Economies rise and fall. The Bush Recession will end one day soon, and the California economy will rebound.
Anxiety about the economy is driving the election today, but with polls tightening to within 3 percentage points in Sen. Barbara Boxer’s reelection race, it is becoming increasingly likely that Californians could wake up when the recession is over and realize that they have elected a senator, Carly Fiorina, who advocates overturning Roe vs. Wade.
If Fiorina is elected, it would represent a radical departure for California voters, over two-thirds of whom are strongly pro-choice. In fact, Californians have not elected a senator who advocated overturning Roe, as Fiorina does, since it became law in 1973.
That’s why Fiorina has been so desperate to keep the topic of abortion out of the race. When she was asked about it in her first debate with Boxer, she confirmed she would overturn Roe “if there was an opportunity,” but quickly added that abortion “is not an issue I’m running on.”
The most recent Field Poll [PDF] on Californians’ attitudes on abortion found that 71 percent voters support Roe v. Wade, and that an identical number, 71 percent, support preserving the state’s liberal abortion laws or making abortions easier to obtain.
Among California independent voters, 75 percent support the state’s current law or would like to see access to abortions made easier. Just 18 percent of independents advocate making abortions harder to obtain.
Broken out by gender, Field found that 69 percent of California women and 71 percent of men support keeping or expanding current abortion laws.
These views among California voters are diametrically at odds with a spate of recent polls in the Senate race. An Oct. 13 poll from Rasmussen — which granted, skews heavily toward the GOP — gave Sen. Boxer a 3 percentage point lead, 49 percent – 46 percent. Rasmussen also found that Fiorina is leading among independent voters — the same group that supports abortion rights by 75 percent.
Similarly, the latest Reuters/Ipsos poll gave Boxer a 5 point lead, 49-45.
Fiorina is not only out of step with voters on this issue, she would be the first senator elected from California who advocated overturning abortion rights since 1973 when Roe became law. Even Republican senators like Pete Wilson and S.I. Hayakawa were pro-choice.
(Similarly, no governor elected since 1973 has advocated policies to restrict abortion rights. Democratic governors Jerry Brown and Gray Davis were pro-choice, as was Republican Pete Wilson and as is Gov. Schwarzenegger. GOP Gov. George Deukmejian — like New York’s former Democratic governor, Mario Cuomo — personally opposed abortion but did not advocate policies to restrict it.)
It is extremely unlikely that California’s independent voters have changed their position on abortion rights since the Field poll cited here was release three months ago. Plus, polling trends show that Californian’s position on this issue is “settled law.” Support for Roe and abortion rights has remained around 70 percent since Field began polling on the question in 1987. The lowest response recorded was 66 percent.
The fact that a majority of independents plan to vote for Fiorina likely means one of two things: Either they are uninformed about the fact that Fiorina advocates overturning Roe v. Wade, or the economic crisis has caused them to lose perspective on how important the preservation of this right is to themselves, their families and all mainstream Californians.
People don’t give a crap about a “woman’s right to choose” when they don’t have a job and have to feed their families.
That is what this election is and should be about.
Pro-choicers: This election could be about abortion if your left-wing politicians hadn’t put CA near bankruptcy.
Carly in 2010 baby!!!!!
Jaime T – It was Bush-Cheney-Enron who put California’s economy in the toilet — besides which, we’ve had a Republican governor since 2003.
But if you right wingers are so desperate to put Big Government in charge of making sure that every pregnancy in America is carried to term, vote for Carly. But imagine the size of the bureaucracy it will require to monitor tens of millions of pregnancies every year. Good luck with that.
Go ahead and vote for Carly, but Boxer is going to win.