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The Spectacle Blog
It appears that Bart Stupak is in fact retiring, after a year of getting it from both sides in one of the most polarizing political debates in the country. For much of his career, Stupak was a rare pro-life standout in the Democratic Party and until the very end he seemed poised to force major concessions or defeat the health care bill outright. So why did he cave?
A lot of people will wonder whether there was some kind of quid pro quo and there will be considerable attention to where Stupak lands once he has departed from Congress. But based on his public statements and some talks I’ve had with people, I think the answer is a simple as this: The economic liberal in Stupak simply lacked the stomach to kill the health care bill.
All along, I believe Stupak thought it would come down to this: If he had the votes to defeat the bill when it was brought up on the House floor, he thought the House leadership and the Obama administration would once again give him the abortion language he wanted. If he didn’t have the votes to stop the bill, he and whatever Stupak Democrats remained could vote against it without keeping it from passing. You’ll note that the last substantive compromise he nearly negotiated the weekend the bill ended up passing would have put the onus on pro-choice Democrats, especially in the Senate, to kill the whole bill if they didn’t like the Stupak Amendment.
But that last-ditch effort was frustrated by threatened defections by pro-choice Democrats and the leadership essentially decided to call Stupak’s bluff. When faced with the actual option of being responsible for the bill’s defeat, Stupak and his colleagues couldn’t go through with it. The executive order was window dressing to make them feel better and also to make it seem less absurd that they had tied up the health care bill for so long only to fold at the end. The sad reality is that the pro-choice liberals had up to that point shown they were much more likely to back down than the Stupak Democrats, so Stupak might have prevailed had he stuck to his guns.
View all comments (27) | Leave a comment
More Blog Posts by W. James Antle, III
http://spectator.org/blog/2010/04/09/why-stupak-caved
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Tim| 4.9.10 @ 11:07AM
Stupak will have to suffer this wrath long after he has retired from public life.
That is what usually happens to back stabbers, sell outs and people that are void of principles.
Rob| 4.9.10 @ 11:28AM
I agree, Tim. We have a sell out in our district as well. Steve "Drippy" Driehaus also voted for this piece of garbage. If we did these underhanded, dirty dealing to get this crap passed, we'd be fired and our reputations would be ruined. But, to the Democrats, it's just another day. (SOP) Standard Operational Procedure.
Sarah| 4.9.10 @ 3:08PM
Stupidpak is just a run of the mill balless, soulless wonder liberal democrat. Who is surprised that he doesn't have a moral core? No liberal does.
Rob| 4.9.10 @ 11:20AM
Bart "Stupid" Stupak has just written his epiatath. He will be known as another coward who knows he'd get creamed if he ran again.
Kenny| 4.9.10 @ 11:45AM
Stupak put liberalism ahead of life -- typical Democrat.
Timaay| 4.9.10 @ 12:03PM
Stupak proves there's really no such thing as a pro life democrat, absolutely none. Democrats can't be trusted to govern- end of story!
Teflon93| 4.9.10 @ 12:11PM
There is no such thing as a pro-life Democrat.
John Thacker| 4.9.10 @ 12:13PM
There are pro-life Democrats. But there are apparently none who actually put life first, ahead of other issues, and for some of us, that's another way of saying that there aren't any pro-life Democrats.
Teflon93| 4.9.10 @ 12:21PM
John, it is simply a tautology.
One cannot claim any sort of "social justice" by committing the ultimate social injustice.
It's the original sin of the Democrat Party---the Democrats have NEVER valued human life properly, first denying the humanity of our African brothers and sisters (and Native Americans as well), then the humanity of infants and the elderly.
There is no such thing as a pro-life Democrat, any more than there was such a thing as a pro-Jewish Nazi.
It is a contradiction in terms.
Teflon93| 4.9.10 @ 12:24PM
Put another way, there is a reason why the Declaration lists life as the first of the inalienable rights.
The Democrats have declared that right to be alienable indeed, which is the moment they fully parted ways with America the idea.
Jamie| 4.9.10 @ 3:09PM
There is no such thing as a pro-life democrat; their loyalty is to their ideology, and their ideology is Marxism.
Stupidpak proved it.
MKS| 4.9.10 @ 1:15PM
There were anti-slavery Democrats in 1859, too. But as long as Democrats were in power, slavery persisted.
Teflon93| 4.9.10 @ 1:42PM
Any names for these, MKS?
I'd love to look into their biographies if so----seems like they might be a case study for what's going on with Stupak et al.
W Krebs| 4.9.10 @ 1:48PM
I think you can fairly classify Stephen Douglas in this group.
In the case of Douglas, he defied the pro-slavery wing of the Democratic party over the Lecompton constitution for Kansas. They payed him back by opposing him in the Presidential election of 1860, ultimately nominating an alternative, Southern candidate. And the rest, as they say, is history.
Heatpacker| 4.9.10 @ 2:21PM
Douglas shepherded the Kansas-Nebraska Act through the Senate, believing that this bipartisan piece of legislation would cement his reputation as a centrist and make him the odds-on favorite for the Democrat presidential nomination, if not in 1856, then definitely in 1860. Unfortunately for Douglas, he completely misread the mood of the country on both sides of the slavery question. Opposition to the K-N Act was so impassioned in the north that it destroyed the Whig Party. Pro-slavery southern politicians exploited the act to try to create a new slave state in Kansas. In the end, Douglas made himself one of the most hated men in America, which is hardly the end that he foresaw.
Big Elk| 4.9.10 @ 1:52PM
If you can't take the heat; get out of the kitchen, eh. comrade Stupak? Stupak is quiting because he is a coward. Good riddance to this baby-killer and, with any luck, his plane will crash on his last trip to Detroit.
john| 4.9.10 @ 2:15PM
Bart Stpak is a typical Demorat liar and scum...
He says no abortion but signed a HC bill that funds Planned Parenthood...Get is tail gone!!!
Heatpacker| 4.9.10 @ 2:28PM
Stupak is not really a coward. He is just a typical centrist, which today may be defined as a person with no core beliefs, who may be easily manipulated. I think that Stupak is retiring because he is ashamed of himself. He pretended to be as pure as a virtuous maiden, and turned out to be as round-heeled as the village slut.
Patriot| 4.9.10 @ 3:11PM
Guilt's a b!tch, Stupidpak; live with yours.
Campy| 4.9.10 @ 4:39PM
Shame? No shame. Just a rat jumping from the sinking ship—like Bayh.
SAweep 'em out!
Mike| 4.9.10 @ 5:52PM
Kudos to Bart Stupak. He is an honorable man who did what he believed what is right for this country and upheld his beliefs. Pretty much proven by all the wonderful uplifting positive comments left by the cavemen and troglytes on this thread.
Intelligent conservatism....William Buckley is spinning in his grave.
LIBERALS LIE!| 4.9.10 @ 7:27PM
Loving, tolerant Liberal democrats like Mike and Stupidpak....50 million dead babies are the result of your horrific liberal social policies. You will be spinning in your grave someday--count on it.
The Democrat party is the party of death.
You and Stupidpak are both deceitful lying losers--all of you corrupt liberals deserve each other. Lies and deceit are 'honorable" to you. Sick.
st louie mo| 4.9.10 @ 8:16PM
Pictures folks. Rahm has the pictures!