The media seems surprised that Fred Thompson used to be pro-choice. The LA Times broke the story on Saturday:
Fred D. Thompson, who is campaigning for president as an antiabortion Republican, accepted an assignment from a family-planning group to lobby the first Bush White House to ease a controversial abortion restriction, according to a 1991 document and several people familiar with the matter.
A spokesman for the former Tennessee senator denied that Thompson did the lobbying work. But the minutes of a 1991 board meeting of the National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Assn. say that the group hired Thompson that year.
His task was to urge the administration of President George H. W. Bush to withdraw or relax a rule that barred abortion counseling at clinics that received federal money, according to the records and to people who worked on the matter.
But Fred Thompson is just another Republican whose views on abortion apparently change with the political winds. I’ve found a number of articles published in the 1990s that suggest Thompson used to be pro-choice.
The New Republic article, published on 10 Apr 1995 (pg. 15) and subtitled “Meet Fred Thompson (R-Hollywood),” pointed out (emphasis added):
On the current Republican hot-button topics, [Fred Thompson] evinces just the right degree of political honesty. He’s pro-choice and is one of the few Republicans willing to broach the subject of cuts in Social Security. But he swaddles his words in soothing balm about not wanting to hurt the “old folks.” Not bad for a beginner. Good enough, even, to make him a distant but conceivable vice presidential pick in 1996.
By 1997, Newsweek (3 Feb, U.S. edition, pg. 30) points out that (emphasis added):
Thompson is hard to pin down politically. He refuses to announce a clear position on abortion (though he consistently votes pro-life).
A few months later, The Economist (July 12, 1997, U.S. edition, pg. 32) writes (emphasis added):
Though he has been in the Senate less than three years, and though the extent of his ambition is uncertain, Mr Thompson is a natural presidential hope. He is six foot six; he has a folksy charm; he is frequently compared to Ronald Reagan. […]
Mr Thompson’s fight against corrupt politics is attractive, to be sure; his open support for abortion choice in a party of abortion foes is politically courageous.
Should he run for POTUS, Fred will have to make up some Romneyesque bullshit story like an epiphany caused by the “obvious” immorality of stem cell research that changed his stance on abortion.
For now, Fred Thompson is just spewing bullshit without the epiphany. Responding to the LA Times piece at the Young Republicans National Convention on Saturday, Thompson said:
“I’d just say the flies get bigger in the summertime. I guess the flies are buzzing,” said Thompson, who is considering running for president as a social conservative. He refused comment on whether he recalled doing the work.
Basically, Fred, like Mitt, has changed his position on abortion. The difference is that Mitt at least made the effort to concoct a bullshit excuse, whereas Fred is just spewing utter bullshit.
No surprise here. Just another hypocrite Publican – flip flopping to get elected. The Publicans don’t have one serious Presidential candidate for 08. NOT ONE. No matter who we run, we’ll win and win so big even the Publican vote fraud won’t help them steal the White House.
This exchange between me and Proud Leftist is so good, I am going to post it in every thread on HA from now on. It destroys the Publicans’ stupid talking points – period.
“I’m working really hard to understand how President Bill Clinton’s actions act as justifcation for the righties. Read this fuckwads.
If your lame ass argument is that Bill Clinton was a bad President – which is what you say – and if your argument now is that the AWOL coward GW Bush is in someway comparable to Bill Clinton, what you are actually saying is that GW Bush is NO BETTER THAN CLINTON.
Does it hurt to be that stupid? I really want to know.
proud leftist says:
RES @ 18
You’ve hit it on the nose. The rightwing fringefucks consider Clinton to be the personification of evil–indeed, he is the devil incarnate in their twisted little minds. Nonetheless, their justification for all of the Bushites’ sins is, always, “well, Clinton did it, too.” Methinks they never studied logic.”
Darryl,
It’s the fact that Thompson shilled for President Nixon that is likely to sink him. It ruins his “electability” image. Turns out that he may have provided Nixon the heads up on that the taping system was likely to come out in the hearings, thus possibly providing the time needed to erase the worst of it.
One by one the Republican possibilities topple off their pedestals.
Would it be wrong if I put one of these on my FRONT bumper?
http://www.cafepress.com/buy/a.....g_/c_/fpt_
O.T. – Join/support the Young Turks’ “ENOUGH” movement.
All it takes is an hour and a tee shirt.
12-1 today (Sunday) and every Sunday at Seattle Federal Courthouse plaza, 2 blks East of Westlake Center.
See Wes Clark Jr’s post here:
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/7/7/16314/43977
Just a reminder for you moonbats, especially RES and PL…
Bill Clinton was impeached and disbarred because he lied to a grand jury in a failed attempt to conceal a pattern of predatory behavior in connection with an assault case that he settled for $800k.
Can you imagine being too fucking dishonest to be a lawyer? How low can you go?
Re: #6
I suppose you could be a dumbshit rightwing troll on HorsesAss.
7 – AND A BET-WELSHER.
BACK ON TOPIC, FRED THOMPSON IS AS DUMB AS A BRICK. I WON’T GO AS FAR AS SAYING HE HAS NO CHANCE IN 2008 (LOOK AT DUBYA) BUT WE GOT THE GOODS ON HIM.
AND IT’S PROBABLY ONLY JUST THE BEGINNING.
Fred Thompson doesn’t have a vast criminal network behind him that will move any mountain — legal, electoral, or otherwise — that will help him get elected. If he wants to have half a chance, he’ll have to get in good with the Bush criminal syndicate and its consigliere, James A. Baker, III. Personally, I think that GOP’s only real chances at getting elected are the following:
(a) drop Jeb Bush in as an 11th-hour candidate, or
(b) find a reason to activate the President’s National Security Directive No. 51, thereby invoking martial law, opening the FEMA detention camps, and “delaying” the 2008 election, etc.
For someone so inconsequential, you libs sure are spending a lot of time and energy trying to *prove* just how inconsequential Fred really is.
Just keep telling yourselves that most of the country really does agree with you… Talk about drinking the coolaid!!! Oh, and then try and come up with a candidate who isn’t: a shrew, a lightweight, a blow-hard, or an empty-suit… Can you guess to whom I’m referring with those characterizations?
.6
Thanks for proving the point I made in post #2. We need more stoooopid, inbred Publicans like you to make sure we win by 15 points instead of 12.
Oh, and then try and come up with a candidate who isn’t: a shrew, a lightweight, a blow-hard, or an empty-suit… Can you guess to whom I’m referring with those characterizations?
Let me try:
Shrew – Giuliani
Lightweight – McCain
Blow-hard – Thompson
Empty suit – Romney
Innuendo and supposition, thy name is Leftist.
By chance, were these “minutes of a 1991 board meeting of the National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Assn.” brought forth by Dan Rather and/or Mary Maples? I’m sure they’re just as credible, because no left-wing organization would *ever* stoop to trying to sabotage a Republican. Right? Never happen!
@12
Funny. Sorry, but you are incorrect. While the Republicans have their own problems, I was referring specifically to Dems in this instance. But thanks for playing, anyway.
It seems like the first thing to be thrown under the bus when someone wants to be President, mostly on the GOP side, are women’s rights to reproductive freedom. Those rights are expendable, apparently. Disgusting. It is telling that formerly pro-choice men cast their beliefs aside so casually–it shows they don’t think women are grown-up enough to decise such things for themselves.
3 Maybe we should all be referring to Thompson as “18-Minute Fred” and point out that it doesn’t have anything to do with why his wife is smiling.
Hey Goldy- how does such BULLshit come out of a HORSESass?
Liberalism- the diarrhea of political discourse.
Thompson should have been aborted himself, very unfortunate.