John Kasich’s capitulation on life underscores why conservatives lose policy fights
Time and time again, conservatives snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. An unwillingness to fight for principles through the legislative process blunts any gains so-called conservative Republicans make in elections. With his veto of the recently passed “Heartbeat” bill, Ohio Governor John Kasich showed that he is the poster-boy for unprincipled capitulation. Doing so put a price tag on human life, and once again shows why conservatives fall short of achieving the policy goals they were elected to enact.
Here’s a brief rundown of what Kasich just did. The Ohio legislature — dominated by Republicans — passed two pieces of legislation aimed at protecting the unborn.
One was a 20 week abortion ban, which bans abortions after the 20th week of pregnancy. The other was a “Heartbeat bill” which would have banned abortions once a heartbeat could be detected from a baby in the womb. Kasich signed the former but vetoed the latter. That’s the problem.
If the only piece of legislation arriving on Kasich’s desk earlier this week was the 20 week ban, and he signed it, that would have been a stunning victory for the unborn. But that was not the only piece of legislation. By vetoing the second bill, and giving an unprincipled reason for doing so, he set the pro-life movement back, stopping its forward momentum. This is a mistake those on the Left don’t make with their policy goals — I’ll get to that later.
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That is what Kasich could have done. He could have signed the law and challenged the courts to strike it. For the small period of time the law was in effect, it would have saved untold lives.
Kasich, however, chose the easy way out.
While the mainstream media treats Supreme Court rulings that strike down conservative and traditionalist laws and say that the ruling is “now the law of the land,” they often cheer when the Left fights rulings it doesn’t like with more legislation.
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.@JohnKasich's capitulation on life is par for the course and why we lose policy fightshttps://t.co/FmSqu8fMWT
— Rob Eno (@Robeno) December 14, 2016
Kasich is right — the heartbeat bill, if it became law, would not have survived legal challenges, given the liberal makeup of our judiciary today.
Now if Trump would follow through on his supposed promise to nominate conservative judges, that all could change down the road. But I have no confidence that he will nominate constitutional conservatives to the court.
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