Democrats should return to real family values

I watched President Donald Trump’s speech before Congress. It was impressive, drawing enthusiastic applause from the assembled Republicans, but by contrast not much from the Democrats, who seemed almost resolved to remain unaffected.

I was once a registered Democrat, but in 1980 switched to Republican when the Democrats were increasingly getting on the abortion bandwagon. Today, years and millions of abortions later, many Americans have been looking for a change. In fact, recent elections have given Republicans majorities in Washington and in many states. Among the many reasons President Trump won the election were concerns about U.S. Supreme Court appointees and dissatisfaction with where we were being led on issues such as same-sex marriage, LGBT, religious freedom and support of Planned Parenthood.

We need a healthy Democratic party and a return to real family values. Abortion is a national disgrace. It will ultimately die, as slavery and segregation did. For the good of their party, Democrats need to abandon support of abortion and other controversial sexual issues and get back to the advocacy of those core issues that are really important to the party. I suspect if they do, their political power will return, and we can enjoy more bipartisan cooperation on important national issues.

This story was originally published March 12, 2017 at 4:45 AM with the headline "Democrats should return to real family values."