So now the other guy has formally launched his campaign by trying to outdo his opponent in the “I’ll cut your taxes” race.

Trying to one-up Lt. Gov. Tim Kaine, Jerry Kilgore promised to cut property taxes by the tried and true way of Virginia Republicans lately — take the decision away from local officials. From the earliest times in the history of the state, property taxes were assessed not by the state but by local officials. But Jerry Kilgore doesn’t like that tradition. He wants the state to take the decision away from local officials and instill it instead in a referendum. In fact, he wants every tax increase to be subject to a referendum. Ironically, one of the people on the stage with Kilgore yesterday was U.S. Sen. John Warner, who dismissed the idea last year when it was brought up to combat Gov. Warner’s tax plan. No reports that the senator reminded the adoring throngs of that fact.

What form would that referendum take? Who knows? Kilgore is offering few details. We know that he wants to keep assessments increases to no more than 5% But since a 5% increase in assessment would amount to a tax increase, would that decision be subject to a referendum? Would the referendum say this is the tax increase, take it or leave it? Or would there be options, say a 1%, 2% (up to 5%) or none? Could local officials wait for the outcome of the referendum before deciding to increase the rate? Well, probably not, as Jerry also wants any tax increase to be subject to a referendum. Would the referendum be on the total increase (rate plus assessment increase) or just the tax rate? Who knows. Jerry isn’t telling.

He’s left himself an out: Taxes could be raised in an emergency. What’s an emergency? Jerry isn’t telling.

“My opponent, he offers a dishonest plan that fails to address the problem,” he said. “Under my plan, tax relief is not an option left to local officials, it is my promise from me to you.”

Like I said, he doesn’t want that tradition of letting local officials decide. In Fairfax County in 2003, we had two candidates with different tax views. The Republican was soundly defeated after promising to limit property tax increases. But I guess the voters didn’t know better.

Kilgore also pledged to improve the state’s road network by creating regional transportation authorities. He vowed to create a commission to monitor state spending. And he promised to support education by offering better teachers higher pay and creating a new trust fund for school construction and technology.

Regional authorities? How does that raise money for transportation? Another commission. Don’t we already have an entire bureaucracy and the GA to monitor expenses? Offering better teachers higher pay is a great idea. Where will the money come from? Who will judge the teachers? A new education trust fund. Funded how?

We don’t know. Jerry isn’t telling.

We do know that he wants to emulate the borrow and spend agenda of the Bush administration.

Kilgore said he would seek to ease gridlock by creating regional transportation authorities that would be empowered to assess local road needs and borrow money.

Kilgore offered few specifics about how his plans would work.

Left unresolved was a big question about his promise to limit increases in real estate assessments. Neither Kilgore nor his advisers would say whether they also intend to freeze real estate tax rates.

As Jeff Shapiro of the Richmond Times Dispatch writes,

Kilgore’s aggressive, populist line on taxes — coming less than a week after Democratic Lt. Gov. Timothy M. Kaine proposed allowing localities to exempt from taxation the first 20 percent of the value of any home — is the latest indication that both parties believe taxpayer anger will dominate the campaign for governor.

Because it takes a minimum of three years to revise the constitution, it would be 2008 at the earliest before either candidate’s proposal could take effect. The next governor’s term will end in 2010.

If this becomes a race of who offers the best tax cuts, we haven’t learned anything in four years. I think Kaine, despite his property tax plan, shouldn’t get sucked into a tax question at every stop. He’s got to talk about what Virginia will look like in four years under his leadership and how he will engage citizens to contribute to the solution.

Kilgore, not surprisingly, rejected Kaine’s offer to debate together throughout the state. Though he waxed proudly about his country twang, Kilgore doesn’t want too many people to hear it, apparently.

Meanwhile, Kilgore tried to paint Kaine with Richmond scandals.

“While we were pushing ethics reforms for state government, my opponent was presiding over a government racked by corruption and did nothing,” he said. The scandals, however, occurred after Mr. Kaine left the council when he assumed the lieutenant governorship in 2002.

Now tell me why Kaine shouldn’t be talking about Kilgore’s phone tap scandal or Jerry’s own mother’s scandal?

All in all, this isn’t starting out as a campaign about ideas, ideals, policies or even values. Its about those folks who say “It’s my money and I want to keep it.”

Depressing.

The term political posturing is often considered negative. But then, the GOP, especially with its latest intrusion into personal matters (see Schiavo case below), has proven its effectiveness. Besides, I agree that placing your policies in a framework of values is not only smart politics, but a fair question for voters to ask. It’s not always about the numbers or policies. People want to know values because they may decide issues that have yet to arise.

Lt. Gov. Tim Kaine has produced radio ads about his values that will air on small market and religious stations.

They feature Kaine in a soliloquy about his upbringing, toiling as a youth in his father’s small Kansas City ironworking shop and his days as a Roman Catholic missionary to Honduras.

“I was taught to be tight with a dollar and watch the bottom line,” Kaine says in the spots. “My core values are grounded in the lessons I learned at home and are guided by my faith.”

The spots conclude: “I’m Tim Kaine. That’s who I am and what I believe.”

That’s smart. People want to know something of where you came from, as that is likely to infuse a lot of political positions. And it makes values personal and real.

Kaine’s team has come up with another good idea.

Democrat Lt. Gov. Tim Kaine on Sunday challenged his likely Republican opponent for governor this November, former state Attorney General Jerry Kilgore, to make joint campaign appearances across Virginia to give voters a chance to compare the two candidates at the same place at the same time.

Kilgore has a reality problem, and he knows it. No, it’s not that he’s out of touch with reality. It’s just that in the flesh and blood, he pales in comparison. Kilgore mannerisms and lack of debating skills are likely to hurt him in a one-on-one arena. My guess he knows it and will steer as far away as possible from such venues.

Kaine is also right to mention the memo spoof by the Kilgore campaign. Kaine should mention “false memos”? Connect them to the CBS memo flap, as much as a stretch that that is. After all, stretching is a Bush communications tenet.

Kaine chided the Kilgore campaign – that formally launches at 5:30 p.m. today at Gate City High School – for circulating a spoof campaign strategy memo designed to look as if it was written by Kaine strategists. The Kilgore- generated “memo” imagined a campaign strategy for Kaine where the Democrat would take different positions on certain issues in different parts of the state, and maligned how Southwest Virginians dress, act and speak.

Here’s the text of what Kilgore’s spokesman Tim Murtaugh sent to reporters.

From: Tim Murtaugh
To: ‘Tim Murtaugh’
Sent: Monday, March 14, 2005 9:00 AM
Subject: URGENT: Internal Kaine Kick-Off Memo Discovered

Reporters –

The Kilgore campaign has unearthed the attached Kaine campaign
memorandum that lays out Tim Kaine’s thoughts and strategies as he
approaches his kick-off. It includes key advice to the Democrat
candidate, depending what region of the state he visits.

While some would say that it would be wiser to keep this to ourselves
in order to “call his shots,” we thought it would be enlightening for
you to see it as well. Because after all, we’re all in this
together.*

Tim

No attempt to admit the spoof there.

Meanwhile, Sean Connaughton, running for the GOP nomination for lt. gov., and blasted Kaine’s property tax proposal.

“It took Kaine’s campaign for governor finally to get him off the dime and moving on this issue, which Sean Connaughton has recognized, and has acted on, ever since he became chairman-at large of the Prince William Board of County Supervisors more than five years ago,” read a statement released by campaign spokesman Bill Kling on Friday.

Note no criticism of the proposal itself.

The Hampton Roads Daily Press hates it all, while admitting there’s a problem.

Now, in point of fact, higher residential values do create hardships for lower-income or fixed-income older homeowners. But there are ways to sensibly address that. There are caps. One approach involves “circuit breakers,” which limit property tax liabilities to a certain percentage of one’s income.

Or you can provide property tax rebates to low-income homeowners, by way of income tax credits.

Or you can implement deferral programs that allow senior citizens to defer payment on property taxes until their homes are sold – as 24 states already do.

It’s true, as Kaine points out, that many states offer homestead exemptions. But, by far and away, most of these are locked on a fixed amount of money and targeted to those homeowners who genuinely need a break. That is not what Kaine proposes, as it works across-the-board, for millionaires and fixed-income retirees alike.

Tweaking this proposal wouldn’t be a bad idea, but anyone who thinks the hue and cry about property taxes comes only from old folks on pensions is out of touch. But at least limiting exemptions to those who really need it will flush out the “It’s my money and I want to keep it” crowd.

Could it be that the Democratic leadership has come up with a unified strategy? The GOP ignores mainstream Virginians really care about, making them ineffective as legislators who lead a government that intrudes into people’s personal lives.A room full of loud Democrats came out to cheer for their latest candidate for the Virginia House of Delegates.

Earnie Porta announced that he would try to unseat Delegate Michele B. McQuigg, R-Prince William.

Porta’s campaign slogan, “I believe we need more effective representation in Richmond,” drew applause each time he uttered the words at the Occoquan Town Hall on Saturday.

Like any good speechmaker he said the words at the end of every point to motivate his audience of about 75 Democrats.

Porta, a resident of the Town of Occoquan, said if elected in November, he would concentrate on sprawl, education, health care and transportation.

Porta chided the last session of General Assembly for concentrating on the less lofty goals of license plate slogans, bake sale rules, road names and “the subject that recently brought international fame to Virginia, a bill to fine people if their underwear is showing.”

“Now these things are comical,” the 41-year-old Porta said, “but they would be funnier if they were not bracketed by more divisive and mean-spirited legislation that so often seems less aimed at solving problems than at stigmatizing, if not demonizing, some of our very own relatives, friends, neighbors and fellow citizens.”

Porta said he wants a House of Delegates that stays out of people’s personal lives, doesn’t meddle in local affairs and works on the serious problems of the Commonwealth.

There is no doubt in my mind that characterizing the GOP as wanting government to intrude on people’s lives is a winning theme. It’s matter of trust. The GOP doesn’t trust people to make personal moral decisions and instead wants government to impose them.

The action by Congressional Republicans is an outrage! As The Washington Post barely touched on, it is first and foremost hypocrisy. What happened about the concerns for state’s rights? Every time a Republican says judges should stay out of certain decisions, we should always bring up this and the 2000 election as evidence that the GOP loves activists judges when they can help them.

As Terri Schiavo’s husband and with full concurrence of her doctors, he should be allowed to make this decision. She has been brain dead for 15 years. It’s not as if she’s going to recover tomorrow, unless by some miracle. If that’s the case, we should leave dead bodies lying around in the hopes that a miracle will cause them to rise from the dead.

It is an abuse of Congressional power. I only hope the courts see it for what it is.

I am disappointed that no Democrat stepped in to stop this legislation.

I feel strongly about this, as my family faced a similar decision. I have an op-ed in the Richmond Times-Dispatch today about it.

A hearing is set for 3:00 this afternoon.

Update: DC Inside Scoop has the memo purportedly from Sen. Rick Santorum’s office about the politics of this case.

Update 2: Kevin Drum has info on an ABC poll on this issue. Even evangelicals don’t agree with DeLay & Co and they know they’re being pandered to.

Note: Pardon the lack of posts lately. Been too busy but feeling guilty to for the blank pages here.

Kaine is off and running. I attended the Herndon affair, and I’m glad to see that the promise to address property taxes now has substance.

The property tax issue is a fair one, even more than the car tax ever was. Yes, people hated the car tax because it had to be paid all at once, and fortunately for Gilmore, it is due, at least in Fairfax, at the height of the campaign season.

But the property tax issue is legitimate for older folks on fixed incomes. “Fixed incomes” is a misnomer. Most of us have fixed incomes, of course, and that is the reason property taxes increases gets some traction outside of the geriatric set. But for some older folks whose pensions and Social Security will not likely increase much, 30% annual increases can be a burden.

Kaine’s solution has merit but isn’t perfect (as opposed to any idea I might have, of course).

Finding a way to divorce home tax rates from commercial ones is a sound idea. The markets act independently and should be treated that way. If it takes a constitutional amendment, well, so be it, although I am amazed we need to write it into the constitution, for God’s sake.

But allowing localities to do carve out a homestead exemption is only part of the solution, as Kaine’s proposals recognize. But there’s the rub, of course: The whole program requires a lot of separate acts to occur, which is unlikely.

Making the counties whole for the loss revenue is exactly what Gilmore proposed with his car tax. So instead of a local income, the car tax became a state expense. Kaine is doing much the same with his proposal that the state fully fund the Standards of Quality for education. The loss of property tax income becomes a state expense. And there are no guarantees.

“…[I]f this is to be seriously pursued, we would like to see a constitutional amendment that would require the state to fully fund the SOQs to guarantee that those revenues would be made available to localities. A mere promise would not be enough,” said [Ellen Davenport of the Virginia Association of Counties.]

And a promise would all it would be. Given that Kaine will likely have a GOP-controlled Assembly for at least a few years, what are the chances that they will help him by fully funding the SOQs?

And what does fully funded mean?

Full state funding of the Standards of Quality would relieve localities of an education burden they now pay for, he said. Gov. Mark R. Warner said the standards are fully funded in the recently approved budget.

So Kaine’s role model is telling us not to expect any more money because the SOQs are already fully funded. Many will argue that’s not true, but fully funded is in the eye of the beholder, I guess.

Kilgore’s camp, of course, jumped on the proposal saying it wouldn’t guarantee anything. They’re right. So I guess we can expect something from Jerry that imposes Richmond’s will on localities, eroding further local independence, supposedly a goal of Republicans who want to get government off our backs.

Kaine’s proposal makes the connection between school costs, which is usually at least 50% of a local jurisdiction’s budget, and property taxes. Kilgore disagrees.

“Clearly, the two are not connected, meaning that Kaine’s recommendation, though laudable by itself, is meaningless when it comes to real estate tax relief,” a Kilgore campaign statement said. “By connecting the two, he is openly trying to deceive the people of Virginia.”

No, Kilgore is. He reminds me of Bob Marshall, who made a similar statement at one of the town hall meetings on the budget last year. As I wrote then,

…Del. Bob Marshall sets us straight: “There is no relationship between state taxes and property taxes,” he lectured. He repeated it several times, perhaps hoping we’d be hypnotized into believing it. “Property taxes are based on assessments,” he said.

Duh, yes, but few would be deceived into thinking that localities don’t have to make up what the state denies.

Give Kaine political credit for trying to come up with something that spreads the responsibility — the Assembly to fund the SOQs, local governments for approving and structuring the 20% relief, the voters for passing the amendment and corporations for taking up some of the slack.

For all those players to act the part will take a not so minor miracle, sure, but politically,

“Given Kaine’s record on taxes, the best defense is a good offense, and this is a terrific offense,” [University of Virginia Professor Larry] Sabato said.

“Being at the bottom of the seniority scale and in the minority I’m not sure what she’d be capable of.”

–Del. Jeff Frederick (R-Prince William), commenting on Hilda Barg’s decision to oppose him in November. In the Republican primary two years ago,
Frederick, defeated Del. Jack Rollison, who was a member of the House for 17 years and chairman of its transportation committee. I guess seniority didn’t matter then.

Kilgore 46%
Kaine 36%
Potts 6%
UnD 12%

Poll out today may not be great news for Tim Kaine, but it’s too early to pay much attention to these polls. Virginia is a Republican state. So right now, all people are reacting to is the D or R next to the name. (Yes, you can argue that’s all most people care about in the voting booth, but we’re talking here about the few who can sway an election.)

I’ve already heard rumblings that business people in Loudoun who recently heard Kilgore speak, left the place shell-shocked. He doesn’t play well on the stump. TV coverage will hurt him.

And when you look at the numbers in this poll, there are some concerns for Kilgore. Potts has 6% after a week of unrelenting bashing from his party. Imagine the bounce he’ll get when the party runs out of expletives. Self-described moderates like Kaine 43-37% with 7% for Potts.

Bad news is self-described independents give Potts 15% but they favor Kilgore over Kaine 41-33% and those “not sure” of their party (with the option of saying independent, what does “Not sure” mean — they can’t remember?) like Kilgore 64-10%. Hispanics like Kilgore 52-18%. Maybe the Dems need to remind them that Kilgore liked the bill to ban illegal immigrants from admission to state colleges.

“[The tax fight] is behind us.”
Speaker of the House Bill Howell

Yes, I suppose Howell would like it to be “behind us.” A case might be made that the Dems shouldn’t let that happen. But clearly some GOPers are happy to keep mouthing the same mantra. Del. Dick Black (R-Sterling) [Disclosure] is already trying to pin his opponent, Dave Poisson, as a tax and spend liberal. At the same time, Black wants to take credit for new highway money coming Loudoun’s way. I’m sure he’ll try to take credit for new school money and anything else he doesn’t deserve. But the Dems should be countering with “without the tax increase and the car-tax cap, there would have been no money last year and less this year.” If the tax hikes were so unpopular, why is Warner so popular?

I’m willing to bet the anti-tax crusade, both nationally and in Virginia, is running out of gas. So maybe let’s not put it behind us just yet.

About two months ago I posted about the impending social security debate.

Anybody know what the Democrats’ position is on ensuring the long-term viability of social security? We know what Bush wants, though we need more details. And Congressman Bill Thomas has a few ideas, like making it gender-specific. But what do the Democrats want? That we can’t articulate it sums up the problem with da Dems. They have no position except to be opposed to Bush’s.

That post generated comments. To one of them I argued

While I acknowledge that Bush is unnecessarily yelling “fire” – and that getting our fiscal house in order is always a good idea — I think now would be a good time for Democrats to present a plan for the long-term viability of social security. For one, it presents Democrats as thinkers. Right now, Dems are all considered knee-jerk protectors of the status quo. They should be perceived as the party of ideas or they’ll never recapture power.

Now would be the time to talk about long-range changes to the SS system, including means testing. SS was meant as insurance against old-age poverty. [Original comment edited for clarity] Seniors with incomes over $100,000 not only receive SS payments but do so long after they’ve recouped what they put into the system. Maybe 100k isn’t the threshold, but I think if combined with the idea of increasing payments to those below the threshold, the Dems could present themselves as the party of the middle class. Such a move would be an increase in the progressiveness of the tax system.

Today, The Washington Post reports two veteran Democratic strategists are arguing the same thing.

The party’s situation was posed most provocatively by two veteran Democratic strategists, Stan Greenberg and James Carville. In a memo issued last week, the two wrote: “We ask progressives to consider, why have the Republicans not crashed and burned?”

“Why has the public not taken out their anger on the congressional Republicans and the president?” they added. “We think the answer lies with voters’ deeper feelings about the Democrats who appear to lack direction, conviction, values, advocacy or a larger public purpose.”

Whatever you think of Bush, you’ve got to give him credit for his willingness to touch the third rail of politics. Long-range, Social Security does have problems — problems that are better addressed today when we have more options and a longer political perspective.

Bush has already won one battle: He has convinced Americans, especially those who will be voting for another 40-50 years, that there is a problem.

In their analysis, Greenberg and Carville said Democrats have resisted saying there is a problem with Social Security, even though 63 percent of Americans in a recent National Public Radio poll said there was. “To say there is no problem simply puts Democrats out of the conversation for the great majority of the country that want political leaders to secure this very important government retirement program,” they wrote. “Voters are looking for reform, change and new ideas but Democrats seem stuck in concrete.”

The voters Carville and Greenberg are alluding to don’t go to the polls until 2006. Here in Virginia, the polls open this November.

Is there an analogy in the Commonwealth? What’s the biggest issue facing us? Most say it’s transportation. So what’s the Dems transportation plan?

If you look to the top of the ticket, Tim Kaine’s web site doesn’t offer many concrete ideas, expect that he’ll save money by insisting VDOT is more efficient. He’ll also lock up the transportation trust fund and push for better linkage between transportation plans and land use plans.

As we better link land use and transportation planning, we will spend our money more wisely. As one example, Richmond provides a significant property tax break to people who perform major renovations of existing buildings. This tax break encourages the continuous redevelopment and reuse of existing structures, which brings reinvestment into the core of already settled areas. By encouraging more activity near our job centers, we help slow down the need for sprawl and the need for expensive road development into the far suburbs. This smart policy choice encourages positive development, helps people live closer to work, provides good construction related and other jobs for our workforce and utilizes existing transportation infrastructure rather than creating a need for new roads. We have to find similar incentives to take advantage of existing road and public transportation networks.

(Smart growthers might argue that renovating old office buildings in downtowns doesn’t do much to attract people to live downtown and it certainly doesn’t bring the jobs to where the people are now living.)

Kaine also has said that gasoline taxes are not off the table. But still, I don’t think even after the man in the street reads Kaine’s position, he would be able to put it into a few words. How will Kaine address the transportation mess?

Fortunately, Jerry Kilgore has even less of a plan.

Jerry Kilgore is committed to looking at innovative and forward-looking initiatives that free up capacity on our existing network of roads by recognizing that transportation is a service that should be treated like other goods and services — allowing the private sector to meet the demands of consumers in an open and free marketplace.

Kilgore is supportive of using a budget surplus for one-time capital projects, such as building new roads and bridges; a constitutional amendment to put the “trust” back in the transportation trust fund; and effectively using public-private partnerships for the maintenance of existing roads and construction of new roads, as part of an overall transportation plan.

When are people going to get over the notion that the private sector can do it any better?

Maybe the task and expense of building a field organization, making speeches and courting the press leaves little time for campaigns to really think about the issues. But as Bush has proven with Social Security, a willingness to put forth some ideas and facts (even spurious ones) about an issue can help generate action.

And in fairness to Kaine, he’s not campaigning against any of Kilgore’s ideas, because Kilgore doesn’t have any. But the difference is Kilgore is a Republican in a red state. The minority needs to generate reasons for voters to switch parties.

Wonder when the Carvilles and Greenbergs of Virginia politics will write a memo lamenting the Virginia Democrats’ lack of “direction, conviction, values, advocacy or a larger public purpose”?

Much was made of the anti-tax organizers’ plan to challenge Republicans in the Virginia Assembly who voted to increase taxes last year to invest in education and other pressing matters. Each was to get a challenger, but as reported today, only six have emerged.

Robin DeJarnette, executive director of VCAP, said the PAC does not expect to endorse any more candidates before the GOP primary

“We wanted to be realistic,” she said. “It would have been difficult to find 19 people.”

Gee, there was such an outcry that statewide, they could find six people willing to challenge them. Even they have their work cut out for them.

Jim Dillard is retiring, so he’s not being challenged; his endorsed successor is — who is running as a Democrat. The challenger, a one Michael Golden, lost to Dillard in the ’03 general election by more than 2 to 1. And the precincts in Dillard’s district gave John Kerry a majority in the ’04 election. There has been a steady conversion of the inner areas of Fairfax County to the Democrats. There’s no reason to think, Dillard’s former aide, David Marsden, will lose this race.

Gary Reese, representing northwest Fairfax and eastern Loudoun County, is known for his school advocacy on the Fairfax County school board. He represents an area that is savvy and passionate about good schools. I can’t imagine that Chris Craddock, a 25-year old school teacher who lost a school board race in ’03, can outpoll Reese, who is more of a “good government” tight-fisted conservative than a social regressive. Reese has an avuncular manner that soothes voters.

Chris Oprison wants to lower taxes, promote home schooling, ban abortion and find “real transportation solutions. He’s challenging Joe May, a quiet man who also is pursuing a long shot bid for lt. governor. Seems Oprison liked May until he voted for more taxes. But Oprison is a litigator. Now how could a good Republican vote for a trial lawyer?

Steve Chapman, 27, is the first primary challenger Harry Parrish has had in 24 years. Chapman was part of an anti-tax march on Parrish’s Manassas place of business. The march fizzled when it encountered an even larger group supporting Parrish. It will probably be a “time for a change” campaign that young challengers use against older office holders.

In two other races, Shaun Kenney, chairman of the Spotsylvania Republican Committee is challenging Bobby Orrock, and Mark Jarvis will challenge Edward Scott.

This feeble effort is likely to do harm to the anti-tax effort. For all its bluster, it seems Grover Norquist can’t blow this house down. If they lose all six races, maybe The Washington Post will stop calling James Parmelee every time somebody whispers the word “tax.” Others are suggesting that Grover Norquist is already on the decline.

There’s a good Richmond Times Dispatch story by Tammie Smith about abortion in the black community. Black women have nearly three times the number of abortions as white women. The anti-abortion movement claims that it is trying to enlist the black community in its anti-abortion crusade.

Victoria Cobb, executive director of the conservative Family Foundation of Virginia, said many blacks, who identify as Democrats, view opposing abortion as a Republican issue. Those old political divisions may be changing, she said.

“We are seeing the beginning of the paradigm shift with the marriage issue. African-American pastors are leading the charge to defend marriage,” she said, pointing out the foundation’s association with a multicultural group of Tidewater-area pastors. “I think we will see more of this on issues like abortion,” she said.

“I think many African-American pastors are engaging on the issue of fatherlessness,” Cobb said. “They are also seeing that tied to abortion, and how incredibly destructive that is to the community.”

Engaging in the issue of fatherlessness is all well and good. But exactly how is that tied to abortion? Preventing black women from getting abortions isn’t going to make the absent fathers return. It would simply bring another child, who perhaps can’t be properly cared for, into the world.

The problem of more unwanted pregnancies among black women is tied to the problems of health care in this country. Contraception is not cheap.

“One out of every three black women is without health insurance,” [said Lorraine Cole, president and chief executive officer of the Black Women’s Health Imperative], when asked about the figures. “Without health insurance, many women do not get routine gynecological care or have limited access to prescription birth-control methods which are more reliable. Also, some women have difficulty negotiating condom usage, which is a male-controlled contraceptive method.

Cole said data show black women also have higher childbirth-related death rates and higher rates of reproductive cancers such as cervical and ovarian cancers — other issues that reflect a “reproductive health crisis,” she said.

“The statistics . . . also speak to the need for comprehensive sex education that includes discussion of the full range of contraceptive options,” Cole said.

“The abortion rate is directly proportional to the rate of unintended pregnancies among both black women and white women. So, it can be addressed largely by preventing unintended pregnancies through comprehensive sex education and access to reproductive health care.”

How many of the social regressives who oppose abortion also oppose government programs that help poor people get adequate health care because doing so might raise taxes? And what do they offer as alternatives to abortions?

[Day] Gardner of Black Americans for Life, said these women need to be told there is other help out there.

“There are a lot of people who will talk about adoption within the white community,” Gardner said.

“I think abortion is thought to be the answer in the black community. We know there are a lot of problems in poor and minority areas. . . . The poverty and the health problems are very real. No one is saying they aren’t. Yes, they have problems keeping these children. Churches will help. There are people who will help.”

And that would be who and what? Churches aren’t going to fulfill the need. Regressives love to say there are alternatives to abortion but rarely say what those alternatives are and who will pay for them.