The language to which state senator Obama objected in 2001 and 2002–the language to which his presidential campaign in August 2008 pointed in justifying his opposition–read simply, “A live child born as a result of an abortion shall be fully recognized as a human person and accorded immediate protection under the law.” The 2003 law he also opposed lacked that sentence, but merely defined any child born alive who “breathes or has a beating heart, pulsation of the umbilical cord, or definite movement of voluntary muscles” as a “person” for the purposes of Illinois law.

Journalists have muddied the waters about Obama’s stance for years. In 2012, a Washington Post fact-checker wrote “we find it hard to fathom that the former senator expressed a belief that human life is disposable outside the womb.” Hard to fathom or not, it’s what Obama did.

The lesson here is that some kinds of spin can succeed essentially forever, no matter how at odds with the facts. No doubt if Governor Northam runs for president in 2024, we will be told that he supported third-trimester abortions “only in cases where the baby could not survive” and anyone saying otherwise is lying.