I resign.

I have always considered myself to be “Pro Life” because I believe that all lives matter: black & white, born & unborn. Further, I believe that some lives are in greater need of care and protection than others.  It has been repeatedly and horrifyingly proven that black lives–particularly young black male lives–are at much greater risk than their white counterparts. Similarly the lives of unborn babies, who cannot speak for themselves, are in greater need of societal protection.  My pro-life stance is so deeply entrenched that I  believe that even animal lives matter and that these defenseless creatures should be protected from the horrifying treatment of modern factory farming which condemns them to wretched living conditions followed by gruesomely painful deaths.  My deepest desire is that all of God’s creatures be safe, loved, and treated kindly. I’ve always longed to find a home in a political party that respects all aspect of life and rejects all forms of violence.

As such, I have longed struggled with placing myself under the umbrella of the pro-life movement which seeks to protect the unborn, but then immediately ignores them once outside the womb. Those same adherents of protecting unborn babies, refuse to fund the programs that benefit babies, children, and unwed mothers: programs such as Headstart, food assistance, and welfare assistance. It also tends to be the same group that refuses to deal with gun violence and takes no action other than “thoughts and prayers” to protect the most vulnerable among us who are sitting ducks in their school classrooms.  I have (barely) hung in there even when the movement went so far as to murder an abortion provider standing at his kitchen sink, and when they have cruelly ignored the anguish of women seeking to end a pregnancy with an abortion by verbally and physically harassing them as they enter abortion clinics.

Now, most recently, the pro-life movement has determined that Brett Kavanaugh MUST be confirmed onto the Supreme Court at all costs, that due process will be ignored, and that his judicial records will be hidden from Congress.  Are we worried at all because a president under serious investigation is attempting to hurriedly place his man on the court? A judge who believes that presidents can’t be subpoenaed and that the Supreme Court erred in US v. Nixon? A judge who has signaled that race can be used to exclude immigrants? Most grievous of all is that the Republican leadership is determined to dismiss charges of past despicable behavior, and instead have chosen to attack the credibility of his accusers. Yesterday, at best, Kavanaugh proved himself to be temperamentally unfit to serve on SCOTUS and at worst he may be a rapist, but we’ll never know, because the Senate Republicans and their base will force him onto the Court, at all costs, before the midterms.  That is why they refuse any attempt to have the matter cleared up with an FBI investigation. If I were an innocent man, wrongly accused, whose good name and family had been “destroyed” I would  INSIST on an investigation to clear my name. Instead I predict that by tonight Brett Kavanaugh and Mark Judge will be sitting on some deck, overlooking some beach, raising a glass and toasting, “We got away with it!”

I must have missed the part of scriptures–which incidentally do not mention abortion–where it says “Thou shalt ignore EVERYTHING else in this book in order to get the judge you want on the Supreme Court.” Congratulations Pro-Life Movement, you may have won this battle, but you have lost me:  I resign.