Republic columnist Bob Robb sees a cultural storm coming for Janet Napolitano on social issues she’s managed to avoid for the past three years, including immigration and reasonable regulations on abortion.
While her rhetoric on immigration has changed, she has not done anything yet to actually help secure our borders. Her recent reminder to state employees that they can participate in Monday’s protest march probably tells us where she really is.
On abortion, she has consistently staked out radical positions. As Attorney General, she refused to appeal a federal court’s decision striking down Arizona’s ban on partial-birth abortion — a horrific and grotesque “procedure” uniformly rejected as unconscionable by the vast majority of Americans.
She also vetoed the enormously popular women’s right to know bill, despite pleas from post-abortive women. During her first campaign for Governor, she said there was not a single restriction on abortion she would support. For even pro-choice Arizonans who support parental consent, health and safety regulations for abortion clinics, and women’s right to know bills, that is an extreme position.
Three new bills are either sitting on her desk or will be shortly. One would require doctors to inform women that a fetus at 20 weeks and beyond can feel pain, which is bolstered by recent medical research on premature babies. Two other bills will tighten up parental consent requirements. The abortion lobby that helped elect her is demanding that she veto these bills. But recent Catholic protests against Napolitano point out the danger she is in.
It’s decision time for the Governor. She has already shown a willingness to throw Latino Democrats and teachers unions under the bus to save her political viability. Will the shrill abortion-on-demand lobby also be sacrificed to her ambition, or will she stay true to her radical views and veto these bills?
