It wasn't even like this one required all that much courage

Mollie Hemingway at The Federalist is fit to be tied, and you will be, too after you read her piece about  Renee Ellmers (R-NC) and her role in pulling the abortion bill.  It's a bill that had passed the previous House.  It bans most abortions after 20 weeks.

Hemingway cites the stats on how unpopular late-term abortions are - among Americans of all stripes.

So what happened?  Hemingway enumerates, and elaborates upon, a few reasons for this turn of events.  One is simple lack of courage:

In an essay at National Affairs, Michael Needham looks at the contrast between the grassroots and party establishment. He talks about the fight over the reauthorization of the Export-Import Bank, a fund for corporate welfare. The establishment fought against the grassroots tooth and nail in order to keep the bank. There have been similar fights over agriculture subsidies and Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac’s influence in the housing market. The moneyed interests fight against the conservative insurgents — and the donor class usually wins. Needham asks:

Given the enormous challenges facing the nation, why bother with "small" issues like corporate welfare and concomitant insider politics? Why pick these fights with the donor base?

As the Tea Party sees it, if conservatives can't stand up for sound policy on "easy" fights like these — despite their relative insignificance compared to issues like entitlement reform — the Republican Party is unlikely to have the fortitude to take on the greatest challenges the country faces. More importantly, any party that contemplates cutting back welfare for needy individuals and families but embraces corporate welfare for the powerful lacks the moral authority to urge sacrifice of any sort.

Exactly. How will the Republicans lead the battle to fight against Obamacare if they’re not willing to go against the insurance lobby on even a small issue? Whether the issue is a legitimate campaign against the dehumanization of the unborn, higher education reform or an actual attempt to thwart the growth of the the administrative state, a Republican Party unable to accomplish an easy task is a Republican Party that will be completely incompetent and worse than useless in a big battle.

Other reasons include a complete lack of public relations skills and strategic ineptness.

But back to the courage aspect, Hemingway offers two videos, both from 2013, one showing Ellmers and one showing Pub House member from Indiana Jackie Walorski speaking in favor of the legislation - which has always contained the rape-reporting requirement that seems to have these two so spooked now.

Hemingway also has a rundown of today's MSM headlines couching this in terms of "moderate GOP women" balking, and crowing about Pub leadership "caving."

Along with the specific issue (extermination of fetal Americans), the reason this is a clarifying moment is that it demonstrates the insidiousness of squish.  Somebody got to Ellmers and Walorski.  Who knows if it was radical feminists hanging the threat of Palin-and-Bachmann demonization over their heads, or big-shot donors spelling out the consequences of acting on principle rather than on the backslaps of the country-club crowd.

It's not easy to stay steadfast regarding your principles once you enter the actual political arena.  The sting of vituperation is something one feels as a mere pundit / blogger, but once once runs for and wins a political office, the stakes are raised considerably.  Still, as Hemingway points out, this one wasn't even hard in terms of where public sentiment lay.

And this Ellmers has a track record as a problematic sort.  About a year ago, she came out as backing amnesty for illegal aliens and got quite testy on Laura Ingraham's radio show when called on it.

But she's really gone and done it this time.  Some Republican.