A Personal Note to the kind and sage readers of Camp Campaign -
I’m generally considered to be a Conservative. In truth, I even consider myself to be fairly Conservative and I am nominally Republican. I favor a smaller Federal government and more power to the States. I think it’s OK to send illegal immigrants home regardless of whatever extenuating circumstances there may be. I think that character matters in politics and I find political correctness to be useless at best and offensive at worst. I believe that the original intentions of the Founding Fathers have been grossly distorted by special interests over two centuries. All Conservative leanings.
But I hold a fair number of views that, if viewed in a vacuum, would be considered Liberal.
I’m opposed to the death penalty. I personally started a recycling program on my college campus to save the environment. I am a Christian, but I’m more of a “Love thy Neighbor” kind than a “Thou Shalt Not” kind, if you know what I mean. I’m more about the caring for widows and orphans than the boycotting gay funerals. I think we need to close the tax loopholes for the uber-rich. I’m concerned about animal cruelty. I’m a strong proponent of racial equality.
But here’s the thing – Despite my Liberal inclinations in certain areas, I’m generally welcome in Conservative company. Sure, we disagree about how much pollution is OK to pump into the air and the effective tax rate of billionaires, but really it’s all good. We get along just fine and laugh about our arguments afterward.
On the other hand, I’m really not welcome in Liberal circles. It doesn’t matter if we’re simpatico on the death penalty and the plight of the underprivileged and we all like The Violent Femmes. Despite all that, there just isn’t any room for me at the big Progressive table. There is a litmus test. There is a defining issue that separates me from the Left in such a way that it seems the chasm can never be crossed.
I have the audacity to believe that a baby is a baby even before it is born.
I know the arguments for both sides. Really, I do. My intention here isn’t to spark a Pro-Life / Pro-Choice debate. Please don’t bother with the nasty remarks in the comments section. It’s just so odd that we, as a Nation of individuals, allow this single issue to be the definitive dividing line that no one may cross without severe and immediate repercussions.
In a society where tolerance is the highest virtue, there is no tolerance for disagreement here. Tolerance ends where the abortion debate begins. And as both sides dig in deeper and deeper, with no room for compromise, it only gets worse. As the two party system becomes the Party for Abortion Rights against the Party Against Abortion, we’re just making the disaster that is our partisan political system that much worse.
So here’s the part of the article where I impart my Solomon-like solution. Except… I don’t have one. This is an issue with no middle ground. Minds great and small alike have debated, discussed, philosophized, pontificated, agonized, and wept over the issue and the end result is that we move farther apart with each passing day.
