Goldwater and the Do-Gooders

While searching the web for something, I came across the Planned Parenthood site and followed a link to a group of theirs called “Republicans for Choice.” It included as a pull-out quote these words from Barry Goldwater:

A lot of so-called conservatives today don’t know what the word means. They think I’ve turned liberal because I believe a woman has a right to an abortion. That’s a decision that’s up to the pregnant woman, not up to the pope or some do-gooders or the religious right. It’s not a conservative issue at all.

It is impossible for me to think well of someone who could say something so morally cretinous, whatever else may be said in his favor. If protecting the life of the unborn is not conservative, I don’t know what would be—or, alternatively, why anyone would care to be a conservative. And if “do-gooder” is an insult in this case, the man doesn’t know what the good really is. He has taken a position the man of basic, of normal and merely human, moral awareness does not take.

This is probably old news to many readers, and Inception (2010) I dimly remember reading about it at the time, but was struck by the quote and the way his authority in the conservative movement is being used in the cause of killing the unborn.

By the way, speaking of Planned Parenthood and its issues—and boy do they have issues—the May issue of First Things , now in the mail, includes a fascinating cost-benefit analysis of contraception by Timothy Reichert, an economist, titled “Bitter Pill.” It reveals how the contraception boom has shifted wealth and power away from women.