’ll vote for him, albeit reluctantly. He’s a hater, and they respect that.

  • I really don’t get why this is such a big deal. If there is one thing I am certain of regarding Rudy Giuliani, it is that he does not believe in a right to privacy. And from a judicial standpoint, that’s what abortion rights most centrally hinge on.

  • Oh, man. Conservatives hate gray. Doesn’t he have anything in black and white he could give them? Doesn’t have to be real. They obviously could care less about that, just as long as it’s doctrinaire.

    Or wait, I’ve got it. He could just tell them 9/11 ate his position on abortion rights. Bang, problem solved.

  • Giuliani is in some sense personally pro-choice, but it’s an issue that he just doesn’t care about at all. While he wouldn’t choose to ban abortion, it would upset him not at all to, for example, see doctors who perform abortion put to the guillotine without a trial. That’s just who Giuliani is. All rights take a backseat to law and order and war, and if waging war means appointing judges who will say crucifixion is a constitutional punishment for jaywalking, then that just means additional shits and giggles for Giuliani.

    Giuliani’s sadism and thirst for vengeance are overwhelming, and to the extent that rights are casualties in his drive to satisfy his sadism and lust for vengeance, he sees that as a more than worthy sacrifice.

  • Rudy may well be pro-choice in his own personal views, but there is no way to be a successful, national level Republican with those views. G. H. W. Bush was/is pro-choice, but he renounced that for the Republican nomination. If historical rumors are to be believed, Colin Powell could have had a Republican nomination too, but he wasn’t willing to go pro-life for it. It’s that party discipline that the Republicans put so much stock in…i’m beginning to think that they have better party discipline than the Bolsheviks.

    One thing’s for sure, we need to deal with this issue. It needs to be put to rest, though i seriously doubt that the boomer generation can/will do it, and one of the reasons is the strength and brand of feminism that runs through it.

    I don’t want to start any huge arguments here, but there is a good argument that a point of development is reached where a fetus is a person. In the pre-revolutionary days and early American years, abortions were tolerated before ‘movement’. Really, this ‘partial-birth’ thing is kind of sick. Does it really take that long to decide to terminate a pregnancy?

  • Both the cross-dressing fascist Guiliani and robot Romney share an inherent ability to change their stripes to suit the audience. What they both want is power, in Guiliani’s case unfettered power. Guiliani has a longer track record than Romney, and how he behaved in NYC is a predictor for how he will behave as president. Robot Romney spent four years as governor of Massachusetts running for president, and constantly drifted to the right, but what sort of president he would be is not nearly as clear as it is with Rudee.

    Guiliani deserves a padded cell with a constant stream of synchophants telling him how great he is, and giving him warrants of execution to sign for his numerous enemies. As a former New Yorker I have no problem saying Rudee is insane.

  • There is only one way to describe Ghouliani, based on his “giveth/taketh-away” position on so-ooo many issues—and that is to say,””Rudi Giuliani believes himself to be God.”

    Hopefully, Conservative America will come to its collective senses and recognize this dwarvish, pudgy little pretender for the blatant, dangerous fraud that he is. However, one only needs to remember the “Jesus Camp” kids—being taught to tearfully and sobbingly pray to a life-sized, cardboard cutout of George W. Bush as the embodiment of God—to realize that there is a portion of Conservative America that is probably too far beyond the edge of the abyss to save.

    And besides—RooDee is enough to drive most sane people to Pastafarianism, and recognition of the Flying Spaghetti Monster as deity….

  • I thought Giuliani’s view is that “9/11 changed everything” with respect to abortion. What could be simpler? He’s consistent and never varies from this view.

  • McCain and Romney have no core beliefs either.

    But maybe it’s just that Republicans can’t win without the bigots, religious fanatics and the angry white guys (not mutually exclusive groups), and so they have to pander to them at least to some extent, no matter how hard right they steer toward traditional conservative beliefs, and the newer neocon values of militarism, nationalism, imperialism, dog eat dog social Darwinism, etc. It’s just not enough. You gotta go after the gays, the pro-choicers, the flag burners, the peaceniks and the secularists if you’re going to win.

    It’s an unholy alliance, pardon the pun. And fragile. And hypocritical. I don’t believe for a moment that the vast majority of wealthy Republicans are any different from us on the social issues. They just pretend to be, because they can’t win otherwise. And they have to win because they are driven by greed. I don’t know why, but the more you have, the greedier you become, and we’re in a kind of runaway income and wealth disparity era, and the Republicans are throwing gasoline on this fire of avarice and selfishness that’s destroying us. The Democrats have been corrupted too, for sure, but they’re not anywhere near as bad, yet.

  • I think all of you who have said that the only thing that matters to Rudy is winning, are 100% correct. For Rudy, grabbing the brass ring that is the presidency – especially now that George Bush has super-sized executive authority – is so important that he will say and do whatever he has to to achieve that goal.

    I think he may be making the confusion work for him, in a weird sort of way, which may be distracting people from what is even worse about him, and that is that he is dangerously stupid on all kinds of issues.

    Not that the media will ever give that sort of thing any serious attention; no, I’m afraid we will have to wait for Rudy and Judy to have some sort of public marital meltdown, or for Rudy to have a bimbo eruption, in order for the media to get out the long knives. Come to think of it, maybe Bernie Kerik and Judith Regan will end up being the best friends the Democrats have in this election.

    How sad is that?

  • libra – my jaw dropped when I read the NYT article you linked to. Un-freaking-believable. Fertilized eggs with rights? Will women have to have tiny cameras implanted to record the event?

    One thing’s for sure – this would be a boon for the legal profession.

    jackpine savage – women do not have an unqualified right to terminate a pregnancy after the 12th week.

  • “Hopefully, Conservative America will come to its collective senses…”

    as tweety would say, “HA!!”

  • Hopefully, Conservative America will come to its collective senses and recognize this dwarvish, pudgy little pretender for the blatant, dangerous fraud that he is. However, one only needs to remember the “Jesus Camp” kids—being taught to tearfully and sobbingly pray to a life-sized, cardboard cutout of George W. Bush as the embodiment of God—to realize that there is a portion of Conservative America that is probably too far beyond the edge of the abyss to save.

    This is right. With a very few honorable exceptions like Andrew Sullivan, there are no voices on the right anymore who can even recognize a fascist when he’s screaming and gesticulating in front of their faces… or, if they recognize him, they don’t condemn him.

    If Giuliani is nominated, we’re going to see something unprecedentedly ugly in the American character next year. If, God forbid, he wins, that ugliness will come to define the American character. The last slender reed of our credibility in the world rests in the notion that Bush is an aberration and a mistake, soon to be corrected. Giuliani winning the presidency would be an affirmation of that fluke; the xenophobia, fetishism for war and torture and constant fear and rage would come to define us.

  • Jimmy Breslin put it best – Giuliani is “a small man in search of a balcony.”

    He will appoint anti privacy theofascist judges. He obvioulsy promised to do so or Pat Robertson would not have endorsed him. We all know that was the promise and that balconyman will need them as he makes Bush look like a friend of the constitution.

    Robertson and his fellow theofascists know full well the only way they “win” is through the courts. They have to be able to say the drive to theofasciland is “legal.” They would knowingly vote for Satan to accomplsh this.

    Say goodnight to America, Gracie.

  • Giuliani is just another in a long line of politicians who have tried to change the perception of their ideals while trying to win the presidency. He is a man who in my mind, cannot be trusted, because it is impossible to find out exactly how he actually feels on important issues. Candidates like Giuliani and Romney will not be getting my vote for that very reason, and I can only hope others educate themselves on how these snakes operate.

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