From last night's presidential debate:
SCHIEFFER: Mr. President, I want to go back to something Senator Kerry said earlier tonight and ask a follow-up of my own. He said -- and this will be a new question to you -- he said that you had never said whether you would like to overturn Roe v. Wade. So I'd ask you directly, would you like to?BUSH: What he's asking me is, will I have a litmus test for my judges? And the answer is, no, I will not have a litmus test. I will pick judges who will interpret the Constitution, but I'll have no litmus test.
What he asked was: Will you overturn Roe v. Wade? The President's non-answer shows that 1) he wants the abortion ruling overturned but 2) he's too chicken-shit to say so.
All judges interpret the Constitution, so picking a judge who does so wouldn't be hard to do. The key question is how a particular judge would interpret the Constition, and on that matter, Bush has made his views clear:
"... President George W. Bush has openly and repeatedly avowed the intent to appoint justices in the politically conservative mold of Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas." (Washington Times)
It's also worth noting his response to an earlier question about a woman's right to choose:
"What I'm saying is is that as we promote life and promote a culture of life, surely there are ways we can work together to reduce the number of abortions: continue to promote adoption laws -- it's a great alternative to abortion -- continue to fund and promote maternity group homes; I will continue to promote abstinence programs."
If Bush was serious about "a great alternative to abortion" he wouldn't have allowed the Food and Drug Administration to continue to delay the approval of over-the-counter sale of emergency contraception when the FDA's own scientific advisors voted 23-4 in favor of approval.
If Bush were interested in working together to reduce the number of abortions, he would have included the funding and promotion of contraception along with maternity group homes and abstinence programs and adoption laws.
Forget a litmus test - if it weren't for his policies, thousands of women in this country and around the world wouldn't even have to take a pregnancy test, let alone consider the difficult choice of abortion.
Reducing the number of abortions is a laudable goal, but Bush doesn't want to reduce the number of abortions by giving women more ways to prevent an unwanted pregnancy.
He wants a Supreme Court that will overturn Roe v. Wade.
