I’m relatively indifferent to Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pa.) speaking at the Democratic National Convention, but given the historical parallels <\/p>\n
, I suspect we’ll be seeing a lot of stories like this one<\/a>.<\/p>\n ABC News’ Teddy Davis and Arnab Datta report: Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa., an abortion rights opponent who endorsed Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill. over Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-NY prior to the Pennsylvania primary, will address the Democratic National Convention on Tuesday, Aug. 26. <\/p>\n Casey’s father, the late Pennsylvania Gov. Robert Casey D-Pa., was denied a prime speaking spot at the 1992 convention because of his opposition to abortion rights. <\/p>\n The 1992 snub has become a symbol over the years of the Democratic Party making support for abortion rights a litmus test. In 2004, Republicans contrasted the Casey snub with California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, R-Calif., and former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, R-NY., two Republicans who support abortion rights, speaking to their convention.<\/p>\n The decision to give Sen. Casey a featured speaking spot is part of a broader effort on the part of the Democrats to broaden the party’s appeal on abortion.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n A couple of things. First, maybe Casey is getting a featured speaking spot at the convention to broaden Dems’ appeal on abortion, and maybe he’s getting a featured spot because he’s a young senator from a key battleground state who endorsed the party’s presidential nominee early on. ABC assumes it’s the prior, but it’s just as easy to think the latter.<\/p>\n Second, Casey’s father was not<\/i> “denied a prime speaking spot at the 1992 convention because of his opposition to abortion rights,” was not<\/i> “snubbed,” and there’s been no<\/em> “litmus test.”<\/p>\n This is a myth, that’s been repeated<\/a> ad nauseum, but is nevertheless false and has been debunked many times. The truth is, Casey Sr. was denied a speaking spot because he refused to endorse<\/a> the party’s nominee (Bill Clinton). At the same ’92 convention, five governors, two senators, and a mayor — all of whom are pro-life — did<\/i> get speaking spots, disproving the notion that there was a “litmus test.” (What’s more, pro-life speakers have been featured at every Democratic convention since.)<\/p>\n Nevertheless, if inviting Casey (Jr.) to speak this year helps bury the nonsense that reporters keep repeating, I’ll be thrilled.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I’m relatively indifferent to Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pa.) speaking at the Democratic National Convention, but given the historical parallels Kauf von Levaquin , I suspect we’ll be seeing a lot of stories like this one. ABC News’ Teddy Davis and Arnab Datta report: Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa., an abortion rights opponent who endorsed Sen. Barack […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16577","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16577","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16577"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16577\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16577"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16577"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16577"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}