FOCA Fun

So I'm at Mass today and I see that someone put out pre-printed postcards, ready for mailing to the local Senators and Congresspeople, opposing something called The Freedom of Choice Act (FOCA). The explanatory literature is, needless to say, very inflammatory; FOCA will supposedly outstrip Roe v. Wade in institutionalizing abortion in the United States.

Now at this point I should note that I voted for Obama. And Kerry. And Gore, Clinton (please ignore 1996, when I voted for Nader; there's a few hundred years in Purgatory waiting for me for encouraging him) and Dukakis. Leaving apart the abortion issue, in terms of social conscience consistent with my faith the Republicans have never come close to offering any sort of alternative. Moreover, the Pro-Life movement, generally speaking, has long since lost any scruples about how they present their case. Both they and the Republicans (and yes, I make a distinction) express their views with the subtlety of a jackhammer. And God help someone who unquestioningly uses their literature to inform their views; facts always take a secondary role to polemics. So I take a pretty jaundiced view towards the Pro-Life literature I see around my local church.

Nevertheless, I will wind up sending in the postcards. Since I started regularly attending Mass again I have never skipped the Eucharist because of my voting record. I know of at least one occasion where John Paul II knowingly gave the Eucharist to a Pro-Choice politician. But abortion bothers me. On social issues I normally take the view that legislating morals does not work, and in any event if society itself is flawed and finite, then why bother worrying about what policies it endorses? I am an American, and to me part of that means believing that we should not be penalized by the circumstances of our births. But that, of course, entails getting born, and I have never heard Reproductive Rights advocates (who themselves are somewhat scruples challenged) make a convincing argument that life definitively begins any later than conception.

Ultimately, my wish is for my party to realize that Pro-Choice advocate have become a boat anchor for the party's election hopes. Without them, Kerry would have won in 2004. Honestly, I know nothing about FOCA, and I suspect that it is not politically viable even in the current environment. As likely as not, the Pro-Life advocates are just trying to keep their followers stirred up. One gratifying trend in recent years has been the increasing success of Pro-Life Democrats, so it would surprise me if FOCA gets anywhere near a vote. But if it does, I certainly do not wish to see any expansion of abortion rights pass Congress.