Conservative women’s PAC strikes at McAuliffe for his sensible policy positions on abortion

A conservative women’s group makes about as much sense to me as Don King’s hair-do, but no one ever said the world should abide by my sense of reasonable and unreasonable. And so it is that a political action committee (PAC) made up of conservative women backing Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli for governor has released an ad “in Virginia’s urban markets” that attacks Democratic Party candidate for governor, Terry McAuliffe, on abortion.

The name of the PAC is Women Speak Out Virginia, a group with ties to the countrywide anti-abortion PAC, Susan B. Anthony List. Over the next two weeks, Richmond, Hampton Roads, and markets in northern Virginia will be hit with ads taking issue with McAuliffe’s political position on abortion.

In particular, Women Speak Out Virginia is attacking McAuliffe for opposing new regulations that will force stand-alone abortion clinics to abide by the same building standards as hospitals, potentially forcing a large majority of Virginia abortion clinics to shut down.

Besides making a deal with the devil (i.e. Ken Cuccinelli), it has always been curious to me why anti-abortion women’s groups would align themselves so thoroughly with a political party whose primary, if not only, common cause is each groups position on abortion.

Aside from the Republican Party’s “pro-life” policy position, the GOP has done more to throw women back into their pre-suffrage social roles over the past few years alone than a time machine could have.

Understandably, the issue of abortion is highly emotionally charged, an issue that touches one of the deepest rights that any individual has: control over his or her body. But with the gargantuan list of offenses by the Republican Party (state, Federal, local, you name it)  against other rights earned by women, one still has to question the intelligence of these women’s groups.

If they were smart, they would attempt to work from within the Democratic Party to bring about a gradual change in its policy positions on abortion. After all, the Democratic Party is the clear champion on women’s rights. So why align yourselves with a group of politicians who would no sooner outlaw abortions then begin focusing on stripping away just about every fundamental right that women in this country have?