As Yuval Levin noted yesterday, Obama’s claim — that he voted against the Illinois state version (S. B. 1082) of the Born Alive Infant Protection Act (“BAIPA”) because it didn’t have the “neutrality clause” contained in the federal version — has been shown false. The state version did, in fact, contain the same neutrality language as the federal Act that not one U.S.senator voted against. The state version was killed in the committee chaired by Obama, with Obama voting against it. NARAL didn’t oppose BAIPA. At the time CNN reported that NARAL’s spokesperson stated the following:
We, in fact, did not oppose the bill. There is a clear legal difference between a fetus in utero versus a child that’s born. And when a child is born, they deserve every protection that the country can provide them (Emphasis added).
The logical import of Senator Obama’s vote is that he disagrees; i.e.,once a baby has been targeted for abortion it thereafter has no inherent right to the food, comfort or medical care provided to other babies born alive. That’s an extraordinary position, one that could be fairly described as vile, even monstrous. Does Obama maintain that the abortion provider retains dominion over babies he fails to abort for some unspecified time after birth? Does common law rescue doctrine attach at some point? If so, when? Would Obama permit the abandonment of any other class of babies born alive, e.g., those born with abnormalities? Precisely where does he draw the lines? As I mentioned yesterday, some veteran politicos maintain that the candidate that first raises the abortion issue (albeit,this is no longer abortion, we’re talking a living, breathing infant that has been born) is harmed thereby, so the Obama camp may be betting that McCain won’t raise the issue. And you can be sure the mainstream media will come nowhere near the matter. But Obama is such an outlier that the questions must be asked. A perfect opportunity will come this Saturday when both candidates will appear at Rick Warren’s Leadership and Compassion forum at the Saddleback Church. If there was ever a question that goes directly to a candidate’s capacity for compassion, it’s “At what point is a baby entitled to be treated as a human being?”