Newt Gingrich hit one right out of the ball park last night during CNN's Arizona Republican debate when a question was asked, via CNN Politics.com, about birth control to which the audience booed loudly and Gingrich immediately took the media to task for their lack of questioning Barack Obama in 2008 about his votes in favor of infanticide.
Gingrich: Two points, "the first is the legitimate question about the power of the government to impose on religion activities which, any religion, opposes. That's legitimate. But I just want to point out you did not once in the 2008 campaign, not once did anybody in the elite media ask why Barack Obama voted in favor of legalizing infanticide. Let's be clear here, if, if we're gonna have a debate about who the extremist is on these issues it is President obama, who as a state Senator voted to protect doctors who killed babies who survived the abortion. It is not the Republicans."
Video below and then some links to that very issue that many bloggers, including Wake up America, did cover but major media deliberately ignored.
Gingrich is right, the main stream media might have touched on the topic in 2008, but they in no way focused on it the way they have been been focusing on the Republican candidates in relation to the contraception, abortion issues today.
Back on June 28, 2012, I personally wrote about those pro-infanticide votes and I was just one of many conservative writers that did so. The topic was hit on again in September of 2008.
From June 2008:
Born-Alive Infants Protection Act.
Further searches brought up criticisms which go back to the year 2001, to the The Born-Alive Infants Protection Act, which was a law passed by the United States Congress in 2002 to protect an infant after a failed attempt to abort the fetus.
In 2001 there was the Senate Bill 1095, which describes what is meant by the term "born alive":Defines "born-alive infant" to include every infant member of the species homo sapiens who is born alive at any stage of development. Defines "born alive" to mean the complete expulsion or extraction from the mother of an infant, at any stage of development, who after that expulsion or extraction breathes or has a beating heart, pulsation of the umbilical cord, or definite movement of voluntary muscles, regardless of whether the umbilical cord has been cut and regardless of whether the expulsion or extraction occurs as a result of natural or induced labor, cesarean section, or induced abortion.
Barack Obama was one of 4 in the Senate Judiciary Committee, to vote "no" on the final action. (Right side of form)
On March 30, 2001, Barack Obama explained his opposition to "Born Alive" On the Illinois Senate floor. (Page 85 to 87 of PDF file)
In 2002, it was bill number 1662 and again Obama gave his verbal opposition on the floor of the Illinois Senate on April 4, 2002 (pages 31 to 34 of PDF file) and then he voted "no" the same day.
In 2003, it was bill 1082 and the Democrats had taken control of the Illinois Senate in 2002, so the bill was sent to the Health & Human Services Committee, which was chaired by Barack Obama.
You can see the action docket for that bill for the year of 2003, right here.
Also covered in that same piece was the entirely separate issue of partial birth abortions to which Barack Obama voted against banning them. (Seems The Politico isn't aware of the difference between infanticide and partial birth abortion)
Partial Birth Abortion.
In October of 2007, Obama voted against banning partial birth abortions.
Partial birth abortions which are a form of late term abortions, and are defined by U.S. laws as:An abortion in which the person performing the abortion, deliberately and intentionally vaginally delivers a living fetus until, in the case of a head-first presentation, the entire fetal head is outside the body of the mother, or, in the case of breech presentation, any part of the fetal trunk past the navel is outside the body of the mother, for the purpose of performing an overt act that the person knows will kill the partially delivered living fetus; and performs the overt act, other than completion of delivery, that kills the partially delivered living fetus. (18 U.S. Code 1531)
Gingrich is correct, the elite media, including those moderating the 2008 Democratic primary debates, never made an issue out of Obama's pro-infanticide votes, some mentioned it in passing and others ignored it completely, but perhaps in 2012, after the massively controversial attack by the Obama administration on religious freedoms with Obamacare's HHS mandate which would force religious institutions to provide contraception, sterilization and abortion-inducing drugs in the insurance they choose to use to cover their employees.
If Gingrich is the nominee of choice, that will undoubtedly be a point that will be hammered home against Barack Obama, but will other candidates choose to hit and hit hard on that issue?
Perhaps if the media elite had done their due diligence and vetted Barack Obama in 2007 and 2008 and informed their readers or viewers of his votes against the born-alive infants protection act, we might not have had to deal with his presidency the last 3 years.
We can only hope they actually do their jobs this time around.
[Update] More thoughts on this from Professor William A. Jacobson.
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