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McCain surrenders GOP Party Platform. Includes Palin’s hard lined stance on Abortion

In an interview with CBS’ Katie Couric Wednesday, Cindy McCain seemed surprised to learn that her husband John wants to see Roe v. Wade overturned. But as it turns out, the surprises hardly end there for the McCains when it comes to abortion and the 2008 Republican platform. By rejecting John McCain’s limited proposed exemptions for cases involving rape, incest and the life of the mother, the GOP’s hard-line abortion banning plank echoes not its presidential nominee, but his running mate Sarah Palin.

That result was to be expected. During a July 30 interview, John McCain admitted he had “not gotten into the platform discussions.” And it shows. Unlike Barack Obama, who personally intervened to help create a new abortion plank in the Democratic platform, John McCain left the GOP committee to its own devices in producing a document that is far more radical than even McCain’s own draconian anti-abortion stand.

In reaching out to his party’s religious right, John McCain famously reversed course on overturning Roe v. Wade. But as the Washington Post noted Monday, McCain in a May interview still claimed to support exemptions for abortions in cases involving rape, incest or the life of the mother:

“My position has always been: exceptions of rape, incest and the life of the mother,” the senator said.

When asked if he would encourage the party to include them in the platform, he replied, “Yes,” adding: “And by the way, I think that’s the view of most people, that rape, incest, the life of the mother are issues that have to be considered.”

As it turns out, not so much. As predicted, McCain flip-flopped on his position in 2000 that the Republican platform should allow the abortion exemptions. His hands-off approach resulted in a hard line GOP abortion platform that not only did away with those most minimal of protections for women’s health, but called for that total abortion ban to be enshrined in the United States Constitution:

“We support a human life amendment to the Constitution, and we endorse legislation to make clear that the Fourteenth Amendment’s protections apply to unborn children.”

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2008/09/06/mccain-surrenders-gop-party-platform-includes-palins-hard-lined-stance-on-abortion/#more-32519