Right Grumbles, at McCain's Peril

[question everything]

The Wall Street Journal

CAPITAL JOURNAL
By GERALD F. SEIB

Right Grumbles, at McCain's Peril
May 20, 2008; Page A2

That sound you hear is rumbling among unhappy social conservatives on the Republican Party's right wing; it spells trouble not just for President Bush, but for the party's presumptive presidential candidate, John McCain. At a time when Sen. McCain badly needs to consolidate the support of the Republican base before the general-election campaign begins in earnest, leaders of the party's social conservatives are letting it be known -- quietly, for now -- that they aren't happy with the way their desires are being met.

(snip)

The most telling sign of unhappiness on the right was a letter sent by social-conservative leaders to Mr. Bush last month, complaining that his administration was consistently rejecting federal funding for organizations that run programs promoting sexual abstinence among young Americans. Many social conservatives believe that abstinence training has led to a drop in teen pregnancies and contributed to a decline in abortion rates. But the five-page letter cites a series of cases in which private groups that promote abstinence have had grant requests turned down by the administration, principally by the Department of Health and Human Services. The letter says those grant decisions are "weakening" the president's policy supporting abstinence training as vigorously as contraception efforts, "with concomitant harm to American youth." It was signed by 50 Republican leaders representing a who's who of social conservatives.


(snip)

Item No. 1 on the list of complaints from Dr. Willke and other conservative leaders is Mr. Bush's failure to compel the Senate to vote on the federal judges he has nominated. If approved, those nominations would put a new set of conservative judges on the federal bench for years to come, regardless of the outcome of this fall's elections. The White House says some 30 judicial nominations are awaiting action in the Senate... Mr. Bush ought to instruct Republicans in the Senate "simply to close up shop until this constitutionally correct set of people is given a shot at a vote," Dr. Willke said. "And he's done nothing."

Beyond judges and abstinence, social conservatives are grumbling that neither the president nor Republicans in Congress have sought to cut off federal funding to Planned Parenthood, which conservatives believe should have been vulnerable after running into controversies over its business and billing practices in Kansas and California. Instead, conservatives see Planned Parenthood surviving and emerging as a force capable of helping Democrats in races across the country this year.

All told, Gary Bauer, president of the advocacy group American Values and a veteran of Republican cultural debates, points to "a certain fatigue factor" among social conservatives that amounts to "a big problem for the Republican Party overall." The danger for Republicans isn't that they will lose social-conservative votes to either Democrats Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton but that they will fail to generate the kind of energy and turnout that put Mr. Bush over the top in, among other places, Ohio in 2004. More than that, social-conservative fatigue means Republicans are caught in the classic dilemma of needing to simultaneously shore up support on their right while moving toward the center to win over independent moderates -- who might be turned off by harsh messages on social issues. But Mr. Bauer argues that the California Supreme Court just handed the Republicans the solution to this dilemma, with its decision giving gays the right to marry.

(snip)


URL for this article:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121123160847804929.html (subscription)

[Old and In the Way]

1. Sucks to be them nt.

[Fridays Child]

2. Off the main topic but, assuming that these people can read and understand...

...basic statistics, why do they continue to support abstinence-only programs when they've been proven ineffective? Is there enough money to be made in marketing these programs that lying to parents about their success rates is worth it?

An abstinence program was offered at my daughter's elementary school, this year. I opted out of permitting her to attend it not only because no one was able to tell me whether it had a religious slant but also because all girls, but not the boys, who participated in it were required to register with the county health department. The whole thing was Big Brotherish and sexist.

Funny thing, too: the young woman hired to present the program? Pregnant and unmarried. I'm serious.

[Lasher]

4. Woah, not a good role model there.

But the reason they continue to support abstinence-only programs is that their ideology always comes first. Pay no attention to those annoying statistics.

[GreenTea]

3. So old McCain, will already be 72 1/2 if he takes office on Jan 20th 2009

His first day, he's already well on his way to being 73....Reagan or worst?