Verbal Minefield

Today we have the story of Republican U.S. Senate candidate Richard Mourdock of Indiana saying that he’s opposed to abortion in the case of pregnancy due to rape, because if the pregnancy occurred, it must be “what God intended.” Putting rape, pregnancy, and God together is not a successful mixture, especially for a Republican.

The fur, as you might expect, is flying, with President Obama’s spokespeople calling the pregnancy remark “outrageous.” Republican Senator Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire, who was to make a campaign appearance with Mourdock, canceled, and GOP presidential hopeful Mitt Romney, while continuing to support Mourdock’s candidacy, said through a spokesman that he disagrees with Mourdock’s view.

While Mourdock was concerned that his statement would be misinterpreted and offered an apology for any offense caused, he also said that when he gave voice to his conviction about pregnancy, he was speaking from his heart.

To be honest, part of me admires Mourdock for standing by his basic conviction instead of trying to weasel-word his way out of it or saying that his tongue slipped. But he has no business interpreting God’s intentions to women. It’s up to the woman in that situation to hear from God directly, if she’s even listening for such guidance. Under the law as it stands, the period goes after the fifth word in the last sentence here.

Look, I am no fan of abortion; in fact, there are probably very few of those who are. The notion that a woman might consider this as a last-resort form of birth control is ridiculous on its face. The only way, it seems to me, that an individual can begin to be comfortable with abortion is by considering a fetus just a hunk of biological matter. If it’s life, well then, abortion is homicide, and no other conclusion is possible. But abortion is not something we’re supposed to be comfortable with. It’s one of those cases, again under the present state of the law, where we permit homicide under certain extenuating circumstances.

BTW, don’t read Roe v. Wade back to me or talk about viability. I’m sure I’ve stepped on a verbal land mine of my own somewhere in here. When all is said and done, words don’t work very well in this area. As a practical matter, we need lawyers – more than theologians and certainly more than politicians -- to define “life” and “death” for us so we can move on to more mundane matters.

But the take-away for any politician, especially a Republican, is you'd better practice your lines before you start talking about this stuff. And if you really believe what you’re saying, don’t back away from it. The voters need to hear someone running for office who actually speaks from the heart, even if it’s wrong. That’s where the phrase “courage of convictions” comes from.