Most prognosticators are predicting a red wave during the upcoming mid-term elections. Reality is setting in with many Americans that Democratic policies that sounded good during the 2020 election, particularly in the environment of Trump fatigue, aren’t as great and equitable as they sounded. Here are a few examples of policies that are driving voters away from the Dems this time around:
- limiting productivity from the fossil fuel industry before green energy alternatives are readily available resulting in higher gasoline, natural gas and heating oil prices.
- blaming an historic spike in inflation on everything but the main causes: too much cash infused into the economy from various forms of government stimulus chasing too few goods.
- seemingly caring more about the criminal than the victim as crime surges in many U.S. cities.
- over-dependence on identity politics and over-use of the construct, “systemic racism.”
- illogical positions on gender, gender fluidity, non-binary birthing persons…
- taking the position that government must control school curricula and one of schools’ roles is to teach kids that white people are oppressors and people of color are oppressed.
- arguing that hate speech and misinformation is not protected by the First Amendment, then defining everything they don’t like as hate speech and misinformation.
These are just a few of the modern Democratic party’s odd policy positions.
Fortunately or unfortunately, depending on your allegiances, the same thing happens to Republicans when they are in the majority. They scare people back to the Democrats, primarily with one policy position that is the chink in their armor, the weak link in their chain, their Achilles Heel – abortion.
At first blush it may look like the country is evenly split. According to Gallup polls taken between 2018 and 2021, 49% of Americans are pro-choice and 47% are pro-life. But if you drill down, the overwhelming number of pro-life voters are people 55 and older – people who will not be faced with the difficult choice of an unplanned pregnancy. Among Americans who make up the pro-choice half, you’ll find that women under 50 years of age make up a large part. The age bands (18-29, 30-49, 50-65, 65+) are essentially inverse with the 18-29s being 56% pro-choice and the 65+ being 58% pro-life.
Pro-life Republicans, perhaps emboldened by the recent addition of Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court, have enacted new abortion laws in several states in recent weeks. Idaho passed a law that would effectively ban abortion after about six weeks. Kentucky passed a law that essentially bans all abortions in the state. And more recently Gov. DeSantis signed into law new abortion restrictions in Florida modeled after a Mississippi law. Some of these are facing legal challenges, but no doubt, conservatives will get their wish as one or more of these will make their way to the Supreme Court. Pro-life folks have been hoping for a case that might weaken or overturn Roe v. Wade for many years.
That Republicans would push away young, educated voters who might otherwise embrace traditional Republican positions on taxation, limited government, border security, national defense, etc. is illogical to me. It seems that Republicans would be better served branding themselves as the party of freedom. Except for this one hot-button issue, Republicans are generally better advocates for individual rights and freedom from heavy-handed government. The COVID pandemic was a great example where blue states tended to issue more frequent and severe mandates while red states trended toward allowing more personal choice. The attacks on free speech at universities and on social media platforms also create an opportunity for Republicans to position themselves as the freedom party.
But it always comes back to abortion. The Republican coalition that was first cobbled together by Ronald Reagan in 1980 was heavily influenced by the religious right. This is still a formidable voting block even as it is shrinking. And just as Democrats must toss some favors to their boisterous progressive minority, Republicans have always kept the pro-life plank in their platform to appease their most passionate block.
If Republicans could redefine “pro-life” to mean they are morally against the concept of abortion as birth control, but don’t favor legislating this matter, they could potentially see a large block of moderate Democrats convert.
These examples are not morally equivalent to the abortion debate, but they demonstrate similar social patterns: people can choose whether to drink alcohol or not, with many people choosing to abstain. People can choose whether to use marijuana in many states or choose to abstain. Each of these freedoms can cause social problems, but the problems that arose when they were outlawed (think prohibition or the war on drugs) caused even bigger social problems. People can choose to eat healthy, and there are likely some radical vegans who would favor making the consumption of meat illegal, but the demand for meat would continue and thrive on the black market.
Instead of fighting for legal victories, pro-life Republicans should focus their energies on funding organizations that offer young women better education and alternatives to abortion. Their goal should be to see the number of abortions nationwide shrink naturally rather than be pushed to back alleys or force people to drive to blue states due to territorial legal barriers. If not, the U.S. will likely see the party of the progressives continue to remain in power and implementing other illogical policies.