OPI ION

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.

OPI ION Clinging to Guns-and Abortion

A

top the quotable Baraek Obama there will be this: "And it's not surprising then that they get bitter, they

ctmgro~or~onoranti~

athy to people who aren't like them." ~ Everyone dings to something. i But when it ": comes to criticizing Wlseemly p0i litical aependen'; cies, it's almost ~ always liberals ~ WONDER accusing them of clinging to posil. LAND tions and ideas ]! By Daniel that an enlight.~ Henninger ened society :I would have abandoned. Dr. Kermit Gosnell, in 2010, during a newspaper Interview. But what do liberals cling to? Recent events have revealed two were hWldreds of 'snippings.'" now, this response is implausible. things. Gun control and abortion. Most were third-trimester babies. It is hardly a revelation anymore The gun-control cling we know Eight of his clinic s tilff have that the media play the news in about because rarely a day pleaded guilty. subtle but tilted ways to protect passes without a news story In these times of a media that what they think is a settled soabout the Senate's gun--control need to fill a bottomless elec- cial good, such 9,S access to aborlegislation. Then there's the tronic news hole, a story as sen- tion, no matter what. Kermit Gosnell abortion trial, sational as the Gosnell abortion Another question raised by which until recently few people trial should be everywhere. But the trlal of this abortion doctor knew about because there was as conservative bloggers and a is the matter of reactionaries little media coverage of it. The few liberal writers such as clinging to the past . rise of the Web notwithstanding, Kirsten Powers have established Mr. Obam.a 's remark about it's still true that unless the _ in recent weeks, most major rural Pennsylvanians clinging to mainstream press covers a story, newspapers and TV networks gWls and religion is the coin of it pretty much doesn't exist. have produced little or cursory the realm in his crowd. But let's Kermit Gosnell is a Philadel- coverage of this trial. The two put their shared consensus phia abortion doctor who has exceptions are the Associated another way: Somehow it became been on trial the past five weeks Press and Fox News. a conventional view in contempoon accusations that he murdered The basic conservative criti- rary American politics that it is a pr~t woman and a number cism here.is that the media have non-urban conservatives who in of fetuses who emerged from the Wlderplayed the Gosnell story every case have to accommodate abortion procedure still alive. because its details might under- their beliefs to a national culture By now, many details of the mine support for the abortion created by people who live someaccusations against Dr. Gosnell status quo, or at least -peowher-e else. "TheyUmust adjust have become known. One will ple to ask what exactly that sta- on abortion, guns, school prayer, suffice. The Philadelphia grand- tus quo is these days. Rather sexual mores and all the rest of jury report, which is a hard reac!, than risk that, the Gosnell story it. Liberals, meanwhile, not only says: "The way he ensured fetal was demoted. feel no need to concede anything demise Ilk Gosnell's phrase] was In response, some have said but use the commanding heights by sticking scissors into the back the conservative bloggers are of the press and academia to of the baby's neck and cutting wrongly seeing a conspiracy of define anyone who dissents from the spinal cord. He caned that silence where there IS only a dif- their ever-evolving national cul'snipping.' Over the years, there ference over news judgment. By ture as a political fringe ob essed

I

i

cause

with people, one might s:>~, _ . ~o aren't like tbem. The gWl--control bill is collapsing in the Senate because its lib· eral sponsors, led by Barack Obama and California's Dianne Feinstein, lost the support of Democratic senators from states with traditional hWlting cultures, such as Mark Pryor Arkansas, Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota, Mark Begicb of. Alaska or Max Baucus of Montana. Why so many pesple in these states and many others to this day still distrust puplic authorities on guns is' a good, but Wltoid, story. Kentuckians recently voted the right to hWlt into their constitution. In· stead, gun-controi's failure will be spun as a win for mindless Neanderthals "out there." But wbat about Kermit Gos· nell? This story suggests something Neanderthal-like may have developed arolUld the fringe of abortion practice in the 40 years since Roe v. Wade. But rather than re-examine and even reform those praetices, the curtain will be pulled on the Gosnell case. They'll cling to Roe no matter how unseemly its status quo. Political correctness-the silent code that decides whose side of the story gets elevated and whose side gets buried-has been a blunt but effective weapon, which the dominant liberal cul· ture has used to achieve a lot of victories over "them" the past 40 years. But the wins have come at a price. That price is the return of an ~takable, growing and potentially destabilizing bitterness in American politics. A fairer-minded media would be the best way to level the play· ing field. Absent that, our politics will be leveled by other means. What the major media think th en, if they're still aroWlc!, won't matter.

of

Write to [email protected]