NARAL’s Blunder

I am a very strong supporter of NARAL, and am also annoyed by claims that the Democratic Party is excessively in thrall to “interest group politics,” because 1)democratic politics is ineluctably group-centered, and 2)such claims tend to assume that affluent white people aren’t really an “interest.” I’m also, as anyone with a passing familiarity with this blog knows, a strident pro-choicer with less than no use for claims that selling out on abortion is good either politically or on the merits.

This said, I’m 90% in agreement with Ezra(1,2) about NARAL’s awful decision to endorse Lincoln Chafee. My 10% of disagreement is that NARAL was quite right to oppose Langevin. In a state like Rhode Island, an anti-choice candidate is unacceptable. Pennsylvania is a different issue; to get one of the most reactionary members of the Senate out of there, in a fairly culturally conservative state, you do what you have to do. But to run an anti-choice candidate in a state Kerry carried by 21 points? No way; that’s basically saying that reproductive freedom isn’t a core Democratic principle. And even if you don’t think that choice is as important as I do, it’s certainly not reasonable to expect NARAL to endorse an anti-choice Democrat over a pro-choice Republican.

But–and this is the key–Langevin isn’t running. Because of this, David Sirota’s defense of NARAL is one long non-sequitur. Endorsing the Republican candidate even though the pro-life Dem candidate you oppose isn’t running does not constitute a “high and tight fastball” at all, because it doesn’t provide any meaningful disincentives. Sirota’s argument reminds me of the libertarian public choicers who claim that although elections are meaningless and irrational, they discipline government by throwing politicians out at random. But this is, of course, transparently wrong. To borrow Gerry Mackie’s analogy, if speeding laws were enforced randomly, they wouldn’t provide any disincentives with respect to speeding; if you’re as likely to be caught if you go 55 or go 80, you might as well just go 80. Similarly, in this case NARAL is telling the DNC that they’ll endorse pro-choice Republicans (who provide votes for a radically anti-choice Republican leadership) even if the Dems run a pro-choice candidate. This doesn’t make the slightest lick of sense. Indeed, it makes more sense for Langevin to run now, and for the party to support him, than it did before the endorsement; if NARAL is going to screw you anyway, why not try to get the seat with the strongest candidate you have?

I generally admire NARAL, but this was an egregiously stupid (and counterproductive) decision.