Rudy is a weasel! Rudy is a weasel!

I knew Giuliani wasn't going to be the pro-life option for Republicans next year, even before I read this. (Yes, it's satire, but it's also right on the button. Have I mentioned lately that Dawn Eden rocks my world?)

Now he's doing the usual pro-abort politician's weaselly tapdance around the question of reconcilinng his ownership by the abortion industry with the religion that presumably helped him get elected. Here's the money graf:

The former mayor said last week that his differences with the Catholic Church over his support for abortion are between him, God and his spiritual adviser, not Pope Benedict XVI. He sought to avoid a head-on confrontation with the pontiff over the issue that has bedeviled Giuliani's campaign. "I don't get into debates with the pope," Giuliani told reporters. "Issues like that for me are between me and my confessor. ... I'm a Catholic and that's the way I resolve those issues, personally and privately," he said. "That's what religion is all about -- it's something that's between you and your conscience and God and then whoever your spiritual advisers are."

No, Mr. Mayor, if you're a Catholic, then you resolve those issues in conformity with Catholic teaching. If you were a Quaker, I'd expect you to be opposed to war, or at the least not working to make war more prevalent. I might not vote for you because of that position, but I'd respect you. If you were a Mormon, I would expect to see you take a stand against, say, polygamy. If you were Jewish, I wouldn't expect to see you speaking at an American Nazi Party rally.

There's no secret that being Catholic (in good standing) requires being pro-life. If Rudy had the stones a president ought to, he should say "I am not opposed to abortion, and I will allow my political principles to take precedence over my faith. I will accept excommunication as the price of that stand." I still wouldn't vote for him, as I vote pro-life, but I could respect him for choosing a master.

But to say "Well, I'm a Catholic, and I'm in favor of abortion, and there's really no conflict there, no matter what the Church says," is a descent into weaseldom. There is a conflict, a deadly one, and all his equivocating can't wish it away.

Grow a pair, Mr. Mayor. Decide where your principles come from, whether it's the Catholic Church or from Planned Parenthood. Pick a side and declare for it. Because if you don't, the voters are liable to do it for you.