Tea at Trianon: Voting as an Act of Valor

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Wednesday, November 2, 2016

Voting as an Act of Valor

From The Christian Review:

Only one of two people are going to make those nominations: Trump or Clinton. Not a third-party candidate. Not a write-in. And not the ghost of “no ballot cast.” So, as part of formation of conscience, the voter weighing those options must ask: Is my hesitation strong enough that, looking reality in the eye, I am willing to cede that control to a candidate I do not choose?

Let us look at this another way.

As I’ve written before, in May of this year, the British medical journal, The Lancet, published the most comprehensive worldwide abortion statistics to date in an article entitled, “Abortion incidence between 1990 and 2014: global, regional, and subregional levels and trends.” The number of abortions worldwide has now climbed to an all-time high of 56.3 million per year, based on estimates ranging from 52.4 million to 70.0 million. Translation: over the next 10 years, more than half-a-billion babies will lose their lives. If the higher estimate is accurate, accounting for population increases, the number could total 750 million, or three-quarters of a billion children. In 10 years.

Now read this section from the current 2016 Democratic Party Platform (p. 46) approved in July:

We will support sexual and reproductive health and rights around the globe. In addition to expanding the availability of affordable family planning information and contraceptive supplies, we believe that safe abortion must be part of comprehensive maternal and women’s health care and included as part of America’s global health programming. Therefore, we support the repeal of harmful restrictions that obstruct women’s access to health care information and services, including the “global gag rule” and the Helms Amendment that bars American assistance to provide safe, legal abortion throughout the developing world.
Note the undisguised words: “America’s global health programming.” The agenda is hidden in plain sight. It is no secret that Clinton is “all in” when it comes to promoting abortion; she has never wavered in her virulent, active, determined support of it, right up through partial-birth abortion. Never for a second.

Today we find ourselves in the situation where Trump needs every vote while the media launch an unprecedented media tsunami against him. Of course it is dreadful—the October surprise is that so many are surprised. What did we expect?

Yet what irony: millions of devout, pro-life religious voters will sit this election out or vote for a “purer” third-party candidate who has absolutely no chance of winning. The votes of these religious elite will be replaced by millions of Democrats—the very same who helped put Bill Clinton and Barack Obama in office—who now see the futility of the current direction of the country and who will act to reverse the trend by voting for Trump.

If Trump wins, it will not be thanks to the religious intelligentsia who fail in the clutch. Yes, their consciences are eased. Their consciences. But at the most critical juncture, once again, the babies are left bereft. The heavy lifting will be done by those less squeamish, the leathernecks, those who get that we are in a war and that this binary election is just that: binary.

Those who invoke conscience must do so clearly looking reality in the eye. Should we really sacrifice the Supreme Court, the hundreds of federal judgeships, the thousands of political appointments up and down the Washington power-structure—for Trump’s foolish, indefensible sexual comments? Is it righteous and just to risk the lives of so many millions of babies with the enshrining of Roe v. Wade for additional decades because of the possibility—unproven at this point—of behavior allegedly similar to that of former president Bill Clinton? How is that justice for them?

The key thing here is that we are not asked to choose between two candidates who are both avowedly pro-abortion: the conscience clause would be much easier to invoke. No, here we have two candidates who are opposites on this. Trump has stated he is firmly pro-life. (Read more.)