8/10/00 4:00 p.m.
The Truth about Compassion
One man's dream.

By Nachama Soloveichik

have a dream.

In the big room there are bright lights everywhere. Bush and Gore are standing opposite each other in dapper suits, with matching confident (but not too confident) expressions. Members of the audience watch in earnest, while Americans across the country watch the live debate in their living rooms, in their dens, and in their bathtubs. Gore seizes the initiative. He mocks the Bush mantra, the famous compassionate conservatism. He accuses his opponent of pretending to be compassionate while leaving women in the dust — denying them the right to choose.

"This is compassion?" he jeers.

Gore one. Bush zero. Tension fills the air along with the protracted silence. In their respective homes, Republicans clench fists while Democrats laugh gleefully. Three minutes pass. Finally the defender speaks.

"Let me ask you something. Why is gun control so important?"

Whispers erupt: What is he doing? Is he nuts?

Gore, more than slightly puzzled, launches into his gun-control mode. "Do you know how many people, how many children are killed each year by guns . . ."

"Let me see if I understand you. You want to save lives?" Bush asks. "Gun control is important because saving lives is important?"

"Yes."

And then the moment comes. It is the part that I play over and over in my mind. Bush's voice is filled with conviction. His shoulders seem straighter, firmer, and his head seems taller. "I too, am in the business of saving lives. I too, cherish the sanctity of every human life. Just like you, Al Gore, I know that every innocent life lost is another mar on the face of this great country. When I speak of compassion, I refer to the innocent and helpless, to those precious human lives that are lost to cruel hands. I refer to the 1.5 million babies killed each year because abortion is legal. Babies with arms and legs, with beating hearts that sound just like yours and mine."

And then he raps on the podium three times: thump, thump, thump. "Just like that. Innocent babies."

He pauses, and then it comes: "I ask you, this is compassion?"

Gore opens his mouth with a ready response. Bush holds up one hand, calling for the floor; and with the other, he reveals a silver object. It twinkles in the bright lights. "This," he announces to the bewildered audience, "is a pair of scissors. Everyone has one in his or her home. I got this one from the toolbox in our shed. You can do a lot of things with a pair of scissors. We use it to cut paper. My wife, Laura, uses it to cut material when she sews. But Al Gore is compassionate, because he believes we should also use scissors to kill babies. A baby is delivered completely except for its head, and then a doctor inserts a pair of scissors, or any other sharp object of choice, into the baby's skull and cuts a hole. And then he sucks out the brains with a vacuum and delivers the baby. Dead. In America, we call this partial-birth abortion."

He pauses. He waits while the impact of his words is swallowed. He waits until the horror of the truth strikes, and then he asks, his voice a level softer: "This is compassion?"

Okay. So maybe it won't happen exactly like that. Okay, maybe it won't happen at all. The Republican Party is tending toward a new trend these days, and it does not look pretty. When it comes to abortion, Republicans, even self-proclaimed pro-lifers, are suddenly scuttling the old-time conservative ship. To the staunch pro-lifer, the sudden shift must feel fickle and unprincipled. But it is actually quite logical.

A favorite criticism against Republicans is the lack of compassion shown to those who need it most, and the overabundance of compassion heaped upon those who need it least, i.e., the wealthy. Conservative ideology is twisted and mangled by the hands of liberals, so that Republicans come out looking like cold-hearted politicians who only care about their pockets.

For years, they've been lambasted: They ignore the poor and minorities; they hate gays and women. It is no surprise, then, that the Republican presidential candidate, Governor George W. Bush, has assumed a new and refreshing epithet: compassionate conservatism. He is a new kind of Republican, and the public seems to be eating it up. The problem is abortion: it gets in the way.

The result is inevitable. The erstwhile unabashed stance on life is no longer unabashed. Rather, abortion has receded to a grayness. Is George W. Bush against abortion? Well, he won't demand a litmus test for Supreme Court nominees. I'm so glad I asked. The unambiguous anti-abortion plank of the Republican platform has become a behind-doors-only topic. No more ranting and rallying from the cold-hearted politicians. Republicans are now kind and compassionate — there's that word again. They are tolerant.

That is why they meet with such groups as Republicans for Choice, entertaining their liberating ideas about a woman's right to choose. That is why the recent Supreme Court decision that invalidated Nebraska's ban on partial-birth abortion is merely "disappointing."

But as Republicans metamorphose from hardhearted to soft and mushy, they lose sight of the big picture. If they are looking for a way to flaunt compassion, they should be embracing the party's anti-abortion views, not muffling them. What the Republican Party needs is to show some courage and conviction. It is their turn to do the lambasting.

While Republicans sit mute, liberals attack the party as a bunch of self-serving women haters. And it boggles my mind — they let them. Who wants to be a doormat for the Democratic Party? Am I hearing things, or was that George W. Bush yelling, "Me!" Last time I checked, Democrats are the ones who advocate sticking scissors in babies' heads. If that's compassion, we're doomed.

There is nothing wrong with compassionate conservatism. Rather, there is something wrong with the current definition of compassion. The Republican Party is compassionate — not in spite of the fact that they oppose abortion, but because of this fact. I cannot think of a form of compassion more worthwhile than helping the innocent and the helpless. And I cannot think of a class of life more innocent and more helpless than four-month-old fetuses whose limbs are severed with a pair of surgical tongs. For their sake, it is due time for the Republican Party to show the country what it is made of.

Like I said, I have a dream.