Stand firm on abortion.

Nelson, Paul David

Bacevich makes a good case that the Republican Party should abandon ideological positions and support essentially paleoconservative ideas, from wherever they derive, whether William Appleman Williams or Flannery O'Connor.

However, I think his asking us to "Forget about outlawing abortion ..." is insupportable. Republicans, he says, "may judge the fruits produced by the sexual revolution poisonous but the revolution itself is irreversible"

If that statement is true, and it may very well be, then the battle for our civilization and culture is already lost. The issue is fundamental--if I may use that overworked word. Pope John Paul II said it better than I ever could when he visited the United States on August 12, 1993. Speaking to young people in Denver, Colorado, he said:

 All the great causes that are yours
 today will have meaning only to
 the extent that you guarantee the
 right to life and protect the human
 person ... The ultimate test of
 your greatness is the way you treat
 every human being, but especially
 the weakest and most defenseless
 ones. The best traditions of your
 love presume respect for those
 who cannot defend themselves.

This statement is at the heart of the matter, and I believe Flannery O'Connor would agree with me. Any political party, any political system that abandons this principle is doomed, because it is based upon a lie.

Alexander Solzhenitsyn warned us of the dire consequences living a lie. Remember the USSR?

PAUL DAVID NELSON

Lexington, Kentucky