Candidate Romney vs. SBA list pledge, round 2

Since his audacious refusal on Friday to sign the SBA List’s common-sense 2012 Pro-Life Presidential Leadership Pledge, Candidate Romney and his spurious excuses have come under intense scrutiny from SBA List as well as the Rick Santorum and Michele Bachmann campaigns. Not to mention from Yours Truly.

Camp Bachmann’s statement calls the Romney refusal “distressing” and a failure of leadership, as noted here on Friday:

It is distressing that Governor Romney refuses to sign the SBA Pledge, even while claiming to be pro-life. The excuses for not signing clearly continue the doubts about his leadership and commitment to ending the practice of abortion.

Meanwhile, Santorum has a post on National Review’s The Corner blog pointing out the frightening implications of Candidate Romney’s disagreement with the pledge plank to appoint only pro-life officials to “relevant Cabinet and Executive Branch positions” (emphasis added):

The pledge does, however, ask candidates to select appointees to “relevant Cabinet and Executive Branch positions, in particular the head of National Institutes of Health, the Department of Justice, and the Department of Health & Human Services,” not “a broad array of key positions in the federal government,” as Governor Romney writes. I would expect a pro-life candidate to agree to such a simple proposition, just as I would expect a pro-business candidate not to appoint a union boss to head the Department of Labor or someone from the Environmental Defense Fund to head the EPA.

As I wrote on Friday, a request for pro-life officials to fill all RELEVANT positions can only be interpreted as “too strict” or “unduly burdensome” or “overly broad” if one intends to appoint officials who are NOT pro-life to abortion-relevant positions! This is a major red flag and kudos to SBA List for exposing Romney’s pro-life tepidity.