Wednesday, March 12, 2008

Senator Chuck Colgan: PLINO?

That's "Pro-Life in Name Only."

You'll recall that state Senator Chuck Colgan has been conning the Conservative voters of his district ... well, for literally decades. He prevailed over Dave Mabie in 2003, and over a very strong challenge by Bob FitzSimmonds in 2007. You see, 'round about election time, Chuck has successfully beat back Republican challenges by claiming to his constituency that he is pro-life.

Of course, to an ever-increasingly moonbat Democrat constituency, this is apostacy. State Democrats even went so far in the last election to send out the typical Democrat scare literature, directed at women, suggesting that Senator Chuck's vote was necessary to preserve a woman's "right" to choose to kill her unborn child.

Recognizing that this might strip away the last vestige of respectability on this issue that he possessed --- by voting with Democrats in the organizational vote, Colgan actually voted to insure that no meaningful pro-life legislative initiative could move forward --- Colgan immediately and publicly disavowed the Democrat Party mailer. Thereafter, he squeaked by a very strong challenge from Republican Bob FitzSimmonds.

I guess we shall see. His Republican opponent, Bob FitzSimmonds, just sent me this e-mail:

Working with the Republican caucus, Senator Ken Cuccinelli was able to get the Senate to vote to ban Planned Parenthood funding from the state budget. While this is fairly normal language for the House version of the budget, the Senate conferees have always stripped it out of the final state budget. This is the first time the Senate has ever voted this way, so we have a historic opportunity to stop funding this organization at state expense.

I was privileged to work with Ken as his Legislative Director during session and it was an amazing experience to see the Democrats come undone over this amendment. Nearly a whole day was devoted to Democrat attempts to side step Ken’s amendment. Ultimately they failed and the proposal passed with the support of one Democrat, Chuck Colgan. Amazingly, the biggest impediment to final passage of this language is now this same Democrat, Chuck Colgan. While Senator Colgan is pro-life this stipulation has never seemed to be a priority for him and in spite of his presence on the budget conference committees, this language has been stripped out year after year.

Immediately after voting for the ban, Senator Colgan appointed another pro-choice legislator to the conference committee. The only explanation for this is to bolster liberals on the conference committee. The outcome will almost certainly be that this restriction will die, while Senator Colgan can continue to claim that he voted right. Senator Colgan, as the chairman of the powerful Senate Finance committee, has tremendous influence in this process and can insist that this language stay in the budget.

It is really important Senator Colgan hear from folks about this. The vote on the budget may take place as early as Thursday. So please call Senator Colgan’s office at 703-368-0300 or email his office at district29@sov.state.va.us and ask him to vote against funding Planned Parenthood.

So, is Democrat Chuck Colgan really pro-life, or is it merely campaign rhetoric by which he cons the voters of his district? Is he now working against the very pro-life legislation for which --- to his pro-life voters --- he will attempt to claim credit?

We shall see.

No comments: