Christine M. Flowers: The wrong choice

THEY say revenge is a dish best served cold.

And I'm sure Bob Casey Jr. would agree that 16 years can go a long way to refrigerating what's on your plate.

Pennsylvania's nominally pro-life senator will be speaking at the Democratic convention four full election cycles after his actually pro-life father was denied a chance to address the delegates. (I say "nominally" because, according to Senate records, Junior has a 65 percent NARAL approval rating.)

You could look at the Dems' move as an attempt to open up the tent to those potential Obama voters who may believe, like John McCain, that life begins at conception.

Or you could assume they're still trying to deal with the fallout from humiliating our former governor, Bob Casey Jr.'s father, a man who epitomized the values of the party in every single way - except one.

Or you could argue that it's the donkey - not the elephant - that has the long memory.

Or you could even say that the Democrats have actually moderated their "Hell, no, Roe won't go!" stance in light of decades of advances in medical technology and techniques for treating the complications of pregnancy, and a rise in the number of young people who define themselves as "anti-abortion."

You could do all of these things - and still be very, very wrong.

A glance at a draft of the Democratic platform reveals just how entrenched pro-abortion sentiment still is in the party of Obama.

Under the section ironically titled "Renewing the American Community" (which is difficult to do if you support killing its prospective members), the party makes the following commitment:

The Democratic Party strongly and unequivocally supports Roe v. Wade and a woman's right to choose a safe and legal abortion, regardless of ability to pay, and we oppose any and all efforts to weaken or undermine that right.

So, not only must abortion be safe and legal, it should also be free, or at least reasonably priced. Who cares if the Hyde Amendment poses a small stumbling block, prohibiting as it does federal funding of abortions? Those crazy kids can dream, can't they?

To be fair, the Democrats go on to talk about "age- appropriate" sex education, programs to help reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies and a cornucopia of other initiatives, like pre- and post-natal health care, parenting skills, income support and "caring adoption programs" (assuming there are any kids left to adopt).

But there's no question that the Democrats are more intent than ever on not only protecting Roe, but extending it.

That comment about abortion being a right "regardless of ability to pay" is extremely troubling because it's an indication that the "choice" crowd is hell-bent on making sure their "choice" is paid for out of our pockets.

So Bob Casey Jr. has his work cut out for him if he expects to find a sympathetic ear in Denver.

He certainly won't be getting one from the presumptive presidential nominee - at least on the topic of abortion if Junior in any way mirrors his father's beliefs, and says that for public consumption.

BARACK Obama is NARAL's dreamboat, the guy who believes that a woman's vagina is totally her private property. Women not only have the right to determine who enters but also who exits.

This was most blatantly on display when, as an Illinois State senator, Obama opposed SB 1095, a bill that would have mandated medical care for infants who survived botched abortions.

The legislation, which ultimately died in an Illinois House committee after passing with an overwhelmingly bipartisan majority in the Senate, would have required that children who miraculously survived an attempted abortion be treated just like every other premature infant. It posed no threat to Roe since it only applied to children who had been born alive.

But constitutional scholar Obama couldn't stomach it. In his book "The Case Against Barack Obama," David Freddoso notes, Obama warned that "whenever we define a pre-viable fetus as a person that is protected by the . . . Constitution, what we're really saying is that they are persons entitled to the kinds of protections . . . provided to a child. That determination . . . would forbid abortions to take place."

This reasoning allows infants to be thrown into the garbage pail even while they're still gasping for air. Nothing in my reading of the Constitution justifies that barbarity.

Not even Barbara Boxer, one of the most pro-choice senators in Congress with a 100 percent NARAL approval rating, agrees with Obama. The same year that he was fighting SB 1095 in Illinois, Boxer voted in favor of the federal Born Alive Infants Protection Act.

This bill was virtually indistinguishable from the state law, and passed the U.S. Senate 98-0. One of those 98 was Hillary Clinton.

Democrats can talk all they want about compromise on abortion, but when you consider the proposed platform in light of their candidate's record, you realize they've become even more radical in their devotion to Roe.

Maybe Junior should stay home after all. That dish may need a few more decades in the fridge. *

Christine M. Flowers is a lawyer.

E-mail cflowers1961@yahoo.com.