how can that be defended? As hard as it might be for some of my readers to believe, I have been hoping for the best in this situation, really hoping that he was just clueless and didn’t realize what, exactly it is, that Plann.ed Parenthoo.d does. Yet he just keeps going on and on about how wonderful it was that he funded it while in the senate.
I have been called a hate-monger or worse regarding my sharing of this information. I have been told that we are all on a journey for truth. Well, why is that when, presented with facts (truth about his voting record) from his own mouth that people still support Santorum? And they support him, to the point of lying about or denying his record.
I have said this before and I will continue to say it: Isn’t this the biggest insult of all, to have a man claiming to be pro-life yet funding the organization who is at the center of the Life v Choice debate?
Santorum’s vote to fund Planned Parenthood indefensible
Pro-life website LifeNews.com is attacking a new ad by the Ron Paul campaign which exposes some uncomfortable news for pro-lifers who support Rick Santorum. The ad (video below) simply exposes the fact that Santorum—a warhawk who describes himself as “consistently pro-lifeâ€â€”â€even hooked Planned Parenthood up with a few million bucks.â€
The statement in the Paul ad is absolutely true, and yet LifeNews’ headline reads “Paul Ad Wrongly Implies Santorum Supports Planned Parenthood.†The article then tries to defend Santorum’s vote, pointing out the vote was part of  â€an overall budget bill that funded the federal government that contained Title X funding,†and then showing that he has been a staunch supporter of funding abortions through PP.
Neither the headline nor the defense is acceptable. The ad does not argue or imply Santorum directly supports abortion, it just proves that he will compromise on the issue given the right circumstances. And it is an unavoidable fact that, for all of his boastful rhetoric about consistency on moral values, Santorum will flip-flop Mitt Romney style even here.
For example, although Santorum told Fox News “Look, I’m not a big fan of Title X, that is Planned Parenthood. No, I want to defund Planned Parenthood,†he turned right around and literally wore his funding vote as a badge in another interview. Tom Woods exposed this nonsense here. Santorum in his own words:
“Just look at my record,†he said smiling, “I was criticized by governor Romney . . . or maybe it was Congressman Paul’s campaign for voting for contraception! That I voted for funding for, I think it was Title X, which I have voted for in the past, that provides for free contraception through organizations even like Planned Parenthood.â€
So in his own words, he voted to fund Planned Parenthood and that is exactly and all that the Paul ad states. What makes Christians and pro-lifers uncomfortable with this is not just the hypocrisy involved in voting to support, materially, PP while claiming to be “consistently†pro-life, but more importantly the fact that all funds are fungible. Giving PP funds for the purpose of contraception is just as bad as directly funding abortion because the money for other purposes simply frees PP’s other funds to be used for abortions. This is true for all federal funding in all areas of government.
And this is not just my argument, or Paul’s argument, it is Santorum’s own argument in yet another instance:
“I can’t imagine any other organization with its roots as poisonous as the roots of Planned Parenthood getting federal funding of any kind.â€
Can’t you, Rick? Because YOU voted to give PP just that: federal funding, and the most general kind of federal funding there is, directly from Congressional approval.
How in the world can anyone square his vote with his own words?
So while LifeNews may find it ethical to report that Paul’s ad “Wrongly Implies Santorum Supports Planned Parenthood,†I’m not sure how else the giving of federal funds can be defined other than â€Support.†Sure, Mr. Santorum may indeed oppose abortion, but due to this vote it is not wrong to imply or even to state openly that he has supported Planned Parenthood. That may be difficult to admit for some people, but it is a clear and inescapable fact.
Beth — You’ve been posting this sort of thing on FB and on your blog, and I haven’t ever addressed it. Every single time the Paul vs. Santorum debate comes up on Facebook, the conversation becomes pointedly uncivil. I don’t wish to be uncivil or engage in a protracted back-and-forth.
Rick Santorum does not personally support or defend Planned Parenthood. Never has. Never will. He voted in favor of an over-all bill which included federal funding for a huge number of items. One can either side with one’s conscience to work against the political machinations which force such a vote by refusing to vote on omnibus bills with questionable items. It is certainly an option. Or, one can do as Santorum has done and vote for something that’s as good as its going to get, not intending to support the direction of cash flow for every single line item and spend efforts to repeal funding with other bills. Santorum has done this. The LifeNews article is clear enough to unburden anyone’s conscience about Santorum’s disposition to Planned Parenthood.
His words and *ironic* smile were a defense of his record before those who intended to unfairly use it against him. The media is painting him as a candidate who not only opposes Planned Parenthood and Title X funding, but a politician whose secret nefarious goal is to revoke access to contraception and make it illegal. He had a right to use his record in that case to deflect the attack.
Ron Paul, on the other hand, never supports any federal funding or federal pro-life measures. And, I think that’s pure silliness. From Ron Paul, we get a lot of “Personally, I believe, but…” It certainly makes him appealing to a wider spectrum in some sense, but with the way the government actually works as opposed to how it ideally works, it’s not going to get the Culture of Life a foot in any door.
People who are voting for Santorum are not somehow “less Catholic” or less moral than Paul supporters. That has been the implication of several of your blog posts and posts on Facebook over the last few months. I think it’s rather unfair if you intend what you imply. I will respect your conscience in voting for Paul, please respect mine and those of your friends’ in not support him but Santorum. You can disagree, but please afford our intentions and intellects some respect.
Paul would like this to be a black-and-white strike against Santorum. It is not. And, it is an ironic bludgeoning point coming from a candidate who would not hesitate to offer the MAP to rape victims and has thrown his arms up over its morality because it’s something that cannot be “policed” anyway.
No politician is perfect. None of them. We in our house, while fulling adhering to our Catholic faith and morals, have weighed the pro’s and con’s of each political option before us in this election and feel Santorum is the best choice of what is offered us.
Moreover, approach means everything. If you wish to convert Santorum supporters, humbly and respectfully submit information. You will only turn even sincere folks away using the “how can you possibly support this, you fools?” method. I have used it. Others have used it. It never works. It is always a stumbling block to truth and productive dialogue.
Suzanne,
This response is from both of us.
There are several problematic statements that you have made here:
That is an absolute falsehood. He voted for the funding of PP with his vote, and he defends his vote even now. That is real personal support of PP. Unless you can show some way that he was coerced and not at fault for an action which was inherently evil (cooperation with the murder of children), then he has a personal stake in this issue. According to your reckoning, any vote could be defended by the provisions attached to the bill. This is definitely morally inconsistent.
There is no principle in Catholic morality that says, “do what you need to – as long as it gets the job done, it doesn’t matter what the collateral damage is”. But this is exactly what Santorum is saying in his defense of repeated support for Title X funding. (The justifications he offers for his vote were (1) chastity education funding and (2) support for pro-fatherhood programs. As far as I can tell, that’s all he offers as justification for voting to give money to the biggest provider of abortions, money which goes directly and indirectly toward funding an enormous number of abortions each year.
The Church does, however, tell us that the end never justifies the means. This isn’t a case of double-effect. That would require that the means were something other than a vote for a bill which included funding for PP among other things. (That would have to be one of the effects, but in this case it is exactly the means whereby he accomplished the end of funding other “good programs”.) This is a case of the end, those other programs, not justifying an inherently unjust means, a vote for direct funding of the destruction of innocent human life.
Even we were able to justify the action by an end which were disproportionately greater (like, funding abortions of 5,000 babies because we’ll actually save 100,000 from abortion), this would be no such case. The goodness of millions of chastity programs and fatherhood programs could never be in proportion to the destruction of one innocent life!
As far as we can see, there is absolutely no way to justify voting for the funding of killing babies.
We also think that the fact that he votes for omnibus bills which include things with which he doesn’t agree (or with which he claims he vehemently disagrees) displays a serious problem of personal integrity. If he’s got integrity, he won’t vote for things which he thinks are bad. We’re not saying he should not vote for things which are less good than he wants – but he absolutely should not vote for things which are bad, especially those things which are non-negotiable. Maybe he negotiates on those things because he doesn’t really understand that killing babies is pretty much the worst thing one can vote for.
The article presents hes personal views – what he says on the issue. It also presents bills he’s voted for, which is fine. However, his words contradict his actions in voting for Title X. So, if you’re saying that words speak more loudly than actions, then I guess the article could unburden your conscience. However, according to that reasoning, a man can do whatever he likes, so long as he says that he wishes his actions wouldn’t have the obvious effects that they do, and so long as he does other things that are good. That’s preposterous.
Santorum can “wish away” PP all he wants with his words, but when he continues to excuse his votes for its funding, all of those good wishes get washed away.
That’s a bald-faced lie. I won’t even dignify that with a further response. You should be responsible and do appropriate research before repeating such lies.
This is not the issue. If the implication is there, it is inherent to the argument against Santorum’s supposed adherence to Catholic doctrine.
We honestly don’t know what Ron Paul wants here. I haven’t heard anything he’s said about the issue (except maybe one video that he responded to an attack by Rick Santorum in a debate – incidentally, the things Santorum said were also lies.)
But the arguments you find here against Santorum don’t have meaning because Ron Paul says them. (That would be ridiculous.) They have meaning because they are based on fact.
As far as we have seen, this is a black-and-white issue. Santorum voted for funding the death of innocents. If he did not, please direct us to the evidence. If he did, please direct me to the specific evidence that this is allowed by Catholic doctrine. This is a challenge we’d really like to see an honest response to and have not yet.
There are lots of other issues which could be discussed at greater detail; we just don’t have time.
Among the things you didn’t mention here are: Santorum’s support of unjust war, his absolute support of torture (which is absolutely forbidden by the Church in no uncertain terms…more on this coming soon), and his perpetuation of irresponsible spending (which is a HUGE issue for Catholics, not just secular people).
Another problem I have with Santorum is he tries to have it both ways. When speaking to the media or other left-leaning entities, he is proud of his funding of birth control, and you don’t need to worry about his personal views because his record shows that he’s voted to fund it.
When he speaks to Christian and/or right-leaning groups, then he says he regrets voting to fund it, but it was part of a larger bill that he supported. Of course, this also means that there are other issues more important to him than whether Planned Parenthood is funded or not.
In the end, though, the major distinction between Santorum and Paul is that Santorum is a big government statist, and Ron Paul is not. CNN Money recently reported that Rick Santorum’s plan would add $4.5 trillion of debt over the next decade, increasing our debt/GDP ratio to 104%, while Ron Paul’s plan would reduce it by $2.2 trillion, reducing our debt/GDP ratio to 76%.
Of course, there’s the war issue too, which is huge. It was great to hear Ron Paul bring up Just War teachings during the debate, and say that he is committed to following them. Meanwhile, Romney and Santorum were both struggling to seem like they were the most eager to bomb Iran.
On abortion, Santorum and Paul are essentially equivalent, except that Paul has an idea which could end Roe vs. Wade immediately. Other than that, they both support a federal pro-life amendment, and both would appoint good judges, though I’d trust Paul a lot more on judges, because of his consistency.