Every Good and Perfect Gift Comes from Above

2010-01-10T17:49:00.000-08:00

CNSNews.com) – A coalition of pro-life advocates and religious leaders plan to gather in Houston on Jan. 18 to oppose what is expected to be the largest abortion clinic in the country. Planned Parenthood is renovating a former bank, turning it into a 78,000 square foot facility that will include a surgical wing equipped to provide late-term abortions. “It’s an abortion super center,” Lou Engle, founder of the pro-life group The Call to Conscience, which is organizing the rally, told CNSNews.com. Joining Engle at the “prayer march” will be Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, and Samuel Rodriguez, president of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference. Religious leaders expected to attend include Bishop Harry Jackson, senior pastor of Hope Christian Church; Richard Land, president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention; Star Parker, president of the Coalition for Urban Renewal and Education; and Abby Johnson, the former director of a Planned Parenthood http://cnsnews.com/news/article/59334

Victor Toews: His traditional view of marriage

2008-05-25T13:32:00.000-07:00

I don't know if everyone remembers Mr. Benoit's efforts to have Bill C291 take flight. It was a bill that made it a separate crime to kill an unborn child as part of an attack against the mother. Mr. Benoit - a man who had always presented as socially conservative and "law and order" in thought was one of the key people that worked behind the scenes to get that bill out of the picture. This was reported in mainstream publications such as the National Post and not just those publications dedicated to a certain perspective on issues.

Many socially conservative people were aghast given his long held position that he was a resource to socially conservative people who wanted to see their ideas put into action. The confidence that some held for him was shaken. It was a very disappointing day for some who had believed that the CPC would offer any hope on this issue.

Apparently there are now additional chapters in the saga about what kind of man Mr. Toews is. Not only is he someone that apparently didn't have the integrity to stand up to defend a bill that supported expectant mothers who were victims of crimes he's also apparently someone who lacks integrity in his own family. According to the winnipeg sun it appears that his wife of over 30 years has had to accept that a young conservative staffer gave birth to his child last year. This is the basis for her filing for divorce. It appears that his personal deficits are enormous.

He has committed adultery. Something that cannot be defend from a Christian perspective.

He and his wife are getting divorced. A position that he put her in through his actions.

All of this from a man who was one of the strongest opponents of same sex marriage. All of this from a man that said that by supporting same sex marriage we were goign to support polygamy one day. All of this from a man who launched a filibuster to delay work on the issue. He was so horrified that gay marriage would be legal in Canada yet his own home and married life didn't reflect the very biblical standards that he reported to uphold.

When Mr. Toews was sworn in his family was publicly referenced - his wife of 30 years and his two children in respective University programs. It was also boasted that he was the son of a Reverend. They also talked about his enjoyment of roller blading, travelling with his family, and so forth. It would appear that his extracurricular activities extend beyond that and their consequences must be deeply painful for his wife and adult children.

His father, a deceased Pastor, of the Mennonite Brethren Church in Rossmere did not live to see the day that his son would so depart from the teachings of his faith and be a living example of a person who professes one thing (that he values marriage and family ) and then lives a life that is so different (does not support a bill protecting expectant mothers and privately engages in adultery)

2008-04-22T09:49:00.000-07:00

http://www.canada.com/montrealgazette/news/editorial/story.html?id=05f38582-809a-499a-a12a-d1a26c1b0e78

Bill to protect unborn victims of crime specifically excludes abortion

PAUL RANALLI
Freelance

Tuesday, April 22, 2008

In an outburst last week against Bill C-484, the Unborn Victims of Crime Act, Dr. Gaétan Barrette, president of the Quebec Federation of Medical Specialists, revealed that there is no issue of fundamental justice that is above being sacrificed on the altar of pro-choice ideology.

In painting an alarmist spectre of a rollback of abortion rights, Barrette shamelessly misrepresented not only the intent of the bill, but its actual wording, since it explicitly excludes elective abortion.

Sadly, but predictably, members of the Quebec National Assembly followed suit with a motion also denouncing the bill, which they have clearly either not read or misunderstood. Citizens of the province deserve better from those among their elected representatives, or the medical profession, who oppose closing a legal loophole that lets reprehensible criminals literally get away with murder.

Let us revisit the horrific circumstances that led MP Ken Epp to introduce his private member's bill, which passed second reading in Parliament last month.

In November 2005, in Epp's own city of Edmonton, Olivia Talbot, who was 27 weeks pregnant with her son (already named Lane Jr.) was shot three times in the abdomen and twice in the head by a long-time male acquaintance. No charge could be laid in the death of baby Lane.

Another pregnant Edmonton woman, Liana White, had been slain by her husband in the summer of 2005, and again no charges could be laid in her unborn baby's death. In 2007, pregnant women were also murdered in Toronto, Vancouver and Winnipeg, in the last case because the woman had refused to undergo an abortion. In every case, the charged assailant was not recognized as having also killed these women's unborn children.
Many Canadians are shocked to learn that when an attacker kills a pregnant woman's unborn child, no charge can be laid in that child's death, even when the attacker purposely intended to kill the child in the womb. This is because our criminal law does not recognize children as victims of crime until they are born alive, a legal tradition that has not changed since it was encoded in English Common Law in the 1490s. It is this gap in Canadian federal law that the Unborn Victims Act is intended to fill.

Who, you might ask, would oppose such legislation? Only a small minority, it turns out. An Environics poll released last October found that 72 per cent of Canadians - 75 per cent of women - would support "legislation making it a separate crime to injure or kill a fetus during an attack on the mother." It is supported across party lines: 77 per cent of Conservative supporters, 71 per cent of both Liberal and Bloc Québécois supporters, 67 per cent of Green Party voters, and 66 per cent of NDP supporters. A recent Angus Reid poll confirmed this support, with 70 per cent national approval of the bill.

Any issue involving crimes against the fetus raises opening up the issue of abortion and, indeed, the Quebec specialists' statement is just the latest in a campaign by pro-choice activists to discredit the bill. But how representative of their own pro-choice members are they?

Not very, according to the Environics poll: Among those who self-identified as supporting unrestricted abortion for the full nine months of pregnancy, 55 per cent supported the proposed legislation. Indeed, an act of such obvious justice has become, in effect, a litmus test exposing those who occupy the most uncompromising fringe of the activist pro-choice movement.

While many on the pro-life side would naturally welcome any bill that offers a minimum of respect to the fetus, those who raise a "hidden agenda" have little to fear: For greater certainty, the bill has a clause that explicitly excludes consensual abortion. Frankly, this aspect of the bill might well disappoint many pro-life Canadians.

Mary Talbot, who would have been Lane's grandmother, told a Halifax talk show this year that she is pro-choice, and is "offended" by the bill's opponents. In a wrenching public statement, Talbot spoke of the "anguish and sense of injustice of losing a beloved family member to violence, only to learn that no crime was committed, only to learn that the one your heart breaks for was of no worth."

For years we have been told by pro-choice advocates that abortion is a necessary solution to the problem of unwanted pregnancies, that "every child should be a wanted child." Yet here we have wanted pregnancies. We have women who have chosen to want their children - and that choice is savagely stolen from them, often along with their lives.

Only the most doctrinaire, uncaring ideology would turn a blind eye to the need to create justice for these women and their grieving families. Fortunately most Canadians agree.

Paul Ranalli is a Toronto neurologist, and an adviser to the deVeber Institute of Bioethics and Social Research in Toronto.

2008-03-15T06:36:00.000-07:00

Valerie Goyette is the mother of two little boys and a little girl. named Tandra. (Her daughter was subsequently born premature reported by her to be due to complications caused by the terrible incident stated below) With her little boys one is named Chad and he's a bright bubbly little elementary school dude. The other little boy is named Mason and he is no longer on earth. He died in his mother's womb.

The testimony that Valerie has shared online is that when at a celebration an unwanted guest who she had a difficult history with attended. By Valerie's report the woman became aggressive later on in the evening. She struck her head several times and targetted her stomach with blows. Persons present weren't terribly supportive in terms of getting proper medical help according to Valerie. When she finally got to the hospital it took a bit of time before it was clarified that the baby was part way out of the uterus. She lost 3/4 of the blood in her body and she had to have emergency surgery. Valerie's son lived for 22 minutes. She baptized her little boy and had to tell her three year old of the baby's death.

Valerie is one of the mothers that has experienced the loss of a child. She supports this bill. It is her hope that our country will recognize the loss of her son and will support her in believing that those who commit crimes against pregnant mothers are held accountable - fully accountable. It won't make a difference for the crime she faced but it will effect future women and their families.

The pro-choice movement that is professing to represent the full scope of Canadian women in their thoughts and aggressively fighting against this bill do not speak for Valerie. They do not speak for women who support Valerie. And they do not speak for the millions of Canadians who are grieved by the magnitude of her loss. The pro-choice people who oppose this and who have been so critical of those who have come forward do not represent the hearts and minds of millions of canadians who live more compassionate lives.

Thank you, Valerie, for sharing your story. It is my hope that people will be inspired to support this legislation because of hearing your message.

I hope that thousands of people will feel inspired to support this bill. Call your MP. Write your MP. Print, sign, and send this petition. http://www.kenepp.com/admin/assets/PETITIONC484.pdf

Here is a direct link to her story expressed in her own words - http://www.facebook.com/inbox/readmessage.php?t=8823392766&mbox_pos=0 - (must be a facebook user to see)

This is posted with her permission, received this morning.

Cunts: A progressive perspective on women who assert themselves

2008-03-14T21:09:00.001-07:00

Barbara McKay recently had a column that was, of course, controversial in terms of her portrayal of those who oppose bill c-484

http://www.barbarakay.ca/archive/20080312hystericalfeministstotheunbornvictimsofcrimeact.html , if you wish to see it for yourself.

A popular blog named canadian cynic was, according to their self-report, one of the persons quoted in the article. In his follow up blog he criticized the reporter for not quoting him directly which is not entirely unfair. What was, of interest, was the way that some of the posters characterized Mrs. McKay for holding a different perspective.

A person who refers to himself as WTF_Cherniak says the following:

Barbara Kay - Fuck you.
Seriously.

You are a good for nothing apologist with a narrow world view. Neo-Con, Zionist, and anti-choice - the idiots trifecta dream.

I’m certain Mrs. Kay, if she came here, would make dikk or dr roy seem like geniuses. While Wanda may never wander here, Mrs Kay may.
If she does, well here’s my message to you: “Fuck you, you self-righteous idiot cunt”.

While it is true that Canadian Cynic is not responsible for the thoughts of persons who leave a comment he has shown in the past a comfort with referring to women who are strong enough to hold an alternative position to his own as "cunts" and he's had male commentors make negative comments about the sexuality of women who disagree with the "progressive" position.

It's amazing to me that calling women cunts is so common within the progressive community.

A response to a cynic

2008-03-12T21:16:00.000-07:00

http://canadiancynic.blogspot.com/2008/03/if-dishonesty-were-any-thicker.html

represents the full link so that any persons reading it have the opportunity to view the comments in their entirety and not my piecemeal.

Yeah, what are you folks all worried about? It's not like this was about abortion or anything.

On the other hand, courtesy of JJ, there's this SUZANNE

If you follow the thread you will see that the canadian cynic links to other sites that talk about the issue of bill c484 as it relates to abortion.

He has a fair point in that there is an inconsistent message on abortion and how it applies to bill c484. While some pro-lifers are saying that it's not about abortion they are in the next breath saying that they hope that it has an impact on abortion laws in the future.

I do not have the legal background to know whether or not the bill will have long-term consequences but I think that pro-choicers have a legitimate reason to be concerned about that. I do, ultimately, hope that abortion will not be legal in Canada but I don't know whether or not this bill can contribute to this process or not. I don't have that kind of a legal background. Certainly, it appears there are competing legal views on that - Mr. Epp has legal evidence to suggest that the prochoicers do not have a valid concern.

I do know that even if I had a guarantee that it would not I would still support the bill. I live a few minutes away from Olivia Talbot's home and I was greatly saddened by her death. I've also had transient opportunities to meet her mother at political events. I've spoken fewer than 3 words to her but her pain is just so obvious.

What I do dislike though is persons presenting Mary Talbot as a person with a hidden agenda. She has said many times that she is pro-choice and does not want this to impact abortion at all. While I understand that prochoice people don't trust the politicians or other advocates for the bill I would like to think that they could understand the grief and pain that motivates Mrs. Talbot. Believe that she is wrong, believe that she is mistaken, and disagree with her respectfully - but acknowledge and realize that her political action stems from pain. By her own report she's had long-held prochoice views.

I'm fascinated that Suzanne (edited to show manners) was allowed to use the phrase "pro-abortion advocates" to refer to pro-choicers, given that most pro-choicers find that former appellation more than a little offensive. One wonders if the Post has a guidebook that explains what is and isn't acceptable terminology. Would someone rebutting Suzie be allowed to refer, not to "pro-lifers," but to "fetus fetishists?" Or would the Post suddenly invent some journalistic standards out of thin air?

It is true that most pro-choicers don't like the term. I am not sure that it's not applicable though when Joyce Arthur herself is quoted by Suzanne as saying that she doesn't know we prefer birth over abortion. That to me is a pro-abortion statement. I wouldn't be offended if someone called me pro-birth!

And as for how Suzanne found her way to a prominent piece in a national paper I would imagine it's because they saw her writing talents and her collected manner of representing herself. And I do not doubt that pro choice persons would be able to call pro-lifers anti-choice or the like in some publications. Suzanne did not use an inflammatory term like pro-death or anything.

I guess most of all I would hope that persons could stop their bickering back and forth between the different groups on abortion and everyone could reflect on Olivia. Her short life came to a horrific end and she lost a child that she was carrying. She and her fiance had hopes and dreams for little Lane. Those dreams ended in gunshots. Her family was left to pick up the pieces and they are motivated by their loss and sadness. They are not people that ever intended to get involved in the abortion debate. They just wanted Olivia and Lane's deaths to be acknowledged and they want the laws to change. That people can't show compassion for that is amazing to me.

All of those people that talk about how they have compassion for this family and then don't even remember Olivia's name or call them "fetus fetishists" or infer that they are not emotionally well because of their grief really stand out for their insensitivity.

If you can't support this law because of your concerns about the impact on abortion then at least do something positive - come up with an alternative piece of legislationt hat would address the concerns without touching the abortion issue from your perspective or just simply donate money to a victim's rights group. Do something compassionate and positive in that young woman's name.

When I scan though the list of contributors to this discussion on cynic's blog I am doubtful that this could ever occur. This is a site that has used the word "cunts" to reference women that they disagree with. A term intended to belittle and silence women with strong voices that are alternatives to their thinking. Some persons that frequent there have, in the past, referred to traditional women building larger families and/or women beginning their families at a young age as "sluts" and "harlots". If that is the mentality that they bring to women, to free thinking women of different philosophy than their own, to childbirth, to pregnancy, to traditional family life etc then they cannot possibly imagine the loss that occured on the doorstep that day when Olivia and her baby died. Some people engaging in this debate are devoid of compassion.

"My Grandson was Murdered": A call for pro-choice compassion

2008-03-08T12:11:00.000-08:00

This letter was published on February 25, 2008 by the Ottawa Citizen

http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/opinion/story.html?id=7f51beb2-7e3c-4e04-b6c3-df6363ca0f0f

It is a letter written by a grieving mother and grandmother who had to bury her 19 year old daughter, Olivia, and her son Liam who died in the womb.

I was in Ottawa on Feb. 14, what should have been my grandson's second birthday, at a press conference urging MPs to vote for Bill C-484, regarding the unborn victims of violence.

The next day, the Canadian Press reported on what Joyce Arthur of the Abortion Rights Coalition of Canada had to say about this bill and about the intentions of the MP who introduced it. It appalls me that she is still trying to turn my cause into some sort of abortion issue. Positive or negative, I do not want to see Bill C-484 connected to abortion whatsoever.

Ken Epp, the member of Parliament who introduced this bill, has worked hard to ensure there cannot be any mistaking that the abortion issue is totally excluded. Please refer to Mr. Epp's website, www.kenepp.com. He has rebutted many of Ms. Arthur's claims, yet she continues to accuse him and anyone who supports this bill of having an ulterior motive. "It definitely is a back-door attempt to attack abortion rights," she told the media.

Here is an MP who is doing something to fight criminal violence, to help protect women and babies, to change the law so that no other grandmother in the future has to go through the grief and insult of being told that the murder of her grandson - that the murder of my darling Olivia's beloved baby, Lane Jr. -- doesn't even register a blip in our criminal justice system.

I also find it an insult that Ms. Arthur suggests my opinion regarding this matter should be irrelevant, as I have a vested interest - my daughter and my grandson were shot to death!

This is what she says on the coalition's website: "While we deeply sympathize with them and understand their wish, it must be recognized that victims of violence are not those who should be making decisions about justice in a democratic society. Appropriate laws and penalties must be determined by impartial parties who do not allow emotion or personal bias to colour their decisions."

Just who are these "impartial parties" she is referring to?

On the one hand she speaks about democracy and on the other she implies that I not be part of the democratic process.

In my own daughter's case, there will be no retribution toward the man who murdered her to kill my grandson. This is "justice in a democratic society"? Ms. Arthur is putting the rights of criminals ahead of the women they abuse, often in very brutal ways, and often done with the intention "to get the baby," to quote the killer of Olivia and baby Lane.

On the one hand she says she "deeply sympathizes" with me, yet if she doesn't recognize the violence against my wee Lane Jr., then what does she have to "sympathize" about?

To you Ms. Arthur: Please show some respect for my daughter's and her unborn baby's memory, for Lane Jr. who I held in my arms and wept for. And I feel that I can ask the same for the rest of the families who are at this time grieving the loss of their loved ones. I hope you never have to experience the pain and anguish and sense of injustice of losing a beloved family member to violence, only to learn that no crime was committed, only to learn that the one your heart breaks for, was of no worth

For those of you who are following this debate from the angle of the long-term impact that you believe it might have on abortion law I would encourage you to look at it from the perspective of a family. A family that had to bury their 19 year old daughter with her infant snuggling in her arms. A family that had named that baby, wanted that baby, and seen a baby born and survive with a comparable gestational age (one week difference). A family where the father of that unborn child and the fiance to the mother wept at the kitchen table in front of reporters talking about how elated they had been to welcome another baby. A man who described going to hold his little boy for the first time and him being dead after he was removed from her womb.
I remember his words - he described that little boy as perfect looking, beautiful, and like a little porcelain doll. The whole family gathered and took turns holding that baby before they had the unenviable difficulty of burying him along with his mother. Mrs. Talbot has been steadfast in her belief that the man who shot her daughter five times killing both her and her unborn child should be charged with two murders. The losses that she has faced inspire her and her entire family. While persons can have concerns about the implications of that and to politically organize to present an alternative opinion it is entirely unacceptable to show a lack of compassion to a family that has faced an unimaginable loss. Mrs. Talbot, I understand, is pro-choice and wants no impact on abortion. She is not someone who is trying to back-door any efforts to make abortion illegal she is just trying to do what she believes is the right thing. Surely, people who are pro choice and against this bill can find some way of communicating an alternative view without insulting this family.

Police seize foetus after abortion tip-off

2008-02-14T21:00:00.000-08:00

By Nick Pisa in Rome
A 21-WEEK-OLD foetus was seized by Italian police in a raid on a hospital after a tip-off doctors had been paid to carry out an abortion beyond the legal time limit.

The 39-year-old mother, who had only just returned to the ward from theatre, was questioned as she lay in bed.

In Italy, terminations are allowed until the 90th day and after that until the 24th week only if the baby is seriously damaged, abnormal, or if there is a grave risk to the mother's health.

A police source said they had raided the hospital in Naples after a call "from within the clinic".

But it turned out the termination had been carried out legally after doctors told the woman the baby had a chromosome defect and there was a high risk it would be born mentally handicapped.

The woman said: "It would have been my first child. I was suffering – I wanted a child at all costs. I had no choice. He would have been ill for the rest of his life."

The news brought the abortion debate into the election spotlight, only days after would-be prime minister Silvio Berlusconi said he would back a United Nations moratorium on terminations.

Livia Turco, the health minister, said the Naples episode was the symptom of "an unacceptable climate of tension" over the issue.

http://news.scotsman.com/world/Police-seize-foetus-after-abortion.3776071.jp

Edmonton Tory's private member’s bill would protect unborn crime victims

2008-02-14T20:57:00.000-08:00

OTTAWA — Edmonton Conservative MP Ken Epp is seeking support for a private member’s bill that would recognize the unborn as separate victims when their mothers are killed or harmed in an attack.

Epp says the Unborn Victims of Crime Act has nothing to do with abortion but is meant to fill a major gap in the law.

But critics say that’s a backdoor effort to reopen the abortion debate by sneaking a recognition of fetal rights into Canadian law.

Epp cited several cases where the killers of pregnant women were charged for the mother’s murder — but not for the death of her fetus.

That’s because the law does not recognize the unborn as human beings until they are born alive.

Epp says his proposed act is supported by people of all political

stripes because it narrowly focuses on cases where a third party harms or kills a fetus in a criminal attack.

He said the bill is constitutional and would not change the Criminal Code in any way that might undermine a woman’s legal access to abortion. A spokeswoman for the Abortion Rights Coalition of Canada vehemently disagrees. Spokeswoman Joyce Arthur says the bill has been promoted by right-to-life groups, and that it would create redundant protections. Judges and parole boards can already take into account whether a convict has injured or killed an unborn child, she said. The bill is to be voted on March 5, but would be derailed if an early election is called

http://www.edmontonsun.com/News/Canada/2008/02/14/4847278.html

In memory of Rebecca Russell

2008-01-27T19:50:00.001-08:00

Shari Russell* had an ultrasound by Dr. Gary DeBakey on June 16, 1992. DeBakey informed Mr. and Mrs. Russell "that their child was a little girl," and that she had anencephaly. The Russells wanted the infant delivered by C-section "to give the child a chance to live if she could," but reported that DeBakey pressured them to choose abortion. DeBakey told them that Shari's medical condition necessitated immediate abortion and "that any delay in the abortion could cost [Shari] her life and that would leave her 7-year-old daughter, [Meghan], without a mother." Under this pressure, the Russells relented, and DeBakey referred them to Robert P. Kaminsky for an abortion.

Kaminsky failed to verify that Shari had any life-threatening condition. Only after the abortion of the baby, whom the family had named Rebecca, did the family learn that Shari had no medical indications for abortion, "that anencephalic children are not necessarily stillborn, and that the abortion was not necessary for the safety of [Shari.]" Mr. and Mrs. Russell sued Kaminski for fraudulent concealment, failure "to disclose the emotional and psychological risks and hazards to the family members," "mental anguish, emotional distress and torment, emotional trauma, loss of affection, loss of solace, loss of comfort, loss of assistance, loss of love, loss of companionship and society, and harm to their family relationships." Suit was also filed on behalf of Meghan for the loss of her baby sister.

*Names changed to protect confidentiality of the family. Doctors' names have not been changed.

Source: Harris County District Court No. 94-027947

http://realchoice.0catch.com/library/weekly/aa040700a.htm

"Don't Like Abortions? Don't Have One."

2008-01-27T19:49:00.000-08:00

"Don't Like Abortions? Don't Have One."
"Don't like abortions? Don't have one." It makes a great bumper sticker slogan. If only it were that simple in real life. Abortion advocates would have us believe that all legalization did was allow those women who would have had dangerous "back alley" abortions to have "safe and legal" abortions instead. It's all supposed to be about each woman making her own choices based on her own religion, her own ethics, her own plans, her own wants. But that's not the way it has turned out in practice.

David Reardon's research of post-abortion women showed that over 60% of them felt "forced" into unwanted abortions by people or circumstances. Nowhere is this more apparent -- or more dastardly -- than in the realm of "medically indicated" abortions.

This is not to cast aspersions on those rare women whose lives are endangered by a pregnancy. Sometimes the death of the unborn child is the unwanted but tragically necessary side effect of treatment necessary to save the mother's life. A conscientious doctor will struggle with such cases, and will make all reasonable efforts to preserve the child's life if possible. The trouble lies in the fact that abortion advocacy efforts have created a climate in which many doctors feel safest recommending abortion at the first sign of trouble.

We've all seen how often a small group of troublemakers can cause grief to others. Abortion proponents have painted abortion as a "right," rather than an evil to be avoided. They have filed suit against conscientious doctors, doctors adhering to the Hippocratic Oath, for failing to advise them to abort in the face of a possible problem with the baby or with the woman's health. Because these folks are loud and expensive to deal with, they have gotten what they want at the expense of other women and the lives of wanted children.

Over a decade before widespread legalization of abortion, even Planned Parenthood's Medical Director, Mary Calderone, recognized that "it is hardly ever necessary today to consider the life of a mother as threatened by a pregnancy."1 But thanks to the efforts of abortion advocates, pregnancy is perceived as dangerous, and women are being steered by litigation-shy doctors into needless, unwanted abortions, ostensibly for maternal or fetal indications.

Nobody knows how often women are channeled into such abortions. The fact that an abortion was prescribed unnecessarily is usually only discovered if the woman persists in her resolve not to abort, or if someone investigates the situation after the abortion. The very fact that such cases happen proves the lie behind the slogans about women choosing abortions freely. We can also hazard a guess about how frequently women are sold needless, unwanted abortions on medical grounds by looking at the experiences of doctors who take the mother's desire to preserve her child's life more seriously.

Dr. Thomas Murphy Goodwin is affiliated with an obstetrical service specializing in high-risk cases. His reflections on cases he has seen in his practice are described by him in The Silent Subject.2 In Goodwin's cachement area, there are approximately 30,000 births a year. The Centers for Disease Control estimate that there are slightly over 330 abortions for every 1,000 live births. That would mean that there are about 9,900 abortions per year in the area served by Goodwin and his colleagues. The Alan Guttmacher Institute estimates that 3% of abortions are for maternal health indications and another 3% are because of fear of fetal problems. So if we look at only half the problem -- maternal indication abortions -- there are approximately 300 abortions done for maternal indications in Goodwin's cachement area every year. Goodwin indicates that in his practice, he and his colleagues will see one or two women a year with health problems that mean they have a greater than 20% risk of death from carrying the pregnancy to term. That's one or two abortions that are actually medically indicated for every 300 women who abort because they believe their lives are in danger. This is, to say the least, overkill -- in the ugliest sense of the word.

Goodwin tells poignant stories of women who had been sent to his practice for unnecessary abortions. One 21-year-old woman was referred for "immediate abortion" of her 19-week pregnancy because she had been diagnosed with a congenital heart lesion. She was so distressed at the idea of aborting that a physician referred her to Goodwin and his associates for a second opinion. An evaluation that could have been done by the woman's referring physician showed that her heart abnormality was not endangering her life. She continued the pregnancy, with unremarkable labor induced, and a healthy baby delivered, at 38 weeks.

Another woman, 32 years old, had a test at 7 weeks gestation that was positive for cytomegalovirus. She was advised to abort lest her baby be born with mental retardation and multiple organ problems. Her doctor even told her that he had confirmed this grim prognosis with a "high risk pregnancy specialist." With great regret, the woman scheduled an abortion. A physician neighbor learned of her plight and referred her to Goodwin's practice. A review of her test results showed that there was a 4 in 100 chance that her baby had been affected by the virus, and that even if the child was affected, there was a 50% chance that the consequence would just be some hearing impairment. "She was stunned and relieved," Goodwin wrote, "to learn that the risk was no greater than that." More precise tests were done which showed that there had been no infection at all. Thanks to the kindly advise of a neighbor, this woman was spared the tragedy of an abortion, and gave birth to a healthy baby boy.

Yet another woman was diagnosed with breast cancer. She was told that she needed immediate chemotherapy, that the chemotherapy would certainly harm her baby, and that trying to continue her pregnancy would worsen her prognosis. She was instructed to abort her 11 week pregnancy so that chemotherapy could be initiated. She scheduled an abortion, but was referred to Goodwin's practice by her pastor. There she learned that breast cancer did not require abortion for treatment, and that the fetus was likely to tolerate the chemotherapy well. The woman was able to have her chemotherapy, and delivered an apparently healthy baby boy. "That many chemotherapy regimens can be continued without apparent ill-effect in pregnancy is information readily available to any interested physician," Goodwin notes. "Why was the patient not informed?"

Although these women were put through needless anguish, they were spared the trauma of abortion. Other women have not been so fortunate. The next Feature will look at these sad cases
http://realchoice.0catch.com/library/weekly/aa101799.htm

"Don't be stupid! It's just a blob of tissue."

2008-01-27T19:45:00.001-08:00

Those are the chilling words alleged to be spoken by a person performing an abortion on a young woman who reports she didn't want one.

Here is the sad story:

Donna Santa Marie’s Forced Abortion

Lawsuit Would Ask Supreme Court to Tackle Botched Abortions

Washington, DC -- In a case which will determine whether women injured by abortion have any rights under the law, Norma McCorvey, the former "Roe" of Roe v. Wade and Sandra Cano, the former "Doe" of Doe v. Bolton (the two cases that brought legalized abortion on demand to America) are announcing that they are joining with 700 women who have been seriously injured by abortion to file an Amicus Curiae petition brief asking the U.S. Supreme Court to hear the case of Donna Santa Marie Et Al v. Whitman, Et Al.

In addition to "Roe" and "Doe", 700 women who have been injured by abortion in similar circumstances will also file a Friend of the Court brief to show the Court that these conditions are widespread in the abortion industry.

Many of these women will appear at a Monday press conference to testify about their own personal experience in abortion clinics and to testify that it is time for the abuse of women to come to an end. There must be a remedy for this injustice. Women will be present to be interviewed from the following states Mississippi; Oklahoma, Tennessee, Iowa, Texas, Michigan, Nebraska, California, Connecticut, and Florida.

The Donna Santa Marie case is the first case in the nation to reach the Supreme Court on Cert. Petition asking the Supreme Court to define the rights of women against the abortion industry.

Donna Santa Marie was a 16-year-old girl who was forced by her parents and abortionist to have an abortion against her will. Her father even punched her in the stomach to try to induce a miscarriage. The abortionist had to be called in to perform an abortion without her consent.

Despite these horrific facts, New Jersey Federal Courts have ruled that Donna Santa Marie cannot sue the doctor, the abortionist, because the infant was not born alive and have cited Roe v. Wade as justification. If Roe v. Wade is supposed to be based on a woman's choice, how can she be forced to have an abortion and have no remedy under the law.

The other women in the case were misled and deceived into having abortions. One of the Plaintiffs, Rosa Acuna, specifically asked her doctor: "Is it a baby?" Her doctor replied, "Don't be stupid! It's just a blob of tissue."

Later, after several weeks of bleeding, she was admitted to an emergency room and when she asked what the problem was, the nurses told her, "They left part of your baby in you when you had the abortion."

Rosa Acuna began to study fetal development and came to the horrible realization that she had killed her own baby, with severe psychological effects.

If Roe v. Wade is based on a woman's right to choose, shouldn't that choice be voluntary and fully informed? Shouldn't there be a remedy against an abortionist who does not fully inform a woman of the nature and consequences of abortion? The Federal Courts in New Jersey have said no. The Supreme Court will be asked to reverse this decision and allow women who are injured by abortion to sue the abortionist.

Source: The Justice Foundation; March 21, 2003 as quoted in Pro-Life Infonet 3/24/03 #2933
http://www.righttoliferoch.org/ndonnaforced.htm

What goes on in an abortion clinic: views from the inside

2008-01-27T19:42:00.000-08:00

Think of it this way- what is the best way to learn about abortion? To actually witness an abortion first hand or to work in a clinic. The second best thing is to read verified eye-witness accounts from people who are current and former abortion providers. These quotes have been tracked down from a number of sources, from the research of pro-choice author Magda Denes to the Washington Post to other magazines.
Verify the facts of fetal development in an encyclopedia or reference book (I suggest K.L. Moore's "The Developing Human, Clinically Oriented Embryology" 3rd edition, 1982). Look in the yellow pages of the phone book to see clinics advertising to perform abortions through the twenty-fourth week of pregnancy.
Sarah Terzo

"In my facilities, I always gave option counseling. Of course you make the abortion the most appealing. I told them about adoption and about foster care and about [when there was welfare] assistance. The typical way it would go is, "Well, you know you can place your baby out for adoption." But then, in the second breath you would say, "That's an option available to you, but you also have to realize that there's going to be a baby of yours out here somewhere in the world you will never see again. At least with abortion you know what's happening. You can go on with your life...The longer I was in it, the less I cared, so I really didn't really care what my conscience said. My conscience was totally numb anyway. But what it did do was public relations-wise. You were able, when a reporter or TV crew came, to pull out a packet of information for the patients to read and they received it. So what can anybody say? Publicly it looked good -- in reality it was another tool that was used to force a woman into abortion. It's typical -- I would give them an option and then shoot it down. The only option you didn't shoot down, obviously, was abortion."

Former abortionist Eric Harrah quoted by Dr. Jack Willke and Brad Mattes

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"In fact many women will come to me considering abortion, and I have been personally told that I am to turn the monitor away from her view so that seeing her baby jump around on the screen does not influence her choice."

Shari Richards, quoted from the John Ankerburg Show on 3/7/90
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"I hated putting babies in strainers and rinsing them off and putting them in zip-lock bags."

--former abortion clinic owner Eric Harrah
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By Dr. Arnold Halpern, former director of a Planned Parenthood abortion clinic:
"There is no difference between a first trimester, a second trimester, a third trimester abortion or infanticide. It's all the same human being in different stages of development. I finally got to the point I couldn't look at those little bodies anymore."
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"So when I went back to doing abortions and saw the fetus on the ultrasound, I recalled the early days of my pregnancies, when I found out I was pregnant and saw the baby on the ultrasound, and it really felt like this is a baby, a very real and potential being. Now, I do feel that this is a potential person and it does not have a life of its own outside of the mother, but I also am really aware that when you're ready to embrace a pregnancy, you can embrace it from the very moment you conceive or are aware that you are pregnant. Faye Wattleton said recently, "I think we have deluded ourselves into believing that people don't know that abortion is killing. So any pretense that abortion is not killing is a signal of our ambivalence, a signal that we cannot say yes, it kills a fetus, but it is the women's body, and therefore ultimately her choice. I believe that very firmly. You look at the ultrasounds and there's a fetus with a heartbeat and then after the procedure, there's the fetus, usually in pieces, in a dish. It was alive one moment and it's not the next. I don't believe it's a painful experience for the fetus because its nervous system is not 'wired' so that it can feel pain at that point. I don't believe, as some anti-abortion people would have you believe, that there's a silent scream.' But it's very clear to me that it's killing a potential life. And I found that hard at first."

----anonymous, quoted by Camille Peri at http://www.salonmagazine.com/june97/mothers/abortion970623.html in Salon Magazine
Why do we need informed consent laws or mandatory counseling for women having abortions? Don't the clinics give accurate information about the fetus?

"Counselors are just to give the appearance of help. . . [They] think of themselves as company for the women."
--abortion counselor

"I have never yet counseled anybody to have the baby. I'm also doing women's counseling on campus at Albany State, and there I am expected to present alternatives. Whereas at the abortion clinic you aren't really expected to."
--abortion counselor

Rachel Weeping and Other Essays About Abortion. James Tunstead Burtchaell, editor. New York: Universal Press, 1982 pgs 42-43
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"I was trained by a professional marketing director in how to sell abortions over the telephone. He took every one of our receptionists, nurses, and anyone else who would deal with people over the phone through an extensive training period. The object was, when the girl called, to hook the sale so that she wouldn't get an abortion somewhere else, or adopt out her baby, or change her mind. We were doing it for the money."
--Nina Whitten, chief secretary at a Dallas abortion clinic under Dr. Curtis Boyd

"They [the women] are never allowed to look at the ultrasound because we knew that if they so much as heard the heart beat, they wouldn't want to have an abortion."-Dr. Randall

'Pro-Choice 1990: Skeletons in the Closet" by David Kuperlain and Mark Masters in "New Dimensions" magazine
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"Every woman has these same two questions: First, "Is it a baby?" "No" the counselor assures her. "It is a product of conception (or a blood clot, or a piece of tissue)" Even though these counselors see six week babies daily, with arms, legs and eyes that are closed like newborn puppies, they lie to the women. How many women would have an abortion, if they told them the truth?"
--Carol Everett, former owner of two clinics and director of four
"A Walk Through an Abortion Clinic" by Carol Everett ALL About Issues magazine Aug-Sept 1991, p 117
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"If a woman we were counseling expressed doubts about having an abortion, we would say whatever was necessary to persuade her to abort immediately."
--Judy W., former office manager of the second largest abortion clinic in El Paso, Texas
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"We tried to avoid the women seeing them [the fetuses] They always wanted to know the sex, but we lied and said it was too early to tell. It's better for the women to think of the fetus as an 'it.'
--Abortion clinic worker Norma Eidelman quoted in Rachel Weeping p 34
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"The counselor at our clinic would cry with the girls at the drop of a hat. She would find their weakness and work on it. The women were never given any alternatives. They were told how much trouble it is to have a baby."
--former abortion worker Debra Harry, quoted in the film "Meet the Abortion Providers" 1989
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"When discussing the sonogram, you are supposed to tell the client that it is a measurement as far as the pregnancy is concerned, but not a measure of the fetal head or anything like that."
--Rosemary Petruso, on her training to be an abortion counselor. Her story appeared in the St. Louis Review and was also quoted in "Women Exploited: The Other Victims of Abortion" Paula Ervin, editor. Huntington: Our Sunday Visitor, 1985
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"Sometimes we lied. A girl might ask what her baby was like at a certain point in the pregnancy: Was it a baby yet? Even as early as 12 weeks a baby is totally formed, he has fingerprints, turns his head, fans his toes, feels pain. But we would say 'It's not a baby yet. It's just tissue, like a clot.'"
--Kathy Sparks told in "The Conversion of Kathy Sparks" by Gloria Williamson, Christian Herald Jan 1986 p 28
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"It is when I am holding a plastic uterus in one hand, a suction tube in the other, moving them together in imitation of the scrubbing to come, that woman ask the most secret question. I am speaking in a matter-of-fact voice about 'the tissue' and 'the contents' when the woman suddenly catches my eye and says 'How big is the baby now?' These words suggest a quiet need for definition of the boundaries being drawn. It isn't so odd, after all, that she feels relief when I describe the growing buds bulbous shape, its miniature nature. Again, I gauge, and sometimes lie a little, weaseling around its infantile features until its clinging power slackens."
--abortion worker Sallie Tisdale "We Do Abortions Here" Oct 1987 Harpers Magazine p 68
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"Vital signs should be observed regularly, and a Doppler [for listening to the fetal heartbeat] inaudible to the patient should be used at intervals to determine the presence or absence of fetal heart tones.. This [informed consent] is a controversial area, but most professionals in the field feel that it is not advisable for patients to view the products of conception, to be told the sex of the fetus, or to be informed of a multiple pregnancy"
--Abortionist Warren Hern in "Abortion Practice" J.B. Lippincott Company, 1984 pgs 145 and 304
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"Sonography in connection with induced abortion may have psychological hazards. Seeing a blown-up, moving image of the embryo she is carrying can be distressing to a woman who is about to undergo an abortion, Dr. Sally Faith Dorfman noted. She stressed that the screen should be turned away from the patient."
--"Obstetrics and Gynecology News" editorial February 15-28, 1986
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"95 percent of women who have had abortions said that their Planned Parenthood counselors gave them " . . . little or no information about the fetus which the abortion would destroy."
--From Aborted Women-Silent No More by David Reardon, Crossway Books, 1987
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"Now, the baby I aborted was eleven weeks old, and can you imagine what this did to me when I saw this baby with the hands and face, sucking his thumb? And they told me it was a cluster of cells!"
--Carole K.
State Director of Women Exploited By Abortion. From Women Exploited, which is a sampling of the stories of WEBA (Women Exploited by Abortion) chapter members.
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"I have seen hundreds of patients in my office who have had abortions and were just lied to by the abortion counselor. Namely 'This is less painful than having a tooth removed. It is not a baby.' Afterwards, the woman sees Life magazine and breaks down and goes into a major depression."
--Psychologist Vincent Rue quoted in "Abortion Inc" David Kupelian and Jo Ann Gasper, New Dimemsions, October 1991 p 16
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"The Pennsylavania Abortion Control Act went into effect on March 20, 1994. For the past six years, health centers that provide abortion services and the lawyers representing them have been fighting the provisions of the law. What does the law provide? Women seeking an abortion must be told by a physician at least 24 hours prior to the procedure the nature of the procedure and the probable gestational age of the fetus. Women must also be told that the Commonwealth's materials are available describing fetal development and listing for agencies that offer alternatives to abortion. . . What we must do now is make sure that our Representatives know how strongly we feel about the law. Call them, write to them! Let them know how burdensome these regulations are. Vote for pro-choice candidates...."
--Elizabeth Blackwell Health Center for Women newsletter April 1994
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Why is there so much fuss about abortion? Isn't what is removed only a mass of tissue?

"But when I look in the basin, among the curdlike blood clots, I see and elfin thorax, attenuated, its pencilline ribs all in parallel rows with tiny knobs of spine rounding upwards. A translucent arm and hand swim beside."
--Sallie Tisdale "We Do Abortions Here"
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"I can remember...the resident doctor sitting down, putting the tube in, and removing the contents. I saw the bloody material coming down the plastic tube, and it went into a big jar. My job afterwards was to go and undo the jar, and to see what was inside.

I didn't have any views on abortion; I was in a training program, and this was a brand new experience. I was going to get to see a new procedure and learn. I opened the jar and took the little piece of stockingnette stocking and opened the little bag. The resident doctor said "Now put it on the blue towel and check it out. We want to see if we got it all.' I thought, "that'll be exciting-hands on experience looking at tissue.' I opened the sock up and put it on the towel, and there were parts of a person in there.

I had taken anatomy, I was a medical student. I knew what I was looking at. There was a little scapula and an arm, I saw some ribs and a chest, and a little tiny head. I saw a piece of a a leg, and a tiny hand and an arm, and you know, it was like somebody put a hot poker into me. I had a conscience, and it hurt. Well, I checked it out and there were two arms and two legs and one head and so forth, and I turned and said "I guess you got it all.' That was a very hard experience to go through emotionally.
--abortionist

"Saline abortions have to be done in the hospital because of the complications that can arise. Not that they can't arise during other times, but more so now. The saline, a salt solution, is injected into the woman's sac, and the baby starts dying a slow, violent death. The mother feels everything, and many times it is at this point when she realizes that she really has a live baby inside her, because the baby starts fighting violently, for his or her life. He's just fighting inside because he's burning."
--Debra Harry

"One night a lady delivered and I was called to come and see her because she was 'uncontrollable.' I went into the room, and she was going to pieces; she was having a nervous breakdown, screaming and thrashing. The other patients were upset because this lady was screaming. I walked in, and here was this little saline abortion baby kicking. It had been born alive, and was kicking and moving for a little while before it finally died of those terrible burns, because the salt solution gets into the lungs and burns the lungs too. I'll tell you one thing about D & E. You never have to worry about a baby's being born alive. I won't describe D & E other than to say that, as a doctor, you are sitting there tearing, and I mean tearing- you need a lot of strength to do it- arms and legs off of babies and putting them in a stack on top of the table."
--Dr. David Brewer of Glen Ellyn Illinois

"I remember an experience as a resident on a hysterectomy. I remember seeing the baby move underneath the sack of membranes, as the caesarean incision was made, before the doctor broke the water.

The thought came to me, "My God, that's a person" Then he broke the water. And when he broke the water, it was like I had a pain in my heart, just like when I saw that first suction abortion. And t hen he delivered the baby,. and I couldn't touch it.. I wasn't much of an assistant. I just stood there, and the reality of what was doing on finally began to seep into my calloused brain and heart.

They took that little baby that was making little sounds and moving and kicking, and set it on that table in a cold, stainless steel bowl. Every time I would look over while we were repairing the incision in uterus and finishing the Caesarean, I would see that little person moving in that bowl. And it kicked and moved less and less, of course, as time went on. I can remember going over and looking at the baby when we were done with the surgery and the baby was still alive. You could see the chest was moving and the heart was beating, and the baby would try to take a little breath, and it really hurt inside, and it began to educate me as to what abortion really was."

quoted in "Pro-Choice 1990: Skeletons in the Closet"
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"Following [the doctor's] directions, I took the collection bottle and poured its contents into a shallow pan. Then I used water to rinse off the blood and smaller particles which clouded the bottom of the pan.

'Now look closely,' the doctor said. 'It is important that we have got all the stuff out.'

I looked in the pan to find that the stuff consisted of the remains of what had been, a few minutes before, a thirteen week old fetus. I could make out the remains of arms and legs and a trunk and a skull. I tried to piece them back together in my mind, to see if there were any missing parts.

Most of the pieces were so battered and bloody they were not recognizably human. Then my eyes locked upon a perfect little hand, less than half a centimeter long. I stared at four tiny fingers and a tiny opposed thumb, complete with tiny translucent fingers.

And I knew what I had done."

--former abortionist "Chi An" quoted in Stephen Mosher's "A Mother's Ordeal: One Woman's Fight Against China's One Child Policy" pgs 60-61
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"I got to where I couldn't stand to look at the little bodies anymore"
--Dr. Beverly McMillan, when asked why she stopped performing abortions.

"I have been there, and I have seen these totally formed babies as early as ten weeks... with the leg missing, or with their head off. i have seen the little rib cages..."
--Debra Harry

"We all wish it were formless, but its not...and its painful. There is a lot of emotional pain."
--abortion clinic worker

Quoted in "The Ex Abortionists: They Have Confronted Reality" Washington Post April 1, 1988 p a21
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"You have to become a bit schizophrenic. In one room, you encourage the patient that the slight irregularity in the fetal heart is not important, that she is going to have a fine, healthy baby. Then, in the next room you assure another woman, on whom you just did a saline abortion, that it is a good thing that the heartbeat is already irregular....she has nothing to worry about, she will NOT have a live baby...All of a sudden one noticed that at the time of the saline infusion there was a lot of activity in the uterus. That's not fluid currents. That's obviously the fetus being distressed by swallowing the concentrated salt solution and kicking violently and that's to all intents and purposes, the death trauma. ..somebody has to do it, and unfortunately we are the executioners in this instance..."
--abortionist Dr.Szenes

"And then to see, to be with somebody while they're having the injection when they're twenty or twenty-four weeks, and you see the baby moving around, kicking around, as this needle goes into the stomach, you know."
--Susan Lindstrom, M.S.W.

"I look inside the bucket in front of me. There is a small naked person in there, floating in a bloody liquid- plainly the tragic victim of a drowning accident. But hen perhaps this was no accident, because the body is purple with bruises and the face has the agonized tauntness of one forced to die too soon. I have seen this face before, on a Russian soldier lying on a frozen snow-covered hill, stiff with death, and cold."
--Pro-choice doctor and author Magda Denes

"Performing Abortions" by Magda Denes, M.D. "Commentary" Oct. 26 p 35-37

Also quoted Magda Denes, "[the doctor] pulls out something, which he slaps on the instrument table. "there," he says, "A leg." . . . I turn to Mr. Smith. . . He points to the instrument table, where there is a perfectly formed, slightly bent leg, about three inches long. . . "There, I've got the head out now." ...There lies a head. It is the smallest human head I have ever seen, but it is unmistakably part of a person."
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"If I see a case...after twenty weeks, where it frankly is a child to me, I really agonize over it because the potential is so imminently there...On the other hand, I have another position, which I think is superior in the hierarchy of questions, and that is "who owns this child?" It's got to be the mother."
--Dr. James MacMahon, who performs D & X abortions, in Nat Hentoff "It's Just Too Late: Third Trimester abortions are an Outrage and an Insult to the Human Race" July 27, 1993 Pittsburg Post-Gazette
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Describing an abortion that apparently did not prevent the child from being born alive, Dr. Haskell said this, "It came out very quickly after I put the scissors up in the cervical canal and pierced the skull and spread the scissors apart...in the previous two, I had used the suction to collapse the skull."
--Dayton Daily News Sun Dec 10 1989
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"The first time, I felt like a murderer, but I did it again and again and again, and now, 20 years later, I am facing what happened to me as a doctor and as a human being. Sure, I got hard. Sure, the money was important. And oh, it was an easy thing, once I had taken the step, to see the women as animals and the babies as just tissue."
--abortionist quoted from a radio talk show by John Rice in "Abortion" Litt D. Murfreesboro, TN.
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"I have never known a woman who, after her baby was born, was not overjoyed that I had not killed it."
--Abortionist Aleck Bourne "A Doctor Speaks" London Express, Jan 25
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"We know that its killing, but the state permits killing under certain circumstances"
--Dr. Neville Sender, abortionist

"Even now I feel a little peculiar about it, because as a physician I was trained to conserve life, and here I am destroying it."
--abortionist

"There was not one [doctor] who at some point in the questioning did not say "This is murder."'
--Magda Denes on her two years of research done for her book In Necessity and Sorrow; Life and Death Inside an Abortion Clinic.

"You know there is something in there alive that you are killing"
--another abortionist interviewed by Denes
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"Clinic workers may say they support a woman's right to choose, but they will also say that they do not want to see tiny hands and tiny feet....there is a great difference between the intellectual support of a woman's right to choose and the actual participation in the carnage of abortion. Because seeing body parts bothers the workers."
--Judith Fetrow, former clinic worker from San Francisco quoted in "Meet the Abortion Providers III" from a taped conference in Chicago 4/3/93
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..the emotional turmoil that the procedure inevitably wreaks on the physicians and staff...There is no possibility of denial of an act of destruction by the operator...the sensations of dismemberment flow through the forceps like an electric current."
--Abortionist quoted in "Meeting of American Association of Planned Parenthood Physicians" OB GYN News P 196
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Quoted in Melody Green and Sharon Bennett "The Crime of Being Alive: Abortion, Euthanasia, Infanticide" p 3

"Remember, there is a human being at the other end of the table taking that kid apart. We've had a couple of guys drinking too much, taking drugs, even a suicide or two."
--Dr. Julius Butler, a professor of obstetrics and gynecology at the University of Minnesota Medical School

"Arms, legs, and chests come out of the forceps. It's not a sight for everybody"
--Dr. William Benbow Thompson at the University of California at Irvine
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"Abortion Practice" by Warren Hern, M.D., Boulder Colarado Abortionist published in 1984 by the J.B. Lippenott Company. Hern performs abortions up until the 4th month of pregnancy

"The procedure changes significantly at 21 weeks because fetal tissues become much more cohesive and difficult to dismember" p 154

"A long curved Mayo scissors may be necessary to decapitate and dismember the fetus." - 154

"The aggregate fetal tissue is weighted, then the following fetal parts are measured, foot length, knee to heel length, and biparietal diameter" p 164

"Television interviews in particular should focus on the public issue involved (right to confidential and professional medical care, freedom of choice and so forth) and not on the specific details of the procedure." p 323
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"Nobody wants to perform abortions after ten weeks, because by then you see the features of the baby, hands, feet. It's really barbaric."
--abortionist quoted in M.D. Doctors Talk About Themselves by John Pekkanen p 93
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"I was for abortion, I thought it was a woman's right to terminate pregnancy she did not want. Now I'm not so sure. I am a student nurse nearing the end of my OB-GYN rotation at a major metropolitan hospital and teaching center. It wasn't until I saw what abortion really involves that I changed my mind. After the first week in the abortion clinic several people in my clinical group were shaky about their previously positive feelings about abortion. This new attitude resulted from our actually seeing a Prostaglandin abortion, one similar in nature to the widely used saline abortion. . . this method is being used for terminations of pregnancies of sixteen weeks and over. I used to find rationales. the fetus isn't real. Abdomens aren't really very swollen. It isn't 'alive.' No more excuses...I am a member of the health profession and members of my class are now ambivalent about abortion. I now know a great deal more about what is involved in the issue. Women should perceive fully what abortion is; how destructive an act it is both for themselves and their unborn child. Whatever psychological coping mechanisms are employed during the process, the sight of a fetus in a hospital bedpan remains the final statement."
Quoted in "The Zero People: Essays on Life" by Jeff Lane Hensley, editor. Ann Arbor: Servant Books, 1983
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"I found much distress in the clinic, but it involved not only the women. I saw the pain of the babies who were born burned from the saline solution used for late-term abortions. I saw the bits of feet, bits of hands, the mangled heads and bodies of the little people. I saw pain and felt pain."
--One time clinic worker Paula Sutcliffe in "Precious in My Sight" "Pro-Life Feminism: Different Voices" Gail Garnier-Sweet, editor
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>From "Rachel Weeping"

"The doctors would remove the fetus while performing hysterectomies and then lay it on the table., where it would squirm until it died. ..They all had perfect forms and shapes. I couldn't take it. No nurse could."
--Joyce Craig, director of a Brooklyn clinic of Planned Parenthood. who assisted in abortion for two months, then quit. p 34

Edward Eichner, director of medicine at a Cleveland abortion facility said "No doctor, for ethical, moral or honest reasons wants to do nothing but abortions...women don't like to do abortions over and over for moral reasons. Sometimes our women doctors become pregnant themselves, which upsets the patients. At the same time, if a woman is carrying a baby, she doesn't like to abort someone else's. WE have much more trouble keeping women doctors on the staff than men." --p 49
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"After an abortion, the doctor must inspect these remains to make sure that all the fetal parts and placenta have been removed. Any tissue left inside the uterus can start an infection. Dr. Bours squeezed the contents of the sock into a shallow dish and poked around with his finger. "You can see a teeny tiny hand' he said.
--abortion clinic worker quoted in "Is the Fetus Human" and in Dudley Clendinen, "The Abortion Conflict: What it Does to One Doctor" New York Times Magazine Aug 11 1985b p 26
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"From May to November 1988, I worked for an abortionist. He specializes in third trimester killings. I witnessed evidence of the brutal, cold blooded murder of over 600 viable, healthy babies at seven, eight and nine months gestation. A very, very few of these babies, less than 2%, were handicapped...I thought I was pro-choice and I was glad to be working in an abortion clinic. I thought I was helping provide a noble service to women in crisis....I was instructed to falsify the age of the babies in medical records. I was required to lie to the mothers over the phone, as they scheduled their appointments, and to tell them that they were not 'too far along' Then I had to note, in the records that Dr. Tiller's needle had successfully pierced the walls of the baby's heart, injecting the poison what brought death...one day, Dr. Tiller came up the stairs from the basement, where the mothers were in labor. He was carrying a large cardboard box, and ducked into the employees only area of the office so that he wouldn't have to walk through the waiting room. He passed behind my desk as I sat working on the computer, and he turned the corner to go around a short hall. He called out for me to come and help him. the box was so big and heavy in his arms that he couldn't get the key into the lock. So I unlocked the door for him, and , pushing the door open, I saw very clearly the gleaming metal of the crematorium- a full sized crematorium, just like the one's used in funeral homes. I went back to my computer. I could hear Dr. Tiller firing up the gas oven. A few minutes later I could smell burning human flesh. Mine was the agony of a participant, however reluctant, in the act of prenatal infanticide."
--Luhra Tivis, [cana@aristotle.net] now a member of Operation Rescue, on her experience in the abortion business Quoted in Celebrate Life Sept/Oct 1994 "Where is the Real Violence?"
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>From the film "Meet the Abortion Providers"

"My heart got callous to against the fact that I was a murderer, but that baby lying in a cold bowl educated me as to what abortion really was."
--former abortionist Dr. David Brewer

"I want the general public to know what the doctors know- that this is a person, this is a baby. That this is not some kind of blob of tissue."
--Dr. Anthony Levantino

"I have taken the lives of innocent babies, and I have ripped them from their mother's wombs with a powerful suction machine"
--McArthur Hill, M.D.
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"I am deeply troubled by my own increasing certainty that I have in fact presided over 60,000 deaths. There is no longer serious doubt in my mind that human life exists from the very onset of pregnancy"
--Dr. Bernard Nathanson, "Deeper Into Abortion" New England Journal of Medicine Nov 1974 p 1189
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"I dare say that any thinking, caring individual can't not realize that he is ending life, or potential life."
--abortionist

"[Powell] said "Is this a fair way of expressing what you have just said, Doctor? You tell the mother "because your baby is defective, you have the right to kill it or not to kill it. If you choose to kill it, I will do the killing." "Of course," he [the abortionist] said. "There is no other way to say it and be honest."

both from The Zero People pg 9
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"I wanted to be the world's best abortionist, for the good of my patients. If I was going to do this, I was going to do it right. So, after I met each patient, reviewed the medical information gathered by my nurse, examined the patient and performed the abortion, I would then carefully sift through the remains to be sure all the parts were accounted for. I had to find four extremities (two arms and two legs) a spine, a skull, and the placenta, or my patient would suffer later from an incomplete abortion...My attention was so focused on my perceived patient that I managed to deny that there were, in fact, two patients involved- the expectant mother and a very small child...I had to wonder, how can having a child be so wrong for some people that they will pay me to end its life?"
--former abortionist Dr. McMillan "How One Doctor Changed Her Mind About Abortion" Focus on the Family, Colorado Springs
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"Abortions are very draining, exhausting, heart-rending. There are a lot of tears. Some patients turn on you...I do them because I take the attitude that women who are going to terminate babies deserve the same kind of treatment as women who carry babies...I've done a couple thousand, and its been a significant financial boon...the only way I can do an abortion is to consider only the woman as my patient and block out the baby."
--abortionist quoted in M.D. Doctors Talk About Themselves
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>From the article "Abortion Providers Share Inner Conflicts" which appeared in the July 12 1993 issue of AAA News, a publication of the American Medical Association:

"I have angry feelings at myself for feeling good about grasping the calvaria, for feeling good about doing a technically good procedure that destroys a fetus, kills a baby."

"When I put my hands on somebody to feel how big they are and I get kicked, I am barely able to talk at that moment."

an abortionist stated that 'somebody had asked her what they could say to the staff to make them look less shocked when they look at a 20 week fetus.."It's hard to be in a profession where you have a hard time answering the questions that other people ask you about what you do."
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"If the abortion is well done, we don't have to watch the baby die. So we inject a salt solution. The result is like putting salt on a slug, but we don't have to watch it."
--Dr. Russell Sacco M.D. quoted in James Long "Infants Aborted Alive: Officials Wink at Laws"
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"Even if you are pro-choice, no one likes to see a dead fetus." -Vilma Valdez, Education Director Planned Parenthood of Greater Miami, The Miami Herald, Oct 24 1992
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"I went up to the lab one day and on the pathologist's table I saw what I thought was little rubber doll until I realized it was a fetus. . .I got really shook up and upset and I couldn't believe it. It had all its fingers and toes, you know, hands and feet. . . I never thought it would look so -real. I didn't like it."
--Planned Parenthood employee quoted in Magda Denes book "In Necessity and Sorrow" New York:Basic Books 1979
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In an interview by Mark Crutcher, former abortion clinic director Joy Davis said "Each person who worked there had a different way of dealing with it. [One] would look at the ultrasound the entire time she was in the room, but she would never look down in the pan. She would never look at the tissue being removed. She never wanted to see that. She would never take her eyes off the screen. And I had one who would never look at the screen....she would never look at the tissue and never look at the screen, she just didn't want to see anything."
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Also from the 1993 Chicago conference
"Planned Parenthood is set up so clinic workers never have to see the babies. It's set up that way because having to look at the babies bothers the workers. ...Generally there is one clinic worker in charge of the babies...I was that clinic worker. I had to look at the babies. I had to store them, I had to send them to pathology. And I was the person who had to dispose of them.....in order to maintain my sanity, I established a personal mourning ritual. I said Shiva for the babies. I said prayers for the dead. I also named the babies as I put them in a waste container."
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"It [the fetus] is a form of life...This has to be killing...The question then becomes "is this kind of killing justifiable? In my own mind, it is justifiable, but only with the informed consent of the mother"
--abortionist quoted in "Democrat and Chronicle" 7/5/92
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>From the Dallas Observer 3/18/95
Former clinic administrator Charlotte Taft, "We were hiding from the women some of the pieces of truth about abortion that were threatening....It is a kind of killing."
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Compiled by Sarah Terzo - comments welcome
Contact Sarah at: terzo@TCNJ.EDU

http://www.gargaro.com/abortquotes.html

It was alive one moment and it's not the next

2008-01-27T19:37:00.000-08:00

An intimate conversation with a woman on the front lines of America's most emotionally charged debate.

http://www.salon.com/june97/mothers/abortion970623.html

BY CAMILLE PERI | She knows it is killing, but she doesn't believe it is wrong. As a doctor, she has performed hundreds of abortions, but as a mother of three small children, she has been forced to reexamine the values that propelled her to become pro-choice. Over time, says Dr. X, who requested anonymity out of concern for her safety and that of her family, her views about abortion have changed.

That kind of admission is rare in a public debate in which the truth has generally been the first casualty. The latest battle in this epic war has raged over "partial birth" or "late-term" abortion (depending on whose language you use), with pro-life activists charging that some women are terminating their pregnancies in the final days before delivery for reasons as trivial as not being able to fit into a prom dress -- a sensational charge that was never substantiated. The pro-choice side lost some of its own credibility when Ron Fitzsimmons, executive director of the National Coalition of Abortion Providers, announced that he and his colleagues had similarly misled the public by claiming that late-term abortions were performed rarely and only on women whose lives were in danger or whose fetuses had multiple deformities -- true for last-trimester abortions, but not necessarily for those done earlier.

Ultimately, however, while pro-choice advocates adhered to their traditional stance that abortion is a women's rights issue, pro-life advocates forced the focus on the fetus, splashing their campaign with gruesome imagery that made even some veteran pro-choice supporters squeamish. Rational questions about the timing and safety of late-term procedures paled next to images of crushed skulls and suctioned-out brains.

Predictably, the crucial ethical questions about abortion that the battle raised have been lost in the angry cacophony of the debate. Does pro-choice need to mean pro-abortion at any point in a pregnancy? Is abortion solely a women's rights issue? If not, when does a fetus gain rights -- at the first sign of a heartbeat, or the first gasp of breath? Physicians such as Dr. X, who performs first-term abortions at a clinic in the Pacific Northwest, face these kinds of ambiguities every day. (For this, they are called "hired assassins" by one side and hailed as heroes on the front lines by the other.) Dr. X reflected on her views and experience -- as a woman, a doctor and a mother -- and provided some insight into some of the moral complexities that the abortion debate has thus far sorely lacked.

You have been involved with doing abortions, as an assistant and then a physician, for about 20 years. What was it that first gave you such strong convictions about abortion?

When I was very young, my cousin got pregnant. She was 15 years old. It was before abortion was readily available, and in order to have one, she had to go before two psychiatrists and testify that she would kill herself. Then she was put to sleep for the procedure and had to stay overnight in the hospital and it was really a big deal. She didn't have to go to Mexico, but it was a harsh, guilt-inducing experience for her.

When she found out she was pregnant, though, she told my aunt and my mother. I saw that my mom believed it was a really important choice for her, that she shouldn't have to bear the consequences of getting pregnant and bearing a child when she clearly was not ready to. So I came away from that experience feeling that this had been a shame-inducing experience for her, but that it also made a difference that she was supported by her mother, my mother and me.

When you began assisting in abortions, did you see abortion primarily as a women's health issue?

Yes. I got involved in women's health when I was in college in Santa Cruz in the 1970s. I was part of a group of women who started a women's health center. That was the time of the self-help movement, learning how to do your own cervical exam and all that -- it was a very exciting time. And in 1972, even though abortion was legal, there was no place that it was provided in Santa Cruz County. It was a Catholic-dominated county and the big hospital there was the Dominican hospital. A physician came down from San Francisco and asked our group for people who would help him as counselors and medical assistants and he opened an abortion clinic one day a week.

So it was during that time that all the ideology came into it for me -- that women should have the right to make choices about what happens to their bodies and that men in positions of authority shouldn't be legislating those choices. For me, that was all very clear-cut, but what was not clear to me was what it meant to be pregnant and have a child. I just felt strongly that a woman shouldn't be forced to do something against her will.

Did you stop doing abortions for a while?

Yes, when I went into family practice, I was working at a hospital where that service was provided in a separate clinic, and because all my patients had that available to them, it didn't feel necessary for me to be doing them.

Why did you start again?

A year and a half ago, I was approached by a former student who was working for an abortion clinic and she said that they were having a hard time finding physicians to do abortions and wondered if I would be interested in doing them. I said yes.

Did you have any hesitancy or qualms about it this time?

I was only hesitant because of all the intervening history of violence against abortion providers, and now I had a family to consider. Right after I started working, there were telephone threats specifically against the doctor, although not me by name, just saying that they were going to kill the doctor in the clinic. So I had to wear a bulletproof vest. Lately, however, things have actually calmed down.

Did being a mother change your views about abortion?

I actually had an abortion during the first year of my internship. I just felt like I couldn't have a child and be a good parent when I would be working 100 hours a week for the next three years. Then, after my medical training, when I finally felt like I had the time to put into raising children, I had some trouble getting pregnant. During that period I became acutely aware, at the first inkling of pregnancy, that this was the beginning of a life.

So when I went back to doing abortions and saw the fetus on the ultrasound, I recalled the early days of my pregnancies, when I found out I was pregnant and saw the baby on the ultrasound, and it really felt like this is a baby, a very real and potential being. Now, I do feel that this is a potential person and it does not have a life of its own outside of the mother, but I also am really aware that when you're ready to embrace a pregnancy, you can embrace it from the very moment you conceive or are aware that you are pregnant.

Faye Wattleton said recently, "I think we have deluded ourselves into believing that people don't know that abortion is killing. So any pretense that abortion is not killing is a signal of our ambivalence, a signal that we cannot say yes, it kills a fetus, but it is the women's body, and therefore ultimately her choice."

I believe that very firmly. You look at the ultrasounds and there's a fetus with a heartbeat and then after the procedure, there's the fetus, usually in pieces, in a dish. It was alive one moment and it's not the next. I don't believe it's a painful experience for the fetus because its nervous system is not "wired" so that it can feel pain at that point. I don't believe, as some anti-abortion people would have you believe, that there's a "silent scream." But it's very clear to me that it's killing a potential life. And I found that hard at first.

It never made me think that this was not the right thing to do, however. Unless there was a perfect world, where women really had safe and 100 percent effective birth control and access to it and there was no such thing as rape and if there was, if the children were born into a society where they were supported and women were supported in raising children, then maybe it would be a different story. But none of those things exist. And having been through three pregnancies and knowing what kind of physical toll that takes on people, I still believe very strongly that women should not be made to carry a child for nine and a half months when they don't want to.

Still, there was also a sadness for me about the procedure that I hadn't really felt before I'd had my own children. In a way, though, I feel that makes me a better provider because I can talk to women about the children they have, about the difficulty of the decision, and let them express their ambivalent feelings and still support them.

Are there any situations that have been particularly poignant or difficult for you?

I can think of one woman who I saw a couple of weeks ago. The whole time during the procedure, she talked about her two sons and all of their accomplishments and how wonderful they were. Clearly she was broken-hearted to be having this procedure. But her husband just could not accept having a third child and there were financial problems that would have made it very, very difficult for them and the other two children. She knew it was the right decision, but it was a painful one for her.

So there are women who are married and who have families but for one reason or another -- because of a bad relationship, or domestic abuse, or financial constraints -- it's really not a good decision to bring another child into the world. For some people, it's a fairly straightforward procedure, but for others, it clearly is a sad event.

Do you ever see women who are getting abortions for reasons that seem frivolous to you -- and does it make you angry?

What makes me angry is people who aren't being careful about birth control, who don't make an effort to get a birth control system in place for themselves and have had several abortions. But it's usually those people who also make me think, "Oh great! They're not having a child" -- even though I think it's an awful way to do your birth control. I firmly believe that I cannot use my own value judgments in deciding when it's right for a person to make this decision or not, however. Ultimately it really is the woman's decision and she is the person who has to carry all the consequences.

How did having two daughters affect your views on abortion?

Well, I hope that they won't have sex before they're mature and ready to have sex, and that they will use birth control and try to avoid becoming pregnant when they don't want to be. But if either of them becomes pregnant before they are ready, it's extremely important to me that abortion be available to them -- and available in the way that I provide it, which is in a safe, clean environment with lots of support and lots of nurturing. A situation where they're not made to feel ashamed or guilty.

Do you still see a lot of shame on the part of women who get abortions?

It's incredible to me how much shame and guilt people have about it. Women will come in, having made this decision, and say, "You know, I don't believe in abortion." I always have to stop at that point and say, "I understand this might not be a situation you ever imagined you would be in, or that this is a sad and a hard decision to make, but you really cannot say that you don't believe in abortion if you've made this decision for yourself here today. You have to tell people that you do believe in that choice for people." I can't tell you how many people tell me that. Or they'll say, "Gee, you're so much better looking than I expected," as if we were supposed to come in with hunchbacks and moles on our faces.

Sometimes they're surprised that I have children, or that I talk about my children and that I want to talk about their children. Last week a very young girl came into the room, and I was with a counselor and a medical student that I'm training to do abortions. The girl said, "Have any of you ever had an abortion?" and I said, "Yes, I have." The medical student was shocked. After we left the room, she said, "I can't believe you said that to her." I told her that I think it is really important to let people know that it happens to all kinds of people and it doesn't have to mean the end of your life, or that you're doomed to a life of bad decisions. It doesn't have to be a shameful thing.

The “Typical” Plaintiff

2008-01-27T19:33:00.001-08:00

http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/air/air_vol9no1_1995.html is a site that talks about the option of pursuing legal action against the abortionist and/or their clinic after an abortion experience. I thought some excerpts were of interest.

The “Typical” Plaintiff
In numerous cases in which we have either evaluated the patient, testified as expert witnesses, or consulted generally on a case, it is apparent to us that most plaintiffs have a number of factors in common.

First, most were between 22 and 35 years of age, unmarried, and experienced both physical and emotional injuries post-abortion.

Second, most did not receive pre-abortion counseling, or if they did, it was so deficient as to be meaningless to the plaintiff at the time of the abortion.

Third, most of these women remembered signing informed consent forms but did not read them or understand them.

Fourth, most were not given options counseling, nor the opportunity to ask questions privately.

Fifth, most had four to eight predisposing risk factors to post-abortion trauma, that were unacknowledged or unexplored at the abortion clinic, or minimized by either the abortion counselor or the physician.

Sixth, most plaintiffs experienced the staff and abortion provider as insensitive to their special circumstances or emotional state.

Seventh, most felt ill-prepared for the post-abortion emotional traumatization and deceived by the abortion counselor regarding the developmental characteristics and humanity of the fetus.

Eighth, most plaintiffs have suffered serious and significant emotional injury, that has negatively impacted their primary relationships, subsequent parent-child interactions, and resulted in lowered self-esteem, the use of dysfunctional coping mechanisms (drinking, drugs, food, avoidance behaviors, emotional numbing), and experienced posttraumatic decline in overall functioning.

Ninth, most of these women had first trimester abortions.

Tenth, most of these women had some preexisting psychosocial stressors, most were competent and functioning individuals in society prior to their abortion traumatization.

The following cases are presented here by way of example of the degree and variance of post-abortion emotional injury.

Predisposing Risk Factors for Post-abortion Trauma
Research evidence is clear that certain women are predisposed to significant negative post-abortion adjustment. Existing biased abortion counseling places maternal health of these women at risk. These women are in need of more counseling, more information, more exploration and deliberative time, and more assistance than others.

Abortion traumatization may in many cases be prevented or remedied if women who give evidence of documented risk factors receive adequate counsel to make a decision that fits their unique psychological and social needs.

Empirical evidence suggests that emotional harm from abortion is probable when the following risk factors are present:

prior history of mental illness
Immature interpersonal relationships
Unstable, conflicted relationship with one’s partner
History of a negative relationship with one’s mother
Ambivalence regarding abortion
Religious or cultural background hostile to abortion
Single status, especially if one has not borne children
Age, particularly adolescents versus adult women
Second trimester versus first trimester abortions
Abortion for genetic reasons, i.e., fetal anomaly
Pressure or coercion to abort
Prior abortion
Prior children
Maternal orientation
Biased pre-abortion counseling

Belinda Byrd: Remember her

2008-01-27T19:29:00.000-08:00

Belinda Byrd
On January 24, 1987, 37-year-old Belinda Byrd had an abortion performed by Stephen Pine at Inglewood Women's Hospital in Los Angeles, California. Belinda was left unattended for three hours after the abortion, and was found unresponsive. Staff at Inglewood delayed an additional two hours before transferring her to a hospital with appropriate emergency services.

Belinda was one of 74 women who had abortions in Inglewood's single operating room that day, and one of 24 whose abortions were performed in the final two hours of the day. Belinda remained comatose until her death on January 27.

Belinda's mother wrote to a Los Angeles district attorney:

I am the mother of Belinda Byrd, victim of abortionists at [Inglewood]. I am also the grandmother of her three young children who are left behind and motherless. I cry every day when I think how horrible her death was. She was slashed by them and then she bled to death ... and nobody cares. I know that other young black women are now dead after abortion at that address. ... Where is [the abortionist] now? Has he been stopped? Has anything happened to him because of what he did to my Belinda? Has he served jail time for any of these cruel deaths? People tell me nothing has happened, that nothing ever happens to white abortionists who leave young black women dead. I'm hurting real bad and want some justice for Belinda and all other women who go like sheep to slaughter.

In the wake of the series of abortion deaths at Inglewood, the authorities inspected the place. Among other things, they caught an abortionist writing post-operative examination notes without even examining the patients. When the state closed Inglewood for numerous violations, the facility simply re-opened as Inglewood Women's Clinic; as a clinic rather than a hospital they were no longer subject to the same intense scrutiny and were able to remain in business.

Other women known to have died after abortions at the Inglewood facility include Kathy Murphy, Cora Lewis, Lynette Wallace, and Elizabeth Tsuji.

http://realchoice.0catch.com/library/deaths/bl87bbyrd.htm

Vanessa Preston: Rest in Peace

2008-01-27T19:23:00.000-08:00

As everyone acknowledges - either as a tragedy or as something we should be thankful for - the anniversary of Roe vs Wade and the mileston 20 year anniversary in Canada let us remember Vanessa Preston. In 1980 on January 22nd she entered the Fairmont Clinic in Dallas. She was the 22 year old wife of a local Pastor. Her husband and little child accompanied her to the facility. Mr. Curtis Boyd performed the procedure. During the abortion procedure she experienced a grand mal seizure and cardiac arrest. My understanding is that the records show that the facility employed immediate emergency procedures to try to save this 22 year old woman's life. They were able to get her heart started again but sadly she went into cardiac arrest again. At the hospital she was transported to she received surgical treatment for a retained placenta and multiple vaginal punctures. She went into cardiac arrest again. She has massive unstoppable blood loss that wasn't address by being given 24 full units of blood. She was pronounced dead despite every effort made. The autopsy reported the reasons behind her cardiac arrest. She had developed amniotic fluid embolism (AFE - amniotic fluid in the mother's bloodstream) and disseminated intravascular coagulopathy (DIC - a blood clotting disorder) during the abortion.

This information is extracted from realchoice blog -http://realchoice.blogspot.com/ and full credit should be given to her for her research.

"Is it right or wrong to let my child live? Should I give life or should I give it away?": The Courage of a mother

2008-01-27T14:50:00.001-08:00

The young woman in this video shares a powerful testimony. Two years ago she was sexually assaulted. She sought emergency room care for medical attention. She was offered a morning after pill which she declined. She later learned that she was pregnant. She shares the whole process of reconciling all of the emotions of being pregnant raped at 19 years of age and becoming a mother though rape.

A moving pro-life video

2008-01-27T14:48:00.000-08:00

Operation Outcry: The pain of abortion

2008-01-26T19:17:00.000-08:00

2008-01-26T10:26:00.000-08:00

The National Post
http://www.nationalpost.com/news/canada/story.html?id=264974 in the wake of a milestone abortion anniversary in Canada outlines some of the thoughts of people on both sides of this issue.

Ms. Mountenay, who would later be sued by Dr. Morgentaler for offering "sidewalk counselling" to patients outside this same clinic, was crushed. Having aborted two pregnancies of her own, to her profound regret, she wept at the thought that more women would see abortion as a "quick and easy fix," and wind up as she was, mourning her unborn children, cursing her naivete.

"I'll never forget the night," she said yesterday.

Denise is is the founder and president of Canada Silent No More. She is the author of FORGIVEN which is her own journey. It became a best seller. She has carried her message about the pain of her abortion to schools, conferences, prisons, churches, and to television and radio.

The article also profiles Andrew Mrozek

"I'm almost embarrassed, still sometimes, to be public on the issue," said Andrea Mrozek, 31, who has commemorated the anniversary by launching a new non-religious support group and Web forum, ProWomanProLife, to discuss the dangers of and alternatives to abortion

Andrea Mrozek is Manager of Research and Communications at the Institute of Marriage and Family Canada, which complies research from the perspective of people that want to change the definition of marriage to the traditional historical one.

The article also profiles the words of Joanne Byfield

Joanne Byfield, president of Life Canada, said in a phone interview she thinks Canadians are too often ignorant and complacent after a full generation with easy access to abortions and little critical public discussion, but also that this is changing. "I think people are questioning abortion," she said

2008-01-26T09:10:00.001-08:00

2008-01-26T09:08:00.000-08:00

A tender ballad about adoption

2008-01-21T19:59:00.000-08:00

This is a song of healing.

2008-01-21T19:57:00.000-08:00

ChrisTomlin singing Amazing Grace

2008-01-21T19:55:00.000-08:00

2008-01-21T19:52:00.000-08:00

Donna shares her story through music at Rachel Vineyard's

Gianna Jessen: I will limp my way into heaven

2008-01-21T18:58:00.000-08:00

25,000 attend West Coast Walk for Life, event continues to grow

Some of the 25,000 marchers at the Walk for Life in San FranciscoSan Francisco, Jan 20, 2008 / 05:55 pm (CNA).- After hearing two speeches from the niece of Martin Luther King, Jr., and a woman who survived an abortion, an estimated 25,000 marchers on Saturday walked 2.5 miles along the San Francisco waterfront to support pregnant women and to protest legalized abortion.

The marchers carried signs and banners reading “Abortion Hurts Women” and “Women Deserve Better.”

About 250 pro-abortion protestors chanted and jeered alongside the marchers’ route.

At the Walk for Life rally before the march, the audience was addressed by Gianna Jessen, who developed cerebral palsy as an infant after an attempted saline abortion in Los Angeles.

"I was aborted and did not die," Gianna Jessen told the cheering crowd, but referred to her injuries adding, "I will limp my way into heaven."

"The abortionist signed my birth certificate," Jessen said, though she continued, "My life is not defined by abortion. I am not a victim, I am a victor."

Alveda King, the niece of Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., spoke to the marchers, comparing the pro-life movement to her uncle’s efforts to secure civil rights.

"We care about life from the womb to the tomb," Alveda King said. "My uncle said injustice anywhere is injustice everywhere. Dr. King said that the Negro cannot win if he is willing to sacrifice the future of his children for personal comfort and safety. So here we are on behalf of the children, the future generation."

King led the crowd in singing the civil rights song “This Little Light of Mine.”

Rev. Clenard Childress and the radio host Jesse Romero also addressed the crowd. Eight Catholic bishops from various regions of California were present to show support for the event and the marchers’ cause.

Walk for Life co-chair Dolores Meehan said her organization was pleased by the growing numbers of participants, noting the first event in 2005 drew about 5,000 people while the 2007 event attracted about 20,000
http://catholicnewsagency.com/new.php?n=11512

Unspoiled by Feminism: A culture of support and respect for their husband

2008-01-21T06:31:00.001-08:00

A DATING agency's sleazy offer of Czech women "unspoiled by feminism" was slammed yesterday.

Protesters have demanded that council officials investigate the activities of the Hand In Hand agency, whose website features the women in skimpy clothing and underwear.

They promise clients women 10 to 20 years younger than them who are "unspoiled by feminism at a very affordable price".

It also claims they are "beautiful, intelligent and educated" and have a "culture of support and respect for their husband".

http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/2008/01/21/fury-over-dating-agency-s-sleazy-ads-86908-20292880/

She said: "Its approach to women would be offensive to anyone, male or female. The implication is it is about the ability to buy a bride.

"As well as the offence it could cause to members of the public, the leaflet must raise concerns about exploitation of women in the Czech Republic."

Another woman who complained said: "The small print on the leaflets probably explains the women cost a couple of goats and half a dozen chickens and that they always look forward to their daily beatings."

Police have also been made aware of the agency's leafleting activities.

Dundee councillor Joe Morrow pledged to act yesterday after receiving a number of complaints.

He said: "Material like this is frankly disgusting and I am certain that everyone in Dundee will share my revulsion that it is being handed out in public."

A spokesman for Hand In Hand in Dundee, one of a number of franchises of the agency in the UK, insisted they were above board. He added: "We are simply an introduction agency and not a buy-a-bride service."

But it emerged last night that Hand In Hand have been criticised by websites investigating internet scams and blacklisted by one - agencyscams.com.

Their investigator said: "I first ran across this agency three years ago. All the girls are the same as then. Bad sign."

Huckabee's comments on gay marriage

2008-01-20T17:04:00.000-08:00

http://a.abcnews.com/images/US/apg_gay_marriage_070614_ms.jpg

WASHINGTON (CNN) — Republican Mike Huckabee is taking heat from some members of the gay community over recent comments that appeared to equate gay marriage with bestiality.

In an interview with the religious Web site beliefnet.com, Huckabee pushes back on recent critics who have called some of his positions "radical."

"I think the radical view is to say that we're going to change the definition of marriage so that it can mean two men, two women, a man and three women, a man and a child, a man and animal," he said in the interview, published on the Web site Wednesday. "Again, once we change the definition, the door is open to change it again."

David Smith of the Human Rights Campaign told CNN Huckabee's comments make clear the former Arkansas governor stance is "out of the mainstream of American thought."

"I think he's equating a loving marriage between two people of the same sex with some form of bestiality," he said. " I think that's really out of the mainstream of American thought, and most people will find that offensive."

Huckabee has previously come under fire for past comments on homosexuality. In his 1998 book "Kids Who Kill," the onetime Baptist minister seemed to link homosexuality with sexually deviant and criminal behavior.

"It is now difficult to keep track of the vast array of publicly endorsed and institutionally supported aberrations — from homosexuality and pedophilia to sadomasochism and necrophilia," he wrote.

Responding to that passage, Huckabee said on ‘Meet the Press’ last month he was not linking the three, but rather pointing out all are deviations from the "traditional concept of sexual behavior."

Huckabee's campaign told CNN the candidate is not equating gay marriage with bestiality, but rather he simply saying that he believes marriage should be between a man and a woman. The campaign also said gay rights groups are trying to pick a fight

Who is aborting their baby?

2008-01-20T17:01:00.000-08:00

NEW YORK — In American pop culture, the face of abortion is often a frightened teenager, nervously choosing to terminate an unexpected pregnancy. The numbers tell a far more complex story in which financial stress can play a pivotal role.

Half of the roughly 1.2 million U.S. women who have abortions each year are 25 or older. Only about 17 percent are teens. About 60 percent have given birth to least one child prior to getting an abortion.

A disproportionately high number are minorities. And regardless of ethnicity, high abortion rates are linked to hard times.

"It doesn't just happen to young people, it doesn't necessarily have to do with irresponsibility," said Miriam Inocencio, president of Planned Parenthood of Rhode Island. "Women face years and years of reproductive life after they've completed their families, and they're at risk of an unintended pregnancy that can create an economic strain."

The American dream
In recent years, the number of abortions has fallen; the 1.2 million tallied for 2005 was down 8 percent from 2000, and the per-capita abortion rate was the lowest since 1974. But overall, since the Roe ruling on Jan. 22, 1973, there have been roughly 50 million abortions in the United States, and more than one-third of adult women are estimated to have had at least one.

Who are these women?

Much of the public debate focuses on teens, as evidenced by the constant wrangling over parental notification laws and movies like the current hit Juno, in which the pregnant heroine heads to an abortion clinic, then decides to have the baby.

In fact, the women come from virtually every demographic sector. But year after year the statistics reveal that black women and economically struggling women — who have above-average rates of unintended pregnancies — are far more likely than others to have abortions. About 13 percent of American women are black, yet new figures from the Centers for Disease Control show they account for 35 percent of the abortions.

Black abortion opponents depict this phenomenon in dire terms — "genocide" and "holocaust," for example. Often, however, the women getting the abortions maintain they act in the interests of children they already have.

"It wasn't a hard decision for me to make, because I knew where I wanted to go in my life — I've never regretted it," said Kimberly Mathias, 28, a black single mother from Missouri.

By contrast, Alveda King, a niece of Martin Luther King Jr., calls herself a "reformed murderer" for undergoing two abortions when she was young.

Now an outspoken abortion opponent, King says the best way to reduce abortions among black women is to dissuade more of them from premarital sex.

Dr. Vanessa Cullins, a black physician who is Planned Parenthood's national vice president for medical affairs, thinks allegations of "black genocide" do not help women meet day-to-day challenges.

"These actions take attention away from medically proven ways to reduce unintended pregnancy — comprehensive sex education, affordable birth control, and open and honest conversations about relationships," she said

Looking beyond racial dividing lines, Cullins views the right to abortion as an important component in the ability of all American women to determine the right size for their family.

"Groups that become assimilated in U.S. culture and experience economic opportunities naturally decide to limit family size, because they want to take part in the American dream," she said. "If you're a single mother, achieving the dream is all the harder, so it makes sense to limit family size so you can shower as much support as you can on the children you have."

A 'prudent choice'
Georgette Forney, who had an abortion when she was 16 and is now an abortion opponent leading Anglicans for Life, says she often sees economic pressures triggering abortions, even in middle-class families.

"We've begun to depend on abortions," Forney said. "We feel we have to choose between our unborn child and our born children."

Martha Girard, on the other hand, says she's appalled by the notion that women should lose the right to choose.

A hospital ultrasound technician from Pleasant Prairie, Wis., and a mother of three, Girard had an abortion two years ago, at the age of 44, when she mistakenly thought she was too old to get pregnant.

Having been through three difficult pregnancies previously, and coping with a mentally disabled eldest son, she felt abortion was the prudent choice.

"I knew that this pregnancy would end up badly — I could feel it — and we've already got enough problems with the mentally ill son," Girard said.

Even among many abortion opponents, the Guttmacher Institute — which supports abortion rights — is considered the nation's best source of abortion statistics.

Federal statistics do not include California, the most populous state, because its government does not provide data. But Guttmacher researchers surveyed abortion providers there as well as in other states to produce the latest national estimate of 1.2 million abortions in 2005. That's down from a peak of 1.6 million in 1990 but still represents more than 20 percent of all pregnancies.

When wealthy women abort
One of the Guttmacher's top researchers, Stanley Henshaw, said the recent drop may disguise the fact that abortion rates remain relatively high for black American and Hispanic women.

He believes the most effective countermeasure would be wider availability of contraceptives such as intrauterine device, or IUDs, that don't require attention as frequently as condoms or birth-control pills.

Though abortion is commonplace across the country, urban areas have far higher rates than rural areas where access to abortion providers can be difficult.

New York, New Jersey, California, Delaware, Nevada, Maryland and Florida had the highest abortion rates in 2005, according to the new Guttmacher report released this week. Wyoming, Idaho, Kentucky, South Dakota and Mississippi had the lowest rates — the latter two states have just a single abortion clinic in operation.

Susan Hill, founder of the National Women's Health Organization that runs the remaining Mississippi clinic, says the statistics may not fully reflect a subgroup of relatively affluent women who obtain unreported abortions through their private doctors.

"In Mississippi, it's the poor women who don't have access to that who have to run through the maze of protesters screaming and yelling abuse," Hill said. "Wealthier women can be more creative about their alternatives."

The demographics
According to Guttmacher data, the abortion rate among women living below the federal poverty level is more than four times higher than among women from middle-income and affluent households.

An increasing number of women avoid surgery by using the RU-486 abortion pill or other early medication — these now account for about 13 percent of all abortions.

Of all U.S. women getting abortions, about 54 percent are doing so for the first time, while one-fifth have had at least two previous abortions. Of those over the age of 20, the majority have attended college. Almost a third those women have been married at some point. About 60 percent have at least one child; one-third have two or more.

"I don't think most people understand that these are women who have families, who are making a very serious decision about their reproductive health," said Nancy Keenan, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America. "The stereotype is that the decision is made lightly. It is not."

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/5468449.html

Ron Paul went to the SF pro life rally

2008-01-20T12:18:00.000-08:00

Abortion activists take to SF streets

SAN FRANCISCO -- One issue that feels like it's fallen off the political radar is abortion - but this week marks the 35th anniversary of the landmark Supreme Court decision legalizing the procedure. Activists on both sides of the issue took to the streets of San Francisco.

Thousands and thousands of abortion opponents filled the Ferry Plaza Park Saturday in the Walk for Life West Coast. The walk is deliberately located in the very pro-choice San Francisco.
"Look at the turnout -- I think the whole plaza is full. I think people care, and they want to know where the politicians stand on it," said Eva Muntean, march organizer.
http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?section=news/local&id=5902392

The link has a video

"There is the sac and there is the heartbeat"

2008-01-19T11:00:00.000-08:00

Another pro-choice story from "I am not sorry"

showed me the monitor for the ultrasound and mention, "right there is the sac and there is the heartbeat."

I asked the Gods (I'm Pagan) to allow this soul to be born through a younger, healthier mother.... In my mind's eye, an angel appeared. She (yes, it was female) was holding close to her bosom a small white Divine light in her hands, and gave me the most serene smile (not judgemental in any way) and proceeded to disappear. I was comforted and able to go through with the procedure.

http://www.imnotsorry.net/lisaC.htm

Time with Liza

2008-01-19T10:54:00.000-08:00

A story at I am not sorry - a pro-choice website - where a mother talks about delaying the abortion so that she could spend more time with her unborn child before aborting it

We waited two months to get the money (I got a medical card) and make the appointment and to have time to share with "Liza". We both loved "her" dearly and wanted to commemorate her as much as we could.

The process of getting the procedure was the most nerve wracking thing ever... seeing the sonogram made me feel better about everything. I was 12 weeks pregnant and I know what Liza looked like. I loved her

http://www.imnotsorry.net/kristenA.htm

When this child's birthday would have been

2008-01-19T10:48:00.001-08:00

"I am not sorry" a pro-choice website hosts the stories of young women who are pro-choice and who have aborted without regret.

Two days before the positive result. I received a letter in the mail from a politician, thanking me for signing, then trying to explain to me the “horrors of abortion”. Fuck him

have had people wanting to talk to me about it. Telling me when this child’s birthday would have been. Telling me they wish they could have talked me out of it. People wondering why I did it.

have had people wanting to talk to me about it. Telling me when this child’s birthday would have been. Telling me they wish they could have talked me out of it. People wondering why I did it.

I wish I went to a more compassionate facility where they treated me like a person. Not a waitress serving ice cold medical procedures. My experience with abortion was not pleasant. They shuffled me from room to room. My doctor was completely rude to me. They denied me any anesthesia. Then gave me one sedative, The nurses all told me how gentle the doctor was, but I was "the last procedure of the day" and he was very rough with me, they gave me an Ibuprofen and sent me on my merry way. No one I've spoken to that had the same procedure recently was as poorly medicated as myself

http://www.imnotsorry.net/hope.htm

We can’t fish in the drains for the baby can we?:

2008-01-19T10:41:00.000-08:00

Another story from " I am not sorry" a pro-choice website

Excerpts as follows:

I arrived at the hospital and had some pills placed inside me. I was told that if I went to the toilet I was to ring an alarm and a nurse would come and inspect what was in the tray(it was a cardboard tray type thing). I started to get cramps and feel nauseated so I was taken to a room and spent the day shivering in bed with terrible cramps. My boyfriend was there this time and he just told me to stop crying and stop being stupid. I hated him for that. He showed no emotion. The pain was unbearable, I wasn’t allowed a surgical abortion because I was too far gone, 13 weeks I think they said but I thought I was only 9, because it was 9 weeks since the condom had split, I even got the morning after pill and it didn’t work, now I know why. Apparently he didn’t think it mattered when there was a tiny hole in the condom. I was quite adamant that I wasn’t 13 weeks, still not wanting to believe my boyfriend would put me through all that. The nurses had said it would take about six hours for my body to effectively give birth to the foetus. This was at about 11am. At around 2pm I went to the toilet and forgot to use a cardboard tray. I felt two large lumps fall out of my body and when I looked in the toilet it was full of blood. I rang for the nurses and told them what I felt and they said well we can’t fish in the drains for the baby can we? I was shocked at that, even though they were right. They didn’t believe me every time I went to the toilet they told me that nothing was happening, I believed that the foetus and placenta had gone down that toilet. At 9pm there was nothing but a small amount of bleeding and so I left the hospital. I wasn’t given the counselling I was promised

I cried myself to sleep for two weeks

Still offered no counselling that I was promised and ever since I have struggled to cope

Despite all of this Hannah does not regret her abortion
http://www.imnotsorry.net/hannahD.htm

A pro-choice perspective on motherhood

2008-01-19T10:32:00.000-08:00

"I am not sorry", a pro-choice website, shares the journey of a pro-choice mother as she reflects on the birth of her child and the onset of motherhood.

The context for this actually quite heartbreaking - a young woman promised oodles of support from a family and a boyfriend that ultimately never stepped up and helped her and her son. Still, her words are earthshatteringly harsh.

I think it has taken me so long to write this because I don't want to be seen as a bad mother. I regret having my son. I do and looking back, the memories of it aren't so bad overall, but my day to day life since then has been. If I had to do it all over again, I would have gotten the abortion at all costs. I do love my son, there is no doubt about that, but I find myself wishing, often, that I had not had him at all. If that makes me a bad mother, then so be it.

Subsequent to this she conceived unexpectedly again,

My decision was easy and it was to immediately seek an abortion. I told my boyfriend, I did not ask him, and he told me that he was actually relieved that I did not want to keep the pregnancy. I called my mother and explained the situation to her and that I would need to borrow some money from her.

And these were the words of the baby's grandmother when she was told the news:

I cried for a very long time when she told me that things would have been different if I had gone to her the first time I was pregnant

http://www.imnotsorry.net/christyA.htm

I beat the high score on my cell phone game

2008-01-19T10:27:00.000-08:00

Another story from "I am not sorry"

my boyfriend did not want the baby. We couldn't afford a baby. We could barely afford an apartment. And I tried, because I like the idea of a family, to see if I could make it work. I made lists and lists of expenses and whether or not we could afford everything on his minimum wage salary. Whether or not we'd have time to care for it, seeing as he works and I was about to start my freshman year at college

She then goes on to talk about the time they were waiting for the procedure

My boyfriend played games on my cell phone.
I beat the high score on my cell phone game.

http://www.imnotsorry.net/bianca.htm

I feel empowered and glad that I took control of my future and didn't let myself fall victim to my own negligence.

2008-01-19T10:22:00.000-08:00

This is another story from "I am not sorry" where a mother talks about her decision to abort a pregnancy that closely followed the birth of her daughter.

I was in complete shock. My husband and I had had a very very difficult time with our marriage this last spring and things were finally starting to turn around and get better. When I told him I was pregnant, he was furious. I was terrified too, and so upset with myself for being so negligent and letting it happen.

I was heartbroken at the possibility of being pregnant interfering with nursing my daughter

I felt like such a hypocrite for even considering aborting because we had tried so hard to have her and were very upset after the miscarriages.

I am thankful that this option was available to me because I want each of my children to know that they were wanted and that we were ecstatic when we found out about being pregnant with them.

I had an abortion and I am not sorry. I feel empowered and glad that I took control of my future and didn't let myself fall victim to my own negligence
http://www.imnotsorry.net/amberE.htm

If I see twins do you want to know that"?

2008-01-19T10:16:00.000-08:00

The pro-choice community often says that we don't understand that not every woman regrets her abortion and some women look back on abortion without a moment's regret. Here is a story that I pulled from "I am not sorry" a website dedicated to promoting the view that not all women regret their abortions. Here are some excerpts with a link to the full story to follow:

I won't say that I tried really hard to use all the right protection, etc. I didn't. I'm a smart, attractive girl that is rational and always makes good decisions but for some reason I had had sex, without protection and never got pregnant, for awhile.

A few minutes later a woman called me and took me to have an ultrasound. She asked cheerfully "If I see twins do you want to know that"? I told her bluntly, "I don't want to know anything". Then I was sent to the cashier and paid my fee. Everything after that happened very quickly

The doctor was a young woman which surprised me a lot. She was not as friendly as everyone else but I really just wanted her to do her job and get it over with.

was put in a wheelchair which I didn't need and put in a recliner with a heating pad for about 20 minutes. I was given antibiotics and sent home. I drove myself there and back with no problems. I will never be sorry I had an abortion

http://www.imnotsorry.net/amandaE.htm

The Bible does not tell parents to spank

2008-01-19T07:42:00.001-08:00

June 02, 2007
The Bible Does not Tell Parents to Spank
by flowermama
When I was younger, up until sometime in the first year of my first daughter's life (she is 11 now), I thought that Christian parents needed to spank their children in order to be godly parents. I'm a theologically conservative Christian, I grew up attending a fundamentalist school from kindergarten through four years of college, and I thought that, biblically, parents were supposed to spank their children. Of course I planned on spanking. There was no question in my mind about it.

When my firstborn was about eight months old (that was when we first got on the internet), I started really looking into attachement parenting. I found other Christians online who practiced attachment parenting, and I found out that many of them didn't spank their children. Choosing not to spank made sense to me -- when I was trying so hard to build a healthy attachment with my child and to build her trust in me by treating her gently, wearing her in a sling, breastfeeding her, sleeping with her, etc., why would I want to purposefully take my hand or an object and strike her?

I studied the issue and realized I felt that God had led me not to spank. Verses stood out to me which said, "the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, Meekness, temperance. . . " (Gal. 5:22, 23b), "Love is patient, love is kind" (see the rest of I Cor. 13 for more about what love is)", ". . . we proved to be gentle among you as a nursing mother tenderly cares for her own children" (I Thess. 2:7), "do to others what you would have them do to you" (Mat. 7:12), etc. It felt *right* not to spank, yet still part of me worried about those "rod" verses in the Bible. Part of me secretly wondered "what if I was wrong?"

These days I feel sure that the Bible does not command parents to spank. In fact, I've realized that the Bible says nothing about spanking. If your Bible uses the word "spank" that is because people translating that version of the Bible decided to translate it that way. It's a cultural interpretation of the Hebrew words from which it is translated.

What we do know without a doubt that God commands parents to discipline their children. However, discipline does not = spanking. God doesn't tell parents what specific discipline methods to use. The term "rod" means discipline in general, but it is not telling us what particular form of discipline to use.

In the so-called "spanking verses," the word "rod" is translated from the Hebrew word "shebet." A shebet is a shepherd's staff (see Psalm 23:4 where it says, ". . . thy rod and thy staff they comfort me") or a king's scepter (Easton's 1897 Bible Dictionary explains that "the use of the sceptre originated in the idea that the ruler was as a shepherd of his people"), and it sybolizes authority. A shebet was used to guide sheep and to protect sheep and fight off predators. The Hebrew word "shebet" does not mean "hand," "switch," "paddle," "wooden spoon," or any type general type of implement. And we certainly wouldn't hit our children with a literal rod. Importantly, we see through use of the word "shebet" that God has given parents the authority and responsibility to discipline -- a word which means teach, to disciple -- their children.

This was posted at www.gentlechristianmothers.com

Spanking babies: The evilness of Tripp

2008-01-19T06:56:00.000-08:00

http://stoptherod.net/tripp.html - A brilliant overview of a book written by a man that has a very different, very negative, and remarkably awful view of children.

Shepherding a Child’s Heart by Ted Tripp

This book is extremely negative and punitive towards children. Jesus’ words about not offending children, about children having the highest status in heaven, as well as Jesus’ injunctions to forgive, show mercy, and follow the Golden Rule are completely ignored.

Tripp calls children cruel names: unruly, troublesome, rebellious, selfish, bossy, intolerant, idolatrous, arrogant, selfish sinner, twisted, warped, sinful, smug, crooked, greedy, “crass self-centeredness”, “wicked attitudes”, “choosing to sin”, “relationship junkie”, “selfish heart”, “impossible to live with”.

Tripp repeats the same themes over and over in this book: parents are “God’s agents”, children are terrible sinners and must be forced to submit and obey instantly, God demands that parents spank bare bottoms, even infants, and that this brings “intimacy”.
Please write a review of this nasty, evil book on Amazon!! Click on this link and scroll down to "write a review":
http://www.amazon.com/Shepherding-Childs-Heart-Tedd-Tripp/dp/0966378601/ref=pd_bbs_2/102-8475496-2476954?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1188004378&sr=8-2

This book is very sick stuff. Here are some quotes for your review, organized under 7 main themes:

1) Parents are “God’s agents”
2) Parents should have total control
3) Children are sinful, idolatrous, and “fools”
4) Don’t encourage children’s self-worth
5) Parents don’t protect children when they are abused
6) Using “the rod”
7) Hide the whippings from others

1) Parents are “God’s agents”
p.xviii “You exercise authority as God’s agent. You must require obedience of your children because they are called by God to obey and honor you. Parents should be ‘benevolent despots’”.
p.34 “It is sobering to realize that you correct your child by God’s command. You stand before him as God’s agent to show him his sin. The parent must be aware of the fact that he is God’s representative to the child.”
p.139 “Obedience is not simply an issue between the parent and the child. It is an issue between the child and God in which the parent is God’s agent.”

2) Parents should have total control
p.xx “You need to direct not simply the behavior of your children, but the attitudes of their hearts. You need to show them not just the ‘what’ of their sin and failure, but the ‘why.’”
p.23 “You want to control the flow of events so that it is never chaotic, but rather a well-structured home.” “I am interested in helping parents engage in hand-to-hand combat on the world’s smallest battlefield, the child’s heart.”
p.133 From birth to age 4, “The most important lesson for the child to learn in this period is that HE IS AN INDIVIDUAL UNDER AUTHORITY.”
p.134 “Acquaint your children with authority and submission when they are infants. This training starts the day you bring them home from the hospital.”
p.135 “It is imperative that children learn to honor and obey. The disobedient child has moved outside the place of covenant blessing.”
p.138 “Obedience means more than a child doing what he is told. It means doing what he is told---
Without Challenge
Without Excuse,
Without Delay.”
p.139 “When your directives are met by a discourse about why what you have asked is not fair, your children are not obeying. When you are met with excuses or explanations, they are not obeying. When they refuse to respond at once, they are not obeying. When you say to your child, “Dear, I want you to go to bed now,” there is only one appropriate response. It is not, “I’ll go after I finish coloring this page.” There is only one obedient response. It is to go to bed without delay. If you accept any other response, you are training your children to disobey. You must challenge disobedience and persevere until the lessons of submission are learned. Victory does not come to the faint of heart. Never allow your children to disobey without dealing with them.”
p.142 “You must provide examples of submission for your children. Dads can do this through biblical authority over their wives, and Moms through biblical submission to their husbands.”
p.145 “Don’t waste time trying to sugarcoat submission to make it palatable. Obeying when you see the sense in it is not submission; it is agreement. Submission necessarily means doing what you do not wish to do. It is never easy or painless.”
p.151 “Your children must understand that when you speak for the first time, you have spoken for the last time.”
p.155 A parent poses the question “What if my child says, ‘But I didn’t hear you’?” And Tripp’s answer is “One of our children seemed to have much trouble with ‘hearing.’ We sat down with this child and had this conversation: ‘You are having trouble hearing. I think, therefore, that you better start to develop the ability to pick my voice out of the other noise in your world. When you hear my voice, you should perk up your ears. From now on, if you fail to obey because you ‘did not hear’, I will spank you for failing to listen to my voice.’ We only had one spanking for failure to hear. After that the hearing problem cleared up.”

3) Children are sinful, idolatrous and “fools”
p.6 “Your concern is to unmask your child’s sin, helping him to understand how it reflects a heart that has strayed.”
p.21 “Even a child in the womb and coming from the womb is wayward and sinful. One of the justifications for spanking children is that ‘Folly is bound up in the heart of a child, but the rod of discipline will drive it far from him’ (Proverbs 22:15). The point of the proverb is that something is wrong in the heart of the child that requires correction.”
p.24 “Since it is the Godward orientation of your child’s heart that determines his response to life, you may never conclude that his problems are simply a lack of maturity. Selfishness is not outgrown. Rebellion against authority is not outgrown. These things are not outgrown because they are not reflective of immaturity but of the idolatry of your child’s heart.”
p.54 Children “need to understand subtleties of the malignancy of their own hearts. They need to know the dangers of trusting in themselves.”
p.67 Children must have their “character flaws” addressed, and understand the “deceitfulness” of their hearts.
p.105 “The child is a sinner. There are things within the heart of the sweetest little baby that, allowed to blossom and grow to fruition, will bring about eventual destruction. The rod functions in this context. It is addressed to needs within the child. These needs cannot be met by mere talk. Proverbs 22:15 says, ‘Folly is bound up in the heart of a child, but the rod of discipline will drive it far from him.’ God says there is something wrong in the child’s heart. Folly or foolishness is bound up in his heart. This folly must be removed, for it places the child at risk.”
p.106 “The fool’s life is run by his desires and fears. This is what you hear from your young children. The most common phrases in the vocabulary of a 3-year-old are, ‘I want…’ or ‘I don’t want….’ The fool lives out of the immediacy of his lusts, cravings, expectations, hopes and fears.” “Watch a baby struggle against wearing a hat in the winter. Even this baby who cannot articulate or even conceptualize what he is doing shows a determination not to be ruled from without. This foolishness is bound up within his heart. Allowed to take root and grow for 14 or 15 years, it will produce a rebellious teenager who will not allow anyone to rule him. The spanking process drives foolishness from the heart of a child. Confrontation with the immediate and undeniably tactile sensation of a spanking renders an implacable child sweet.”
p.143 “Show (children) how they are inclined to disobey and turn irrationally from what is good for them.”
p.174 “Children need to be convicted that they have defected from God and are covenant-breakers. You must deal with the child in a deep way that enables him to see the implications of his behavior and to indict himself.”
p.177 “You cannot, with integrity, tell your child that if he tries hard enough, if he is good enough, if he really wants it, he can be what God has called him to be. He can’t.”

4) Don’t encourage children’s self-worth
p.51 “When I ask parents why they put their children in these dance classes, they explain that it has helped their child’s sense of self-worth. Are there any passages (in the Bible) that make the development of self-worth a biblically mandated goal? Are we not encouraging pride that comes from the capacity to perform?”

5) Parents don’t protect children when they are abused
p.16 “Your children are responsible for the way they respond to your parenting.”
p.53 Regarding schoolyard bullies: “You should instruct your children to entrust themselves to God in the face of unfair treatment, to face injustice without retaliation, and see the needs of those around them.”
p. 58 “Faced with being kind to one who abuses you, there is nowhere to go but to God, who alone can enable a person to respond in love. When your child’s heart desires revenge, when she must love an enemy, when her faith demands she leave room for God’s justice—there is no place to go but to the cross.” “Getting help from Christ was powerfully illustrated in the life of our daughter. As a ninth grader she seemed to get on the wrong side of her Spanish teacher. Through four years of high school she struggled with feeling angry over being sinned against. We spent many hours talking about how to respond. We discussed the impossibility of her loving this lady apart from God’s grace. We encouraged her to find hope, strength, consolation and comfort in Christ.”

6) Using “the rod”
p.31 “I recall many conversations that went like this:
Father: You didn’t obey Daddy, did you?
Child: No.
Father: Do you remember what God says Daddy must do if you disobey?
Child: Spank me?
Father: That’s right. I must spank you. If I don’t, then I would be disobeying God. You and I would both be wrong. That would not be good for you or for me, would it?
Child: No. (A reluctant reply)”

p.36 “The child learns to receive correction, not because parents are always right, but because God says the rod of correction imparts wisdom.”
p.74 “A biblical approach to children involves two elements that you weave together. One element is rich, full communication. The other is the rod. ‘Do not withhold discipline from a child; if you punish him with the rod, he will not die. Punish him with the rod and save his soul from death.’ Proverbs 13-14.”
p.104 Tripp describes spanking his son while guests are over: “Nick, a friend from church, and his girlfriend, Angela, were visiting for a Sunday afternoon. During our meal, one of our sons was disobedient. I took him to a private room upstairs to discipline him. “What’s he going to do with him?” Angela inquired. “Probably spank him,” my wife responded matter-of-factly. At that moment my son’s cry could be heard upstairs. Angela went running from the house in a state of great agitation.”
p.110 “The rod is a rescue mission. The child who needs a spanking has become distanced from his parents through disobedience. The spanking is designed to rescue the child from continuing in his foolishness. If he continues, his doom is certain. Thus, the parent, driven by love for the child, must use the rod.” “Failure to obey Mom or Dad is failure to obey God. This is the issue. The child has failed to obey God.”
p.112 “I know of nothing harder than spanking my children. It is difficult to hold your own child over your knee and purposefully inflict pain on him. Who benefits if you do not spank your child? You do. You are delivered from the agony of inflicting pain on one who is precious to you.”
p.114 “I have witnessed spankings administered through a double layer of diapers to a child who never stopped moving long enough to know he had been spanked. The spanking was ineffective because the parents never made the rod felt.”
p.115 “The rod returns the child to the place of blessing. Left to himself, he would continue to live a lust-driven life. He would continue to seek comfort in being a slave to his desires and fears. The rod of correction returns him to the place of submission to parents in which God has promised blessing.”
p.149 “The ‘when’ of spanking is so simple that parents miss it. If your child has not obeyed, he needs to be spanked.”
p.151 Tripp describes the whipping procedure: take the child to a private place (so nobody can stop the abuse), make the child confess, tell the child "how many swats he will receive", put the child over your lap (as Tripp says, to "put the spanking in the context of your physical relationship" (!!)), pull the child's diapers or "drawers" down and whip them. Then pull the child up and show affection.
p.152 If the child is angry about being whipped, then "the discipline session is not over" and Tripp says to whip them some more until they are "sweet".
p.153 “Because you are dealing with young children, there is a heavy emphasis on the undeniably tactile experience of spanking."
p.154 “When your child is old enough to resist your directives, he is old enough to be disciplined. Rebellion can be something as simple as an infant struggling against a diaper change or stiffening out his body when you want him to sit on your lap. When our oldest child was approximately 8 months old, we were confronted with parenting our first mobile child. We had a bookshelf constructed of boards and bricks. Fearing the shelf would fall on him, Margy told him not to pull himself up by the shelf. After moving him away from the shelf, she left the room. As she peeked in on him, she observed him surveying the room. Not seeing her, he headed back toward the forbidden bookshelf. Here was a young child, not yet able to walk or to talk, looking to see if the coast was clear so he could disobey. Obviously, he was old enough to be disciplined.” (He’s not old enough to even understand English! – my comment)

7) Hide the whippings from others
p.114 Tripp answers the concern of a parent: “I’m afraid of being arrested for child abuse.” This is his answer: “There is validity to this concern. You must be careful to avoid unnecessary exposure to being reported by someone who does not approve of spanking. Spanking should be done in the privacy of the home.”

A trip to the Christian bookstore

2008-01-19T06:46:00.000-08:00

I am ashamed to say yesterday that when we went to the local Christian bookstore in response to Dr. Dobson's books on using corporal punishment especially on little boys being placed front and centre as part of a promotional opportunity on books with parenting as a focus I covered all of his books with 3-4 books of a more gentle caring nature. I hope that this diminishes the possibility of people actually buying that produce.

George Bush: Sanctity of Human Life.

2008-01-18T21:01:00.001-08:00

Contact: White House, Office of the Press Secretary, 202-456-2580

WASHINGTON, Jan. 18 /Christian Newswire/ -- The following text is a proclamation by President Bush:

On National Sanctity of Human Life Day, we recognize that each life has inherent dignity and matchless value, and we reaffirm our steadfast determination to defend the weakest and most vulnerable members of our society.

America was founded on the belief that all men are created equal and have an inalienable right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, and our country remains committed to upholding that founding principle. Since taking office, I have signed legislation to help protect life at all stages, and my Administration will continue to encourage adoption, fund abstinence education and crisis pregnancy programs, and support faith-based groups. Today, as our society searches for new ways to ease human suffering, we must pursue the possibilities of science in a manner that respects the sacred gift of life and upholds our moral values.

Our Nation has made progress in its efforts to protect human life, and we will strive to change hearts and minds with compassion and decency. On National Sanctity of Human Life Day and throughout the year, we help strengthen the culture of life in America and work for the day when every child is welcomed in life and protected in law.

NOW, THEREFORE, I, GEORGE W. BUSH, President of the United States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Constitution and laws of the United States, do hereby proclaim Sunday, January 20, 2008, as National Sanctity of Human Life Day. I call upon all Americans to recognize this day with appropriate ceremonies and to underscore our commitment to respecting and protecting the life and dignity of every human being.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this eighteenth day of January, in the year of our Lord two thousand eight, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and thirty-second.

GEORGE W. BUSH

http://christiannewswire.com/news/808825416.html

UK Doctors Refuse to Give Hysterectomy to Disabled 15-year-old

2008-01-18T20:58:00.001-08:00

LONDON, January 18, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Doctors in the UK have decided against performing a hysterectomy on a 15-year-old girl with cerebral palsy, an operation the girl's mother requested to prevent the girl from experiencing the pain of menstruation.

Alison Thorpe, whose daughter Katie suffers from cerebral palsy and cannot walk or talk, made the request to doctors on the basis that menstruation would be an infliction of pain and indignity on Katie. Following an outcry from disabled rights groups, the doctors changed their minds and said they would only operate if there was a medical reason to do so.

"This means that if and when Katie does start her periods she could endure months and months of pain and discomfort before anything is done," said Thorpe. "I think the Trust has bowed down to what they perceived to be public opinion. But I have had overwhelming support from the public, both able-bodied and disabled people. The only opposition has been from disabled rights movements but I would say to them, 'Come and spend a week with me, walk in my shoes'. I've spent 15 years with my daughter, as a mother who loves her dearly I am trying to do the best I can for her."

"I feel the trust misread the so-called lack of support from the minority, groups such as Scope," she continued. "I have not had any contact with any (disability) organization, they do not know me or Katie. They have not provided any support or help for us as a family. I am not surprised by what they said but in the way they said it. They have not been made aware of any of the facts in his case, they made up their mind before hearing the other side of the story, without referring to us. I don't want to take away disabled people's rights, I want to give them choice."

Doctors prescribed contraceptive pills and injections to stop Katie's periods, but Thorpe turned them down because she was afraid Katie might develop thrombosis from them.

The hospital authorities say they cannot justify surgery on the grounds suggested by the mother.

Thorpe, who lives with partner Peter Reynolds, has another daughter, 12-year-old Melissa, who has written to the hospital's non-executive directors in an effort to change their minds out of pity. The 12-year-old's letter recommends surgery once Katie starts her periods.

"It's one of those things, life with a disabled child is one long battle and this is just another step down the ladder," said Thorpe. "It was not unexpected. It means we move to stage two and carrying on fighting."

"An irreversible procedure of this nature that is not clinically necessary is not the right way forward," said Sharon Collins, an executive director at SCOPE, a British organization that works to aid victims of cerebral palsy. "There are so many approaches, this is a completely inappropriate response to the situation. To violate Katie's rights is not the answer."

"Scope does not believe that a child should be modified to fit society but instead that society needs to adapt and become more inclusive of disabled people," said Andy Rickell, another executive director at SCOPE.

"Before we make any decision to operate on a patient we look at each case on an individual basis," said a spokesman for the Mid Essex Hospital Services. "This applies in the case of Katie Thorpe and we have met the family to discuss this. Due to patient confidentiality we are not able to give any more details."

Katie's case is very similar to that of Ashley X, a girl born brain-damaged to parents in the United States. Ashley's parents argued that since she had the mind of a little girl, she should always have a body of a little girl. They used extensive hormone treatment to stunt the 9-year-old's development, and had doctors perform a hysterectomy on her. Doctors also performed a highly controversial procedure to remove her breast buds, a procedure that prompted backlash from disabled-rights organizations who accused the parents of mutilating their daughter for their own convenience.

See Related LifeSiteNews Coverage:

Parents Keep Disabled Girl Forever a Child, Using Surgery to Stunt Growth and Stop Development
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2007/jan/07010906.html

Abortion as a Health and Moral Hazard

2008-01-18T20:56:00.001-08:00

MANILA, Philippines, January 18, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo today expressed her grief over the discovery of a dead foetus inside a washroom in the Malacañang Palace complex early Thursday morning. She has ordered authorities to intensify a government campaign against abortion.

"The President is extremely sad over the discovery of the foetus in the New Executive Building. As a devout Catholic, a mother and grandmother, she is against abortion and believes strongly in the sanctity of life. We are saddened by this incident. We hold every human life sacred. We pray for the soul of this innocent child and hope that whoever was responsible for this, realises the gravity of this deed and seek atonement," presidential spokesman Ignacio Bunye said in a statement.

Arroyo's chief security officer said local police were trying to find who left the foetus, placed in a blue plastic bag and abandoned in a toilet.

"We still have no idea if it was intentionally aborted or it was an accident," Brigadier-General Romeo Prestoza told reporters, adding they were reviewing tapes from a closed circuit camera to identify a woman who went into the washroom early in the morning.

President Arroyo has directed the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) to step up its programs geared towards dissuading people from tolerating abortion, and to intensified counseling efforts for unwed and teenage mothers.

"She has given instructions to the DSWD to expand its community networking and outreach efforts to educate the public on the need to shun abortion as a health and moral hazard," said Bunye.

Abortion is strictly illegal in the Philippines and the government under President Arroyo has been promoting chastity education, natural family planning and the traditional Philippine culture in its protection of life and family. "We will push for responsible parenthood and a population policy that is in keeping with our culture," President Arroyo told foreign reporters shortly after her inauguration.

Read related LifeSiteNews.com coverage:

NEW PHILIPPINE PRESIDENT'S PRO-LIFE STAND FRUSTRATES POPULATION CONTROLLERS
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2001/feb/01020203.html

Philippine President Declares March 25 Day of the Unborn
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2004/mar/04032507.html

Abortion Pill Crackdown in Philippines Has Police Chasing Down U.N. - Supported NGOs
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2005/may/05052602.html

Philippines Uses UN Population Control Money for Natural Family Planning
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2005/oct/05101205.html

PHILIPPINE HEALTH WORKERS FIND INTERESTING USES FOR DUMPED CONTRACEPTIVES
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2003/jan/03011505.html

A controversial pro-life strategy

2008-01-18T20:54:00.001-08:00

Some people in Racine say a mass mailing by the local chapter of Wisconsin Right to Life is in poor taste.

The group is defending mailing more than 44,000 plastic fetus statues to homes in and around Racine.

The models began arriving in mailboxes Saturday.

Wisconsin Right to Life spokesman Dave Obernderger syas the intent was to show the humanity of the unborn baby, and was not meant to be offensive.

"The most positive out of this is the discussion that's occuring," says Obernderger.

"I think it's good to have discussion, and I think it's great to hear the positive and the negative. I think we need to have the discussion on this very important issue."

Obernderger calls the mailing the largest undertaking the chapter has had in quite a while, if ever.

http://www.620wtmj.com/news/local/13892537.html at the url you'll also find a link to a radio commentary.

Henry Morgentaler: "Abortionist Morgentaler Patient:: "I Told Him I Don't Want to Do This to My baby."

2008-01-15T18:53:00.000-08:00

Lifesite.com shares the tragic story of a mother who had what she reports to be a negative difficult - heartwrenching- experience with Mr. Morgentaler.

VANCOUVER, January 15, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - It's been more than thirty years, but social worker Vicky Green still vividly remembers her abortion experience with Dr. Henry Morgentaler, and she tells part of her story in the short film '1st Degree Morgentaler' by John S.C. Hetherington.

The powerful short film juxtaposes shots of Dr. Morgentaler explaining his rationale for supporting the "right to choose" abortion, against the testimonial of Mrs. Green.

"We came to a stop light and I wanted to get out and run," says Mrs. Green, recalling her former boyfriend driving her to Dr. Morgentaler's first clinic in the east end of Montreal. But soon she found herself face to face with the doctor himself, "I was surprised it was Dr. Morgentaler doing the abortion."

After a brief counseling session she told him, "I don't want to do this to my baby." According to Mrs. Green Dr. Morgentaler replied, "It's not a baby." She says she cried the whole way through the abortion procedure.

The ten minute film is being released as part of the online film contest Project Breakout. Interestingly the date of the announcement of the winners of Project Breakout happens to coincide with the 20th Anniversary of the January 28, 1988 Supreme Court ruling, known as the 'Morgentaler Decision,' which decriminalized abortion in Canada. Since that ruling, the fate of Canada's abortion law has been in the hands of Parliament, and, since it has failed to act, there has been no legal restriction on abortion for twenty years.

After making the contest finals and editing his material together, Mr. Hetherington said, "When I learned the Project Breakout winners were to be announced on January 28th, the 20th anniversary of 'The Morgentaler Decision'; I knew entering this film was meant to be."

'1st Degree Morgentaler' is one of 15 films in the finals of the Project Breakout contest. It can be viewed and voted on from Monday January 14th to Sunday January 27th. Fifteen votes are allowed per person each day, and the audience vote counts for twenty-five percent of the overall rating. "Your support would be much appreciated," said Hetherington.

Click this link to view and vote for '1st Degree Morgentaler' each day beginning January 14th.
http://shortfilm.projectbreakout.com/media_page/entry_id/219

There is a short registration process requiring name, postal code and email provides an activation code permitting voting.

Filmmaker's site with info. on how to obtain a DVD copy by donation.
http://www.shoutlife.com/abortedartist

In Beloved Memory of Laura Hope Smith: Victim of Choice

2008-01-15T18:43:00.000-08:00

http://realchoice.0catch.com shares the story of this young woman's final life chapter through the eyes of her family.

It was 7pm, we had just finished dinner and settled down to watch the evening news. My husband's cell phone rang with Laura's name on the ID. We always loved hearing from her. Laura was so full of life, your spirits were lifted just by talking to her. Except this time it wasn't her voice. There was guttural screaming and sobbing on the other end by a voice I did not immediately recognize. I heard the words "Laura", "Hospital" and the worst one, "Not Breathing," and then "abortion". My brain tilted, my heart sank, and life as I knew it ceased. It was Laura's friend Karen on the phone. She told me what happened, that Laura was having an abortion and something went terribly wrong. Karen was at the ER and the Doctor needed to talk to me. What Karen didn't know was that Laura had arrived at the ER already deceased. The EMT's found her this way at the abortion mill. The hospital was looking for next of kin to give the news to first, and Karen wasn't kin. "Laura's gone" the doctor told me. I wanted to hear "50-50 chance"...I would even accept "90-10 chance." But the word "chance" was not in the doctor's statement. All hope was gone, along with my daughter.
That call came on September 13, 2007 to Eileen and Tom Smith. Laura had died on a Hyannis, Massachusetts abortion table.

The bewildered couple hadn't even known that their daughter was pregnant.

Karen and Laura had arrived at Women Health Center in the morning for preparatory steps to abort Laura's 13-week baby. The two young women were to return in the afternoon for the actual procedure. Laura wasn't supposed to drive, so Karen drove and the two ran errands. Because Laura wasn't supposed to eat, Karen fasted with her friend.

They returned to the facility at about 4 in the afternoon and waited. Laura was called in at about 5, back to where Dr. Rapin Osathanondh and his instruments waited for her. Karen stepped out briefly, expecting her friend to be out of surgery in about fifteen minutes. But Laura didn't emerge from the bowels of the clinic. A worried Karen grew increasingly distressed.

"And then all of a sudden [an assistant] comes out and says she's not breathing. And I was like, what do you mean she's not breathing," Karen told the Cape Cod Times.

Fire department rescuers were dispatched to the clinic at 5:49 p.m., and found an unresponsive patient. They initiated CPR and took her to the hospital. Karen followed, but was not permitted to see her friend. She asked about Laura's condition. "It doesn't look good," she was told. Because next of kin hadn't been notified yet, the doctor couldn't tell Karen the truth: Laura was already dead on arrival. It was 6:22 p.m.

I met with the doctor who aborted my grandchild, and who saw my daughter take her last breath. He would only meet me in a public place, without my husband. We talked for an hour and a half. Based on that meeting I believe I know what happened to Laura. He denies doing anything that caused her death. When we were done talking about Laura, I prayed, and asked God if there was anything He would have me say to the doctor. This is what I said next.... "The blood of my daughter is on your hands; the blood of my grandchild is on your hands; the blood of every life you have ever taken is on your hands," and I went on from there. He was silent with his head hung low. When I was ready to leave, I asked him if he would think about my daughter, and consider not doing any more abortionsâ€”he said he would think about it. When I left there I was praying, and said to God, "Can You stop this man from doing abortions? Is this what You have in mind, that he might even stop doing them?" I was thinking too small. I thought if one girl changed her mind [about having an abortion], I could find some comfort. I then realized that the Lord had much bigger plans. I have never experienced in my life, such tragedy, nor such grace.
OR also reports that Eileen Smith said she was "appalled and sickened" by her daughter's death, but can not give more details due to a pending lawsuit against the abortionist.

"My daughter was 22, healthy, and alive when she walked into that clinic," OR quotes Eileen Smith. "She didnâ€™t even have a cold. There is no reason for her to be dead."

OR says, "Laura was born into abject poverty in Hondurus on May 25, 1985, and was abandoned at an orphanage. An American couple that adopted Laura abused her terribly and gave her up. Laura was then adopted by Tom and Eileen Smith, a Christian family that lovingly raised Laura in the Cape Cod community of Sandwich." She graduated from Upper Cape Tech in 2004, trained as a cosmetologist, but she left that field to work in retail management.

It's particularly sad to me that Laura resorted to abortion despite being a Christian active in her local church. Her mother also reported that Laura was strongly opposed to abortion. Which goes to show that anybody can panic, and our churches need to be teaching young women how to get past the panic that too often leads to the abortion table.

OR reports that over 600 people attended Laura's funeral, and at least one young woman decided to reject abortion after learning of Laura's needless death. National Catholic Register reports that the young woman was being pressured by her parents to abort, and was about to capitulate when she learned of Laura's fate.

I know that God is going to bring good out of my daughter's death. What a horrible thing; for my daughter to be associated with abortion. But, if God's going to use it for good and for His glory, then so be it. We're going very public with a very shameful, private thing because I believe God wants to use it to save lives. I believe the truth will come out, and the light of God will shine on this. Laura's death has had tremendous impact around the country, and even into Canada, without the local news mentioning it. It just came out in the secular media this weekâ€”5 weeks after Laura's death. I now believe it is my calling to keep telling Laura's story to the Church, and the world. I naively believed that abortion was not a choice for a Christian girl. A Pastor had even apologized to me and the Lord, for not speaking about this from his pulpit. We both had false assumptions. This is a problem in the Church, and one that needs to be spoken about from the pulpits. We have to take the "A" word out of the closet, put it out in the open, and discuss it. And maybe, possibly, hopefully, we'll even become active against it. Please keep our family in your prayers, and please tell someone Laura's story.

Laura's parents are also sharing the story publicly after a few months of healing in hopes of everyone learning the risks of abortion and learning from their tragedy. Christian newswire reported that Laura's mother, Eileen, intends to have a significant public role educating women on her daughter's death.
"My daughter walked into that office healthy and she left dead" are tragic words that have passed her lips. On January 22nd, 2008 on the 35th anniversary in the United States of Roe vs Wade she will marching alongside Concerned Women for America. She is also slated to join volunteers on wednesday to lobby congress for pro-life legislation.

Remember their daughter. Pray for this family.

A child named Luck:

2008-01-13T19:40:00.000-08:00

http://www.cbsnews.com/sections/i_video/main500251.shtml?id=3706833n

This clip on 60 minutes was just amazing to me. It's a horrible tale of how Conga has been impacted by rape. How it is being used as weapon of war. How women are being damaged physically and emotionally by it. Women who are tortured. Women who are gang raped. It is a horrible horrible video to watch and I would encourage everyone to take that into consideration if they choose to click and begin watching this clip.

One of the women tells her story of being gang raped, her brother killed in front of her when he refused to engage in raping her, and being taken as a sexual (and physical) slave for 8 months without her born children coming with her - she didn't even know if they were alive. She conceived a child during that period of time and at the end they will show you a clip of her baby. A baby she named Luck which speaks to the great beauty of the human spirit. That someone is able to find hope and luck and good fortune amidst some great challenges and hardships.

2008-01-13T12:35:00.000-08:00

Giuliani Rattled, Cancels Remarks as Pro-lifers Disrupt Sunday Bus Tour Stop
"A third of my generation is dead because of politicians like Giuliani." -- Steven Pokorny, age 28, at Giuliani during meeting in Miami, Sunday, Jan. 13

Contact: Joseph Landry, 406-860-9738; Steven Pokorny, 216-346-9765; Randall Terry, 904-461-0834; all with The "Stop Rudy" Tour

MIAMI, Jan. 13 /Christian Newswire/ -- Rudy Giuliani was rattled by pro-life advocates and canceled his speech at his first bus-tour event Sunday in Miami. Activists have planned confrontations with Rudy for every stop of his Florida bus tour. Photos available online.

On Sunday, Jan. 13, at approximately 12:15 PM, pro-life activists were in the crowd at The Green Street Cafe (located at 3110 Commodor Plaza, Coconut Grove Florida, just outside Miami) waiting for Giuliani to begin his Florida Bus Tour.

When Rudy Giuliani arrived, Joseph Landry (age 26) was within 5 feet of the candidate, and began yelling: You are a baby killer! You are a baby killer! Florida is pro-life! Rudy wants public funding for abortion!" See news report.

Law enforcement officials immediately escorted Mr. Landry from the area, while Mr. Landry continued his monologue.

Within Minutes, Steven Pokorny, age 28, stood to his feet and cried out, "A third of my generation is dead because of politicians like Giuliani! Giuliani wants to kill children and have you pay for it!" Law enforcement did not stop Mr. Pokorny.

At that point, Giuliani left the building, without addressing the crowd.

Mr. Pokorny was able to follow Mr. Giuliani for more than a minute, yelling out about Rudy's pro-choice, pro-homosexual agenda. Again, Mr. Pokorny was not interrupted by police.

Giuliani officials had no idea how many pro-lifers were in the crowd, and how many more times Giuliani would be confronted. This might explain why Mr. Giuliani did not make any remarks - and left the meeting without addressing supporters.

Pro-lifers have scheduled confrontations with Rudy on every stop of his Florida Bus tour.

Video footage of the confrontations with Rudy is available upon request.

http://christiannewswire.com/index.php?module=releases&task=view&releaseID=5336

Male Privilege

2008-01-12T06:52:00.000-08:00

I find this an interesting list. Food for thought. Permission granted by the author.

The Male Privilege Checklist

1. My odds of being hired for a job, when competing against female applicants, are probably skewed in my favor. The more prestigious the job, the larger the odds are skewed.

Without question I think that men have an easier time climbing the corporate ladder than women but I think that's a larger issue than male privilege I think that women tend to want balance work with other life matters. My understanding is that if you take a man who has never had children and a woman who has never had children you will find career successes equivalent.

2. I can be confident that my co-workers won’t think I got my job because of my sex - even though that might be true. (More).

That's true.

3. If I am never promoted, it’s not because of my sex.

That's true.

4. If I fail in my job or career, I can feel sure this won’t be seen as a black mark against my entire sex’s capabilities.

I don't think it works that way in either direction.

5. I am far less likely to face sexual harassment at work than my female co-workers are. (More).

That's true.

6. If I do the same task as a woman, and if the measurement is at all subjective, chances are people will think I did a better job.

I don't agree.

7. If I’m a teen or adult, and if I can stay out of prison, my odds of being raped are relatively low. (More).

Very true - and a tragedy.

8. On average, I am taught to fear walking alone after dark in average public spaces much less than my female counterparts are.

I agree.

9. If I choose not to have children, my masculinity will not be called into question.

Agreed.

10. If I have children but do not provide primary care for them, my masculinity will not be called into question.

I agree.

11. If I have children and provide primary care for them, I’ll be praised for extraordinary parenting if I’m even marginally competent. (More).

That is true but it's not a uniform reaction. I would have to say that there is also a real question at times about the masculinity of a guy who stays at home. That's sexism in reverse.

12. If I have children and a career, no one will think I’m selfish for not staying at home.

That's true to an extent but people who feel that a child needs a full-time parent may criticize the choice of the entire family to have two working incomes.

13. If I seek political office, my relationship with my children, or who I hire to take care of them, will probably not be scrutinized by the press.

I have not seen a politician who has had their child care plans outlined in the press so I am curious for an example. In terms of the relationship with children that's greatly mistaken. Look at Mr. Giuliani and having his poor relationship with his children spotlighted. Look at Mr. Clinton and the positive reviews of his rapport with his own daughter. The list goes on. Those things find their way to the spotlight now.

14. My elected representatives are mostly people of my own sex. The more prestigious and powerful the elected position, the more this is true.

I'll agree with the former. I'll defer comment on the latter.

15. When I ask to see “the person in charge,” odds are I will face a person of my own sex. The higher-up in the organization the person is, the surer I can be.

The professions where I tend to want to see the person in charge are female dominated so while it's not been my experience I have to factor that in.

16. As a child, chances are I was encouraged to be more active and outgoing than my sisters. (More).

That's probably true.

17. As a child, I could choose from an almost infinite variety of children’s media featuring positive, active, non-stereotyped heroes of my own sex. I never had to look for it; male protagonists were (and are) the default.

I can't comment.

18. As a child, chances are I got more teacher attention than girls who raised their hands just as often. (More).

I can't comment.

19. If my day, week or year is going badly, I need not ask of each negative episode or situation whether or not it has sexist overtones.

20. I can turn on the television or glance at the front page of the newspaper and see people of my own sex widely represented, every day, without exception.

I think both sexes are represented.

21. If I’m careless with my financial affairs it won’t be attributed to my sex.

I am not sure that's true. Certainly my husband is carefree when it comes to spending money on traditional male sort of "toys for boys" kind of stuff. I think that's heavily attributed to his sex when it's commented on.

22. If I’m careless with my driving it won’t be attributed to my sex.

I am not sure that's true at all. Young men have a definite stereotype - grounded in statistics - around high risk driving habits.

23. I can speak in public to a large group without putting my sex on trial.

I don't think that women have that experience.

24. Even if I sleep with a lot of women, there is no chance that I will be seriously labeled a “slut,” nor is there any male counterpart to “slut-bashing.” (More).

I totally agree with that.

25. I do not have to worry about the message my wardrobe sends about my sexual availability or my gender conformity. (More).

I can't agree because I think that men who choose stylish clothes or certain colours or such are mocked for paying a bit too much attention to their appearance and questions are raised about their sexual orientation. That, however, is NOT the norm and it's not as ingrained and as common an issue as women's clothing being assessed for some kind of slut-factor. I can't agree with the statement in black and white but it's MUCH more of an issue for women.

26. My clothing is typically less expensive and better-constructed than women’s clothing for the same social status. While I have fewer options, my clothes will probably fit better than a woman’s without tailoring. (More).

Mixed - I agree with some parts.

27. The grooming regimen expected of me is relatively cheap and consumes little time. (More).

More true of the past than the present.

28. If I buy a new car, chances are I’ll be offered a better price than a woman buying the same car. (More).

I can't comment.

29. If I’m not conventionally attractive, the disadvantages are relatively small and easy to ignore.

I don't think I'd say that they are relatively small but I'll agree that women have to deal with higher expectations.

30. I can be loud with no fear of being called a shrew. I can be aggressive with no fear of being called a bitch.

I'll agree with the latter and not agree with the former.

31. I can ask for legal protection from violence that happens mostly to men without being seen as a selfish special interest, since that kind of violence is called “crime” and is a general social concern. (Violence that happens mostly to women is usually called “domestic violence” or “acquaintance rape,” and is seen as a special interest issue.)

I would like to ponder that.

32. I can be confident that the ordinary language of day-to-day existence will always include my sex. “All men are created equal,” mailman, chairman, freshman, he.

I agree but it's a non-issue. That's just petty.

33. My ability to make important decisions and my capability in general will never be questioned depending on what time of the month it is.

I agree.

34. I will never be expected to change my name upon marriage or questioned if I don’t change my name.

I would agree with that but they will be questioned about their wife's decision and some people will tie that to their manhood.

35. The decision to hire me will never be based on assumptions about whether or not I might choose to have a family sometime soon.

True.

36. Every major religion in the world is led primarily by people of my own sex. Even God, in most major religions, is pictured as male.

I agree - non issue but I agree.

37. Most major religions argue that I should be the head of my household, while my wife and children should be subservient to me.

I don't agree with how that's framed.

38. If I have a wife or live-in girlfriend, chances are we’ll divide up household chores so that she does most of the labor, and in particular the most repetitive and unrewarding tasks. (More).

I think that occurs more after you have children than at the onset of a relationship. Also I don't agree that women get the most "repetitive and unrewarding tasks". Although I am neat I don't know that I find too many chores rewarding - they are just things that need done.

39. If I have children with a wife or girlfriend, chances are she’ll do most of the childrearing, and in particular the most dirty, repetitive and unrewarding parts of childrearing.

Women will do more of the childrearing. It's a rare family that splits it 50-50. I find the comment "the most dirty, repetitive and unrewarding aspects of childrearing" - that comment just sickens me.

40. If I have children with a wife or girlfriend, and it turns out that one of us needs to make career sacrifices to raise the kids, chances are we’ll both assume the career sacrificed should be hers.

Agreed.

41. Magazines, billboards, television, movies, pornography, and virtually all of media is filled with images of scantily-clad women intended to appeal to me sexually. Such images of men exist, but are rarer.

I agree but I don't think that's something I want equality around.

42. In general, I am under much less pressure to be thin than my female counterparts are. (More). If I am fat, I probably suffer fewer social and economic consequences for being fat than fat women do. (More).

I agree with the former but studies show that there are hiring practices that discriminate against those with extra weight.

43. If I am heterosexual, it’s incredibly unlikely that I’ll ever be beaten up by a spouse or lover. (More).

Agreed.

44. Complete strangers generally do not walk up to me on the street and tell me to “smile.” (More: 1 2).

Totally true!

45. On average, I am not interrupted by women as often as women are interrupted by men.

I haven't noticed that.

46. I have the privilege of being unaware of my male privilege.

I think that many people don't stop and reflect on these issues.

(Compiled by Barry Deutsch, aka “Ampersand.” Permission is granted to reproduce this list in any way, for any purpose, so long as the acknowledgment of Peggy McIntosh’s work is not removed. If possible, I’d appreciate it if folks who use it would tell me how they used it; my email is barry-at-amptoons-dot-com.)

(This is a continually updated document; the most current version of The Male Privilege Checklist can always be found at amptoons.com/blog/the-male-privilege-checklist . To see posts discussing the Male Privilege Checklist and various items on it, please visit this archive page).

http://www.amptoons.com/blog/the-male-privilege-checklist/

Forced to abort at 9 months

2008-01-07T05:48:00.000-08:00

A Chinese woman who was forced to have an abortion despite being nine months pregnant is suing the authorities for their actions.

Jin Yani's waters had already broken when China's abortion police came for her. They took her to a nearby abortion centre, injected her unborn baby girl and removed the body two days later.

Mrs Jin's crime was to have become pregnant by her fiance five months before she married him at the age of 20, the legal minimum.

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Pregnancy outside marriage is illegal. But forced abortions are now supposed to be illegal in China.

In a blow against the state's brutally imposed one-child policy, she and her husband are claiming danmages against the authorities, saying that officials acted unlawfully.

China's higher courts have agreed to hear the plea - the first time this has happened in a case of this kind.

Yang Zhongchen, her husband, tried to prevent the abortion by wining and dining officials in Hebei province. He also agreed to pay a fine of £650, but none of this prevented Changli county family planning officials arriving on Sept 7, 2000.

Mrs Jin said: "I got on my knees and begged them after they took me to the clinic and said I wanted to give birth to my daughter. I had already named her Yang Yin."

In the clinic, she was injected with a large syringe. Her husband arrived in time to witness the removal of the dead foetus with forceps two days later.

Mrs Jin lost blood, and was hospitalised for 44 days. Her husband was charged for the medicine she needed. He said that his wife is now infertile as a result of the abortion.

Mr Yang has demanded £85,000 to cover medical expenses, psychological distress and Mrs Jin's inability to conceive.

At first the case got nowhere, but the regional people's court agreed to hear the couple's appeal in October. At that point, Mr Yang said that officials made contact offering him a job and free hospital treatment for his wife. But that is not enough, he said.

"They have made no mention of damages," he said while on a visit to Beijing to meet his lawyer. "We can get a job anywhere."

But the couple say they can never truly be compensated.

"Our baby will never come back," Mrs Jin said. "We just hope this kind of thing will never happen again."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2008/01/07/wchina107.xml

You will never read about feminist outage over this mother, nine months pregnant, being forced to abort. It's because there is none.

21 missionaries who died for the faith in 2007

2008-01-05T21:23:00.001-08:00

Rome, Jan. 2, 2008 (CWNews.com) - In a year-end account of missionary deaths, the Fides news service has named 21 Church workers who died for the faith in 2007.

The Fides report lists the priests, religious, and seminarians who were killed during the year. The report notes that the number is slightly down from the 24 who died in 2006, and the 25 in 2005.

Because the circumstances of their deaths were different-- and in several cases unclear-- Fides does not refer to the 21 people who died as "martyrs." But the report notes that each of them "without a doubt made a radical decision: to be witnesses of God's Love often in situations of violence, degradation, material and spiritual poverty, total disrespect for the dignity and rights of the human person."

Asia saw the deaths of 8 missionaries in 2007: 4 priests, 3 deacons, and a seminarian. In Latin America there were 7 deaths: 6 priests and one religious brother. More surprisingly, 2 priests were killed in their homes in Spain.

Acknowledging that there are many others who die for the faith and remain unrecognized, Fides has asked readers to supply any information that could supplement the annual count.

The Christian missionaries who were slain in 2007 are:

Father Mario Bianco, an Italian Consolata missionary, who died in Colombia on February 15.
Father Martin Addai, a Ghanaian White Father, who died in Kenya on March 10.
Father José Luis Camacho Cepeda, a Peruvian, who died in Colombia on March 11.
Father Fransiskus Madhu, an Indonesian Divine Word missionary, who died in the Philippines on April 1.
Sister Anne Thole, a Franciscan from Swaziland, who died in South Africa on April 1.
Father Richard Bimeriki, a Congolese priest, who died in Rwanda on March 12.
Father Wolfgang Hermann, a German Fidei Donum missionary, who died in Brazil on April 10.
Father Salvador Herandez Seller, a Spanish priest, who died in Spain on April 11.
Father Humberto Macias Rosales, a Mexican priest, who died there on May 1.
Father Raghiid Ganni, a Chaldean Catholic priest, who died in Iraq on June 3 along with 3 deacons (below).
Rev. Basman Yousef Daoud, a Chaldean deacon, who also died in Mosul on June 3.
Rev. Ghasan Bidawid, a Chaldean deacon, who also died in Mosul on June 3.
Rev. Wahid Hanna, a Chaldean deacon, who also died in Mosul on June 3.
Justin Daniel Bataclan, a Filipino seminarian, who died on June 7 in Quezon City.
Brother Enrique Alberto Olano Merino, a Little Brother of Mary from El Salvador, who died in Guatemala on June 9.
Father Tomas Perez, a Spanish priest, who died in Spain on July 16.
Father Fernando Sanchez Duran, a Mexican priest, who died there on July 22.
Father Ricardo Junious, an American Oblate of Mary Immaculate missionary, who died in Mexico on July 29.
Father Florante Rigonan, a Filipino priest, who died there on August 27.
Father Nicholaspillai Packiyaranjith, a Sri Lankan priest, who died there on Septemerb 26.
Father Allard Msheyene, a South African Oblate of Mary Immaculate missionary, who died in South Africa on October 6.
http://www.cwnews.com/news/viewstory.cfm?recnum=55689

Blood red poinsettias

2008-01-05T21:16:00.000-08:00

During the Christmas season millions of pots of red poinsettias can be seen in churches and homes throughout North America. The red represents the blood of Christ. It has recently been learned, however, that the symbol extends beyond that. The Ecke Ranch is one of the largest suppliers in the USA of this particular product. They are also one of the largest contributors to Planned Parenthood and have been added to the boycott list for businesses.

Worldnet explores this further in this article

When Christian churches flooded their facilities with poinsettias to celebrate the Christmas season, odds are that at least some of the money they paid for the blooms will be dedicated to paying for abortions, a new report reveals.

According to the Corporate Funding Project assembled and released by Life Decisions International, the Paul Ecke Ranch business of Ecinitas, Calif., has been added to its Boycott List because of its support for Planned Parenthood, the biggest abortion advocacy organization in the world and the largest U.S. provider in the abortion industry.

Other corporations newly added to the list are BBJ Linen, which produces home products, and Carlson Companies, including its travel agencies and brand names Country Inns & Suites, Park Inn, Park Plaza, Radisson and Regent, according to Life Decisions.

Also added to the list released this week are restaurant chains T.G.I. Friday's and Pick Up Stix, auto services provider Midas and InterContinental Hotels, including brand names Candlewood, Crowne Plaza, Holiday Inn, Indigo and Staybridge, the group said.

Officials at Paul Ecke Ranch declined to return multiple WND messages requesting comment. But on their website, they boast "approximately 70 percent of all the flowering poinsettias in the USA and more than 50 percent worldwide get their start at the Paul Ecke Ranch in Encinitas, California."

The organization says it ships "several million vegetative cuttings" to growers in four dozen nations "and finishes thousands of potted flowering plants for Christmas."

Its website explains how the family ownership team saw the flowers growing wild in the early 1900s and worked for decades to connect the bloom to the Christmas holiday season to build their business, including working with set designers for Bob Hope's shows to make sure they were included each Christmas season.

LDI, which was incorporated in 1992, is "dedicated to challenging the Culture of Death" and concentrates "on exposing and opposing the agenda of Planned Parenthood."
http://worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=59518

Dimitri and Varvara Artamkin: Thanks Mom for Choosing Life:

2008-01-05T21:03:00.000-08:00

Quintuplets Born in UK in Defiance of Medical Pressure to Abort

By John Connolly

OXFORD, January 4, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The quintuplets of a Russian couple were born in the UK after doctors in Russia denied them care unless they aborted some of them.

Dimitri and Varvara Artamkin, both Russian natives, gave birth to five girls at the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford last month. Each of the babies now weighs 3 pounds 3 ounces, and they have been separated since birth so they can undergo incubation in two hospitals.

Dmitri, a mathematics professor, says that the children are each a gift from God.

"We believe God has given them to us as a gift and sent us here, to Britain, to give them the best possible chance," he said. "We don't yet know when we'll be able to take them home - it depends on the progress they make. But we're praying it will be soon."

Dmitri and Varvara come from strong religious backgrounds; both were brought up in the Russian Orthodox Church. They tried to have a baby but were unable to during the first seven years of their marriage. They eventually tried fertility treatments, and were surprised when they discovered that they were pregnant with five children instead of one.

"We love children so much and have always wanted to have lots," said Varvara, a music teacher. "We both come from big families so to us, having lots of children seems normal. I am one of four children, Dimitri is one of nine, and we have 13 nephews and nieces. We have always been surrounded by children and we prayed to God to send us children. What happened to us last year was very sad but we always believed we would have another chance."

"We were very happy when we first found out but we couldn't celebrate because the doctors told us straight away that it would be impossible to have all of them," said Dimitri. "Then all we could feel was worry."

The couple refused to have selective abortion, and because of that were turned away by most Russian doctors due to the risk to Varvara that was posed by so many children being born at once.

"We just said no as soon as they told us. We prayed to be given children and God granted our prayer - to kill them would be totally against everything we believe," said Dimitri. "We go to church every week and believe very strongly in our faith. Varvara's father is a priest in the Russian Orthodox church. For us, having the abortions was not even an option. It was a frightening and sad time for us but we knew we had to have all the babies. We could see all of them on the ultrasounds and each one was a little person. It was not something we even had to discuss."

The quintuplets, named Elizaveta, Alexandra, Nadezhda, Tatiana and Varvara, are the first to be born in the UK in five years. The parents are waiting for them to be strong enough to all be gathered together again. They were very thankful for the amount of support that people have shown them in the past weeks.

"The people we have met since being in this country have been fantastic," said Varvara. "The level of care the babies have received is amazing and strangers have been so kind in sending us gifts. We want everyone here to know how thankful we are. We are a little overwhelmed by all the attention but we know we have everyone's best wishes."

The couple had the babies baptized the day after their birth and their families are planning a big celebration and to help with childcare when they return to Russia. Both Dimitri and Varvara say that they would like to have even more children, although both hope eventually to return to their jobs.

Russian Couple Flees to Britain to Save Their Unborn Quintuplets from Abortion
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2007/nov/07111610.html

Parents Have Quadruplets After Having Twins Two Years Ago
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2007/dec/07122107.html ;

Couple Chooses Life and Sextuplets
http://www.lifesite.net/ldn/2007/jun/07061207.html &nbs...;

Dimitri and Varvara Artamkin

Man of the Year: Pastor Johnny Hunter

2008-01-05T09:03:00.000-08:00

Rev. Johnny Hunter Named Operation Rescue's 'Man of the Year'
Contact: Troy Newman, President, 316-841-1700; Cheryl Sullenger, Senior Policy Advisor, 316-516-3034; both with Operation Rescue, info.operationrescue@yahoo.com

WICHITA, Kansas, Dec. 31 /Christian Newswire/ -- Operation Rescue announces today that it has chosen Rev. Johnny Hunter as Man of the Year for 2007.

Rev. Hunter is the President of L.E.A.R.N., Inc. (Life Education And Resource Network), the largest African-American Pro-life organization in the country. Under Rev. Hunter's leadership, the African-American community has become aware of the devastating effects of abortion on their racial group, and have activated like never before to stop abortion. African-Americans now comprise the fastest growing segment of the Pro-Life Movement.

"We do not want our people to perish because of ignorance. Ignorance and apathy has hindered the proper response to the main destroyer of our future and the child. The single biggest threat to the survival of children, especially children of color, is imposed death by induced abortion," said Rev. Hunter. "The African American community alone has lost over 12,000,000 people due to this most racist act. In the United States, over 36,000,000 human beings have been unjustly destroyed and the numbers are getting worse by the addition of over 4,000 more deaths each day."

"The revival taking place in the African-American community regarding the Sanctity of Life is an amazing and underreported story," said Operation Rescue President Troy Newman. "This remarkable awakening is a direct response to the leadership of Rev. Johnny Hunter and L.E.A.R.N. Operation Rescue is proud to announce Rev. Hunter as our 2007 Man of the Year."

Operation Rescue is one of the leading pro-life Christian activist organizations in the nation. Operation Rescue recently made headlines when it bought and closed an abortion clinic in Wichita, Kansas and has become the voice of the pro-life activist movement in America. Its activities are on the cutting edge of the abortion issue, taking direct action to restore legal personhood to the pre-born and stop abortion in obedience to biblical mandates.
http://christiannewswire.com/news/767585201.html

Giuliani Dumped!

2008-01-05T08:59:00.000-08:00

Giuliani Trounced Because of Abortion: New Hampshire, Florida Next

MEDIA ADVISORY, Jan. 4 /Christian Newswire/ -- "America's Mayor is being sent back to City Hall because of his support of abortion. Our mission is to speed up that process by continuing to expose and confront him in New Hampshire this weekend, then Florida for the rest of the month."

"We will be dogging Rudy in Florida next, until his campaign is a smoldering ruin and a warning to any other pro-choice Republicans: Stay out, or face the same end." Randall Terry, President, Society for Truth and Justice

Weekend Activities:

Pro-life activists will lead protests at Giuliani's appearances in New Hampshire, highlighting Rudy's pro-abortion position, and other positions hostile to the Christian community.

Activists with the Society for Truth and Justice will lead a protest at the Republican debate on Saturday.

A Large literature drop is scheduled for New Hampshire Churches on Sunday Morning, again exposing Rudy's history and agenda.

On Monday and Tuesday, pro-lifers will be handing out literature and holding large signs at key intersections and voting locations, all geared toward pulling away the false front Rudy has constructed - as he tries to pawn himself off as a conservative Republican.

Florida Next. New Hampshire's activities are a prelude to nearly 3 weeks of "Anybody but Rudy" plans scheduled for Florida until the Florida primary on January 29.

For further information, contact Randall Terry at 904 461 0834
http://www.earnedmedia.org/rt0104.htm

The Power of Christian Conservatives: Huckabee won!

2008-01-05T08:55:00.000-08:00

Dobson Says Huckabee Win Displays Power Of Christian Conservatives
Ever since the 2006 midterm elections, there have been suggestions that the influence of Christian conservatives on U.S. presidential politics is waning.

But today Focus on the Family founder James Dobson said the Iowa caucus results suggested otherwise.

Mike Huckabee, a former Baptist minister, easily won the GOP vote in Iowa. Roughly 80 percent of his supporters identified themselves as born again or evangelical Christians.

`The results of the Iowa caucuses reveal that conservative Christians remain a powerful force in American politics. That had to be a great shock to those on the far left,'' Dobson said in a release, according to the Associated Press.

The AP reports that Dobson was critical of "media elites" for writing off Christian conservatives and suggested Huckabee's win "`was evidence of an energized and highly motivated conservative community."

The national influence of Christian conservatives in this presidential cycle is still yet to be seen, however. And a tough test for Huckabee will come in New Hampshire, the next state on the voting calendar. It is expected that a far smaller percentage of GOP voters in the Granite State will self-identify as evangelical Christians compared to Iowa, were entrance polls found that almost 60 percent of GOP caucus-goers described themselves as evangelical.
http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2008/01/04/politics/horserace/entry3675578.shtml

Won by Love: Norma McCorvey

2008-01-05T08:47:00.000-08:00

This photo, I believe, is of Norma with a little girl who witnessed to her when she was a staff at an abortion clinic in Texas. This little girl was a huge part of her conversion story.

Here is a beautiful interview:

http://www.citizenlink.org/content/A000006212.cfm

Thirty-five years after historic Roe v. Wade ruling, 'Jane Roe' is living for the Lord.

She never wanted to be famous. At least not this kind of famous — the kind that turns brother against sister and splits a nation asunder. She certainly never wanted to rewrite the law and with it, U.S. history, but her lawyers did, so they gave her a pseudonym. They called her "Jane Roe” — partly because “Jane Doe” was already taken, but mostly because if you’re going to be the one whose unplanned pregnancy is the impetus for arguably the most contentious court decision of the last 50 years, do you really want your neighbors to know? Do you really want to be the face of abortion in America?

In 1970, she signed an affidavit that made her the lead plaintiff in a class-action lawsuit challenging the Texas law against abortion, then faded into the background while her attorneys, Sarah Weddington and Linda Coffee, argued her case all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. The lawyers never revealed her identity, and when the decision finally came in January 1973, when Roe v. Wade legalized abortion on demand by a 7-2 margin, “Jane Roe” learned about the ruling like most Americans did — on the radio, and in the next day's newspaper.

We learned her real name, Norma McCorvey, in 1980. We also learned, in no particular order, that she was a former carnival barker, house painter, apartment manager and waitress; that she was never raped, as she had first claimed; and that she never had an abortion. The pro-abortion movement loved Jane Roe as a symbol, but McCorvey was far too rough around the edges to put up on the platform. Yet she needed money, so McCorvey took what she could get — speaking engagements at smaller pro-abortion events and a job at whatever abortion clinic would have her.

McCorvey was answering phones at the Dallas clinic A Choice for Women in 1995 when the pro-life group Operation Rescue moved into the office space next door. She tried trading insults with the pro-lifers, but they rebuffed her barbs with smiles, Scripture and an invitation to church. McCorvey quit her clinic job later that summer and announced her conversion to Christianity. Operation Rescue's national director, the Rev. Philip “Flip” Benham, baptized McCorvey in a Dallas swimming pool.

Citizen magazine first featured McCorvey more than 10 years ago (“Roe No More,” January 1997, pp. 10-12), and as pro-lifers mark the 35-year anniversary of Roe v. Wade, we decided to catch up with the woman who has spent the last decade working to overturn the decision that made her famous.

1. It’s been over a decade since your conversion — first to Christianity, then from pro-abortion to pro-life. What do you say to those who said it wouldn’t last?

(laughs) I say to those who don’t believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and by His blood and by His redemption, that you're missing the train. You should jump on the train and love the Lord, because He’s very good.

2. Both you and Sandra Cano — the plaintiff in the companion case before the Supreme Court, Doe v. Bolton — say you were coerced and manipulated by your lawyers.

Yes, we were. … I was a hippie. I lived in a park, I sold flowers on the street corner, and I worked for an underground newspaper and in drug trafficking. And Sandra Cano, she has a very tragic story, too. But she’s doing much better. She was baptized, I think, five or six years ago, into the Christian faith. She’s married now, and she’s taking care of her two grandchildren.

We testified together (in 2005) before the Senate Judiciary Committee for Sen. Brownback of Kansas. I’ve also testified for (former) Sen. John Ashcroft. I was up against one of the pro-abortion people who was saying that women should be allowed to have abortions because (carrying the baby) might interfere with their education, or it might interfere with their social life.

3. What is the best way to help a woman heal from the trauma of abortion?

I was just down in Mississippi not long ago, and I learned that a woman who was sitting on a nearby bench was post-abortive, times four. So, I went over there to her and I put my arms around her and I said, “Let me tell you something, sweetie. You know those children who you've lost to abortion?” She said, “Yes.” And I said, “You know that those children are waiting for you … and they're going to welcome you with open arms. They’re going to say, 'Welcome home, mama. We know that you made a mistake and we forgive you.’ ”

She wept a great deal. And I said, “Now let me see a pretty smile on that pretty face” … She said, “Well, I’m just so sorry.” And I said, “We were all deceived.”

4. You hit some hard times a couple years ago — to the point that you wondered if you were going to have money for groceries. How did that happen, and where did you turn?

I turned to a friend who had sent me a letter about his ministry. I had asked him to make a $20 donation to my ministry so we could go and buy some groceries. He said that he had 4,000-plus people on his e-mail list, and asked if he could he put out (my request) over the Internet.

About two days after the story came out here in Dallas, this man comes driving up (to my home) and he starts bringing in bagful after bagful after bagful of groceries. He looked at me, and I started crying. I was overwhelmed by his generosity. He said, “Miss Norma, I used to be a drunkard, and I used to be a drug addict, and I'm so glad that I can finally do something good to help you. Anytime you need my help, please let me know.”

5. What are you up to nowadays?

I want to lobby half a year and speak half a year. I want to tell young women who are considering abortion, please don’t. Talk to your parents. Talk to a post-abortive women. Go to your pastor, your priest, your synagogue. Go to a pregnancy center and get an ultrasound. Once they see that child in utero … they’ll know that they've been lied to. And that’s when the Lord kicks in and says, “Get out of the abortion mill.”

Pro-choice Loser: The Journey Of Mrs.Bill Clinton

2008-01-04T17:48:00.000-08:00

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Hillary Clinton Tells Iowa Campaign Rally "I Am in Favor of Abortion"

Des Moines, IA (LifeNews.com) -- At a campaign stop in Iowa, Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton told an audience that she favors abortion. Clinton meant her comments to come across in the same moderate tone former President Bill Clinton, but the way she phrased her position could come back to haunt her.

Abortion advocates frequently insist they don't support abortions but want to keep them legal as an option for women.

Clinton, like other pro-abortion politicians, has used the "safe, legal and rare" mantra as a way to tone down their stridently pro-abortion views and voting records against bans on partial-birth abortions or tax-funded abortions.

Normally politicians say "abortions should be safe, legal and rare" but don't talk about their own position supporting or opposing them. Clinton changed and went a different direction.

“I am in favor of abortion being safe, legal and rare,” she said.

As if noticing that she told the audience she favored abortion, she quickly added, “I would do everything to make it as rare as possible.”

But, MSNBC's Tucker Carlson in November questioned whether that was really the case.

"Has she ever suggested placing any restriction of any kind on abortion, limiting for instance abortion for sex selection? Or any restriction, of any kind. Ever? I must have missed it. Has she?" Tucker asked.

Last month, Clinton largely avoided a question of how abortion is hurting social security. A woman in the audience said abortion is going to make it harder to keep the system afloat.

She simply said she has worked to keep abortion "safe, legal, rare."

She finished last - couldn't be sweeter from my perspective!

Update on Ed Snell Story: Alleged Perpetrator Nathan Richardson is Named

2008-01-01T19:48:00.000-08:00

Penn Live has shared the name of the alleged perpetrator in their news story. A story that was absent from mainstream media since the event.

In 20 years of protesting at abortion clinics in central Pennsylvania, Ed Snell has had his share of confrontations.

People have screamed at him, spit in his face and knocked his cap off. About 10 years ago, Snell said, a man grabbed him by the throat and choked him outside a now-closed clinic in downtown Harrisburg.

In the past, he's brushed off the confrontations. But after a recent incident in which he cracked his head on the pavement and was hospitalized, Snell, 69, of Penbrook, said he's rethinking his approach.

Balance of story is here
http://www.pennlive.com/news/patriotnews/index.ssf?/base/news/119914890893330.xml&coll=1

It will be interesting how this unfolds - what the different versions will be - what witnesses Mr. Richardson will be able to produce - if the clinic will be called on to confirm their initial comments applauding what happened and what they will say, etc.

Ultimately though I hope that this elderly man experiences a full recovery. While I do not believe his approach is best I think it's shameful that, if the accusation is accurate, that a young man in his early 20's could cause some vicious injuries to an elderly person. If the story is accurate I hope that the consequences of such an act linger for this man into his future. Anyone with the capacity to harm an elderly person has a frightening temper. At the same time I think it's important to realize that he may have a different version or a context to share.

Catholic Priest Agrees That Abortion Is the Only Way Out

2007-12-29T18:09:00.000-08:00

http://votelifecanada.blogspot.com/2007/12/catholic-priest-agrees-that-abortion-is.html

VotelifeCanada has a piece that I've linked to above that is quite sad.

I’m reading Saving Those Damned Catholics. It’s a recent book by Judie Brown, President and co-founder of American Life League. The following excerpt is a sample of the contents.

**********

My Pastor Said the Abortion Was My Only Way Out!

Fifteen years ago I got pregnant; I wasn't married at the time. I was in college. 1 knew a terrific priest at the local parish church. His name was Father X. I went to him after I found out that I was pregnant, and we talked about how this pregnancy would affect my life. I had slept with a friend, and I never intended to get pregnant. I only had one year to go before graduation; I was engaged to a very fine man from my hometown; and I knew that if i did not have an abortion, my fiancé would leave me, my degree would be put on hold, and my life would be ruined. Father X listened to all I had to say and immediately reached out to me and said, "Pat, you have to do what is right for you in this situation. God loves you, and he will be with you regardless. Just be careful and be sure to get plenty of rest after the surgery."

For years after my abortion, I wept every time I saw a baby. I had nightmares every year when what would have been my baby’s birthday approached. I did not graduate because I felt so depressed after the abortion that I turned to alcohol. I got a job in a local bar and had more one-night stands than I can remember. I did not marry the man to whom I was engaged because I felt dirty and evil; I knew I just wasn't good enough for him. I knew that I had murdered my own baby and that a Catholic priest said I was doing what was best. My pain was so severe that I often felt that death would be superior to life.

And then one day I heard about a retreat that was dedicated to helping men and women experience healing after an abortion. So I signed up. On the second day of the retreat, I had the opportunity to go to confession. I had not been back inside a Catholic church since that day when the priest encouraged me to kill my baby. But somehow I knew that God wanted me to surrender this tragic sin to Him and tell Him how broken I was, how sorrowful I was, how much I needed my Father to forgive me.

Father Murphy, the retreat priest, was the most awesome priest I have ever met in my entire life. He shared with me the wonderful nature of Christ's forgiveness when the sinner is truly repentant. He assured me that over time I would feel not only the sense of relief but the assurance that I could also forgive myself and move on with my life. He shared his sorrow with me that Father X had not explained to me that I was a mother and that my baby would bring me joy, not pain.

For the first time in years, I felt the beginning of closure. I understood my own sin and the tragic nature of that sin. I also understood the sin of that priest, who had the chance to at least tell me why I should not murder my baby and chose instead to be an accomplice in my baby's execution. At the end of the confession, Father Murphy told me that I must forgive Father X.

Now my life is back on track; I am practicing my faith, and I pray for Father X every day. But I still wonder why any priest would do such an awful thing.

The true villain in this mother's story is the priest, not the abortionist. It is true that the abortionist used the instruments to kill the baby, but the fact is that the priest facilitated the abortion by doing absolutely nothing to stand in the way of this young woman's ultimate decision. The question in a case like this one, which is all too common, is why-why would any Catholic priest be so blasé about an act so criminal, so vile, so wrong?

Why didn't he use the opportunity to affirm this young woman's motherhood? Why didn't he explain to her that her baby's life was worth more than all the degrees in the world? Why didn't he let her know that he would visit her fiancé with her and do what he could to help this young man see the courage of her decision to carry this baby to term? There are so many positive things this priest could have done-yet he chose to commiserate with the young mother and support her decision to have an abortion.

Blaming the Victim: A feminist perspective that violence is deserved

2007-12-29T09:53:00.000-08:00

This is from the American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family and Property (http://www.tfp.org/TFPForum/TFPCommentary/injured_in_line_duty.htm):

By Michael Whitcraft

At 6:30 am on Saturday, December 22, while most were snug in bed, resting up for Christmas activities, veteran pro-lifer Ed Snell was arriving at Hillcrest Abortion Center, in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. He had come with two other activists to persuade women entering the clinic not to abort their pre-born children.

The group customarily meets at the clinic and has saved many lives. In fact, they have been so effective, that the clinic erected a 7-foot privacy fence to cut off all communication between the women and the pro-lifers. However, their efforts were scuttled, when the activists began bringing ladders so they could speak over the fence.

Mr. Snell, age 69, preferred to stand on a more solid foundation, so he constructed a plywood platform on the roof of his car to elevate him above the fence.

“This platform gives him a real steady base and a commanding view,” said fellow activist and eyewitness John McTernan. As Ed stood on his platform that morning, a man and woman exited a car in the parking lot and proceeded towards that door of the abortion mill.

When Mr. Snell tried to counsel the woman, his words were cut short when the man became furious, jumped the fence and, in the words of Mr. McTernan, “leaped on the vehicle with Ed and catapulted him off of the vehicle and onto the ground.” Mr. Snell hit his back and head on the pavement and was knocked unconscious.

His medical report outlines the extent of his injuries: “multiple trauma, right subarachnoid hemorrhage (bleeding in the area between the brain and the tissues that cover the brain), compression fractures of four vertebrae (T3, T4, T5 and T10), right scapula fracture and fracture of the fourth and fifth ribs.” Before doctors were able to stop the bleeding in his head, they even feared Mr. Snell would die.

When asked on the phone about the vicious attack, the receptionist at Hillcrest Abortion Clinic refused to give a recorded statement and angrily shouted: “He got what he deserved! He earned what he got!” She then hung up the phone.

Immediately after the attack, Mr. McTernan ran over to Ed and was frightened to see that he was unconscious and breathing irregularly. He reported the attack to “911” and then shouted to the assailant: “You assaulted him and he is unconscious.” Agitated, the man replied: “I did not assault him, I just pushed him,” with an aggressiveness that made Mr. McTernan fearful for his own safety.

Ed was taken away in an ambulance and three police officers arrived to investigate. They went into the clinic, where the assailant was waiting. After a few moments, the assailant and his companion left the clinic freely, got into their car and drove away.

Shocked, Mr. McTernan shouted to the police: “What are you doing? That’s him! That’s the assailant!”

One cop replied: “It is none of your business!”

Mr. McTernan: “I am making it my business, Ed Snell is my good friend!”

The officer then threatened to arrest Mr. McTernan for interfering with a criminal investigation. Mr. Mcternan replied: “Go ahead and arrest me, I am not afraid. I want to know why the assailant walked away from this scene where an elderly man was left unconscious. We have excellent attorneys and we will sue you if you do not do your job.”

She angrily responded: “Don’t threaten me or I will arrest you!” She then returned to the police car and drove away. At the time this article was written, the Harrisburg Police Department had not returned a phone call requesting a statement on the incident.

Once the extent of Mr. Snell’s injuries were discovered, the assailant was arrested.

Nevertheless, as Mr. McTernan put it: “I cannot imagine me [as a pro-lifer], striking someone connected with Hillcrest [Abortion Center], knocking them unconscious, the police coming, the injured person being taken away in an ambulance and the police letting me go. There is something wrong with that.”

There is also something wrong with the lack of media coverage of the incident. At the time this article was written, a google search about the attack returned no results.

Ed returned home just in time to celebrate Christmas with his family. He was released from the hospital on Christmas Eve, just a couple of hours before Bishop Kevin Rhodes of Harrisburg arrived to pay him a visit.

Doctors expect him to make a full recovery, although it will take a long time. “Ed is very sore,” said Mrs. Snell in a telephone interview, “he is black and blue and the doctor said that it will be a full eight weeks before his bones heal completely.”

Mrs. Snell is thankful for the prayers that Ed has received and hopes these will continue. She feels confident that, supported by these prayers, he will recover well.

As for Mr. Snell, he is not yet accepting telephone calls, but feels humbled by all the prayers and attention he has received. A man of faith, he feels called to his work and remains undaunted. As Mrs. Snell aptly put it: “I know that the Devil is busy and that he does not like the work that Ed does, but if that is the case, then Ed is doing the right job.”

Please keep Mr. and Mrs. Snell in your prayers and, due to the lack of press coverage, please email this article to all your friends

http://defendlife.blogspot.com/2007/12/pro-life-activist-injured-in-line-of.html

Learn more about pro choice violence here.
http://abortionviolence.com/

1400 African American babies aborted daily in the USA

2007-12-29T09:44:00.000-08:00

I thoughtful article on the impact of abortion on the black community from the perspective of a member of that community

http://hellonegro.wordpress.com/2007/12/28/over-1400-african-american-babies-are-aborted-each-day/

Over 1,400 African-American babies are aborted each day
Jump to Comments
“Abortion is so critical to us, because this is essentially a genocide. According to the census of 2006, African Americans are reproducing below replacement level, which is 2.1 children per household, and we are now at 1.9. We need to turn this around quickly, because over 1,400 African-American babies are aborted every day. That’s going in the wrong direction.” - Walter B. Hoye II, executive elder of Progressive Missionary Baptist Church of Berkeley

I’ve posted about African-Americans and abortion before and it’s a very very touchy subject. In the black community, I find that most people have a don’t ask don’t tell policy. Whether someone has had one…you don’t ask. That’s med’ling in grown business, if you will. If you had one, you only tell the people you trust or you keep it to yourself. But of course, the topic is not one that anyone would consider cause for casual conversation. Why? I think the major factors are the huge black christian community that considers it and premarital sex sinful and community stigma around abortion. The stigma part of the equation created in me an internal struggle. I really couldn’t say that I was pro-abortion, because I don’t believe a life should die because you and your partner don’t want it or made a mistake and didn’t use a condom…etc. However, I don’t think that children should be born into families where they are not wanted, will not have proper parenting, or will suffer as a result. I also don’t think that it’s my job to decide whether other women should have the option (especially in cases of rape, incest, or when the mother or child is endangered by the pregnancy). It’s a very very touchy issue. In the end, when it comes to questions of life and death, I believe that there is a place for government, church, and personal choice. Ultimately I think that each individual, male and female should have the choice of many informed choices when it comes to pregnancy. Abortion, adoption, parenthood, It’s not my choice to make.

But enough of what I think…I want to know what you readers think about African-Americans and abortion.

A Catholic Voters Overview

2007-12-29T09:40:00.000-08:00

http://www.catholicvoter.com/2007/12/28/how-ron-paul-not-john-paul-convinced-me-that-abortion-is-a-tragedy-not-a-right/

I found the thoughts of this Catholic Blogger interesting

Before you get up on your britches here me out. I don’t like talking about Abortion, I would rather ignore it as I have done for the last 25 years or so. I am a bit of an anti-authoritarian type; I don’t like to be told I need to wear a seatbelt, or that I can’t smoke cigars in public or I need to pay my taxes. I am a lapse Catholic, not even an A&P Catholic anymore, but that does not mean I still don’t hold to a Catholic morality or philosophy, that has been branded into me, by my Irish Mother.

I have grown up under the cloud of Roe vs. Wade where a few white men, 5 to be exact now have determined for the whole nation that Abortion is legal. Notwithstanding the fact that they have no “Authority under the Constitution to make such a decision”, the Constitution only allows federal courts to hear cases regarding the “regulation of interstate commerce.” Ron Paul’s position is that it is up to the individual states to determine the legality of Abortion rather than the Federal government. This I agree, wholeheartedly, but this is not why I am writing the article.

Pope John Paul II tried his best to argue for the “sanctity of life”, however I didn’t find his argument convincing mostly because a priest was telling me that I had to abide by his opinion, the whole “papal infallibility” thing has made the pope a virtual non-entity, regarding moral concerns. I don’t pay attention to anyone that claims they are always right, it is a ludicrous idea and I believe it hurts the church rather than helps it, at this point. If you can walk on water and ascend to heaven, then I might believe you,… maybe.

I have always been opposed to Abortion, it is an emotional response, primal. I can’t understand how a mother can kill her own child? I have heard all the arguments, a woman doesn’t have the money, the lack of maturity, but what most gets me about the abortion question, is not why women get abortions, but that they call it a Right? The Right to choose. The right to choose what? To kill a baby? In ancient times they would call this human sacrifice.

Abortion is our modern-day human sacrifice ritual. It is an unconcious mechanism because we don’t acknowledge that we are taking a life. American women have killed over 55 million kids since Roe vs. Wade was instituted in 1972. When a woman goes in for an abortion, after the baby is sucked out of the womb, neither doctors or nurses look at the child. They all know as I do, as I am writing this that is a sickening and horrifying procedure, it is a tragedy not a right. In 25 years of hearing women proclaim that Abortion is a right, I have never met one that was not severely emotionally damaged. The woman that I have been in relationships with that have had Abortions are dead on a certain level, often they have some form of sexual dysfunction; such as not being able to have an orgasm. Women who have had abortions are often are extremely self destructive sexually, having multiple partners and are unable to form a lasting bond with a man. Women often complain that Men are irresponsible and not men, while that may be true on a certain level. From a Man’s perspective, I don’t have much respect for a woman who feels that it is her right to have 3-4 lovers at the same time or that she can kill a child that I created without my consent. That really does not turn me on or create a feeling that I want to live the rest of my life with this woman. So yea, I will treat her like a whore and have a one-night stand with her. If it is a right to choose, then you need to also take responsibility for the enormous “guilt and shame” that will come with that choice. I was caught stealing at 15. I went home crying and felt awful for weeks after, I would not get out of bed and I could not bear to see other people, especially those who knew I was a thief. Increase this by a factor of a 100, I can only imagine what a woman must feel like after an Abortion.

Now getting to Ron Paul, Dr. Ron Paul. He was a vietnam surgeon for 5 years, think Hawkeye and a baby obstetrician for 20, he delivered over 4000 babies. He obvious has have this conversation on Abortion with thousands of women. I saw him on the view and he sat in the middle of 5 liberal Pro-choice women. They immediately launched into an attack on the Abortion topic, I was wincing just thinking about what he was going to say.

He casually said that Abortion is an act of violence and that his oath as a doctor is to protect life not take it, he was not self-righteous as a Huckabee or a George Bush. Ron Paul then turned the question around and started talking about late term abortion, he said do you believe in late term abortion? None of them said yes, they all said of course not. he then changed the question to one that fundamentally you do not agree in abortion is a right. The women were dumb-founded, I was dumbfounded, there were perhaps for the first time being taught to think on a deep level about the meaning of Abortion that just the knee-jerk political slogans being propagated by the Liberal left.
It was then a question of when a fetus became a life. Ron Paul then brought up the fact that he could be sued for murder if he screwed up as a doctor at any stage of the pregnancy. By the end of the interview, these women were actually starting to like Ron Paul as everyone invariable does who meets the guy. The good Doctor is actually healing both women and men of this horrific tragedy known as Abortion and getting them to think on a deeper more philosophical way than just the standard black and white thinking being promulgated by the Main Stream media. With Ron Paul, what we have on our hands is a living character out of a Norman Rockwell painting. A man steadfast in his beliefs, who does not wear his religion on his sleeve, a very catholic viewpoint from a man who is the son of a Protestant dairy farmer.

In Honour of Benazir Bhutto

2007-12-27T16:03:00.001-08:00

Assassinated Pakistan Leader Benazir Bhutto Was Strong Abortion Opponent
by Steven Ertelt
LifeNews.com Editor
December 27, 2007

The world mourned the loss of assassinated Pakistani leader Benazir Bhutto on Thursday, but her death was more than a setback for those hoping for democracy in this war-torn nation. Bhutto was a member of an international pro-life women's movement that understood abortion causes medical, mental health and other problems for women.
When Bhutto was the prime minister of Pakistan, she helped lead a delegation to the 1994 Cairo population conference that confronted abortion advocates looking to make abortion an international right.

"I dream ...of a world where we can commit our social resources to the development of human life and not to its destruction," she told the United Nations panel at the time.

Bhutto was one of only two women to address the conference.

Instead of telling women in nations where population growth is an issue that they should kill their offspring, Bhutto told world leaders that the best solutions is "tackling infant mortality, by providing villages with electrification, by raising an army of women."

She hoped to "educate our mothers, sisters, daughters, in child welfare and population control, by setting up a bank run by women for women, to help women achieve economic independence, and to have the wherewithal to make independent choices.”

Bhutto warned conference participants that "this conference must not be viewed by the teeming masses of the world as a universal social charter seeking to impose adultery, abortion...and other such matters on individuals, societies and religions which have their own social ethos."

One of the leading pro-life women's groups in the United States, Feminists for Life of America, honored Bhutto in the 1998 issue of its publication The American Feminist. The group named Bhutto as one of the first and best "remarkable pro-life women" around the world.

"Prime Minister Bhutto advocated a more holistic approach to resolving population-control issues worldwide," the group said of the Pakistani leader.

FFLA said Bhutto prefers "the empowerment of women" over their destruction via abortion.

The loss of an amazing testimony to the pro-life movement.

A feminist response to teenage rape

2007-12-27T13:26:00.000-08:00

LAS VEGAS – A former high school track coach and substitute teacher is facing a felony charge stemming from allegations he got a team member pregnant and helped her get an abortion, authorities said.
Kenneth Craig, 28, was free Thursday pending a preliminary hearing Feb. 20 in Las Vegas Justice Court on a felony charge of sexual misconduct with a student, court officials said. The charge carries a possible sentence of one to five years in prison.

AdvertisementCraig was arrested Dec. 20. It was not immediately clear if he posted bond or was freed without bail. The public defense lawyer who represented him at a court appearance on Monday did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment.
Craig worked as a substitute teacher for the Clark County School District from May 2003 to May 2007, and was a track coach at Las Vegas High School from February to May 2006, according to a police arrest report.

A school district spokeswoman said Thursday she could not disclose whether Craig quit or was fired.

Craig told school district police in March that he had sex with the student after she graduated, but Las Vegas police said e-mails and cell phone messages between Craig and the then-17-year-old senior contradict that account. Craig declined to give Las Vegas police a statement in September, police said.

The former Las Vegas High student, who police said now lives outside Nevada, told police she and Craig first had sex in March 2006 at her parents' home. Medical records obtained by police through a grand jury subpoena showed the victim had an abortion in June 2006, the same month she graduated, police said.

The relationship first was reported to school district police by the current Las Vegas High girl's track coach, Uvette Gonzaque-Francis.

As a public education employee, Gonzaque-Francis was required by law to report suspected abuse involving students. Records show school police turned the case over to Las Vegas police in April.

Craig's ex-girlfriend, Deanna Riddle, told police she suspected Craig had a relationship with the girl, and said she drove the girl to a doctor's office near the end of her senior year in school.

It is interesting to me that the feminist news publications are not tackling the actions of a teacher who raped a young girl and then facilitated an abortion. As long as the outcome of the pregnancy is abortion that seems to dilute their reaction. Here is the news article outlining this man's actions:

Former Las Vegas track coach accused of sex with teen student

LAS VEGAS – A former high school track coach and substitute teacher is facing a felony charge stemming from allegations he got a team member pregnant and helped her get an abortion, authorities said.
Kenneth Craig, 28, was free Thursday pending a preliminary hearing Feb. 20 in Las Vegas Justice Court on a felony charge of sexual misconduct with a student, court officials said. The charge carries a possible sentence of one to five years in prison.

was arrested Dec. 20. It was not immediately clear if he posted bond or was freed without bail. The public defense lawyer who represented him at a court appearance on Monday did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment.
Craig worked as a substitute teacher for the Clark County School District from May 2003 to May 2007, and was a track coach at Las Vegas High School from February to May 2006, according to a police arrest report.

A school district spokeswoman said Thursday she could not disclose whether Craig quit or was fired.

Craig told school district police in March that he had sex with the student after she graduated, but Las Vegas police said e-mails and cell phone messages between Craig and the then-17-year-old senior contradict that account. Craig declined to give Las Vegas police a statement in September, police said.

The former Las Vegas High student, who police said now lives outside Nevada, told police she and Craig first had sex in March 2006 at her parents' home. Medical records obtained by police through a grand jury subpoena showed the victim had an abortion in June 2006, the same month she graduated, police said.

The relationship first was reported to school district police by the current Las Vegas High girl's track coach, Uvette Gonzaque-Francis.

As a public education employee, Gonzaque-Francis was required by law to report suspected abuse involving students. Records show school police turned the case over to Las Vegas police in April.

Craig's ex-girlfriend, Deanna Riddle, told police she suspected Craig had a relationship with the girl, and said she drove the girl to a doctor's office near the end of her senior year in school.

In case persons believe that the recent timeline is the obvious reason for their silence I'd like to suggest it's not that neat and tidy. lifenews.com has shared that there have been FOUR recent cases of children having abortions following rapes by persons in positions of trust.
http://www.lifenews.com/state2709.html

That's God's Problem!

2007-12-26T10:58:00.000-08:00

Adoption by the dozen: Couple parents 17 children

AIRFIELD TWP. — "Christmas can be very loud around here," said Scott Rosenow, looking at the crowd of Christmas stockings hanging from the fireplace mantel.

But that was far from a complaint.

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Forgive him if he says that with a fair amount of pride and indescribable joy. Rosenow, 50, and his wife, Kathy, 48, have worked hard at creating a large and loving family, which in the last week has grown to 17 children with the finalization of three adoptions, plus a new son-in-law and a grandchild on the way.

The Rosenows have four biological children. Erin, their second, now 26, was born with severe learning disabilities and communication disorders, plus a damaged kidney and malformed bladder valves. Her first surgery was at age 3½.

The youngest, Ryan, now 18, was born without a right hand. Doctors at first told them there was nothing that could be done, but they met a team of surgeons in Louisville, Ky., who did the first of 25 surgeries when he was 10 months old. It was to get closer to these surgeons that the Rosenows moved from Alabama.

When Ryan was 2, Kathy heard a radio interview with Tim Burke, who gave up a $600,000 salary as a pitcher for the Cincinnati Reds so that he could help his wife, Christine, take care of the four special-needs children they adopted.

"Their story was fascinating, and we thought we could do that, too," Kathy said. "We had seen the bonding that had taken place between Ryan and Erin. They both were getting beat up by the world.

"Erin would come home from school crying because they were so hard on them, so we determined early on that our house would be a safe place for them. We taught them to treat each other with respect and we did not allow them to make fun of each other.

"When we started finding out about so many kids out there without a place to go, we started talking about adoption."

It wasn't easy for them, nor something they undertook right away. The cost of Erin's therapies and the various operations on her and Ryan had emptied the family's savings accounts, and adoptions — especially international adoptions — were very expensive.

Six years later, they heard about Nathan, a newborn who was abandoned outside an orphanage in Bolivia, so young that his umbilical cord was still attached.

"That's our son," Scott said. "We've got to get him out of there."

And when Kathy protested that they just couldn't afford it, Scott replied, "That's God's problem."

For four months they sent out letters and explained the situation to everyone they knew. They eventually borrowed $7,000 to get the rest of the money so they could go to Bolivia to get their son.

"While we were there, we were amazed at the poverty," Kathy said. "We'd never left the country before, and we realized that in America we have everything and they have almost nothing. We saw disabled people begging in the streets, and we realized that was the life Nathan would have been destined to have had we not gone down there to get him."

After they brought Nathan home, they'd watch him play with his brothers and sisters on the floor.

"Before long, we started thinking we could do one more, but it just kept going," Kathy said.

The family has or will, in the near future, adopt 13 children.

"We weren't trying to build a family," Scott said. "We were trying to save a child."
http://www.middletownjournal.com/hp/content/oh/story/news/local/2007/12/26/mj122607rosenowmain.html

Islam should not be blamed for terrorism," UN conference

2007-12-26T10:56:00.000-08:00

Islam should not be blamed for terrorism," UN conference

The international community should counter the spread of Islamophobia partly due to "misinformation and misperceptions", participants at a UN counter-terrorism conference said.

Speaking at the 3-day conference, experts said there is a need for the international community to counter the spread of Islamophobia, which they noted has been growing in recent years partly because of misinformation and misperceptions about the religion.

The emergence of "misguided groups" that have deviated from the straight path to fanaticism, violence and extremism, attributing their acts to Islam, in no way justifies associating this phenomenon with the Islamic faith, they said during the conference titled "Terrorism: Dimensions, Threats and Countermeasures" in Tunis.

"It profits from weak State capacity to maintain law and order," said co-chair and Tunisian Culture and Preservation of Heritage Minister Mohamed El Aziz Ben Achour, during the concluding session on November 17.

"These vulnerable areas are exploited by terrorists to mobilize recruits and justify violence. None of the religions are a cause of political radicalism and extremism. Religious doctrine may be 'tools of mobilization,' rather than a direct cause," he said at the conference which was jointly organized by the UN's Department of Political Affairs and the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC).

Participants agreed that terrorism flourishes in environments where there is discontent, exclusion, humiliation, poverty, political oppression and human rights abuses, as well as in countries engaged in regional conflicts.

http://www.hindustantimes.com/StoryPage/StoryPage.aspx?id=09c88aac-9dcf-4651-9d7d-f313cc04d1b0&ParentID=d01d7a7c-e1bf-4d47-a252-c090bee4744e&MatchID1=4617&TeamID1=3&TeamID2=4&MatchType1=1&SeriesID1=1163&MatchID2=4625&TeamID3=1&TeamID4=6&MatchType2=1&SeriesID2=1165&PrimaryID=4617&Headline='Islam+should+not+be+blamed+for+terrorism'

Trenton Quick: A disturbing end to a short life

2007-12-26T09:49:00.000-08:00

Disturbing Details in Death of 4-Year-old Boy

Eyewitness News has uncovered new information in the murder case involving 4-year-old Trenton Quick, the little boy police say died as a result of child abuse.

North Las Vegas police arrested the little boy's mom, 24-year-old Amber Scott and her boyfriend 21-year-old Trevor Carter, in connection with the death. Both made their first appearance in court Friday via video. Carter, who is charged with murder, was denied bail. Scott's bail was set at $40,000. She is charged with abuse and neglect.

Details of the child abuse have not been released, but coworkers and family members of Scott say they are positive 4-year-old Trenton did not die in the car accident that police say Trevor Carter staged.

In the hours following the bail hearing, Amber Scott made a call to coworkers, who talked with Eyewitness News.

Family members and coworkers say Trenton had an accident in his pants early Tuesday morning and Trevor Carter, who goes by the nickname TJ was not happy. They say Amber, how was at work, talked with Trenton on the phone.

"She could hear TJ screaming in the background and saying 'I'm not putting up with your kid (expletive) in his pants anymore. He's 4-years-old. He's a little old to be doing this.' Amber said 'just clean it up' and 'I'll take care of it when I get home,'"kathryn Averitt, coworker.

Scott's coworker says the little boy then told his mom he got "whooped real bad." The coworker says not too long after that phone call, Amber Scott got another call at work about a car accident in North Las Vegas and that her little boy was dead.

The two other children who were living in the home are still in protective custody.

www.lasvegasnow.com

God these people must hate children

2007-12-26T09:39:00.000-08:00

Extreme parenting has come to be associated with images of overly involved parents — this generation's stage parents, who manage and control every minute of their child's life, imposing their adult dreams and desires onto the little ones in a pathetic attempt to fuel their own insatiable need for success and recognition. As familiar as this parental profile has become, another form of extreme parenting has emerged, one that is getting harder to ignore. I am referring to the increasingly ubiquitous parenting approach that rejects the use of the word "no," and in which even the most reasonable degree of parental limit-setting is consistently absent.

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EMAIL TO A FRIEND PRINT THIS ARTICLE Discuss this article (16) Most of us have been in social situations where we've observed, with incredulity, a parent bow to the extreme demands of a menacingly persistent child, inches from a tantrum — "Okay, but honey, that's your last package of Twizzlers before breakfast." Worse, many of us too often have been that parent. What is happening here? I thought the Dr. Spock generation put an end to tyrannical rule within family life a few generations ago. It did not. In too many families the tyrant still rules — but today he is much shorter.

How did the power balance in our parent-child relationship become so off-kilter? In what other relationship would we give in to someone we love, as a matter of course, saying "yes" to every demand, every whim, no matter how unreasonable — and expect our emotional connection to remain unharmed? "I know, dear, our new neighbor really is a knock-out, especially in that two-piece. Well, okay, but just this once, and don't be home too late, it's a work night."

On the very far end of the non-confrontational parenting trend, and seemingly designed for Our kid's emotional "immune systems" need exposure to life lessons that involve at least the risk of disappointment.parents who would rather get out of the driver's seat altogether, is an organization called Taking Children Seriously. TCS adherents attempt to parent without infringing upon the children's will. When there's a conflict, they find a compromise between the child's and parent's desires; eliminating the win/lose dynamic. The examples provided on their website seem absurdly idealistic, and impossible for any parent who needs to care for a newborn sibling, meet a deadline or get dinner on the table to implement. Not to mention, this approach seems to overlook the profound limitations of a young child's capacity for reason and impulse control.

Aside from this extreme example, this recent transformation in child-rearing appears to be a twisted, supercharged version of what began benignly as a "child-centered" approach to family life. Its effect on our children is attracting notice — and not just among our in-laws. Several new books have appeared within the last year, each identifying a cultural phenomenon of concern to any of us who are attempting to raise happy, healthy, well-adjusted children. If the experts' predictions are on target, we're facing a future filled with overgrown, ill-tempered, and entitled Baby Hueys who will spend their adulthood wondering why they can't sustain an intimate adult relationship or hold down a decent job.

It's not just that many American parents are under-parenting by not setting reasonable limits. Paradoxically, we are also over-parenting by making every effort to ensure that our children are not given the opportunity to fail. At the same time, our pediatricians are urging us to cut back on the excessive use of hand sanitizers and antibiotics (kids need exposure to some germs if their immune systems are going to successfully fight the really bad ones), our child development experts are telling us to stop excessively slathering our children with the word "Yes." Our kid's emotional "immune systems" need exposure to life lessons that involve at least the risk of disappointment, failure or emotional turmoil if they are going to be able to withstand the bigger setbacks and losses they will inevitably face in adulthood.

We just ran a story on Babble.com that tackles what for Generation X has become a taboo subject: discipline.

Kathryn J. Alexander's "The War on No: Is 'child-centered' parenting producing a generation of brats?" says that the emphasis in recent years on making children feel secure has had an unfortunate consequence: kids who have never heard the word "no," and so who are unprepared for the real, "no"-filled world.

She writes:
It's not just that many American parents are under-parenting by not setting reasonable limits. Paradoxically, we are also over-parenting by making every effort to ensure that our children are not given the opportunity to fail. At the same time, our pediatricians are urging us to cut back on the excessive use of hand sanitizers and antibiotics (kids need exposure to some germs if their immune systems are going to successfully fight the really bad ones), our child development experts are telling us to stop excessively slathering our children with the word "Yes." Our kid's emotional "immune systems" need exposure to life lessons that involve at least the risk of disappointment, failure or emotional turmoil if they are going to be able to withstand the bigger setbacks and losses they will inevitably face in adulthood.

We asked Babble readers if they thought kids today were being spoiled; an amazing 89% said yes.

Do you agree? How do you / did you / would you handle your own kids? We touched on this some last week when the Times reviewed the hardcore early Sesame Street and compared it to the much softer fare serve up to today's kids. And this anti-discipline trend seems to go hand-in-hand with the everyone-wins entertainment.

On the playground, we often see parents explaining in great detail to a two-year-old why he can't run out into traffic while the kid stands there blinking in confusion. Personally, we're very adamant about saying no when it's called for, enforcing a bedtime, sending thank-you notes and all those traditional strict-parent things.

And yet, whenever we brag about how well-behaved our son is, we bring down some kind of cosmic jinx on the house and the next day he's all trying to chase the cats and throw baseballs through the window. So for the cats' sake, we won't say we have it all figured out, but we will say we're whole-heartedly committed to raising a good citizen.

Given the attachment-parenting thrust of the current generation and the emphasis on self-esteem and creativity rather than fairness and maturity, sometimes it seems that creating responsible, capable adults isn't currently all parents' first priority.
http://news.aol.com/newsbloggers/2007/11/30/are-gen-x-parents-raising-spoiled-brats/

Baby-on-Board Review: Be By Baby

2007-12-26T09:28:00.000-08:00

Baby-on-Board Review: Be By Baby

But our favorite thing about Be By Baby isn’t even their merchandise. The store offers free weekly playgroups where you can bring your kid and enjoy the company of other parents in their muraled back room. Interested in meeting other parents whose primary language is Spanish? Want to connect with other same-sex parents, or families of multiples? Just need somewhere inside to play while it’s bitter cold? Check out their website for these themed get-togethers (scheduled to start up again in January), as well as their (also occasionally free) classes covering topics from CPR to cloth diapering.
http://chicagoist.com/2007/12/14/babyonboard_rev_18.php

'Imagine no religion,' says atheists' display

2007-12-10T12:28:00.000-08:00

Connecticut atheists, taking advantage of a town's policy of allowing holiday-season displays in its public park, have erected a 10-foot tall sign in celebration of the winter solstice that includes a message blaming the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, on religious believers.

The 3-sided sign was erected in the Town of Vernon's Central Park on Dec. 1 by the Connecticut Valley Atheists. The two sides facing Main Street feature a pre-attack image of the Twin Towers with the sun shining between them and the message, "Imagine no religion," drawn from the John Lennon anthem, "Imagine."

Use of the image is meant to say the Twin Towers would still be standing were it not for religion, CVA coordinator Dennis Himes told the Hartford Courant.

The goal is to "simply emphasize an advantage of atheism, something good about atheism," Himes said. "Al-Qaida is not a terrorist organization that happens to be religious, it is a terrorist organization that is inspired by its religious beliefs."

The third side of the sign faces town hall with a message about the winter solstice – the basis for the group being given a permit. It reads:

"In late December the sun is lower and days are shorter than any time of year. Throughout the rest of winter the sun gets higher and the days get longer. Because of this people have celebrated the winter solstice from time immemorial. People used to believe that gods moved the sun across the sky. Today we know that there are no gods, and that the sun moves by natural causes, and we celebrate not only the movement of the sun but our ability to understand that movement."

"We would prefer no displays promoting theological worldviews be displayed at all, but as long as they are we thank the Town of Vernon for permitting atheists equal access," the group says on its website.

"The town marked off three spots in the park," Himes said. "The notice to groups said first come, first served, so we picked the one right in front of town hall. We fully expected the other displays to be up around the same time we put ours up."

While the town issued permits to a local synagogue for a menorah display and to a group of churches that plan to place a creche in the park, the atheists were the first to erect their display – indeed, as of the weekend, theirs remained the only display except for a large Christmas tree Mayor Jason L. McCoy had a town crew erect 10 feet from the atheists' sign.

McCoy rejected suggestions placement of the tree is meant to obstruct views of the atheists' display. When told that it did, in fact, obstruct the view, McCoy responded to the Courant, "Oh, really – that's unfortunate."

McCoy and other town officials have been fielding complaint calls for a week from residents angry at the group's suggestion their religion was responsible for 9/11.

"People are not offended the atheists have something up there, and they're not offended by whatever they celebrate. What they're troubled by is they feel [their] religion is equated with being involved in terrorism," McCoy said.

Officials also said the tone of the atheists' display appeared to be more political and not consistent with the description given on their permit application of a "triangular stand displaying information about the winter solstice, atheism and human light observance."

Himes insists the town made the issue political when it decided to allow religious displays on public property.

"The original question was whether Vernon would have a nativity scene on church property or town property," Himes said. "The difference between those two is a political difference."

For generations, Vernon has displayed its circa-World War II creche in the park, but it was moved to St. Bernard Church last year after Hines complained, saying the town was violating the separation of church and state.

Republican town committee members passed a unanimous resolution calling for the creche to be returned to its traditional location in the park in 2007. A new policy, crafted last August, grants equal space for any group wanting to set up traditional displays or symbolic messages during the month of December.

Sandi LaChapelle, owner of Russ' Time Rock 'n' Roll Diner, told the Courant visitors to her business have been commenting on the photo of the sun streaming between the Twin Towers.

"The sun forms a cross," she said.

"That certainly wasn't intentional," Himes said.
http://worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=59111

The Pickton Trial: Voices Lost

2007-12-10T06:46:00.000-08:00

This weekend Mr. Pickton was found guilty of killing Mona Wilson, Sereena Abotsway, Marnie Frey, Andrea Joesbury, Georgina Papin and Brenda Wolfe. There will be much debate as to whether or not it should have been a different conclusion - first degree versus second but I'd like everyone to remember the humanity of these young women.

Marnie's family made a beautiful webpage remembering special memories with her in her childhood. Her biological daughter thanks her for relinquishing her to other family members to raise. http://www.vanishedvoices.ca/MemorialRoomMarnie.html

Andrea Joesbury's family has spoke out from the earliest days about their disagreement with portraying these young women from the angle of their addictions or their life on the streets rather than remembering them as human beings with lives and families.

``I am content with the image I have in my heart of Andrea, as well as the rest of the family,'' Cummer wrote.

``We know all her faults and blessings and her smiling face is with each and everyone she had met.''

It's my hope that everyone will look past all of the blemishes in people's lives and remember that really human being died a horrible death on that farm in BC and focus on justice for them rather than the difficulties in their lives.

Abortionists speak!

2007-12-08T21:16:00.000-08:00

I didn't do a good job with my children, the only reason I'm up here is to be with them. But they don't appreciate what their father has done. I love them, but they don't understand their grandpa. I can't even talk to them about it."

Bill Baird
Clinic Owner
The Republican, 06/19/2006

Nine years before Roe Vs Wade Mr. Baird had established the first national abortion referral centre and then went on to run clinics in Boston and New York. He moved his then wife and their five children to Hampden in 1971 and saw them just on weekends. Eventually though his children became Christians and people of faith. They are deeply religious conservative adults.

Abortion doctor Tommy Tucker told the Atlanta Journal Constitution in a May 16, 1993 interview:

"We're perceived as being dirty, underhanded, the lowest echelon of the medical practice."

In 1993, Tucker told Time Inc:

"I wish I would never ever have to do another one. I don't like it. It's not fun. It's not like you're curing a cancer or fixing a broken bone. You're terminating a potential life."

Feminist History

2007-12-08T19:32:00.001-08:00

Feminists for Life on their website has some persuasive insight into the history of feminism:

Susan B. Anthony
In her publication The Revolution, was written:
"Guilty? Yes. No matter what the motive, love of ease, or a desire to save from suffering the unborn innocent, the woman is awfully guilty who commits the deed. It will burden her conscience in life, it will burden her soul in death; But oh, thrice guilty is he who drove her to the desperation which impelled her to the crime!"
Abortion was referred to as "child murder."
The Revolution, 4(1):4 July 8, 1869
"We want prevention, not merely punishment. We must reach the root of the evil...It is practiced by those whose inmost souls revolt from the dreadful deed."
The Revolution, 4(1):4 July 8, 1869
"All the articles on this subject that I have read have been from men. They denounce women as alone guilty, and never include man in any plans for the remedy."
The Revolution, 4(1):4 July 8, 1869

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Elizabeth Cady Stanton
She classified abortion as a form of "infanticide." The Revolution, 1(5):1, February 5, 1868
"When we consider that women are treated as property, it is degrading to women that we should treat our children as property to be disposed of as we see fit."
Letter to Julia Ward Howe, October 16, 1873, recorded in Howe's diary at Harvard University Library
"There must be a remedy even for such a crying evil as this. But where shall it be found, at least where begin, if not in the complete enfranchisement and elevation of women?"
The Revolution, 1(10):146-7 March 12, 1868

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Emma Goldman
"The custom of procuring abortions has reached such appalling proportions in America as to be beyond belief...So great is the misery of the working classes that seventeen abortions are committed in every one hundred pregnancies."
Mother Earth, 1911

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Mattie Brinkerhoff
"When a man steals to satisfy hunger, we may safely conclude that there is something wrong in society - so when a woman destroys the life of her unborn child, it is an evidence that either by education or circumstances she has been greatly wronged."
The Revolution, 4(9):138-9 September 2, 1869

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Victoria Woodhull
The first female presidential candidate was a strong opponent of abortion.
"The rights of children as individuals begin while yet they remain the foetus."
Woodhull's and Claflin's Weekly 2(6):4 December 24, 1870
"Every woman knows that if she were free, she would never bear an unwished-for child, nor think of murdering one before its birth."
Wheeling, West Virginia Evening Standard, November 17, 1875

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Sarah Norton
"Child murderers practice their profession without let or hindrance, and open infant butcheries unquestioned...Is there no remedy for all this ante-natal child murder?...Perhaps there will come a time when...an unmarried mother will not be despised because of her motherhood...and when the right of the unborn to be born will not be denied or interfered with."
Woodhull's and Claffin's Weekly, November 19, 1870

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Mary Wollstonecraft
As early as 1792, Mary Wollstonecraft wrote "A Vindication of the Rights of Women," which Susan B. Anthony admired enough to serialize in The Revolution. After decrying, in scathing 18th century terms, the sexual exploitation of women, she said:
"Women becoming, consequently, weaker...than they ought to be...have not sufficient strength to discharge the first duty of a mother; and sacrificing to lasciviousness the parental affection...either destroy the embryo in the womb, or cast if off when born. Nature in every thing demands respect, and those who violate her laws seldom violate them with impunity."

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Matilda Gage
"[This] subject lies deeper down in woman's wrongs than any other...I hesitate not to assert that most of [the responsibility for] this crime lies at the door of the male sex."
The Revolution, 1(14):215-6 April 9, 1868

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Alice Paul
The author of the original Equal Rights Amendment (1923) opposed the later trend of linking the E.R.A. with abortion. A colleague recalls her saying:
"Abortion is the ultimate exploitation of women."

Human Life Matters: A blogger's comments on Robert Latimer

2007-12-08T16:46:00.000-08:00

http://humanlifematters.blogspot.com/2007/12/about-robert-latimer-being-denied-day.html

Mark Pick up is an Edmonton activist for persons with disabilities and he speaks eloquently on the subject of Mr. Latimer recently being denied day parole.

After seven years in prison for murdering his disabled daughter, Robert Latimer applied for day-parole. On December 5th 2007, his application was denied. Parole Board panel member Kelly-Ann Speck told Latimer, "We were left with the feeling you have not developed the kind of sufficient insight and understanding of you actions,".

Indeed!
Robert Latimer remains defiant and unapologetic for gassing his 12 year old daughter Tracey to death in 1993. She had cerebral palsy. He told the panel, "I still don't feel guilty because I still feel it was the best thing to do." A majority of Canadians (70%) support Latimer. Many believe he should not have been charged with a crime in the first place and many other Canadians believe he did a favour for his daughter by killing her. He has become a Canadian folk hero.
Inaccuracies about Tracey's life
Since the beginning of this case, the media has misrepresented the humanity of Tracey Latimer.
On December 6th 2007, Victoria Times Colonist reporter, Rob Shaw, reported about the parole Board denial of the previous day. He wrote that Tracey was a "bed-bound quadrplegic who could not speak or feed herself ...". She was not bed-bound! Tracey Latimer went to to a developmental centre five days a week for a regular school day. There were discussions about integrating her into the regular school system. From Monday-Friday Tracey traveled to school on a regular school bus and returned home at the end of each school day on the same bus as her siblings and other children -- right up to the Friday before she was killed.
Tracey was not in constant pain as has been widely reported throughout the years. That assertion is simply not true. At Robert Latimer's trial it was clearly established that her pain was intermittent. Despite her cerebral palsy and the various trials she faced, Tracey Latimer was a happy child as the court transcripts clearly show. She loved music, sleigh rides, television, games, parties, the circus, sleepovers and pets. Tracey adored her family and her face would brighten at the very sight of them. She did not have the mental capacity of a four month old infant -- another inaccuracy widely reported. That was a grossly inaccurate speculation thrown out to the court by a family practitioner: Her life contradicted this assertion, her natural childhood joie be vivre proved him wrong and said something else.
Tracey Latimer had something to bring to the world. At one point during the court proceedings, her mother Laura acknowledged that Tracey brought beauty to their lives. She reminisced, "Tracey enriched our lives. Tracey made us better people, she --Tracey taught us how to love."
Apparently her father forgot what she taught. Tracey's parents were tired, Bob's patience had run out, there was a new baby in the family. It was time to move on with life. Robert Latimer put Tracey out of his misery.
Robert Latimer/Susan Smith
It's curious that with the media's help, Robert Latimer became a Canbadian folk hero. A year after Robert Latimer murdered his daughter, American Susan Smith put her car into a South Carolina lake, drowning her two little boys, Alex and Michael. Why is Susan Smith universally reviled to this day for killing her children while Robert Latimer became a folk hero after killing his child? The difference is this: Susan Smith killed two healthy children while Robert Latimer killed one disabled child. Tracey Latimer was not cute; Michael and Alex Smith were adorable. What should we make of the dramatic difference in public response and attitudes? Are disabled children worth less than healthy children? Would Robert Latimer be a folk hero and enjoy the support of a majority of Canadians if Tracey had been a healthy child? No, I don't think so.

Cold winds of public opinion

Robert Latimer was returned to his jail cell yesterday but his case served to set new public sympathy for so-called mercy-killers in Canada. Today, a public opinion survey was conducted by Canada's Globe and Mail newspaper about the Parole Board's decision to deny Robert Latimer day-parole. More than 80% of respondents disagree with the parole Board's decision. They think he should been given it. The Canadian Civil Liberties Association's Allan Borovoy said the government of Canada should step in and pardon Latimer. Lawyer Borovoy calls the imprisonment of Robert Latimer a "national disgrace."

It's a scary time to be disabled (as I am). Apparently it's a disgrace to imprison the killer of a person with a disability. We are held in low public opinion. The winds of public opinion blow colder than a Canadian winter for the disabled of Canada.
Mark Pickup

Posted by Mark Pickup at 1:06 PM

3 comments:
Jim Todd said...
Mark:
Once again I find that I and many others have been given the big lie and have fallen for it hook, line and sinker. I believe that everyone is better alive then dead. I believe that we should all be loved and given the best treatment to keep us alive. I have had several discussions with people concerning Robert Latimer and I am always getting it thrown in my face that I am an unfeeling, sadist who wants people to suffer because I feel that Latimer was not justified in doing what he did to his daughter. I am also satisfied that the parole board did not release him.
Could you lead me in the direction of your sources of information? I too would like to dethrone this "pop- hero".
Most of all, Mark, do not get discouraged because of the mass media attitude and lies towards the disabled. Your life and attitude about life and Christ speak volumes of what it means to be human, to be Christian.
Remember you in my prays and thoughts.

Jim Todd

December 6, 2007 7:47 PM
T E Fine said...
You mention Susan Smith - the Andrea Yates case happened in my backyard in 2001. I remember the uproar at the U of Houston about how evil she was, how horrible she was - heck, I had an atheist professor talking about how she was morally reprehnsible and deserved the death penalty!

I am disgusted that 70% of Canadians support or pity Latimer. Where's the righteous anger and indignation? Where's the sympathetic pains for his baby girl? What kind of beasts are we growing these days, that they let a kin slayer slide under *any* circumstances?

They won't let him out - good. He doesn't deserve what he's got, let alone any kind of reward for his behavior.

He's the kind of guy that makes it a real trial to pray for your enemies.

2007-12-02T07:04:00.000-08:00

Austin Peck was a model who then went on to have a seven year run on DAYS OF OUR LIVES followed by a role on As the World Turns. He was a fan favourite when he was on Days of Our Lives generating lots of fan mail.

He quite publicly became a born-again Christian and he's outspoken about his faith.

He's a frequent guest on TBN.

2007-12-02T06:57:00.000-08:00

I am beginning to highlight born-again Christians who are famous.

Deezer D is an actor, rapper and speaker. He is best known for his role as Nurse Malik on ER.

Motherhood Meme

2007-12-02T02:11:00.000-08:00

1. How many children call you Mommy/Mom/Mama?:
All three do.

2. Girl? Boy? or both?

Three boys have been born so far.

3. Did you know what you were having?:
Yes we did. I had complications so had more ultrasounds than average so towards the end it gets pretty obvious!

4. How old were you when you became a Mom?
I was young.

5. How long were you in labor?
I've blocked that out!

6. What was your least favorite thing about labor?
Having people be abrupt and unsympathetic

7. Do you want more kids?:
Yeah, I've always wanted a large family.

8. Do you plan on having more soon?:
After our next baby we are considering taking a break.

9. Does daddy change diapers?
yes but more at the beginning then when they get older.

10. How many times have you been peed on?

Too many times to count!

11. Barfed on?:
Too many times. Yes.

12. Is your child named after anyone?
Two of them are.

13. How did you come up with their name(s)?
Different answer for each chid and it's personal.

14. When your child(ren) gets in trouble, who is the bad guy?
Believe it or not, me! I am the tough one!

15. And who is the good guy?
We're both the good guy.

16. What is the longest you have been away from your child(ren)?
Overnight.

17. Kids bedtime routine?
Different routine for each child. With the older two they get a story and a massage before they go to bed. They were fussy boys as babies so infant massage kept me sane and they've just grown into it as a routine. They have problems falling asleep without a message. I also either sing to them or read to them - or my husband does - and the kids get to pick that. With our littlest one he's held until he falls asleep and we talk to him or sing to him.

18. Are your toes painted?
Always!

19. Last movie you saw in the theater?
I don't remember.

20. Last time you had a date?
We have not had a date since my husband had an accident several weeks back but we have been pretty faithful at finding time to ourselves even if not an official date. We wake up early and have breakfast together on the deck before anyone is up.

21. One thing you will not give up just because you are a mom?
I would give up anything for them if it was necessary but I like to find time to myself which is pretty easy for me despite having a few kids because of the amount of help and support I have.

22. One thing you did give up now that you’re a mom?

You automatically give up a sense of catering to yourself instinctively and it doesn't seem a sacrifice it's just an automatic thing.

I think I also gave up ease in decision-making. Everything seems so much more complicated in terms of making a decision. I find myself more reflective, more philosophical, and much more willing to re-evaluate things now that I am responsible for other people.

23. Best Mom you know?
My own mother is a great mom.

Wedding Meme

2007-12-02T01:55:00.000-08:00

I agreed to do this one but I'm eliminating some of the questions or passing on them because some stuff I won't give away online.

1. Where/How did you meet?
We met through inter-church activities growing up but it didn't initially have a romantic context because we were quite young.

2. How long have you known each other?
Childhood.

3. How long after you met did you start dating?
Several years.

4. How long did you date before you were engaged?
Pass.

5. How long was your engagement?
Our engagement length kept being stretched out by a family illness. It just didn't seem the right time to get married with an illness looming. We were formally engaged for just shy of two years.

6. How long have you been married?
A few years - nothing more precise!

7. When is your anniversary?
Pass, that leads to identity theft issues.

8. How many people came to your wedding reception?
120

9. What kind of cake did you serve?

My husband had a groom's cake which was basically a digestible small version of a wedding cake that was all chocolate. The wedding cake was a 7 tiered cake that had layers that were fake and layers that were actual food. We have those fake layers on display in the house under glass. We had fresh flowers decorating our cake. It was red velvet which is my husband's favourite - mine not so much!

10. Where was your wedding?
Edmonton, Alberta

11. What did you serve for your meal?
We had a very casual rehearsal dinner which was a barbeque and a day out at the lake with water skiing. For the wedding we had a lovely buffet that had chicken as the main dish.

12. How many people were in your wedding party?

We had a big wedding party because of the number of flower girls.

13. Are you still friends with them all?
Yes.

14. Did your spouse cry during the ceremony?
Yes.

15. Most special moment of your wedding day?
Lots of different things were special. My sister had passed away at that time and we found a way of honouring her during the ceremony. We did it in a way that wasn't morbid.

On a happier note there were a couple of things. My husband truly had the most beautiful wedding vows written. I hadn't read them before and I remember thinking "You are so outdoing me!" because he is just more articulate and sweet. He's also very musically talented. He picked out the music for the wedding ceremony and then he brought a personal musical touch to the reception.

16. Any funny moments?
Yes but I'll keep that to myself!

17. Any big disasters?
Not really.

18. Where did you go on your honeymoon?
We had a short local honeymoon.

19. How long were you gone?
It was short!

20. If you were to do your wedding over, what would you change?
Having more time to ourselves after rather than my husband having to start work.

21. What side of the bed do you sleep on?
I sleep on the left.

22. What size is your bed?
King size.

23. Greatest strength as a couple?
That we see each other through kind and charitable eyes and really intend to always magnify each other's strengths rather than tear each other down.

24. Greatest challenge as a couple?
My eating disorder and all of the issues that linger around that.

25. Who literally pays the bills?
Both of us - depends on the bill but mostly me.

26. What is your song?
I will be here.

27. What did you dance your first dance to?
Our first dance ever or at our wedding? Our first dance was to a crappy country and western song and I dont' even know! I was just glad he asked me to dance!

28. Describe her wedding dress.
I had two. My parents were very opposed to the one I liked so I got a more traditional dress. My husband actually saw how much despair I had over not getting the dress I wanted and he made arrangements for me to have the dress I really liked for the reception! It was a long white dress with a tighter-fitting bodice and a beautiful big hoop of a skirt! it was backless and had lots of beadwork.

29. What kind of flowers did you have at your wedding?
White roses with streamers.

30. Are your wedding bands engraved?
Yes.

Meme

2007-12-02T01:49:00.000-08:00

A meme posted by friends on their sites:

MOUTHOLOGY
Q. What is your favorite fast food restaurant?
A. Wendy's because I loved their bakes potatoes but McDonalds for french fries!

Q. What food could you eat every day for two weeks and not get sick of?
A: Potatoes

Q.What are your pizza toppings of choice?
A. Chicken and spinach at BP.

TECHNOLOGY
Q. What is currently on your computer wallpaper?
A: A picture of my kids.

Q. How many televisions are in your house?
A: 5 shamefully.

BIOLOGY
Q. Are you right-handed or left-handed?
A. Right.

Q. When was the last time you had a cavity?
A. Never had one.

Q. Have you ever been knocked unconscious?
A. Yes.

OTHEROLOGY
Q. What color do you think looks best on you?
A. Pink

Q. Have you ever saved someone's life?
A. I was a nurse before I got married - I'd like to think I contributed to someone living.

Q. Has someone ever saved yours?
A. No, I've not been sick or in a high risk situation.

DUMBOLOGY
Q: What is in your left pocket?
A: Right now? A pacifier.

Q: Is Napoleon Dynamite actually a good movie?
A. Never heard of it!

Q: Last time you had a run-in with the cops?
A: Yesterday when I reported a MVA

LASTOLOGY
Q: Last person who called you?
A: My sister Hannah

Q: Last Person you hugged?
A: My husband.

FAVORITOLOGY
Q: Number?
A: Don't really have one.

Q: Season?
A: Summer!

CURRENTOLOGY
Q: Mood?
A: Tired.

Q: Listening to?
A: Christmas music.

Q: Watching?
A: The computer screen.

RANDOMOLOGY
Q: What can you not wait to do?
A: Wake up my kids.

Q: What's the last movie you saw?
A: Can't remember.

Q: Do you smile often?
A: Yes

: When Holding On is a Crime

2007-11-28T20:12:00.000-08:00

My alternative parenting choices have often elicited criticism and ridicule from the world outside my home. But the comment I hear most recently is the one that hits me right in the mother self-doubt department. It's the condescending "Sounds like you just don't want to let go."

It's an accusation I've heard before. And if holding on is a crime, then I'm guilty as charged. I confess, I have a long rap sheet of offenses. The letting go police are always on my heels, reading me my right to send my kids out into the world without me.

It all started several years ago when I was reprimanded for staying home with my daughter. Apparently, I broke some unwritten law of feminism when I declined to "let her go" to day care. But it wasn't an act of rebellion or possessiveness. My partner in crime and I just felt that it was only natural for our baby to be in her mother's care.

The second charge against me came during the same year. It was my first year of motherhood, and I was a suspect in an assisted crib break. It's true. I helped my baby escape from her crib jail and allowed her to hide out in our king size family bed. I even let two subsequent members of our gang use the same hideout, but I slumbered in fear of getting caught. It seems we were always covering our tracks and concealing evidence. When word got out that we were cosleepers, I was essentially tried and convicted by a jury of parenting peers.

I knew I had already sealed my fate when I went so far as to shun the preschool experience and keep my three and four-year-old at home. But the recent confession that I planned to homeschool my daughter instead of sending her to kindergarten, that was the last straw. Now I was a wanted mom. A well-meaning posse of family, friends, and acquaintances tried to convince me to change my ways.

"She can't stay home forever."

"Sounds like you just don't want to let go."

If they had been talking about a college kid, I might have surrendered to the attachment patrol. But who decided that the official time for letting go is five years of age?

I think this whole letting go philosophy is getting out of hand. It's a natural emotion to want to hold on to a baby, a toddler, or a young child. It even makes sense. At an age when my daughter can barely speak up for herself, let alone defend herself, my internal logic pleads with me to stick close by, to monitor the surroundings, and not to trust just anyone to take my place.

I'm advised to ignore that voice. I'm told that it's the voice of weakness, of irrational concern, and of my own selfish longings.

But am I to ignore the voices of my children too? The sound of a baby crying for her mama in the middle of the night? Or the voice of my oldest child saying she'd rather stay home with her family than go to school?

My daugher is not pulling away. She's not asking to be let go of. On the contrary, when given a choice, she'd rather go fishing with mom or dad than go to an amusement park with anyone else.

Call it emotion or logic or insecurity. Call it what you will. But my inner voice/my heart/my maternal instincts/the Holy Spirit doesn't say anything about letting go just yet. When it does, I will listen. When my daughter seems ready, I will send her out into the world on her own. But that time does not always come by the ripe old age of five.

I stand accused, but I stand by my convictions. I will continue to pour my heart and soul, my time and energy, my intelligence and creativity into nurturing my children. And if this kind of "holding on" is wrong, then I don't want to be right.

A wonderful article that can be found at gentlemothers.com and many more like it!

2007-11-28T20:07:00.000-08:00

Planned Parenthood-Endorsed Book for Young Children too “Sexually Explicit” for Prisoners

WASHINGTON, November 28, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Excerpts from a sexually explicit book published for children aged eight to thirteen have been banned from Internet sites and from a Washington state prison for its “inappropriate content”. The book includes graphic depictions of genitalia, different forms of contraception, tampons and menstrual pads, and depicts people engaged in sex. It explains non-vaginal sex such as oral and anal sex. It has little to say about virginity (the word does not appear in the index), abstinence or chastity.

As a tool of the homosexual movement, it has been endorsed for its usefulness in that it describes homosexuality and bisexuality as simply other ways of being and goes on to explain that although some people feel hate towards homosexuals, such opinions are based on misinformation. The book attacks the religious objection to masturbation, saying, “Some religions call masturbation a sin, but masturbating cannot hurt you.” This is followed by illustrations and instructions.

The book is “It's Perfectly Normal: Changing Bodies, Growing Up, Sex, and Sexual Health”, was published in 1996 for children aged eight to thirteen and is under fire again from pro-life and pro-family advocates. It is strongly endorsed by Planned Parenthood as a means of teaching children that whatever sexual activity they would like to engage in is “perfectly normal”. It explains how to use contraception and endorses abortion and the medically discredited “safe sex” propaganda to avoid sexually transmitted diseases including HIV/AIDS. Its author, Robie Harris, was on Planned Parenthood’s national board of advocates.

“It's Perfectly Normal” was included in the American Library Association's list of “most frequently challenged books of 2005” for “homosexuality, nudity, sex education, religious viewpoint, abortion and being unsuited to age group.” It ranked #15 in the Association’s list of “100 most frequently challenged books 1990-2000”.

“How can anyone claim that this book is appropriate for 10 year olds?” asked Jim Sedlak, vice-president for American Life League.

The comments follow revelations a few months ago that a Washington State prison rejected a letter that included images from the book on the grounds that they are too “sexually explicit” and “obscene” to be allowed in the prison.

Last week American Life League posted a video report about the book on several Internet sites. That report was removed from three of these sites vidilife.com, sharkle.com, and hi5.com for "inappropriate content," and flagged on metacafe.com for viewers over 18.

The video report asks, “If these images are too obscene for adult prisoners, why are they good for ten year-old children?”

“We are calling for libraries, schools and parents all across the country to take similar action," Sedlak concluded. "Planned Parenthood should be denied access to our children at all times. The material it promotes is totally inappropriate and could be harmful."

View a report by American Life League:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VuUmsZYWnrs ;

2007-11-28T20:04:00.000-08:00

The head of a Kansas-based pro-life group is demanding an apology and monetary damages after the driver of a pro-life truck was illegally arrested and his truck impounded in Atlanta.

Bob Roethlisberger was arrested and jailed over Thanksgiving weekend in a northern suburb of Atlanta, Georgia, on the charge of "disorderly conduct" for driving Operation Rescue's "Truth Truck" bearing signs with photos of aborted babies. The truck subsequently was impounded, and was released late Monday.

Gwinnett County Police Department officers arrested Roethlisberger Saturday after telling him that signage on the Truth Truck was "vulgar and obscene." According to the pro-life group, officers "ransacked" the back of the Truth Truck without a warrant and ordered Roethlisberger to change or remove the signs. When he refused, he was arrested and incarcerated for three days before being released on $1,000 bond.

Operation Rescue president Troy Newman says the officers' action were a violation of constitutional rights and illegal.

"These officers actually took a utility knife and cut these signs off of our completely legal, registered, and insured vehicle, and incarcerated our driver," the pro-life leader explains. "I would think this is an abuse of power, and we're going to use all civil remedies to rectify the situation."

Newman alleges that the officers punished Roethlisberger, who otherwise cooperated with authorities, for expressing a viewpoint with which they disagreed. "[Bob] refused to compromise on his message," notes Newman, "which is unequivocally protected by the First Amendment." In addition, he points out the legal right to display the images on the trucks has been upheld in courts across the nation.

But the illegal arrest and destruction of property by the police does prove one thing, Newman asserts. "If these pictures are so graphic and horrible that we don't want to see them, perhaps we shouldn't be tolerating the act of abortion," he shares.

http://www.onenewsnow.com/2007/11/prolife_leader_outraged_over_i.php

Stop Child Abuse

2007-11-25T20:21:00.000-08:00

A grand jury will decide in early December whether to indict a Tennessee man on charges that he raped two of his daughters and forced them to wear an electric-shock dog collar. His wife may also face trial for failing to intervene.

Wayne Burkhart Jr., 38, and his wife, Rebecca, 35, were in court yesterday as Claiborne County Judge Robert Estep ruled that the case should go before a grand jury.

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The husband and wife were arrested in September. Wayne Burkhart faces two counts of aggravated child assault and two counts of rape. Rebecca Burkhart was charged with aggravated child neglect and failing to report child abuse.

"We're pleased with yesterday's results, and we feel the judge's decision was consistent with the evidence," Claiborne County Assistant District Attorney Jared Effler told ABC News.

Burkhart's 17-year-old daughter told authorities in a Sept. 10 interview that she had been sexually and physically abused by her father, according to the complaint affidavit. "Among other things, her father [the defendant] uses dog collars equipped with electric shock to train his hunting dogs, and that he uses the collar on her to shock her and her 19-year-old sister," the affidavit reads.

The teen told authorities her father used the shock collar on her Sept. 9 "because he was mad at her for going out with a boy."

The teen also said that her mother had witnessed this and that her father typically put the collar around her midcalf to shock her. The girl's siblings, 15, 11 and 13, corroborated the account, according to the court documents.

Both teens showed investigators bruises consistent with an electric dog collar and the girl also said that her father held a shotgun to her head and said that if she "ever told anyone, he would kill himself, her and anyone who tried to remove her from his home," the affidavit reads.

Burkhart's children also said that their stepmother, Rebecca Burkhart, had been present when the dog collar was used. "At none of these times," the affidavit reads, "did [Rebecca Burkhart] attempt to call law enforcement or seek medical treatment for her stepdaughter."

http://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=3864646&page=1

2007-11-25T20:18:00.000-08:00

A TODDLER bled to death after her stepfather flew into a rage and crushed her against the edge of a bathroom sink, a Melbourne court has been told.

Phong Gia Quach, 23, told police he intended to scare the three-year-old into obeying him after an illness caused her to continually vomit on herself, not into a bucket as he had asked.

He pleaded guilty to manslaughter in the Victorian Supreme Court today.

Quach put Liliana Lam on the floor and pushed on her stomach with both hands, then picked her up and pushed her forcefully over the edge of the basin on May 3 last year at their Noble Park home, the court was told.

Liliana died less than an hour after being taken to Monash Medical Centre the next day.

The court was told Quach admitted to police he might have killed Liliana but never intended to hurt her.

Prosecutor Geoff Horgan SC said Quach gave a bizarre reason for his actions, saying Liliana's grandparents had accused him of being a drug user and bashing her so he thought "if I'm going to be accused of it I might as well do it".

The court was told Liliana had suffered an abdominal injury at least eight weeks before her death which had left her fragile.

But Mr Horgan said there was no evidence about how this injury had occurred.

Defence lawyer Robert Richter QC said his client was remorseful and had insufficient parenting skills to deal with Liliana.

He said there was no evidence Quach had been a "serious, brutal and sadistic carer", instead he had simply lost his composure with the youngster.

Quach was remanded in custody for sentence on a date to be fixed.

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,22791247-421,00.html

VIDEO REPORT: Mother refuses abortion, daughter celebrates 16 years

2007-11-25T20:16:00.000-08:00

Lori Vance went against the doctors' wishes and saw her pregnancy through to birth.

Now on her daughter's sweet sixteenth birthday, the family is celebrating her triumphant life.

The Vance family told News Channel 11 that a fatal disorder isn't always a death sentence.

At 16-years-old, one of the hardest decisions for Donna Joy Vance is what to wear.

Sitting on the couch with her mother, Donna blushes over a TV crush. "We're celebrating Donna Joy's 16th birthday,” Lori Vance Said. “It's a special day because it's a day the doctors and so-called experts way back when said would never come to be."

At seven months into the pregnancy, doctors realized that Donna Joy had a brain disorder called Holoprosencephaly, or HPE.

Physicians told Lori Vance that her child would be completely blind, likely deaf, likely born with no face, no ability to move limbs or suck and swallow.

"Basically, everything that makes you a human being was going to be missing," Vance told News Channel 11. "They wanted to terminate the pregnancy because they said she was going to die anyway," Vance said.

Vance refused.
She was determined to give Donna Joy a chance. "Even if it was only for a few minutes—to give her some dignity, wrap her up in a pretty blanket. Say ‘I love you’ and let her go," Vance said.

But mother and child never had to say goodbye.
Donna Joy is beating the odds.

While the pre-natal studies on Donna Joy's brain were accurate, her functions have surpassed expectations.

"She didn't read the book on this disorder,” Vance said. “No one told her she couldn't do these things. So she does them anyway."

Among Donna Joy's accomplishments: Special Olympics track medals, modeling, singing and beauty pageants.

2007-11-25T20:12:00.000-08:00

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No-holds-barred abortion battle
'Personhood' amendment could ban some birth control, stem-cell research
By Lisa Ryckman, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)
Saturday, November 24, 2007
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Email this Print this Comments Change text size Subscribe to print edition iPod friendly Share this site Del.icio.us Digg Newsvine Map my newsA©2007 Yahoo! Inc.Data ©Navteq,TeleAtlasIt's known as the "Definition of a Person" in Colorado, the "Ultimate Human Life Amendment" in Mississippi, the "Paramount Right to Life Amendment" in Georgia and the "Personhood Amendment" in Michigan.

In each case, the measure would change the state constitution to define a fertilized egg as a person entitled to constitutional protections of inalienable rights, justice and due process. And in every case, it's part of a no-compromise anti-abortion strategy that has created a deep divide between those state groups that want a direct attack on Roe v. Wade and those that prefer National Right to Life's incremental approach.

But abortion-rights supporters and opponents agree that Colorado's "personhood" amendment would outlaw abortion and potentially have much broader effects.

Toni Panetta, deputy director of NARAL Pro-Choice Colorado, called the amendment the "latest volley in the death by a thousand paper cuts by anti-choice activists."

She said the amendment potentially could outlaw any form of birth control that makes the uterus a hostile environment, including intrauterine devices and the "morning after" pill, as well as other oral contraceptives.

Colorado Right to Life spokesman Bob Enyart said he thought it also could mean an end to embryonic stem-cell research. "The goal is to stop the killing of unborn children by reasserting the personhood of the unborn," he said.

But Kristi Burton, the 20- year-old head of Colorado for Equal Rights, the group behind the initiative, refused to speculate on what might happen.

"The goal is simply to define when life begins," she said this week after the State Supreme Court cleared the way for the measure by accepting the argument that it fit the definition of a one-issue initiative. "We'll see where it takes us."

Political road ahead

At least for the next six months, the amendment will take Burton and her supporters into the churches they plan to use as bases to collect the 76,000 signatures needed to put it on the November 2008 ballot.

It will probably get there, said independent political analyst Eric Sondermann, but he predicted that it won't play well in a state where more than 60 percent of adults support abortion rights.

"This one is a frontal assault on the right to choose," he said. "Every poll and analysis I've seen shows this is a pro-choice state. If you go at the very core of the right to choose without any exception, it's going to be a very tough political row to hoe."

The measure represents a hard-line strategy by abortion opponents to overturn Roe v. Wade by zeroing in on what they consider a loophole in the landmark 1973 U.S. Supreme Court decision that established abortion rights.

"The (state of Texas and others) argue that the fetus is a 'person' within the language and meaning of the 14th Amendment," Justice Harry Blackmun wrote for the majority. "If this suggestion of personhood is established, (Roe's) case, of course, collapses, for the fetus' right to life would then be guaranteed specifically by the (14th) Amendment."

The hope by anti-abortion groups is that such an amendment would be challenged up to the U.S. Supreme Court, which would uphold it, thereby affirming the "personhood" of the fertilized egg and effectively undoing Roe.

But the strategy has created a rift between state groups and National Right to Life, which prefers to be more subtle.

"National Right to Life is more in favor of the incremental approach, and they don't want people like us and people in the states to even do human life amendments," said Brian Rooney, an attorney with the Thomas More Law Center in Ann Arbor, Mich., which gives free legal help to groups pushing "personhood" measures. "They believe it's not the right time. But we believe it's never the wrong time to do the right thing. The incremental approach has not stopped one abortion from happening."

Colorado voting history

To abortion-rights activists, approach is irrelevant, Panetta said. "It doesn't matter whether they take on Roe in its entirety or chip away at the rights," she said. "Both attempts deny women the right to choose and access to safe medical care."

An amendment similar to Colorado's is still alive in Georgia and Mississippi, but it died in the Montana legislature, failed to get enough signatures in Michigan and was tossed out in Oregon, where Thomas More attorneys have filed a lawsuit.

In recent years, Colorado voters haven't been supportive of measures that limit abortion access. In 2006, backers of a proposal to ban late-term abortions failed to turn in signatures to place the measure on the November ballot.

About 60 percent of voters in 2000 rejected Amendment 25, a measure to delay abortions 24 hours while women perused information on medical risks and other options.

If Colorado voters were to pass a "personhood" amendment, they would be doing something that Justice Blackmun himself refused to do: pinpoint the moment life begins.

"When those trained in the respective disciplines of medicine, philosophy, and theology are unable to arrive at any consensus," he wrote in Roe, "the judiciary, at this point in the development of man's knowledge, is not in a position to speculate as to the answer."

Proposed Initiative 36

Shall there be an amendment to the Colorado Constitution defining the term "person" to include any human being from the moment of fertilization as "person" is used in those provisions of the Colorado constitution relating to inalienable rights, equality of justice, and due process of law?

* Supporters say: The amendment would be challenged in court and make its way to the U.S. Supreme Court, which would use it to overturn Roe vs. Wade.

* Opponents say: The amendment is misleading because it fails to state its main goal, which is to outlaw abortion. It would open a Pandora's box of legal problems by giving fertilized eggs the right to access Colorado's courts.

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Comments
Posted by JohnSWren on November 24, 2007 at 6:22 a.m. (Suggest removal)
When does a woman become a mother, and her child gain equal rights?

When the child draws its first breath? When it is conceived? When it can defeat its father in physical combat?

Who decides? In our representative form of government, in the long run it is our elected representatives. The League of Women voters has said your voice counts most in electing them at your neighborhood caucus. One vote can often make the differnce in nominating candidates and passing resolutions.

Resolutions on both sides of the question are sure to be offered across the state February 5 at the 6000 or so meetings with neighbors at our Colorado caucus.

To have a voice and to be part of the decision, you must register with the political party of your choice by December 5. To learn more Google “Colorado caucus.”

Posted by Theoldguy on November 24, 2007 at 9:25 a.m. (Suggest removal)
This is an obvious far reaching quest by the anti-abortion folks simply because the claim that a fertilized clump of cells has the same human rights that a full term human has goes beyond reason. A fertilized human egg has to go through a "proof of viability test" to become a human being. The fertilized egg must first become stronger that its uterine environment after traveling along the fallopian tubes that may, or may not, be conducive to fertilized egg travel. Some of these passages are genetically inferior of may have been damaged by disease or chemicals. This isn't even considering the genetic make up of the two parents' genes which may have far reaching compatibility issues. There are so many variables to an egg becoming full term, or not, that it goes far beyond a simplistic answer being produced by this remedy. Sticking to the wishes of this group one can imagine that a spontaneous abortion would be a crime of the mother.
Knowing that this is an emotional issue, is it wise to let others set the standard? Many less knowledgeable people will be expected to decide this issue. Are the four named states really a repository of in depth knowledge that supports the wishes of the other 46 states?

Posted by Iceman on November 24, 2007 at 10:34 a.m. (Suggest removal)
"We'll see where it takes us."

Regardless of your stance on abortion this is reason enough to oppose the measure. If proponents of a proposal aren't fully aware of the legal impacts, intended or otherwise, there's no way it should be supported. I say this based on years of legal analysis of legislation from an impartial perspective. This isn't just an argument opponents of the measure can and should make - it could be a disaster for pro-life supporters if this measure triggers a flurry of unintended problems that turns public sentiment against such proposals in the future.

Posted by gloriapoole on November 24, 2007 at 10:50 a.m. (Suggest removal)
A human being with human DNA and human cells is human and should be defined as "person" and human for the sake of Constitutional protection. The medical professions, particularly obstetrics, and neonatology defined the moment of life as the moment of fertilization long ago. The reason the Judiciary pretends not to know that, is the love of money that The Bible warns against. [I Timothy 6:10 *] Of course, that only makes the Judiciary branches look foolish and out of touch with truth. And it makes clear the fact that propaganda is the tool of the devil still.

Abortion is death to an innocent human being. That is fact. It is also premeditated because the killers prepare their instruments and their "operating room" that is often not much better than a back-office room of the preborn assassin's work place. There is much testimony that abortionists do not follow standard operating room procedures nor do they have admitting privileges to hospitals for emergency care of the women they butcher. It is also medical fact that millions of women who aborted were rendered sterile and have deep, abiding sorrow and regrets because of that.
The premeditated, purposeful destruction of innocent human life is NOT a right. GOD's commandment is "thou shalt not kill" [Exodus 20:13], and JESUS said, "even so it is not the will of your FATHER which is in heaven, that one of these little ones should perish." [Matthew 18:14]
GOD willing there are more good people in U.S. than wicked, and they will know the truth and vote the truth. It is the right thing to do to outlaw all abortions as soon as possible. It is also the right thing for all those millions of women who were deceived to repent and turn away from such evil, for the sake of your relationship to GOD ALMIGHTY, and the peace of your soul.
I write this as a Registered Nurse of many years who worked in Operating Rooms. I refused to participate in medical killing or call that a "right" and got fired for it, and then was fired again for protesting with words the killing of innocents in hospitals, that is supposedly a First Amendment liberty. However, it is written, "be not deceived. GOD is not mocked. For whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap."[Galatians 6:7] Those in this nation who have purposely, year after year, voted to continue the mass murders of millions of innocents who were created in the womb by GOD, are going to have to face GOD on HIS JUDGEMENT DAY and h--- is waiting for them. Those who sat by and did nothing to help the innocents, those who actively shredded and murdered innocents, those women who signed the lives of their innocents away on a deceitful "informed consent", those accomplices to evil who stood and handed instruments of death, will also have to give an account before GOD.
signed gloria poole {RN} licensed as Gloria Poole Pappas, RN in Colorado

Posted by rogercopy on November 24, 2007 at 11:05 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Why do abortion opponents continue to act as God? The 10 commandments tell us that we should have no other God before Him. In judging and condemning those who support a person's right to control their own body, abortion foes are acting as God, instead of allowing him to do it himself. What human has the right to act as judge and executioner over another human? Opponents should live their own lives and allow God to judge those who would "murder" unborn children. To act on behalf of God and judge someone here on Earth is blasphemy.

Furthermore, why aren't all these abortion foes helping out in Darfur? Many already born babies are dying everyday. Could it be that their righteous dogmatic nature propels them to be our "moral police"? It's hypocritical and sinful for abortion opponents to be so unbalanced in their quest to save lives. It reveals their purpose to be furthering their religious/political agenda, rather than actually saving lives.

Posted by Joanna on November 24, 2007 at 11:59 a.m. (Suggest removal)
So, when does it end. Cancer cells are alive too? Do we protect them? They are part of the human body, so god must want them there, right? Isn't it desecrating human life to remove part of our god-given body?

Will the voters have a solution for all these babies that will be born? Who takes care of them? Face it, we already have enough "parents" who don't do their job...now we force women who don't want to have a baby to deliver a child. Then what?

And I am SO SO SO tired of the BS lines about women who've had abortions who are permanently damaged. That's crap. They've been brainwashed by those around them.

I don't like abortion. I think there are far better forms of birth control, such as abstinence, birth-control pills, IUDs, and other tried and true methods. But I once found myself in a position where I had to make a decision. It was actually quite easy. I protected the one child I had and I protected myself. I had an abortion, because that's what I needed to do to begin becoming a productive member of our society. I got off drugs, graduated from college, worked 2 jobs to pay for it all, and raised my son to become the fine young man he is today.

Oh, yes. It was my choices and my fault that I found myself in the position I did. It was also my choice to pull myself up by my bootstraps and fix things.

Notice all the CHOICES I made? Who are you to tell me I was wrong?

http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/front/la-na-egg23nov23,1,4569441.story?coll=la-headlines-frontpage&ctrack=2&cset=true

2007-11-25T20:10:00.001-08:00

OTTAWA -- Amid reports that he may be charged under the Elections Act for matters dating back to the 2004 election, MP Wajid Khan is "stepping aside" from the Conservative Party caucus.

"The decision was made following media reports that he may be charged under the Elections Act over matters dating back to the 2004 election, when he ran as a candidate for the Liberal Party," a news release issued late Friday from Khan's office said.

Charges were filed in court earlier this month against Khan. He is accused of violating the Elections Canada Act by allegedly overspending during the 2004 federal campaign.

"Although I have not yet been served with court documents, given the circumstances, I am withdrawing from the Conservative caucus to sit as an independent MP," Khan said in the statement. "I have also offered the Prime Minister my resignation as his Special Advisor for Middle Eastern and South Asian Affairs."

Khan said he would continue to sit as an indepedent MP.

The charge was filed in court Nov. 15 after getting the required approval from the Director of Public Prosecutions, after an investigation by the Elections Commissioner.

Khan ran as a Liberal Party candidate in 2004 and 2006, but crossed the floor in January 2007 to sit as a Conservative party member. He is alleged to have exceeded allowable spending by 40 per cent.

"In the 2004 campaign, Wajid Khan is accused of overspending his limit for campaign expenses and making a campaign expense by someone other than an official agent," Dan Brien of the Public Prosecutions Service of Canada told CTV News.

There are charges filed against: Khan, Khalid Sagheer, and Khan's auto dealership, Dufferin Mazda.

The Globe and Mail's Campbell Clark told CTV Newsnet that it's relatively rare in Canada to see charges laid for overspending.

Khan could face up to five years in jail if he's found guilty of the charges.

While the charges have been filed in court, Khan's lawyer said earlier Friday the MP has not been served with any papers.

"Contrary to the news reports, Mr. Khan was not charged with any offences today. To be clear Mr. Khan has not been served with any process or summons in relation to any Elections Act charges," Scott K. Fenton wrote in a statement to CTV News.

The Mississauga MP was elected as a Liberal candidate twice, in 2004 and 2006. He took a position as a special adviser on Middle East issues to Prime Minister Stephen Harper before crossing the floor and joining the Conservatives last January.

Khan has been a controversial member of Parliament, refusing to make public a report he wrote while visiting the Middle East.

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20071123/khan_charges_071123/20071123?hub=Politics

Half of Americans Want to Know Candidate's Abortion Stance Before Voting

2007-10-29T17:46:00.000-07:00

Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- A new poll conducted by Fox News finds that almost half of all voters want to know where a candidate stands on the issue of abortion before casting their vote for or against him. The poll is the latest to show that abortion still has a significant impact for voters, despite media pronouncements to the contrary.
The new survey, released on Friday, finds 45 percent of Americans need to know a candidate's position on abortion before they vote, while 53 percent say they don't.

A candidate's position on abortion is more important for pro-life voters than those who back abortion.

Fox News found that 56 percent of those identifying themselves as pro-life want to know a candidate's abortion views while just 41 percent of those who back legal abortions do.

That reconfirms results from previous surveys showing pro-life voters are more engaged on the abortion issue than those who back abortion and the results give pro-life candidates a slight edge on the issue.

The Fox News survey also found out that 48 percent of women, 46 percent of Republicans and 51 percent of born-again Christians want to know where a candidate stands on abortion before voting.

John Gorman, the head of the polling firm Opinion Dynamics, which conducted the survey for Fox News, downplayed the results.

"It is interesting to note that even among pro-life voters only slightly more than half need to know," he said.

They survey also found that while media stories focus on immigration and ethics issues as top stories, abortion is just as important for voters when they named their list of top political issues.

The poll also found that pro-life voters were five times more likely to say that abortion is a key political issues compared with voters who call themselves "pro-choice."

According to the Fox News survey, a majority of Republicans oppose abortions in the overwhelmingly majority of circumstances.

Some 50 percent of those polled say they oppose legal abortions in cases when the "pregnancy is unwanted" and only 39 percent of voters say abortions should be legal in such cases.

Republicans were 67-22 percent pro-life according to the poll while Democrats back abortion in general on a 54-37 percent margin.

The poll also determined that many voters don't know when abortions are done. Despite opposing abortions in 98 percent of the cases, the voters labeled themselves "pro-choice" on abortion by a 48-37 percent margin.

Another 15 percent said their views were mixed or didn't know how to classify where they stand on abortion.

http://www.lifenews.com/nat3410.html

Harper government irresponsibly approves HPV Vaccine that causes atrocious side-effects for young girls, including cancer

2007-10-29T17:39:00.000-07:00

The Stephen Harper Conservative minority government earlier this year made a decision to spend $300 million on a campaign to inoculate females nine to 13 against cervical cancer. Sounds like great leadership on a critical health issue doesn't it. The problem is that the decision appears to be motivated to financially support the U.S. Big Business Pharmaceutical interests that developed the vaccine. Kathleen O'Hara in the Hamilton Spectator on 26 September 2007 referred to the vaccine programme as effort to create "more guinea pigs" for a vaccine that has many reported serious health issues.

Four provinces -- Ontario, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland and Labrador, and Prince Edward Island -- have jumped on the bandwagon, making the relatively new vaccine Gardasil by Merck Frosst available for certain ages through public vaccination programs. Other provincial governments are deliberating on the matter, along with the territories.

There have been eight documented deaths that have been linked to the cervical cancer jab.

Doctors suspect the jab, which protects against a sexually transmitted human papilloma virus that causes the cancer, may be implicated in 3,461 adverse documented reactions, including paralysis and seizures.

The American-based National Vaccine Information Center (NVIC) had released in February 2007 a new analysis of the U.S. Federal Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) reports of serious health problems following HPV vaccination (Merck's GARDASIL) during the last six months of 2006. Out of the 385 individual GARDASIL adverse event reports made to VAERS, two-thirds required additional medical care and about one-third of all reports were for children 16-years-old and under, with nearly 25 percent of those children having received simultaneously one or more of the 18 vaccines that Merck did not study in combination with GARDASIL. NVIC is calling on the FDA and CDC to warn parents and doctors that GARDASIL should not be combined with other vaccines and that young girls should be monitored for at least 24 hours for syncopal (collapse/fainting) episodes that can be accompanied by seizure activity, as well as symptoms of tingling, numbness and loss of sensation in the fingers and limbs, all of which should be reported to VAERS immediately.

According to NVIC's report, a majority of GARDASIL adverse event reports to VAERS involved those who suffered fever, nausea, headache or pain; 14 percent were for syncopal episodes with or without neurological signs; and 8 percent experienced tingling, numbness and loss of sensation, facial paralysis or Guillain-Barre Syndrome. Although adverse event reports to VAERS do not prove causation, they can provide an early warning sign that a new vaccine may be causing health problems that could be important. NVIC also found that there were several VAERS reports of HPV infection, genital warts and cervical lesions after GARDASIL vaccination. It is unknown if the girls were infected with HPV before being vaccinated or if GARDASIL failed to protect them. One case of HPV infection occurred in a 22-year-old girl who had participated in a Merck GARDASIL trial in 2003 when she had shown "strong conversion to all 4 vaccine types" but "tested positive for high risk HPV" in 2006, according to the VAERS report.

A lead researcher who spent 20 years developing the vaccine for humanpapilloma virus also says the HPV vaccine is not for younger girls, and that it is "silly" for states to be mandating it for them.

Not only that, she says it's not been tested for effectiveness in younger girls, and administering the vaccine to girls as young as 9 may not even protect them at all. And, in the worst-case scenario, instead of serving to reduce the numbers of cervical cancers within 25 years, such a vaccination crusade actually could cause the numbers to go up.

"Giving it to 11-year-olds is a great big public health experiment," said Diane M. Harper, who is a scientist, physician, professor and the director of the Gynecologic Cancer Prevention Research Group at the Norris Cotton Cancer Center at Dartmouth Medical School in New Hampshire.

"It is silly to mandate vaccination of 11- to 12-year-old girls There also is not enough evidence gathered on side effects to know that safety is not an issue."

Judicial Watch, a U.S. government watchdog, became concerned while noting large donations to key politicians originating from Merck. A freedom of information request from the group in May of this year discovered that during the period from June 8, 2006 -- when the vaccines received approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) -- to May 2007 there were 1,637 reports of adverse reactions to the HPV vaccine reported to the FDA.

The Toronto Star recently reported that Merck Frosst Canada Ltd hired public relations giant Hill & Knowlton to push the immunization strategies using some well-connected lobbyists: Ken Boessenkool, a former senior policy adviser to Prime Minister Stephen Harper; Bob Lopinski, formerly with Premier Dalton McGuinty's office; and Jason Grier, former chief of staff to Health Minister George Smitherman.

Harper's Conservative Government approved Merck's HPV vaccine Gardasil in July and later announced a $300 million program to give the vaccine to girls from ages 9-13. That of course is only the beginning of what Merck likely hopes will be a much larger vaccination of all potentially sexually active women in Canada who are not already HPV infected. In August, McGuinty's Ontario Liberals, on the advice of his Health Minister George Smitherman, announced that all Grade 8 girls will have free access to Gardasil.

Katelyn Lexus: An american family tragedy

2007-10-13T10:04:00.000-07:00

Not long ago, Nicholas and Lola Kampf looked like a couple who had it all.
A million-dollar house in North Yarmouth. A thriving real estate business. The luxuries of trips around the world and private school education for their two children.

Then came shocking charges last September, when their 19- year-old daughter, Katelyn, told police her parents tied her up and drove her south in the family Lexus, in an attempt to force her into an abortion she didn't want.

On Friday, the couple's legal ordeal ended when they pleaded guilty to misdemeanor charges of assault and disorderly conduct. Their family problems, however, were far from resolved.

"This is an American family tragedy," Lola Kampf told Superior Court Justice William Brodrick. "These events have ripped our family apart."

Nicholas and Lola Kampf sat at a defendants' table in Cumberland County Superior Court in Portland, clutching hands. Their daughter, who is now 20, sat on a bench about 15 feet behind them, holding her 8-month-old son. The parents did not look back, and Katelyn Kampf did not glance over when she told a judge he was letting them off easy.

"I'm really unhappy with the plea agreement. I know that they did kidnap me," she told Brodrick. "I do think they should face felony charges."

In the end, Brodrick accepted a plea deal that spared the parents from jail time. Instead, they will undergo psychological evaluations and counseling.

The Kampf family's legal saga began at their North Yarmouth home on Sept. 15, 2006.

Katelyn Kampf told police her parents wanted to take her to New York, where abortions are allowed until 24 weeks into the pregnancy. The procedure is allowed in Maine only until the 20th week, which she had already passed.

Nicholas and Lola Kampf say there was an argument and a fight. They said they bound their daughter's hands and untied her in the Lexus. They told investigators that they knew an abortion would not be provided without Katelyn's consent, and they were hoping during the car ride to convince her that that was the best choice for her future.

The parents were indicted last fall on charges of kidnapping, assault and terrorizing. Cumberland County District Attorney Stephanie Anderson eventually sought lesser charges through a plea deal, based on a judge's recommendation and the fact that Katelyn Kampf said she wanted to avoid a trial and did not want her parents to go to jail.

Anderson said she just learned in the past few days that Katelyn Kampf had changed her mind about the plea deal.

For most of Friday's hearing, Katelyn Kampf held her son, D'Andre, and fed him from a bottle at one point. Her parents apparently had never seen the child whose impending birth sparked the events of last September, as well as the claims and counterclaims that followed.

"This is one of the most unusual and bizarre cases I've ever encountered in over 20 years of doing this," said Anderson, the district attorney.

Anderson said Katelyn Kampf had dropped out of George Washington University and had become pregnant by her boyfriend, Reme Johnson. On Sept. 15, Katelyn decided she wanted to keep the baby, but her parents still wanted her to undergo an abortion. That led to the confrontation and car ride heading south.

When Katelyn Kampf and her father went into a department store in Salem, N.H., to buy a cell phone, Anderson said, Katelyn walked into a Staples store and called police.

Anderson dismissed claims that the ordeal was racially motivated. Kampf is white, and Johnson, the father of her baby, is black. Statements to investigators by Johnson and Katelyn Kampf did not support any theory of racial motivation, Anderson said.

"In my conversations with Katelyn, she had the feeling they didn't like Reme Johnson but they had never said anything overt about his race," she said.

The animosity was based on Johnson's criminal record, his lack of employment and

the fact that he was living with Katelyn Kampf without her parents' knowledge, Anderson said.

In her statement to Brodrick on Friday, Katelyn Kampf disagreed.

She said that when police interviewed her and her brother, Daniel, they asked if her parents were racist. "We did say 'yes,'" Kampf said. "Part of the reasons these things happened was because he was black."

Seth Berner, Katelyn Kampf's lawyer, contended outside court that the events constitute a hate crime. He said he will try to get the state Attorney General's Office or the U.S. attorney to review the facts.

"The outcome of this case is absolutely horrendous," said Berner, co-chairman of the legal redress committee for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People Portland Branch. "It says what they did was no worse than stealing a bottle of wine."

But Anderson said every step was taken to make sure that Katelyn Kampf was part of the plea negotiations. The district attorney said she signed off on the plan at a Sept. 17 meeting.

During Friday's hearing, Berner tried to speak on Katelyn Kampf's behalf but was quieted by Brodrick, who said Berner had no legal right to speak.

"Any differences you have with Ms. Anderson can be handled elsewhere," Brodrick said to Berner. "You're on the record. Now you can proceed to your seat."

Brodrick said the assault and disorderly conduct charges, if they did not involve a "bizarre" family dynamic, would likely have been punished by a short jail sentence, probation and a fine. But he agreed that jail time would not be appropriate.

The Kampfs, who now reside in Florida, must undergo psychological evaluations and counseling and must pay for $5,000 worth of counseling for their daughter. They are not allowed to have contact with Katelyn Kampf, unless she decides to sit in on their counseling sessions.

If the Kampfs meet all the conditions, the assault charges against them will be dropped in 2009, but the disorderly conduct convictions will remain on their records.

Hope for reconciliation is another matter. Both parents said Friday that they want to mend the torn relationship.

"We have all made some bad choices in the past and we will have to live with them, but we must believe with our hearts and soul that time will heal the wounds they have caused," Lola Kampf said.

Immediately after the hearing, in a hallway, Katelyn Kampf cast doubt on that hope.

"They will never be involved in my life. Ever," she said.

What a tragedy that parents can do this to their daughter and grandchild -even if not racially motivated - and not spend many years in jail.

This young woman was kidnapped and assaulted in order to procure an abortion. If this had happened to a woman seeking an abortion with parents protesting that the prochoice movement would have made vast public commentary. This woman because she chose to give birth to her child has not prompted a word from that community.

Pro-abortion Women Circling 2 Pro-Lifers At The Supreme Ct.

2007-09-06T19:27:00.000-07:00

http://www.godtube.com/view_video.php?viewkey=3063e419773b4f310fc2

This video shows women who are pro-abortion rallying at the Supreme Court to share their sadness over the Partial Birth Abortion decision in the USA. It was a huge risk for Roe vs Wade. During this rally two pro-life people present themselves for prayer and the prochoice form a huge oval around them to shout slogans promoting their pro-abortion perspective.

My 17th Birthday Party I was ProChoice - Silent No More

2007-09-06T19:23:00.000-07:00

In this powerful video Kathleen shares that on her 17th birthday she missed and had an abortion before returning to her family birthday party. That was her first of three abortions.

http://www.godtube.com/view_video.php?viewkey=0ef507e2f5d67614b4be

When abortion is racism

2007-09-06T19:22:00.000-07:00

http://www.godtube.com/view_video.php?viewkey=cc7196161261972daa59

This is a theory that exists within the prolife movement.