April 07, 2014 09:07 AM UTC

Gardner's attempt to compare his abortion stance to Schaffer's doesn't make sense

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• by: Jason Salzman

(Promoted by Colorado Pols)

In a blog post Friday, I tipped my hat to a Greeley talk-radio show for being the first media outlet to report that Cory Gardner's new position on abortion, in the wake of his un-endorsement of the personhood amendment, aligns with dogmatic religious views against abortion, even in the case of rape and incest.

But KFKA hosts Tom Lucero and Devon Lentz let me down by not questioning Gardner when he told them he holds the same position on abortion as "many pro-lifers in Colorado, including Congressman Bob Schaffer."

But Bob Schaffer never endorsed the personhood initiative at all, much less collected signatures for it. Personhood leaders would never have called Schaffer one of their "main supporters."

In Congress, Schaffer never co-sponsored federal personhood legislation, which would have banned all abortion, even for rape and incest, like Gardner did less than a year ago.

You can bet Schaffer never sent a constituent a letter saying, "Throughout my life, I've been committed to protecting human life, beginning at conception." Gardner wrote this just last month.

So, actually, Gardner's abortion position is significantly to the right of Schaffer's, which obviously carries serious political baggage for Gardner, as Lucero and Lentz should have pointed out.

On abortion policy and politics, Gardner is much more like Ken Buck. Afrwe being an enthusiastic supporter of the personhood amendment, Buck un-endorsed the measure in much the same way Gardner did, saying he still supported it "as a concept" but he hadn't fully understand it. Gardner, you recall, said the personhood initiative was motivated by "good intentions."

Buck's flip did nothing to stop him from, arguably, losing the election due to his position on women's issues. Schaffer would neither have been as vulnerable as Buck was or as vulnerable as Gardner remains.

These are the issues that should be raised, if Gardner continues to downplay his personhood flip flop by comparing himself to Schaffer.