May 2006 Archives

KeloLand television is reporting that Oglala Sioux tribal council has voted to ban abortion on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation and to "suspend tribal President Cecelia Fire Thunder on grounds she asked for donations for an abortion clinic without the council's OK." Fire Thunder will be suspended for 20 days until an impeachment hearing can take place.

Michigan's Coercive Abortion Prevention Act (S.B. 1177 and H.B.5882) are proposed legislation to amend the penal code to define specific actions as criminal if they are intended to coerce a pregnant woman into seeking an abortion. The penalty of jail time up to 15 years or a fine of not more than $7500 or both would be added to acts or threats that are already physical crimes (assault, stalking, attempted murder). These threats must be part of a pattern of repeated, harassing behavior, not a single statement or angry remark. If the pregnant woman is under the age of 18 and the perpetrator of the coercion is the adult father of the unborn child, the punishment can be doubled.

Not surprisingly, Planned Parenthood opposes the bills.

From LifeNews

This is appalling. What next? Will mothers start aborting babies with overbites or because they don't like their eye color?

A British religious official who earlier spoke out on abortions of children with cleft palates is speaking out about new reports showing abortions there on children who have clubbed feet. The condition is operable and not life-threatening and Rev. Joanna Jepson says such abortions should be illegal. She accused doctors of pressuring women to have abortions when unborn children are diagnosed with any physical or mental disability.

"Women shouldn't be put in the position where they are under pressure to abort from the medical profession," she told the Birmingham Post newspaper.

Crossposted at Marlowe's Shade

When exactly is a pregnancy terminated? Abortion proponents attempting to answer that question should run into a problem. By trying to protect one flank, they've exposed another.

To be consistent, the abortion industry's definition of when a pregnancy begins should agree with its definition of when it ends. But the two don't jibe. For over 30 years, abortion proponents have maintained pregnancy begins when an embryo implants in the uterus and ends after a completed delivery.

According to pro-aborts, a fallopian tube carrying a newly created embryo has no bearing on pregnancy. It merely provides the portal of entry into the uterus. How then can they claim the portal of exit, the birth canal, has anything to do with pregnancy either? Once the baby is outside the uterus, they should consider the pregnancy over, terminated. This becomes problematic when considering partial birth abortions.

Read my column today, "Pro-abort PBA paradox," on WorldNetDaily.com.

Kristen Day, the head of Democrats for Life, points out that in 1978 the Democrats had 90 more seats in the House than they do today. The Democratic caucus also included 90 more pro-lifers than it does now.

More: Cracking the Door by Ramesh Ponnuru

This just in:

The Oglala Sioux tribal council banned all abortions on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation and suspended President Cecelia Fire Thunder on Tuesday, charging that she solicited donations on behalf of the tribe for a proposed abortion clinic without the council's approval.

And this was published in IndianCountry.com last week:

Hat tip: Stacy and Rod.

Terence Jeffrey reports on an interview with Republican National Chairman Ken Mehlman:

Republican National Chairman Ken Mehlman doesn't mind telling you that he sees the pro-life cause as a moral and political winner for his party.

Mehlman insists, however, that the GOP should advance the pro-life cause "because it is morally right," not because it is politically advantageous.

"Those people that say we should abandon our pro-life platform, I believe, are wrong from a political perspective, and I think are wrong from the perspective of what's right for this party," he said.

Mehlman's analysis can explain the self-contradictory behavior Democrats often exhibit on abortion. But it cannot explain similar behavior by Republicans. Democrats find themselves caught between the demands of commonsense and good morality on the one hand and a core constituency adamant about preserving legalized abortion on the other. They forsake commonsense and morality to appease their base.

Now women in China will no longer know the gender of their child prior to an abortion:

The northern Chinese province of Hebei has closed more than 200 clinics for telling women the sex of their fetuses so they can abort girls, a state newspaper said on Wednesday.

China launched a one-child policy in the early 1980s to curb its population, now over 1.3 billion, but the restrictions have bolstered a traditional preference for baby boys and have come under fire from Western countries and human rights activists.

In rural areas of Hebei, there were 134 boys born for every 100 girls, the Shanghai Daily said.

“Twenty-five years later, I still cannot talk about it without tears and pain in my heart. It all looks simple on paper and seems like an easy way out of a bad spot, but no one tells you that the easy way out will cost you later in emotional damage and physical problems.” – Scherrie

Compassion means speaking the truth:

“The women of South Dakota are no longer suffering in silence. Because the governor signed the Bill to Protect Women and Children, and because the pro-abortion rights groups are challenging the legislation, women are coming forward to say, ‘My abortion hurt me,’” stated Leslee Unruh, upon hearing word that a group will be filing signatures on a petition to keep abortion-on-demand legal in South Dakota. “We’re glad this effort will give us the opportunity to educate the citizens, just as we educated the legislators, about how abortion hurts women."

A sad case:

Jackie Maxwell Brown is facing additional charges of attempted intentional homicide in the death of a 5-month-old fetus. The Kane County man is accused of kicking his 31-year-old pregnant girlfriend, allegedly causing her to miscarry her unborn baby.

A Texas mother and her baby are the latest victims in an ongoing battle against a Texas law that allows medical facilities to tell the family of a patient that they have 10 days to find another medical center willing to treat the patient because their doctors think the case is hopeless. (LifeNews)

The exclusive story was reported by the Dallas Morning News:

Baby Daniel is nearly brain-dead. He cannot breathe without a ventilator. He cannot eat without a feeding tube.

And if his mother doesn't find another hospital, the doctors at Children's Medical Center Dallas will disconnect him from the machines and he will die. The hospital's ethics board has ruled that it would be futile and inappropriate to keep Daniel alive – despite his mother's wishes to try.

The child's fate could be settled after a judge hears the case Friday.

"Something deep down inside is telling me not to unplug my 10-month-old," said Dixie Belcher, Daniel's mother. "I know it's going to take him quite a while to pull out of this, but I know he's my little fighter, and he's got to pull through. He's got to pull through."

Don't look at me, I didn't say it, an anti-war politician in England did.

Article

Asked by GQ magazine if Blair's assassination by a suicide bomber would be justified as revenge for the Iraq war, he said: "Yes, it would be morally justified."

Rigghht. So Pro-Life people would be "morally justified" if they killed pro-abortion people?

Click here to continue reading

Last weekend graduates of Saint Thomas University were treated to a surprising speech by 21-year-old graduating student Ben Kessler. Some graduates walked out, many jeered, and others spewed profanities in response to his speech.

Just what did he speak of which caused such an outcry? The War in Iraq? Border control? NSA spying? None of the above.

So, what exactly did Mr. Kessler do wrong? He touched society's third rail: contraception. Mr. Kessler had the audacity to call the use of birth control "an act of selfishness."

This is a follow-up to the Mohler piece I posted yesterday - and the comments some of you made there. I want to tell the story of my evolving thoughts on birth control and children.

As anyone who's been around my blog MommyLife for a while knows, I come from a very bad background - divorce, abandonment, foster homes, sexual abuse, poverty marked my early childhood. No family love, no spiritual foundation. In the 60's and 70's, the counterculture provided a sense of identity and meaning for me that I never had. I was a Washington DC antiwar activist and a radical feminist - a spokeswoman for the pro-abortion movement. At the same time, there was part of me that was very positive: I married, had two daughters Samantha Sunshine and Jasmine Moondance, got my education as a Montessori teacher and taught impoverished preschool children to give them a better start.

On the outside, I looked confident and together - though definitely very antisocial. In 1976, after moving to San Francisco, the demons from the past became bigger than my ability to keep them down. I became a drug addict, abandoned my first husband and Samantha, and had an abortion which at the time I almost regarded as a rite of passage. You can read more about that in this article I originally published a few years ago in The Washington Times.

A remarkable report by LifeSiteNews.com reveals that Amnesty International is evaluating a proposal to move into abortion advocacy. The human rights group claims that their planned departure into child killing is related to their support for women's and homosexual rights.

Read the rest here

As he watches his life fade, the imprisoned Dr. Death isn't sorry he killed his patients - he regrets getting caught:

"He did what he did, and it brought it to public awareness [of physician-assisted suicide]," said Kevorkian's attorney, Mayer Morganroth. "He now realizes that having performed it when it was against the law, wasn't the, probably, appropriate way to go about it. … What he should have done was work towards its legalization verbally. … Pursuing that cause, and not performing it because it still was against the law."

Testifying before yesterday's Senate Judiciary Subcommittee titled "The Consequences of Legalized Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia", Wesley J. Smith had this to say about infanticide:

In the Netherlands, infants are killed because they have birth defects, and doctors justify the practice. A 1997 study published in the British medical journal, The Lancet, revealed how deeply pediatric euthanasia had metastasized into Dutch neonatal medical practice. According to the report, doctors killed approximately 8 percent of all infants who died in the Netherlands in 1995. Assuming this to be typical, this amounts to approximately 80-90 infanticides per year. Of these, one-third would have lived more than a month. At least 10-15 of these killings involve infants who did not depend on life-sustaining treatment to stay alive. The study found that 45 percent of neonatologists and 31 percent of pediatricians, who responded to study’s questionnaires, had killed infants. A follow up study of end-of-life decisions made for infants published in the April 9, 2005, found that nothing had changed. In 2001, “in 8%” of cases, drugs were administered to infants “with the explicit intention to hasten death.”
In 2004, Groningen University Medical Center made international headlines when it admitted to permitting pediatric euthanasia and published the “Groningen Protocol,” infanticide guidelines the hospital utilized when killing 15-20 disabled newborns each year.” The Protocol creates three categories of killable infants: infants “with no chance of survival,” infants with a “poor prognosis and are dependent on intensive care,” and “infants with a hopeless prognosis,” including those “not depending on intensive medical treatment but for whom a very poor quality of life…is predicted.” Par for the course, authorities refused to prosecute even though pediatric infanticide is clearly murder under Dutch law.

The Kansas Senate today fell four votes short in a bid to override a veto of a bill requiring more detailed reporting of late-term abortion statistics and added protections for babies born alive during attempted abortions. Previously, Governor Kathleen Sebelius vetoed the measure, claiming her beliefs as a Catholic support a "women's right to privacy." Ironically, Sebelius also asserted that her personal beliefs as a Catholic tell her "abortion is wrong."

Kansans for Life provides the following report:

In Kansas getting an abortion when the baby is already viable (able to live outside the womb) is illegal unless necessary to prevent the woman's death or to prevent "substantial and irreversible bodily damage" to the woman.

But official state abortion statistics in Kansas show there have been 3,800 abortions at 22 or more weeks gestation in the last 8 years (when the first abortion statistic bill was passed). They show 2,300 of them were on viable babies (those able to live outside the womb at the time of the abortion), and that none of the 3,800 were to prevent the death of the mother.

When justices consider challenge to partial-birth abortion ban, they will know stories of children who survived the gruesome procedure. - CitizenLink

The mistake that saved her baby's life:

"When I woke up, Dr. Rubel walked over to me and he said, 'Tina,' — and he was shaking his head and he took his little surgical mask off," she said. "And he said, 'I just want to tell you this is a miracle. You have a three-pound, three-ounce baby girl.' "

... when you listen to them weeping--and think back to a comment made by another woman ("Sometimes abortion is the most morally responsible and loving choice we can make. Amen.")--you are reminded of the almost infinite capacity of the human mind to deceive itself.

The Grim Reality of Abortion's Aftermath

Brookfield, WI – In a May 22nd letter to Governor Doyle, signed by Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan and Bishop Robert C. Morlino, the Wisconsin Catholic Conference of Bishops strongly urged the Governor to “rethink our state’s policy regarding the destruction of human embryos.”

In a written response, stridently defending his utilitarian policies facilitating the killing of embryonic people, Governor Doyle defied his Bishops. In the May 24th letter, released to the public on official Wisconsin letterhead, Doyle stated, "I must respectfully disagree with your position."

This press release gives us a preview of his testimony.

In his testimony, Smith will "argue that there is a proper public policy role for the federal government against assisted suicide, such as prohibiting federally controlled substances from being used to intentionally end life."

Smith, named by the National Journal as one of the nation's top experts in bioethics, notes that: "In the thirty-plus years since euthanasia was redefined in the Netherlands as a legitimate tool of medical practice instead of a serious crime, ... rather than being rare, statistics show that euthanasia is now almost a matter of medical routine."

For those interested, testimony from the hearing can be found here.

In his lengthy comments, Smith stated:

There are two deep ideological beliefs asserted by advocates for legalizing assisted suicide. The first is radical individualism that perceives the right of personal autonomy as being virtually absolute. Accordingly, promoters of assisted suicide generally believe that “the individual’s right to self-determination—to control the time, place, and manner of death” is a paramount liberty interest. The second ideological principle underlying assisted suicide advocacy is that killing (ending life) is an acceptable answer to the problem of human suffering.

Kansas Lawmakers will attempt to override Gov. Kathleen Sebelius’ veto today of a measure that would compel abortion mills to report the reason for each abortion on viable babies past 22 weeks. Although most post-viability abortions are illegal in Kansas, Attorney General Phill Kline is investigating allegations related to illegal late-term abortions outside the exceptions allowed by Kansas law. The legislation vetoed by Sebelius would have made the abortion mills more accountable for their actions. [HT: Operation Rescue]

Sebelius’ media spokesperson, Nicole Corcoran, told the Topeka Capital-Journal, “She’s very clear about her personal beliefs as a Catholic and supports a woman’s right to privacy.”

Sebelius stated, “My Catholic faith teaches me that life is sacred. Personally, I believe abortion is wrong.”

Kathy Ostrowski, legislative director for Kansans for Life voiced shock at Sebelius’ statement. “Gov. Sebelius’ attempt in her veto explanation to portray herself as pro-life is outrageous. She cannot re- invent the term, no matter how carefully she chooses her words,” she said.

The generation who told us to "question authority" and railed against "the man" has become the authority and "the man". So what are they telling the youth now? They are challenging the youth to be conformist and believe the way they do or else. They indoctrinate our children with their beliefs such as homosexual, transgender, anti-war, anti-Bush, pro-Palestine and more. No longer do the 60s & 70s generation believe in "power to the people", now it's "listen to us, we know what's best for you."

Earlier this week, Liberty Counsel filed an amicus brief on behalf of fellow pro-life blogger Jill Stanek in the case of Gonzales v. Carhart, which challenged the federal Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act passed by Congress and signed into law by President George W. Bush in 2003. Jill is a former nurse who testified at the hearings on the Born Alive Infant Protection Act, offering Congress her first-hand accounts of watching babies born alive and then left to die. This prominent pro-life advocate helped bring this disturbing practice to Congress's attention.

Erik Stanley with Liberty Counsel says the procedure is never necessary to protect the health of the mother. "Abortion doctors use the health exception, which contains no standards, to justify the procedure," he states. "This is a classic case of the fox guarding the henhouse." In addition, he says, if the same procedure were performed on a convicted criminal, it would constitute cruel and unusual punishment. "The partial-birth abortion procedure is gruesome and barbaric," Stanley notes.

The Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act is only part of a continuum of protection enacted by Congress to protect the unborn, partially-born and newly-born children, including the Born Alive Infant Protection Act, and "Laci and Connor's Law," which provides that a person who kills an unborn baby, along with the mother, is guilty of two crimes.

Related: Visit Jill's Weblog

The introduction of ultrasound machines in pregnancy centers began slowly decades ago as research began to show the effect these images have on a woman facing an unplanned pregnancy. In 1983, the New England Journal of Medicine published an article by Drs. John Fletcher and Mark Evans who found that seeing the image of the baby "in the late first or early mid-trimester of pregnancy, before movement is felt by the mother, may also influence the resolution of any ambivalence toward the pregnancy itself in favor of the fetus. Ultrasound examination may thus result in fewer abortions and more desired pregnancies."[10]

The ultrasound image was a welcomed alternative for pregnancy centers. Showing images of life, the mother's own child, as opposed to a life destroyed, would prove to be a gentler, yet even more compelling approach to educating the client, especially the clients raised in today's more visually oriented society:

This is not a generation that has grown up on the written word. Far from it: they grew up on visual images. They are the product, in perhaps its purest form, of television, where for a generation producers have picked compelling visuals and then assigned writers to match words to the video. It is a generation that scans information quickly; information that can be graphic or text, and one that is more than adept at picking quick meaning out of pictures. It grew up 'reading' visual images rather than text.[11]

Excerpt from: Pregnancy Centers: A Practical Response to the Abortion Dilemma

Latter day feminists think abortion is not just fine, it's holy.

Wrote Debi Jackson, owner of Cincinnati Women's Services abortion mill, in a web post recently:

Imagine... that a woman may create a ceremony... to be performed during the abortion or afterwards with family and friends in attendance... She may have a circle of women friends take part in the procedure itself - an ancient ritual of fertility, life, death, and rebirth....

A Cincinnati City Beat article last year included a photo of Debi, "practic[ing] an ancient Chinese calming ritual.... Harmonic vibrations caused by rubbing the dragon bowl's brass handles create wavelets and jumping water."

I'll tell you what's jumping, Debi. My skin is, that's what, you sicko.

Then there's...

Read today's column, "The lunatic fringe goes mainstream," on WorldNetDaily.com.

By Maggie Gallagher

The week of June 5, the Senate will vote on a constitutional amendment on marriage. The text reads: "Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman. Neither this Constitution, nor the constitution of any State, shall be construed to require that marriage or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon any union other than the union of a man and a woman."

On Fox News Sunday, Sen. John McCain announced: "I will vote against it because I believe very strongly, first of all, in the sanctity of union between man and woman, but I also believe that the states should make these decisions."

By Bill Beckman

Promoters of the right to "reproductive health care" (a code phrase that includes abortion) are identified as the protectors of women’s health. The Pro-Life community’s rejection of abortion, opposition to abortifacient contraceptives, concern that "safe sex" is not safe, and promotion of abstinence-only programs for teenagers gets it labeled as dangerous to women’s health. This contrast suggests ideology is controlling what passes for science in today's world.

Real world evidence demonstrates that promoters of “reproductive health care” are definitely not protecting women’s health. Have you heard any of them express concern about unethical and unsafe abortionists? In just the last 13 months abortionists in five states have had their medical licenses suspended or revoked. The latest case occurred in Alabama where the state health department has suspended the medical license of the Summit Medical Center, the abortionist, and a nurse for unsafe medical practices involving RU-486. This drug was being given to women much further into their pregnancies than intended for RU-486 abortions. Beyond that, RU-486 was being administered by a nurse when state law requires that its use be directed by a doctor.

Of course, the safety of RU-486 is seriously questioned, but you can count on the defenders of “reproductive health care” to assure everyone that RU-486 is safe. They question whether the infections that have now killed seven women after using RU-486 were actually unrelated to the abortions attempted using the drug. When scientific evidence suggests that a connection does exist between use of the RU-486 regimen and these infections, RU-486 supporters simply ignore the evidence because it is not politically correct. And they accuse Pro-Lifers of having ideology-driven agendas!

The Terri Schindler Schiavo Foundation Center for Health Care Ethics Calls For a Moratorium of Ordinary Care Removal From Persons Diagnosed in a Persistent Vegetative State

ST. PETERSBURG, Florida, May 24 /Christian Newswire/ -- Following reports that the drug Zolpidem can temporarily revive people in a permanent vegetative state (PVS) to the point where they are able to speak, The Foundation is calling for a moratorium of all potential ordinary care removal for persons diagnosed in a PVS condition.

Zolpidem is usually used to treat insomnia. However, South African researchers, writing in the NeuroRehabilitation, looked at the effects on three patients of using the drug for up to six years.

They reported that "All patients were aroused transiently every morning after Zolpidem.”

Their conclusion was that Zolpidem appeared to be effective in restoring some brain function to patients previously determined to be in a persistent vegetative state.

Terri’s family pleaded for years with Terri’s guardian, Michael Schiavo, and the courts to try and use different treatments or medicines that could possibly help improve Terri’s condition, but were denied. The Foundation has been contacted by dozens of families with similar stories of patients improving significantly after being wrongly diagnosed in this PVS condition.

Chuck Colson gets it right in his commentary about the worldview represented in Michael Schiavo's book:

Joking aside, Michael Schiavo’s world is a dangerous and scary place, a place where the “survival of the fittest” is taken to a whole new level—a place where a badly brain-damaged woman should have her food and water taken away simply because she is badly brain damaged and her husband says she would not want to live that way. It’s a place where it’s easy for even a registered nurse like Michael Schiavo to confuse food, which everyone needs, with the kind of life support, like a respirator, which his wife did not need. It’s a place where, as Schiavo is accustomed to saying with a straight face, taking someone’s food away is not starving her to death; it’s simply allowing her to die peacefully and painlessly. (Why a hospice needs to administer morphine to a person dying painlessly is something that Schiavo does not bother to explain, like so many other issues.)

From the Kentucky Enquirer:

Prosecutors agreed Tuesday to dismiss criminal charges against a retired Northern Kentucky University professor accused of dismantling an anti-abortion display if the dispute can be resolved through mediation.

Two weeks ago prosecutors had declined to drop the charges against Sally Jacobsen in exchange for community service, an offer that was extended to, and accepted by, six of her students also accused in the incident.

Campbell District Judge Karen Thomas said officials from the university, student government and Northern Kentucky Right to Life would attend the mediation. If the sides cannot come to a mutual agreement by June 27, the criminal case against Jacobsen will proceed.

"Any violence perpetrated against that silly display was minor compared to how I felt when I saw it. Some of my students felt the same way, just outraged."

It would certainly be refreshing if, through mediation, Jacobsen actually apologized to Northern Right to Life, a group of students who worked quite hard to set up the display in memory of the unborn who would have attended their school had abortion not claimed their lives.

Update: Lifenews has published an update

What's your reaction to this latest development? Comment below.

Unfortunately, Texas hospitals continue to exploit futile care laws to forcibly remove care from their patients. Yesterday, we received the following alarming email from Texas Right to Life's Elizabeth Graham:

We have two new cases this week: one is a pediatric case in Dallas, and the other is in Houston. The Houston family is not ready to go public yet, or I would be shouting for assistance from the rooftops.

Regretably, they are a little squeamish about the name of the patient being in the press. I was invited to participate in the futility review process at the Houston facility, and it was disgusting and appalling. The attending physician stated that the patient was definitely NOT brain dead, simply brain damaged from a stroke. The paitent is NOT experiencing organ failure, meaning her lungs, heart, kidneys, liver,...everything is working. The patient has a trach collar, but she breathes on her own, and she processes food and hydration appropriately. She is free from infection.

During the meeting, I pointed out that the withdrawal of food and water would effectively starve the patient to death, and the doctors dismissed me as if I did not understand medical science. I am not sure what exactly is scientific about starvation, but the patient's mother agreed and was bewildered at the discussion of withdrawal of treatment including food and water.

Oh yes, did I mention that the patient has NO insurance? The medical folks involved in these cases adamantly avow that financial considerations never enter into the futility decisions; however, I have yet to hear from the family of any patients with good, adequate health insurance. Our Dallas attorney is working on the pediatric case, and the family was granted some additional days because the facility did not follow proper statutory procedure. This patient has only Medicaid.

I received this today from a new pro-life friend on South Dakota's Oglala rez. Apparently the Natives are restless with their president's plan to launch an abortion mill on their land and are planning a protest.

... Des Moines Register columnist Dave Yepsin says that Dem guv candidate Mike Bluoin's party of choice and pro-life waffling are messing with his prospects: "While Blouin is pro-life, he now says he wouldn't change anything in Iowa law, which is pro-choice. So I guess that makes him a pro-choice pro-lifer. No wonder neither side trusts him." Wow, he gets it.

... And vandalizing NKU prof Sally Jacobsen is not being let off the hook. Said Assistant Campbell County Attorney Rick Woeste: "We don't live in a country where we're allowed to destroy someone else's property or vandalize someone's else's property when we disagree with what they're saying.... If that were the case, we could never have political signs."

Abortion remains at the heart of the culture wars in America because it pits two absolutely opposed world and life views against each other. Abortion forces us to confront our most deeply held beliefs about God, man, and the definition of what it means to be a human being, protected by the laws of the land. The heart of the abortion issue is the struggle between what is often referred to as the sanctity of life worldview and the quality of life worldview. At the core of the sanctity of life view is the belief that all human life — unborn, handicapped, or elderly — is sacred because it is created in the image of God. Dr. Paul Ramsey states it clearly.

The notion that an individual human life is absolutely unique, inviolable, irreplaceable, non-interchangeable, not substitutable, and not meldable with other lives is a notion that exists in our civilization because it is Christian, and that idea is so fundamental in the edifice of Western law and morals that it cannot be removed without bringing the whole house down.[7]

Excerpt from: Pregnancy Centers: A Practical Response to the Abortion Dilemma

Standards for diagnosis of persistent vegetative state (PVS) have not been widely accepted by the medical community. Yet this designation is used in practice to motivate the withdrawal of care and death of patients through-out the world. Terri Schiavo was one such individual who lost her life while Haleigh Poutre cheated death despite being declared "virtually brain dead" and in a "hopeless" state of "persistent vegetation" by her doctors. Yenlang Vo’s life currently hangs in the balance after being labeled PVS (her family is frantically searching for a doctor in Texas who will care for her – please help).

An absolutley stunning study is now being reported in which sleeping pills were used to revive people classified as PVS to the point where they were able to have conversations.

Zolpidem [also sold as Ambien] is usually used to treat insomnia.

South African researchers, writing in the NeuroRehabilitation, looked at the effects on three patients of using the drug for up to six years.

[snip]

Each of the three patients studied was given the drug every morning.

An improvement was seen within 20 minutes of taking the drug and wore off after four hours, when the patients restored to their permanent vegetative state.

Patient L had been in a vegetative state for three years, showing no response to touch and no reaction to his family.

After he was given Zolpidem, he was able to talk to them, answering simple questions.

Patient G was also able to answer simple questions and catch a basketball.

Patient N had been "constantly screaming", but stopped after being given the drug when he started watching TV and responding to his family.

Oklahoma Gov. Brad Henry today signed SB 1742, a pro-life bill which had overwhelming bipartisan support in the legislature. Oklahomans for Life summarizes the measure:

The bill contains funding for alternatives to abortion, provides information about where a woman could get a free ultrasound, tells her about the pain a baby 20 weeks or older might feel during an abortion, provides for the consent of a parent before a minor’s abortion, and makes it a crime to kill an unborn child in contexts other than legal abortion.

Family Research Council has filed a "friend of the court" brief with the U.S. Supreme Court in the case of Gonzales v. Carhart. The Supreme Court last February agreed to take up this case, which challenges the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act which was passed by Congress and signed by President Bush in 2003. The act never went into effect since Planned Parenthood immediately went into federal court and obtained an injunction to stop enforcement of the act. For the last three years partial birth abortions have continued to be practiced in America, in spite of widespread public opinion against this terrible procedure. We hope the Supreme Court will side with the angels on this one, and save our future generations from an untimely almost born death. [Sourec: FRC]

New Hampshire's legislature is considering a bill to address end-of-life care that includes language that may give hospital ethics committees the legal right to withdraw care from a patient. Pamela Hennessy comments:

Hospital ethics committees are not groups of doctors who interact with patients, families or caregivers of the patient. Rather, they are people who protect the legal interests of the hospital or nursing home, particularly when disputes over care arise. To a great degree, they mind the company store -- not necessarily the customer.

Putting the power to end the lives of people they don't know, based on cost containment practices or life quality judgments is not only an invasion of the patient's privacy -- it's asinine.

Abortion. The word is part of the vocabulary of almost every American over the age of twelve. Abortion has been embedded in the American experience since January 22, 1973. On that day, the U.S. Supreme Court, with rulings on Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton, struck down every state law governing abortion and replaced those laws with a ruling that granted the right to privacy for every woman, a right to privacy that included the right to have an abortion during her entire pregnancy. Legalized abortion on demand had come to America.

The restriction on the liberty appeared to be illusory...She must find a licensed clinic after month three; and after her child was viable, she must find an abortionist who believed she needed an abortion. When the full dimensions of the liberty were realized, the liberty was little short of unlimited.[1]

Attorneys with the Alliance Defense Fund and the Christian Legal Society filed a friend-of-the-court brief at the U.S. Supreme Court Monday urging the justices to uphold the constitutionality of the federal ban on partial-birth abortion.

“There’s nothing in the Constitution that allows a person to end a life simply because he thinks that life is less valuable than his own,” said CLS Chief Litigation Counsel Steven H. Aden. “That’s exactly what’s happening when an abortionist ends a baby’s life just seconds before the baby takes her first breath.”

LifeNews reports the following pleasant surprise:

Pro-abortion Gov. Jim Doyle, a Democrat, has signed legislation that would require sex education programs in public schools to promote abstinence as the preferred sexual behavior for teens. The measure requires primary and secondary schools spend more time teaching abstinence education than other methods of preventing pregnancy.

Planned Parenthood Advocates of Wisconsin and NARAL's Wisconsin affiliate both opposed the bill, and Doyle has frequently vetoed pro-life legislation on abortion.

A young woman shares her abortion experience: "I ended up crying earlier this evening because of it and how he didn't seem to care about me or the baby I was aborting." JivinJehoshaphat has the story. More and more women are coming forward to express their regret and testify that they were hurt by abortion.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: Amber Dolle
May 23, 2006
540-903-9572 / ADolle@ALL.org

ALL analyzes intricacies of South Dakota's new abortion law in 'Celebrate Life' article.

WASHINGTON, D.C. — After researching the new law in South Dakota banning all surgical abortions, American Life League legislative analysis director Gualberto Garcia Jones gives an in-depth review of the law in the latest edition of Celebrate Life magazine by American Life League. Below are excerpts from the enlightening review:

In yesterday's post at Secondhand Smoke Wesley Smith presented this stunning article on a subject to which few of us have given much thought. The survey methods and responses differed between the Dutch doctors and the physicians in Oregon, but it is clear that for a significant number of doctors there is serious emotional fallout from physician assisted suicide and euthanasia.

Results and Discussion: The physician is centrally involved in PAS and euthanasia, and the emotional and psychological effects on the participating physician can be substantial. The shift away from the fundamental values of medicine to heal and promote human wholeness can have significant effects on many participating physicians. Doctors describe being profoundly adversely affected, being shocked by the suddenness of the death, being caught up in the patient's drive for assisted suicide, having a sense of powerlessness, and feeling isolated. There is evidence of pressure on and intimidation of doctors by some patients to assist in suicide. The effect of countertransference in the doctor-patient relationship may influence physician involvement in PAS and euthanasia.

Continued at Marlowe's Shade

A grand jury convened on Monday for the first time to begin an investigation of late-term abortionist George R. Tiller in the death of Christin Gilbert.

A group of about 20 Christians gathered to pray for the grand jury proceedings outside the Sedgwick County Courthouse where Chief Administrative Judge of the 18th District Court Richard Ballinger is presiding over the secret proceedings. Reports indicated that a panel of 15 jurors was being selected during Monday’s session.

Leon at Red State comments on the woman who shot herself in the abdomen, killing her unborn child, on the very day her daughter was to have been born:

The problem with line-drawing that is arbitrary in nature is that someone inevitably comes along and exposes, often in a rather graphic way, the indefensible nature of any line-drawing that is divorced from principle. So it is that the arbitrary line enshrined by Roe v. Wade has been exposed yet again

Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius has vetoed a bill that would have required the state to collect more data on late-term abortions. Although Kansas prohibits abortions after the 22nd week of gestation, abortionists can get around the law by exploiting an undefined and ambiguous mental-health exception. Sebelius is apparently comfortable with this practice.

In response, Fr. Frank Pavone, National Director of Priests for Life, stated, "Once again, the Governor is serving the abortion industry rather than the people. Most Americans don’t realize that abortions are being performed by the thousands after 22 weeks gestation, and the abortion industry wants us to think they are performed only for health reasons. They know that if the public found out how many healthy babies of healthy mothers are killed at that stage, people would demand a change in the law."

More information: LifeNews

British doctors are advising women with Downs Syndrome babies to have late-term abortions - LifeNews. One mother commented, "My baby was fully-formed and his name was decided. I was appalled."

Sadly, Kelly Meyers, the Missiouri woman who had her feeding tube removed, has passed away. The following statement was received from a reader:

Kelly passed away Sunday May 22nd, at 3:30 am in the 11th day of starvation.

By David Brandao

In Suffolk, Virginia last February 23, a gunshot to the abdomen during the ninth month of her pregnancy took the life of Tammy Skinner's preborn baby. The case went to court last week. According to the Norfolk Virginian-Pilot, the shooter's attorney argued that no crime had occurred; the judge agreed and dismissed the charges.

It sounds incredible, but the judge simply followed the letter of the law. It was not a crime because the person who shot and killed Tammy Skinner's baby was ... Tammy Skinner.

Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin, which received over $3 million in federal tax money in 2004 according to its annual report, is using its main Web site — not just its political-action committee's site — to endorse Democratic Governor Jim Doyle's re-election -- Dawn Eden has the story. Doyle has only only response to pro-life legislation: veto.

I missed this on Wesley Smith's blog last Tuesday, but LifeSite caught it.

Oregon’s confusion over the state’s alarming rate of suicide among the elderly would be laughable, if it were not so tragic, said Wesley J. Smith, an expert in the field of bioethics and euthanasia and the author of a critical examination of the assisted suicide/euthanasia movement, Forced Exit: The Slippery Slope from Assisted Suicide to Legalized Murder.

Oregon legalized physician-assisted suicide in November of 1997. Over the ensuing decade, rates of non-physician assisted suicide in the state have outstripped the national elder suicide rate, with about 100 Oregonians aged 65 or older taking their own lives annually.

More at Marlowe's Shade

Michael Todd has died:

A 14-year-old boy whose family fought evaluations that he was brain dead was removed from life support Friday after another doctor agreed with the diagnosis.

A neurosurgeon, whose name was not released, examined Michael J. Todd and confirmed the diagnosis the hospital had made May 10, the boy's family and the University of Kansas Hospital said.

A judge dissolved the temporary restraining order at 3:40 p.m., and a respirator and all tubes were disconnected.

The death certificate will list May 10 as the date Todd succumbed to gunshot wounds suffered a day earlier in the Kansas City suburb of Blue Springs, Mo., hospital spokesman Dennis McCulloch said.

According to Operation Save America:

Summit Medical Center, the abortuary that has been killing children in Birmingham, Alabama for the past 24 years, has been shut down for good. That’s right! The Alabama State Health Department walked into the doors of Summit Medical Center at 11:00am, Wednesday morning, May 17, 2006, and closed the doors of this horrific business forever.

A faithful sidewalk counselor at Summit for the past 14 years saw the Alabama State Health Department arrive in a white van. Two department officials entered the building and, in a few short minutes, all the clientele began to leave. The counselor was told by the security guard, “This will be very good news for you. The Health Department is closing this place down!”

Kelly Meyer, 44, suffered strokes on both sides of her brain. According to a friend, she is responsive, sequeezes hands and blinks in response to questions. Her feeding tube was pulled last Friday.

I spoke briefly with Missouri Right to Life this morning and was told they've moved Kelly out of Westchester House, the location mentioned in the link above. Readers are urged to contact the States Attorney General.

The Silent No More Awareness Campaign responded today to a report recently released by the Guttmacher Institute entitled “Abortion in Women’s Lives.”

“To take this report as truth is to ignore our voices and our experiences,” remarked Jennifer O’Neill, actress, author and celebrity spokesperson for the Campaign, “Anyone concerned about women’s health should start by listening to us, the women who have been devastated by abortion... experience overrides theory.”

“This report is an attempt at damage control as more and more evidence about abortion’s harmful effects becomes known,” said Alevda King, niece of Martin Luther King and participant in the Campaign “To draw charts and issue papers that make broad assertions about the safety of abortion is easy. But we who are silent no more will not be fooled, nor will those who hear our testimonies.”

A study of more than five thousand African Americans found that individuals who were involved with or participated in religious activities had significantly lower blood pressure than those who were not, despite being more likely to be classified as hypertensive, having higher levels of body mass index (BMI), and lower levels of medication adherence:

The findings, presented today in New York City at the 21st Annual Scientific Meeting of the American Society of Hypertension (ASH 2006), are from the Jackson Heart Study, the largest exclusively African American study sample ever used to ascertain associations among religion, spirituality and blood pressure.

Female gender, lower socioeconomic status, increasing age, and lower levels of cortisol were associated with more religious activities. Higher levels of religious participation were related to higher levels of body mass index (BMI) and lower levels of medication adherence. Contrary to the original hypotheses, those with more religious activities and participation were more likely to be classified as hypertensive. However, those with more religious activities had significantly lower diastolic blood pressure in an uncontrolled model, and significantly lower systolic blood pressure in a controlled model.

While interesting, this isn't exactly "new" news - a study by Duke University researchers way back in 1998 found that "older people" with an active faith have lower blood pressure:

Continue reading ...

In a recent column, I connected the morning-after pill controversy with the larger issue of contraception. Basically, pro-lifers can't oppose the MAP without opposing birth control pills, since they contain the same ingredients (female hormones) and, therefore, may both cause abortions - stop an embryo from implanting in the uterus.

Pro-aborts have honed in on this and are using the contraceptive issue as a wedge to separate the public from pro-lifers and pro-lifers from each other, since abortion is no longer the wedge issue it once was with anyone.

See these articles/columns from various sources just yesterday, for instance:

The move to withhold contraceptives "was started by a small group of extreme ideologues who claim the right to impose their personal beliefs on the overwhelming majority of the American people," Mrs. Clinton declared in an email to supporters on Wednesday. "They're waging this silent war on contraception by using the power of the White House and their right-wing allies in Congress... and so far, they're getting away with it." - Newsmax.com, May 17

They have a plan for you and if you are anything like the 85 percent of American couples who have sex once a week, you’re not going to like it. The pro-life groups who are the most committed to ending legal abortion—and gotten the furthest in their goals—are also leading campaigns against the only proven ways to prevent abortion: contraception. Shocking as it may be, there is not one pro-life organization in the United States that supports the use of contraception. - Op ed by Cristina Page of NARAL NY in TomPaine.commonsense, May 17

There seems to be a concentrated effort by the population control crowd recently to paint Republicans as being anti-contraceptive. - Human Events, May 17

I am a Protestant who opposes contraception, not only because some of its forms may cause abortions, but also - moreso - because the thinking behind contraception makes it the forerunner to abortion.

I base my thinking on several Biblical concepts. The foremost concept is that God is always described in Scripture as the sole procreative decision-maker. To my knowledge, every incident in Scripture describing pregnancy or barrenness gives God complete credit.

If that premise is true, who has the right to say no to God? Who can say they have a better grip on timing than God?

Pro-aborts are right. Contraception is next issue after abortion. And pro-lifers must work it through.

The Monthly Call for Life at MarchTogether.com is the only nationwide monthly call to action that seeks to unite Pro-Life people on a frequent and regular basis

Here's the idea behind this effort. First and foremost, we are Pro-Life. What does that mean? I hope that it means we are doing everything we can to end abortion, not just talking about how bad it is. Think about it, there have to be at least 20 million active Pro-Life Americans right? If just 10 percent of us call, email, write or picket once a month on the same day, that's a lot of voices going out at the same time, challenging our representatives to end abortion.

Are you already involved in a Pro-Life effort? Come on...once a month, that's not too much extra time for us to unite in this effort is it? It only takes 5 minutes to email our reps, 5 minutes to call & a couple of hours to picket if you so choose.

Unite with us once a month on the first Friday to speak out against abortion. Over 3,000 Americans who will be killed that day will be grateful that you stood up for them.

The next Monthly Call for Life is Friday, June 2nd. Go to MarchTogether.com and find out how you can become involved in this easy effort. Then tell 2 of your friends to join you. The sappy letters you get from your representatives when they respond will surprise you & you can joke about them to each other. Email them to us, we'll post them online.

MarchTogether.com

United we stand - Divided they die - Pass it on

Governor Kathleen Sebelius has until Tuesday, May 23rd to sign or veto Senate Bill 528. This bill mandates enhanced reporting of reasons for late-term abortions and insures that babies born alive during abortions are cared for properly.

MESSAGE TO GOVERNOR: Please Sign Senate Bill 528!

To contact the governor call: 1-877-579-6757 - The secretary will take your message. Ask the Governor to sign Senate Bill 528. Do it today!

Texas is now the second state in the nation to fund alternatives to abortion according to a statement released by Texas Right to Life. For the first time in Texas history, pro-life pregnancy centers, maternity homes, and adoption agencies will be rewarded by the state for empowering women facing unplanned pregnancies with practical life-affirming counseling and services.

Texas Right to Life spearheaded the lobbying efforts for this funding provision during the 2005 Legislative Session. The Senate Finance Committee accepted our proposal, and the funding was approved and passed as a “rider” clause on the greater state appropriations bill. Passage of the measure authorized the Texas Health and Human Services Commission (HHSC) to write the rules and procedures for the distribution of the allocated $5 million. As with all state contracts, HHSC solicited proposals and bids from contractors interested in serving as the administrator of the funds.

According to its president, the National Breast Cancer Coalition has "revolutionized" public policy in the quest to eradicate breast cancer.

NBCC has an odd way of running its revolution.

On May 4, NBCC announced the Golden Boob Awards, to "highlight the biggest boobs of all – the organizations that are using breast cancer purely as a way to make money or to promote an ideology."

NBCC's top nominee was the Coalition on Abortion/Breast Cancer, of which I am an advisory board member.

But who really is the biggest boob? I explain why it's NBCC in my column today. Its leaders, at least one of which is heavily involved in the abortion industry, are disputing logic and evidence to prop up their liberal feminist ideology, endangering women's lives in the process.

Read "The biggest boobs" on WorldNetDaily.com.

There is a pernicious meme that has spread through the pro-choice blogosphere. Pro-choicers think that they have finally found the perfect method to expose pro-lifers as either hypocrites or heartless fanatics. Your Humble Blogger has to wonder: Is there some pro-choice think-tank that invents this sort of nonsense? If so, are they paid for their efforts?

Here is the question:

Imagine that there is a roaring fire in an IVF clinic. You are in the clinic as it burns. As you try to escape, you see a toddler trapped by the flames. You also see a petri dish that contains ten embryoes. You have the time to save either the toddler or the embryoes, but not both. Which do you pick?

I have seen this dilemna posed by pro-choice commenters on several pro-life blogs. It has also appeared as the subject of a few pro-choice blog posts (here, here, and here). On the pro-life side, JivinJ made a passing reference to it in one of his posts. Although the Roasted Embryo dilemna seems to be losing steam right now, I'm sure we'll see it again....

Fortunately, I haven't seen it on my blog yet, for which I give full credit to the intellectual honesty of my pro-choice commenters. Still, I've seen enough of it now, and I want to make my rebuttal. Consider this post as my "preemptive defense," except I don't intend to seek the approval of the allies.

As the evidence of the last ten years clearly shows, embryonic stem cell research is a dead end. Despite the constant hype of the MSM and others, ESCR has produced no cures, no helpful treatments, and no promising hopes of real breakthroughs. But the development of medical treatments using adult stem cells? That's where the results have come through -- over and over.

But even if the media refuses to tell the truth about the remarkable successes being developed using cord blood cells, skin cells etc., there are others who are becoming keenly aware that the smart money is on adult stem cell research. Here is another case of a company who is following that smart money in a literal way.

And in a related story, here's a newspaper in Australia describing a major new government investment in adult stem cell research.

Yenlang Vo is a hospital patient whose life hangs in the balance after her doctors informed her closest kin that medical treatment will be withdrawn under Texas' futile care statute. While a patient of St. David's North Austin Medical Center in Austin, her condition was given the label "persistent vegetative state", a diagnosis that is disputed by the family. Vo's daughter, Dr. Loann Trihn, is an emergency room physician who suggests that her mother is quite responsive, as assertion recently confirmed by witnesses (click here). Unfortunately, Vo's family have until June 5th to find another doctor and facility - otherwise treatment will be withdrawn and her life ended.

Trihn knows her mother and has spent a substantial amount of time interacting with and observing her. Trihn states that her mother needs stimulation prior to responding and the brief visits by her doctors have been inadequate to determine Vo's mental capacity.

Trihn and others are rightly skeptical regarding the PVS designation. Standards for diagnosis of PVS have not even been widely accepted by the medical community. Yet this designation is used in practice to motivate the application of futile care laws for the ultimate withdrawal of care and death of the patient. Terri Schiavo was one such individual who lost her life while Haleigh Poutre cheated death despite being declared "virtually brain dead" and in a "hopeless" state of "persistent vegetation" by her doctors.

LifeSiteNews has exciting coverage of the March for Life Canada, an annual event that drew 5,700 participants. Although the event received more mainstream coverage than prior years, the public broadcaster - CBC, the nation's largest circulation paper - The Toronto Star - and the supposedly 'conservative' National Post all offered no coverage.

The Globe and Mail erroneously reported that there were "several hundred people carrying signs" rather than the nearly 6,000 in attendance (more here).

Following the March, Campaign Life Coalition hosted a special all-day conference that attended by an unprecedented 500 youth.

She shot herself in the abdomen, killing her unborn child, on the very day her daughter was to have been born:

SUFFOLK - A legislator who sponsored the state's fetal homicide law two years ago says prosecutors were right to charge a Suffolk woman with producing an abortion after a self-inflicted gunshot wound killed the fetus she was carrying.

There was much debate over the wording of the fetal homicide law, said state Sen. Kenneth Stolle , R-Virginia Beach, and it was believed that another law - producing an abortion or miscarriage - covered a mother harming her own fetus.

"In one of the statutes, we specifically say another person," said Stolle, who heads the Senate Courts of Justice Committee. "In the opinion of the attorney general and the courts committee and everybody else, the abortion law applied to somebody who did something to themselves."

Tammy Skinner , 22, was charged earlier this year with producing an abortion or miscarriage, a Class 4 felony, punishable by up to 10 years in prison.

more

Visit the North Country Gazette.

Please do take the time to read about the desperate situation involving Yenlang Vo and consider publicizing her case. St. David's North Austin Medical Center in Austin informed Mrs. Vo's family that they will end her medical treatment (and therefore her life) on June 5th under the Texas futile care statute. Yes, the circumstances are very similar to what happened to Andrea Clark and Andrea's family is speaking out.

Mrs. Vo's daughter and husband are frantically searching for another licensed care facility and a nephrologist who will meet Mrs. Vo's medical needs. As it stands, there are very few prospects and your prayers would be appreciated. If you have information about possible treatment options or know a physician in Texas you we urge you to contact the family.

In the legal battle over Michael Todd’s life, the University of Kansas Medical Center disputes the accusation that doctors misdiagnosed the fourteen year-old and prematurely declared him brain-dead.

Cecelia Cole, Todd's mother obtained a temporary restraining order blocking the KU Medical Center from taking her son off life support, accusing the hospital of misdiagnosing her son. She said her son is not brain-dead. Cole said Todd is moving his feet, crying and is trying to open one of his eyes. Relatives also said Todd was responsive to touch immediately following the accident.

The hospital claims it followed protocol when it obtained the diagnosis of brain death. I wonder if this procedure involved interviews and observations by those who know the child best? Do doctors dispute his mother's claims? I also wonder where the family got the idea that the hospital was fishing for organ donations.

Check out the video here.

... watch for Dan's cartoon here.

Last week Judicial Watch issued its stunning report on President Bill Clinton’s promotion of RU-486. The packet includes an unbelievable letter written to Clinton by Ron Weddington, the co-counsel in Roe v. Wade (note: this is reported on by Lifenews) urging the "President-to-Be" to embark on an aggressive program to prevent “poor babies” from being born via chemical abortion.

The letter provides a clear picture of the elitist agenda associated with the culture of death to eliminate what Weddington calls “cheap labor” and “cannon fodder” from our population by killing unborn babies. He can't imagine anyone being able to afford more than one child without inheriting millions and believes the government must "persuade" Americans to stop having children.

A lot more could be said - and hopefully will be - about Weddington's agenda and its similarities to the writings of Margret Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood. For your use I've reproduced the full text of Weddington’s letter below.

Abbigail Lynn and Isabelle Anne Carlsen were born November 29th at 10:50am to the proud parents of Jesse and Amy Carlsen at Abbott Hospital in Minneapolis. As identical twin sisters, they were conjoined at the lower chest and upper abdomen, a condition called omphalapagus. Doctors determined that their livers were connected and they shared a common bile duct and part of the small intestine.

On Friday, the two baby girls were separated following at daylong surgery at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN and are currently in intensive care under sedation, breathing with the assistance of ventilators. Although they have a long recovery ahead, the twins are doing well.

Doctors reported today that the twins continue to show steady improvement.

They had a very good night with vital signs improving, and their conditions have been upgraded from Critical to Serious. As the care team continues to closely monitor their progress, the girls are right on course as expected and hoped, with tests showing continued healing.

Yenlang Vo is a hospital patient who, like Andrea Clark (more here), has been designated by her doctors for passive euthanasia under Texas' futile care statute. While a patient of St. David's North Austin Medical Center in Austin, her condition has been given the label persistent vegetative state. The diagnosis is disputed by the family, including Ms. Vo's daugher, Loann Trihn, who is an emergency room doctor and suggests that her mother is responsive. Mr. Vo's family have until June 5th to find another doctor and facility - otherwise treatment will be withdrawn and her life ended.

Today we received the following message from Lanore Dixon, one of Andrea Clark's sisters, concerning her visit with Mrs. Vo:

I was in Austin this weekend and asked Jerri Ward (the lawyer who represented my sister, Andrea Clark, and who is also representing Mrs. Vo) if I could go see Mrs. Vo. She thought it was a good idea and she met me up there Sunday morning. We were escorted to Mrs. Vo's room by her husband, Mr. Tran.

Before I was allowed in the room, a nurse stopped us at the door and demanded to know who I was. I told her I was a friend of the family. She wanted to know what "kind" of friend I was. I told her I was an "important" friend of the family. She said if I was media she couldn't let me in. This didn't seem right to me, but I didn't argue the point since I wasn't media. I assured her I was not media. We washed and gowned and went in to see Mrs. Vo. The nurse hovered in the room and about the door for most of the visit.

We weren't there five minutes and another hospital official along with a security guard came into the room and handed me a business card. She told me I'd have to call the administrator on the card and identify myself. Is it just me or is this sounding Gestapo to you too? I asked her if she was telling me I couldn't visit the patient if unless I called this person. She started crabwalking a bit..."I'm just saying you are to call..." I demanded to know if she was telling me I couldn't visit the patient. Then the security guard interrupted and said he thought there was some kind of misunderstanding and he drew the woman back out into the hall to talk in low tones--after a few minutes they disappeared down the hall.

The Schindler family sought an impartial judge, one that would stand up for their daughter’s right to life. Instead the case was presided over by George Greer, a Circuit Court Judge who ordered Terri’s death by dehydration and continues to be a public advocate for his role in this case. His latest speaking engagement is at Loyola University:

Los Angeles, CA (LifeNews.com) -- Circuit Court Judge George Greer continues to make the rounds on the lecture circuit following his high-profile involvement in the Terri Schiavo case. The judge, who refused to back down from sentencing Terri to a painful 13-day starvation and dehydration death, will be a featured speaker at Loyola Law School Los Angeles in June. However, this speaking engagement may be worse than the others as Judge Greer will instruct members of the mainstream media in how to report on significant legal stories like the battle over Terri's life.

From FoxNews

I suppose it is already old news, but it's good news...

Britain's House of Lords on Friday rejected proposed laws to allow physicians to assist terminally ill people to die, a measure that faces broad public opposition and is not backed by Prime Minister Tony Blair's government.

More at Marlowe's Shade

USAID requires that grant recipients of its AIDS humanitarian funds must sign a pledge that they oppose commercial sex work. A federal court recently ruled that this is an unconstitutional restriction on free speech. Despite the fact the US holds that prostitution is illegal (with the exception of Nevada) and that there is a near-universal condemnation for the practice, apparently allowing the government to restrict its humanitarian funds to actually be humane is unconscionable.

Reported by the Times Online:

A WOMAN is pregnant with Britain’s first designer baby selected to prevent an inherited cancer, The Times can reveal.

Her decision to use controversial genetic-screening technology will ensure that she does not pass on to her child the hereditary form of eye cancer from which she suffers.

MaryMeetsDolly concludes,

I submit to you that all of us are in some way "genetically defective." We all carry genes that make us susceptable to cancer, or heart disease, or stroke, or high cholesterol, or obesity, or hairy backs, or thinning hair. I think you get the picture.

Abbigail Lynn and Isabelle Anne Carlsen were born November 29th at 10:50am to the proud parents of Jesse and Amy Carlsen at Abbott Hospital in Minneapolis. As identical twin sisters, they were conjoined at the lower chest and upper abdomen, a condition called omphalapagus. Doctors determined that their livers were connected and they shared a common bile duct and part of the small intestine.

On Friday, the two baby girls were separated following at daylong surgery at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN and are currently in intensive care under sedation, breathing with the assistance of ventilators. Although they have a long recovery ahead, the twins are doing well.

The family writes:

Thank you Lord for answering our prayers!!!

Abby and Belle are now two separate girls and just as beautiful as always!

When I went to see them this morning I was told they had a good night with no problems. Mom and I went to Abby's bed and talked to her and her legs started to stir so I know she heard us. Belle was getting an ultrasound to check things out and we were told everything looked good on both girls. They might take them off anesthesia later so both Abby and Belle will be awake. We will be there to make sure the first thing they see is our faces. If all goes well I hope to have the first pictures of Mom and I holding the girls seperate for the first time this coming week.

Thank you all for your support and prayers! It's amazing how our girls have touched so many people. You all care so much about Abby and Belle I wish there was a way you all could meet them after we leave the hospital. I plan on keeping up with these updates so in a way you will all be with us.

Remember! No prayers are too small and no prayers are too big. We've had our prayers answered up to now. And we will continue to pray for a perfect recovery.

God Bless!

Jesse and Amy

A battle for the life of a fourteen year-old boy:

The family of a 14-year-old who was shot in the neck has received a restraining order preventing the University of Kansas Hospital from taking the boy off of life support.

Michael Todd of Kansas City was shot Tuesday at a Blue Springs apartment. Police said a witness told them that the gun might have gone off accidentally.

"Our doctors have determined him to be brain dead," hospital spokesman Dennis McCulloch said on Friday.

But Michael's family argues that the hospital wants to remove the boy from life support because it wants to use his organs for a donor program.

"It's so quick," said Odette Cole, Todd's aunt. "He's 14 years old. ... You're acting like you're in a grocery store for body parts."

In the News:

Family stops hospital from taking boy off life support

Life Support Fight

Stay with me please, the liberal culture has just been exposed for its racist, eugenist views & you have to see the whole picture.

Remember Margaret Sanger? She was the racist eugenist who made such wonderful liberal comments like:

"The most merciful thing that a large family does to one of its infant members is to kill it."

Where am I going with this? Ask President Clinton & click here to keep reading

Washington, D.C. – "I'll put this as plainly as I can," said American Life League president Judie Brown. "Mothers give life; Planned Parenthood destroys it. The callous insensitivity of American's leading abortion chain using Hollywood actresses and electronic greeting cards in an attempt to further the Culture of Death by seeking Mother's Day donations is simply unspeakable."

In a recent e-mail to Planned Parenthood supporters, pro-abortion actresses Gwyneth Paltrow and Blythe Danner championed the Planned Parenthood Mother's Day Challenge fundraiser. Paltrow and Danner suggest making a donation in honor of Mother's Day and then, "whisper it to your baby at bedtime." A series of traditional-looking Mother's Day e-cards is offered to those who contribute to this effort.

During meetings about the safety of the RU-486 abortion drug, Centers for Disease Control officials revealed a seventh woman has died from a drug-based abortion. Stunning to be sure. LifeNews has the story.

Monty Patterson, one of the fathers of women who died after taking RU-486, attended the meeting. According the the San Francisco Chronicle, Patterson said the meeting confirmed his notion that RU-486 "is not safe." "It killed my daughter, and I want it off the market," said Patterson, whose daughter, a Livermore 18-year-old, died in 2003.

Six students charged with vandalizing a pro-life display on the Northern Kentucky University campus last month were granted diversion Thursday, but the professor who encouraged and acted with them will not be getting the same break. [LifeNews]

The students have been given the opportunity to perform community service and later have the charges expunged from their records while Professor Sally Jacobsen will face prosecution. Jacobsen was photographed aiding her students in the destruction of 400 crosses representing aborted unborn babies.

Interestingly, according to the Cincinnati Post, the students told investigators that Jacobsen told them they would not be punished because the anti-abortion display was unauthorized, said Thomas Beiting, who represents Caster. In reality, though, the student right-to-life group that put up the display had obtained a permit from the university.

I have to wonder if the severity of action against Jacobsen would have been reduced had she simply apologized instead of justifying her actions and claiming to have been the victim. Here is what she originally told the press:

"Any violence perpetrated against that silly display was minor compared to how I felt when I saw it. Some of my students felt the same way, just outraged."

Although it is unlikely to happen, the group that Jacobsen ought to apologize to is the newly formed Northern Right to Life, a group of students who worked quite hard to set up the display in memory of the unborn who would have attended their school had abortion not claimed their lives. The group released the following statement on their website:

Concerning the recent news with the Cemetery of the Innocent display.

Northern Right to Life would like to thank of our supporters for the kind sentiments and encouragement we've have been recieving in the past days after the dismantling of our Cemetery of the Innocent display

By Dave Andrusko
Today's News and Views, National Right to Life

"Worried about a bacterial infection that led to the deaths of at least five [actually at least six] women who took the abortion pill RU-486, scientists from the nation's leading public health agencies will gather in Atlanta today for the first meeting in 10 years on the drug's safety." Skip to next paragraph New York Times, May 11

"The deaths linked to RU-486 have created an unusual split in the small world of abortion providers, a growing number of whom say that they will not dispense the drug. The risk of death with pill-based abortions now appears to be about 10 times that of surgical abortions." Same story, written by Gardiner Harris

By the time you read this edition of TN&V, scientists and researchers from the Institutes of Health, the Centers for Disease Control, and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) will have completed their first day of discussion in Atlanta, Georgia. Their focus is on the role of Clostridium sordellii, a virulent bacterium, in the deaths of at least six women following a RU-486 induced abortion and eleven other women who died after either giving birth or miscarrying.

There are a number of inter-related issues. Let me try to tackle three of them and begin by placing the conference and the issues raised in the larger context.

In the first essay in this spontaneous series, I discussed how materialism informs and (mis)guides the Culture of Death. Now I'd like to question some of its fundamental assumptions in regard to a tradition of acceptance of the spiritual as part of the human experience.

In a recent news story a group of girls in Laos began acting strangely and were deem to be possessed by evil spirits. Buddhist monks were called in to bless them and drive the demons out. This was reported in the Western press as a humorous curiosity piece. It is possible, even likely that there is a natural explanation for this incident. There are similarities to the infamous events in Salem MA, which now appear to have been caused by ergot poisoning. But the story illustrates the kind of magical thinking that persists in much of the world. Like our ancestors, their world is very different from the bleak Cartesian one in which we post-moderns dwell.

Read the rest at Marlowe's Shade

At the January March for Life Rose Dinner in Washington DC, I was privileged to run into a table occupied by pro-life Democrats. Although the group was certainly a political minority among banquet attendees, they received an enthusiastic round of applause following an introduction by March for Life Founder Nellie Gray. After snapping the photo published above, I enjoyed learning about their organization, Democrats For Life of America (DFLA). Founded in 1999, their primary mission has been to elect pro-life Democrats, support pro-life elected officials, promote a pro-life plank in the Democratic Party platform and achieve legislation that fosters respect for human life.

In a recent press release, the organization solidified its support for the South Dakota bill prohibiting abortion:

Democrats For Life of America (DFLA) commended the South Dakota legislature today for recently approving a bill that will prohibit abortion in their state.

DFLA noted that support from pro-life Democrats was critical to the ultimate passage of the bill.

The legislation would not have passed without the support of pro-life Democrats. There were as many Democrats voting for the bill voting for the bill as Republicans voting against.

“Pro-life Democrats in South Dakota saved the day on this bill. There were just as many Democrats who voted for this legislation as there were Republicans voting against it. So when it comes to protecting the unborn, pro-life Democrats stepped in and gave the voiceless, a voice in South Dakota” said Kristen Day, Executive Director of Democrats For Life.

From today's Chicago Tribune:

BADHOCHHI KALAN, India -- This is the land of the vanishing girl, where 14 boys and seven girls attend 1st grade, where educational plays warn of a future with no women. A nearby midwife delivers one girl for every five boys.

Villagers do not talk openly about why the number of girls is so low here--how couples use ultrasound tests illegally and then abort female fetuses. But everyone knows the reason....

The village is a typical one in Fatehgarh Sahib district, a focus in India's fight to stop couples from aborting female fetuses, largely a phenomenon of the elite and educated. In the 2001 census, this district in the northwest state of Punjab had the most skewed sex ratio in the country. For every 1,000 boys younger than 6, there were 754 girls. That was a precipitous drop from 1991, when the census showed 874 girls for every 1,000 boys.

In Badhochhi Kalan in 2001, the ratio was even more disparate, 651 girls for every 1,000 boys. A nearby village had only 440 girls for 1,000 boys, the worst in India....

Sex selection abortions are also epidemic in China. They're causing quite a few problems for adult women, such as sex-trafficking, rape, and wife sharing.

It's logical to presume sex selection abortions are also committed in the U.S., even if only among sexist immigrants.

This phenomenon presents many interesting questions....

You may wonder why many of us stick with the Life Principles as outlined at the March for Life Education and Defense Fund web site. The reason is that if we allow people to experiment with or create conditions on the life and death of human beings, we will come up with all kinds of creative ways to kill or allow human beings to be killed.

There are so many inventive reasons we as humans want to come up with "exceptions" to abortion.

Continue reading at MarchTogether.blogspot.com

“Why should I apologise. I have done nothing wrong, all I tried to do was to try to educate. I want people to know what is going on. Seven million unborn babies have been murdered."

In retaliation, the hospital has banned him for all non-emergency treatment and he was taken off a waiting list for a hip replacement at the QEH after sending in the pictures.

Although the judge in this case disagrees, it seems clear that Atkinson’s intentions are to change minds by using an abhorrent yet accurate picture of abortion. In evaluating his strategy, the question that comes to mind is whether or not he has been successful. Have abortion supporters changed their minds because of Atkinson’s efforts?

From May 6th through the 11th, Missionaries to the Preborn demonstrated at the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) National Convention in Washington D.C. MTP notes that of the ACOG’s 35,000 members, nearly 2000 perform abortions and several hundred are full-time abortionists.

This meeting of physicians has become especially notorious following the ACOG’s announcement of the “Ask Me” campaign, an effort to pressure the FDA to approve the morning-after pill by marketing the drug to each patient at every visit

More from the MTP here.

Thousands of pro-life Canadians gathered today for the annual 2006 March for Life in Ottawa. As reported by LifeNews, the participants want the federal government to reopen the debate on abortion and were encouraged when at least a dozen Conservative and Liberal backbench members of Parliament, along with several senators, addressed to the crowd, urging them to keep up their fight.

Thanks to Suzanne from the Blue Wave for the photos. She has published many more here.

Larry Donlan, founder of the pro-life group Rescue the Heartland, has vowed to continue protesting outside the home of an abortion clinic worker despite the recent arrest of several picketers. The Columbus Telegram reports:

OMAHA, Neb. - Seven abortion opponents have been charged with unlawful picketing for gathering outside the home of a woman who works at a Bellevue abortion clinic.

The people who protested outside the home of Karen Pender say they were exercising their rights to free speech.

Pender said the protesters threatened to picket outside her home if she didn't quit her job as a medical assistant at Abortion and Contraception Clinic of Nebraska.

Video and pictures here.

National Pro-Life Action Center (NPLAC) renewed its plea to remove RU-486 (also know as Mifeprex and Mifepristone) from the market in response to news that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) will hold a high-profile meeting today about deadly side-effects associated with the drug’s use.

“RU-486 is a lethal drug regimen that takes the life of an innocent unborn child every time—and in many cases has taken the life of the mother as well,” said Paul Chaim Schenck, director of NPLAC. “Given the number of deaths known or suspected to be associated with RU-486, and given the knowledge that many organizations, like Planned Parenthood, have been dispensing it with improper use instructions, the FDA would be guilty of gross negligence if they do not immediately remove RU-486 from the market.”

I want to alert readers of ProLifeBlogs that I've just published an article at Generations for Life addressing the notion that pro-lifers, especially we pro-life activists, are "filled with hate" in all that we do. This is the first regular installment in the series of articles debunking the myths that people believe about pro-lifers which I introduced recently. Comments welcome.

(BTW, I hope not to offend with the photo here, but this is the kind of thing we see every day and it illustrates where much of the hatred is really coming from.)

By Randall K. O'Bannon, Ph.D.
National Right to Life director of Education & Research

There are some who have been suggesting that people look at the vaginal self-administration of the prostaglandin, the second drug in the process, as the most likely means of introducing the deadly bacteria, Clostridium sordellii, into a woman's reproductive tract. But we've learned that Clostridium sordellii is already present in 10% of all women's vaginal flora, and yet infections with this pathogen are extremely rare, even with the normal bleeding of a woman's reproductive life.

The best explanation for this sudden spate of deaths among RU-486 patients appears to involve the immunosuppressant properties of the abortion pill RU-486. A woman's immune system is normally capable of protecting her from deadly bacteria like Clostridium sordellii, but RU-486 appears to compromise her immune system, so that it is unable to help her fight off such infections.

Update: The Washington Post made a huge typo in their chart - the percentage of children under 5 who are Black and Asian was switched. Black children actually represent 15% of all children under five. Here's the correct information.

The Washington Post has a story on a census report which discusses the race of children under the age of five. The census found that 45% of Americans under the age of five are members of a racial/ethnic minority compared to 33% of America's total population.

However, the chart at the bottom of the page shows that black children under five represent only 4% of the population younger than 5 even though African-Americans represent 13% of America's total population. While other minority gourps like Asians and Hispanics have a much higher percentage in the under 5 population, African-Americans have a much lower percentage.

Where are all the black children? They've been aborted. According to the Centers for Disease Control, 36.6% of U.S. abortions performed in 2002 were performed on Black women. This percentage has held fairly steady since the early 1990's.

The abortion pill known as RU-486 will be in the spotlight on today as U.S. health officials meet to discuss an outbreak of rare bacterial infections across the country, including a handful of cases in women who took the pill. - Reuters

LifeNews reports that the father of a California teenager who died after using the dangerous abortion drug she obtained from a local Planned Parenthood will attend a join FDA-CDC meeting on Thursday as the federal agencies look into why the abortion pill has recently killed five women through lethal bacterial infections.

Through eugenics:

Women with a family history of breast cancer will now be able to use IVF to prevent their children suffering from the disease, the fertility watchdog has announced.

The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority said IVF clinics would be licensed to carry out tests on artificially fertilised embryos to see if they carry genes that cause the disease.

more

President Vladimir Putin said Wednesday the country must increase its birthrate, calling the persistent population decline of hundreds of thousands a year "the most acute problem of contemporary Russia." - Washinton Post

Mr. Putin then warned that Russia's population has been declining by almost 700,000 people a year, and that the state must stop the decline. In 2004, for every 16 Russians who died, only 10.4 Russian babies were born, according to the most recently available official data. - The New York Times

What the Post and the Times failed to report is that abortion rates in Russia are some of the highest in the world. Conservative estimates indicate 60% of all pregnancies end in abortion. LifeSiteNews reported in August that Russia’s abortion rates exceeded the national rate of birth for the first time in 2005.

Previously:

Russian Abortion Killing and Sterilizing Millions; Demographic Collapse Likely to be Worse than Previously Predicted (April 13, 2005)

Every Third Russian Abortion Ends in Patient's Death (April 8, 2005)

They've got to be kidding:

Women can work out whether a man will make a good father just by looking at his face, research shows. ... By studying what appealed to women, they concluded that the ideal partner should have a symmetrical face, large deep and expressive eyes, with a straight nose and soft jaw.

Ann Scheidler hits the nail on the head in her statement regarding the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists' plan to push the morning after pill:

"The ACOG 'Ask Me' campaign is aimed at pressuring the FDA to approve of Plan B, the morning-after pill for over the counter sale." said Ann Scheidler, Executive Director of the Chicago- based Pro-Life Action League, "not an effort to provide quality health care for women."

Here's the rest of the Pro-Life Action League's Statement:

"The suggestion that all women of child-bearing age should have a prescription at the ready for 'emergency contraception' is an insult," said Scheidler. The nation's OB/Gyn's are acting as if fertility is a virus and that women need to treat it as an illness rather than a healthy condition."

On Monday the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists announced their plan to encourage women to get an advance prescription for the "morning-after pill." Part of the campaign is to post "Ask Me" notices in doctors' offices, to urge doctors to ask women if they want the prescription.

Laura Ann Davis of Titusville, FL was murdered on January 23, 2006. Her 18-week old unborn son Tavarious Ja'Quan also died, but because of current Florida law, no legal protection exists for his death. In response, a Florida grandmother is leading an effort to change state law to make sure pregnant women and their unborn children are protected from acts of violence throughout pregnancy. (LifeNews)

You can help by downloading the petition and collecting signatures that can be retuned to Florida Right to Life, 378 CenterPointe Circle, Suite 1250, Altamonte Springs, FL 32701

More information: click here

Rep. Ted Harvey introduces Gianna Jessen, survivor of a late term saline abortion.

Abortion rights extremists decried Rep. Ted Harvey's introduction of Gianna Jessen, a woman who survived a botched late-term abortion. Jessen’s presence apparently tainted the assembly’s resolution to recognize Planned Parenthood, the nation's number one abortion provider.

Medical records show that as an unborn baby of about 24 weeks' gestation, Jessen was injected with a high-concentration saline solution for the purpose of bringing about her death via abortion. Although the poisonous salt solution worked on Jessen’s fragile body for 5 hours, her mother went into labor and she survived. She was injured and today bears some of the scars and a mild case of cerebral palsy. But she is alive, she is well and full of life.

Although it's hard to believe, Harvey’s critics responded by claiming that Jessen’s health problems could not be tied to the botched abortion.

LifeNews has more on this story: Colorado lawmakers hear the national anthem on Monday from a woman who was nearly the victim of abortion. Gianna Jessen, who has traveled the world to share the story of how she survived a botched abortion, sang the patriotic song to open the last day of the legislative session.

Note: this article was originally posted here. We updated it with pictures courtesy of the Passionate Pro-Lifer who has posted more information here.

American Life League has announced that tomorrow, May 11, their Rock for Life group will hold an informative demonstration outside of the Centers for Disease Control Conference Center in Atlanta, Georgia beginning at 7:30 a.m. The CDC is hosting a meeting focused on the deaths of women who had taken the RU-486 abortion pill. Holding signs that read,

"RU-486 KILLS," Rock for Life representatives will be on-site to offer the facts regarding the dangers the drug poses to both women and preborn children. Given the lethal effects of the drug, American Life League is calling for the immediate removal of RU-486 from the market.

A hearing over medical record subpoenas in a criminal investigation into abortion mills continues to be on hold pending a ruling by Shawnee County District Judge Richard Anderson on whether to allow media to cover the proceedings.

The Associated Press and the Kansas Press Association are asking Judge Anderson for the ability to cover the court hearing in which Kansas Attorney General Phill Kline has asked for 90 medical records from two abortion mills in his investigation into illegal late-term abortions and the concealment of child rape.

Kline has agreed to an order from the Kansas Supreme Court that the names of the abortion patients be redacted before being turned over to the Attorney General’s office. “We were never asking for patient names,” Kline has said in the past.

Alan at JoinMyFast continues foward, hoping you'll join him.

To me the following video is a typical MSM hit piece. They make statements like "political conservatives" and "the conservative family research council".

Continue reading at MarchTogether.com

States through-out the country are actively working on legislation to limit or even ban abortion. An update from Focus on the Family summarizes the fight:

South Dakota's Legislature voted to ban abortion earlier this year, with the only exception being when the life of the mother is in danger. Not surprisingly, that law is now caught up in the courts. Eleven other states, including Mississippi, Louisiana, Ohio and Kentucky have either banned the practice or have pending legislation to do so.

Meanwhile, six states have codified Roe, guaranteeing the right to abortion should the ruling ever be overturned: California, Connecticut, Maine, Maryland, Nevada and Washington. Hawaii has been dubbed the "abortion state" after the passage of a law eliminating of residency requirements and ending a ban on late-term abortions.

John Long, executive director of Hawaii Right to Life, said there is a certain amount of apathy among residents there.

"Until the church, that sleeping giant, wakes up," he said, "I think we're going to continue to lose battles here."

But Mississippi Sen. Alan Nunnelee told Family News in Focus he senses a growing optimism in his state.

"We feel empowered in Mississippi," he said. "We began to feel that empowerment following the Casey decision."

The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) has announced a new program to promote the use of the so-called "morning after" early abortion pill even as pro-lifers protest the abortion group during their annual convention being held in Washington, DC.

Pro-life organizations oppose the use of the "morning after" pill because it acts as an abortefacient. A true contraceptive prevents fertilization, but the morning after pill allows fertilization, but prevents the new, the life from implanting in the lining of the womb. The new "Ask Me" campaign encourages obstetricians and gynecologists to offer a prescription to the morning after pill to every woman at each visit. Organizers admit the new program of just-in-case prescriptions is in direct response to the FDA's refusal to let the morning-after pill be sold over the counter in drugstores.

Abortion rights extremists decried Rep. Ted Harvey's introduction of Gianna Jensen Jessen, a woman who survived a botched late-term abortion. Jessen’s presence apparently tainted the assembly’s resolution to recognize Planned Parenthood, the nation's number one abortion provider.

Medical records show that as an unborn baby of about 24 weeks' gestation, Jessen was injected with a high-concentration saline solution for the purpose of bringing about her death via abortion. Although the poisonous salt solution worked on Jessen’s fragile body for 5 hours, her mother went into labor and she survived. She was injured and today bears some of the scars and a mild case of cerebral palsy. But she is alive, she is well and full of life.

Although it's hard to believe, Harvey’s critics responded by claiming that Jessen’s health problems could not be tied to the botched abortion.

Update: LifeNews has more on this story.

Forty-six years ago on May 9, 1960, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved Enovid as the first prescription oral contraceptive. "The Pill" has proved to jeopardize women's health in addition to marriage and family. The Pill has even been called an assault on women's health experts and even by those involved in developing and testing the drug.

As we examined in yesterday's post, the Pill has certainly not lived up to its promise of worry-free marital relations. On the other hand, it opened up the floodgates for promiscuity and extramarital affairs.

Three days after being sworn into office, President Bill Clinton signed an executive order directing the Department of Health and Human Services and the FDA to take steps to promote the testing, licensing, and manufacturing of the RU-486 abortion pill. Under the Clinton administration, the FDA took a very active role and engaged in extraordinary efforts to bring the drug into the U.S.

Now, 13 years later, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is preparing for a May 11 meeting in Atlanta, Georgia to focus on deadly infections allegedly caused by RU-486. Judicial Watch, a public interest group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption, today released a new special report: "The Clinton RU-486 Files." The report contains recently uncovered documents that shed new light on the Clinton administration’s aggressive drive to push RU-486 to market in the United States. Judicial Watch obtained the documents from the National Archives at the Clinton Presidential Library in Little Rock, Arkansas in February 2006, shortly after the archives allowed public access to Bill Clinton’s presidential papers.

[The Da Vinci Code] is a piece of propaganda which follows the same pattern as the revolution that gave us abortion and the rest of our promiscuous culture. The fallout of that revolution has led to the deaths of millions of innocents, and I fear that the fallout from the Da Vinci onslaught could lead to the spiritual deaths of millions more. - Rev. Thomas J. Euteneuer, Human Life International

We also shouldn’t be too surprised by the return of an old heresy. The lure of being initiated into secret knowledge, being informed of a global conspiracy can be extremely enticing. But when stripped down to its mysticism and anti-intellectualism, the Gospel of Judas/Thomas/Oprah, etc., loses its luster and becomes ripe for critique. Because Christians throughout the ages have effectively responded to these challenges you don't see too many First Church of Gnosis. - Joe Carter, Evangelical Outpost

Polygamist church leader Warren Jeffs was recently placed on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list. The agency has high hopes that the additional publicity and reward will bring in information leading to his arrest.

FoxNews reports that Jeffs is accused of arranging marriages between underage girls and older men. He is wanted in Arizona on criminal charges of sexual conduct with a minor. He also was charged in Utah with rape as an accomplice.

The Family Research Council’s Tony Perkins comments on the high profile case:

I hope the FBI catches this man. His trial would be far more educational for Americans than most of the murder and mayhem that get wide coverage on TV. This would allow Americans to see what will eventually be asserted as a "right" if the U.S. Constitution is not amended to protect the definition of marriage as being between one man and one woman. I thank Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and the Bush Administration for recognizing the seriousness of these charges.

Check out Rich Lowry’s National Review Column on the political shift in the Democratic party on abortion:

Bob Casey Jr. isn’t being punished for the sins of his father, even though he shares them. Casey is a Democrat running for the U.S. Senate. His late father, then the governor of Pennsylvania, was banned from the podium of the 1992 Democratic Convention because he was pro-life. Casey Jr. is pro-life too, but the national party is embracing him.

This shift is a sign that the Democrats are beginning to grapple with a painful truth, one that will hurt even more as its full weight becomes evident to them: The absolutist pro-choice position on abortion is a political loser. In his brilliant and incisive new book, The Party of Death, my colleague Ramesh Ponnuru demonstrates why.

Lowry notes Sen. John Kerry’s “pro-life” stance on abortion - a position he trumpeted during the last presidential election. The Senator is personally opposed to abortion, believing that life begins at conception, but is not willing to impose his view on others. In his book, Ponnuru traces this political tactic back to Mario Cuomo, the astute three-term governor of New York who began the claim to be “personally opposed” in a 1984 speech at Notre Dame. This position has been often repeated by Democrats, especially since the American public has become wise to the radical pro-abortion position of the Democratic platform.

This eloquent and poignant letter appeared in The Guardian. The whole thing is so well stated that I hope Ms. Campbell won't mind if I post it in it's entirety.

Jane Campbell Tuesday May 9, 2006 The Guardian

Assisted dying is not a simple question of increasing choice for those of us who live our lives close to death. It raises deep concerns about how we are viewed by society and by ourselves. I have a severe form of spinal muscular atrophy, and require 24-hour assistance. Many people who do not know me believe I would be "better off dead". Even more argue: "I couldn't live like that." And some suggest that advances in genetic screening should be used to enable parents to choose whether to have a child with disabilities.

Assisted Dying for the Terminally Ill, Lord Joffe's private member's bill, which will be debated in the House of Lords this Friday, feeds into that lack of knowledge (some might call it ignorance, others prejudice) by endorsing such views and legalising the killing of terminally ill and disabled people. The bill has the backing of the Voluntary Euthanasia Society (recently renamed Dignity in Dying) and, according to their polls, the support of the British public.

Yet it has failed to get the endorsement of a single organisation of disabled people. Three major national charities have condemned it, and leading campaigners have united under the banner of Not Dead Yet UK to make the voice of disabled people heard. The very people the bill is intended to help, the terminally ill and disabled, are frightened by what it seeks to achieve.

Read the rest at Marlowe's Shade

Another save at the Falls Church, VA abortion mill

There are frequent saves at abortion mills. Many women are looking for an "out" and our presence can be all it takes to encourage them to deny the abortionist.

A woman went to the Falls Church abortion mill at 900 S. Washington st. on Saturday for an abortion. There were about 10 deathscorts present, but that didn't stop us from saving a life that day.

After seeing us Pro-Life folks there & hearing us plead for her not to kill her child she burst into tears and turned away from the mill!

Continue reading at MarchTogether.blogspot.com

It is no surprise that noted conductor and pianist Daniel Barenboim is partial to the sense of hearing. In his campaign against Muzak, he comments,

But the ear, let us not forget, starts operating on the forty-fifth day of the pregnancy of a woman. That means the foetus that is in the womb of a pregnant lady begins to use his ear on the forty-fifth day of the pregnancy, which means it has seven and a half months advance over the eye.

She admitted to shooting herself in the abdomen, killing her unborn baby. The judge dismissed the charge of illegally inducing an abortion

Charlie and Catherine Mariethoz's daughter Charlotte suffers from a rare blood condition which apparently will be fatal without treatment through a stem cell transplant from a genetically matched donor. The British Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA), which regulates the use of human embryo and stem cell research in the UK, has given consent for a clinic to try to create a baby that is a genetic match for Charlotte, using an embryo selection technique. Their method of "creating" a match is eugenics in practice:

Charlotte's parents will undergo IVF treatment to create embryos that will then be tested to see if they are the required genetic match – if one is found, this will be implanted in the womb to create the designer baby.

When born, the baby will be provide stem cells that can be transplanted into Charlotte, hopefully saving her life.

Doctors recommended the controversial measure after deciding that an unrelated stem cell transplant would not help, and that the chances of producing a genetic match without artificial intervention were not great enough.

The practice of selecting embryos based on their genetic make-up is controversial, as some worry that it could lead to the selection of embryos based on eye colour or other trivial preferences.

As a Catholic, I'm very much in favor of ecumenism, including greater cooperation and improved uderstanding between Christians, Jews, and Muslims. However, when it comes Bishops opening their churches to illegal immigrants in order to pressure the Belgian authorities to allow the immigrants to stay in the country, altering the inside of a Catholic church, and especially moving the altar and covering the statue of Our Lady to hide her from the eyes of the Muslim believers, we have left the realm of Christian charity and reached into the bottomless and dangerous well of voluntary dhimmitude.

While Western Europe is turning Muslim, its Christian Churches are committing suicide. A Muslim would never allow his mosque to be turned into a dormitory for non-believers. This, however, is exactly what the Belgian Catholic Church is doing. The Belgian Bishops have already opened up 20 churches and chapels to illegal immigrants - so-called "sans-papiers" or "people without papers [=staying permits]" - who by Belgian law have to be expelled.

I can tell the pro-aborts are getting angry & nervous. More & more they are attacking our signs & displays.

Click here to read about their previous attacks on our displays

The latest attack on a display in at a Washington state university is an example of their ever growing anger at the Pro-Life movement. A man played his guitar for hours not far from the display, probably singing peace songs or anti war songs, when he finally snapped & attacked the display.

Continue reading at ProLifeNews.tv

A recent New York Times Magazine article, "Contra-Contraception" by Russell Shorto [1], highlighted the growing trend against the use of artificial contraception by Christians and the growing number of anti-abortion (pro-life) groups that are addressing the issue. Though he brought to light many aspects of negative impacts of contraception, Shorto's article avoided many important points regarding the harms of artificial birth control on marriage, society and women's health. It served more as a forum to mock the anti-contraception movement.

Opposition to contraception is certainly not a new idea. When Margaret Sanger began her crusade for social acceptance of birth control and abortion in the early twenty century, most individuals in our country opposed her ideals. As acceptance of birth control grew, so did the need for and acceptance of abortion, and abortion was determined to be the bigger, more morally offensive issue. Time and energy from those who opposed contraception shifted to opposing abortion, and the fight against contraception fell by the wayside. But, the social acceptance of contraception remained the problem regarding abortion.

Texas Right to Life emailed this exceptional statement following Andrea Clark's death:

Andrea Clark’s family announced that she had passed away Sunday about 3 pm at St. Luke’s Hospital. Andrea was surrounded by her two sisters, her brother, and her son. Andrea was not in pain but had developed a severe infection, and her fragile body could no longer fight. Her new attending physician reported that Andrea's heart naturally stopped beating. Andrea received the Catholic sacrament of Last Rites on Saturday.

Even though some would have considered Andrea's life futile, her life had tremendous value—even during the last week of her life. The outpouring of love, prayers, and support for Andrea and her family galvanized activists to speak for those who cannot speak for themselves. Even though her fragile body was beginning to fail, Andrea still continued to touch countless thousands across the continent.

Prior Article: Andrea Clark Has Passed Away

From LifeNews

AI seems ready to jump on the UN abortion bandwagon:

Amnesty International is coming under fire from pro-life groups for asking its membership if it should add promoting abortion to the list of human rights topics it covers. The group is defending itself and saying it's only polling its members and hasn't taken a pro-abortion stance yet. Last month, AI leaders sent documents to its membership proposing three areas in the abortion debate where the group could be involved.

Pro-life groups have been very vocal in saying AI should not adopt a pro-abortion position, including Catholic 'Aid to the Church in Need' (ACN), which participates in humanitarian assistance campaigns.

Continued at Marlowe's Shade

The Food and Drug Administration has announced its agenda for a meeting that will examine the deadly infections that have occurred in women who took the abortion drug, RU-486. The Wall Stree Journal reports:

The meeting, to be held jointly with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases at the CDC's Atlanta campus on Thursday, will focus on scientific questions about the origins, cause and need for future research about infections due to the bacterium Clostridium sordellii, as well as another type of pathogen that has no tie to the drug. Mifepristone, known by the brand name Mifeprex and sometimes called RU-486, is made by Danco Laboratories LLC and is given in combination with another drug, misoprostol, to cause an abortion in the early stages of pregnancy.

Panels of scientists are expected to discuss the infections, but possible regulatory actions won't be debated. An FDA official said the agency, which has added warning language to the drug's label, might consider further moves, but it first wants a better scientific grasp of the issues.

Read the rest

We received the sad news from her sister this evening:

Andrea passed away peacefully a little before 3pm today, with her family and her friends at her bedside. We love her so very much and we are going to miss her terribly. We hope that the battle that we fought for our sister will bring to light and bear witness to the horrible acts committed in the name of ethics in hospitals across the state of Texas.

The fact that we had to fight this battle is both frightening and a sad commentary on the so-called "ethics" now being practiced in medical facilities in this state. The battle for life is a difficult one, in the best of situations, but when a family is put through what we had to go through at such a time, it is especially agonizing.

We wish so much that we could have spent more time at our sister's side, when she was living and fighting for her life, rather than having to visit our attorney's office, give interviews to radio and television stations to let the public know of the atrocity about to befall Andrea, and literally stand outside the hospital and beg them not to kill our sister. In attempting to deprive Andrea of the most basic of her human rights--life--St. Luke's Hospital managed to deprive her family and her of that which is most dear to us all, when we are faced with the death of a loved one: a proper goodbye.

How, in the name of God, anyone can call putting someone to death when they are at their most helpless and begging for their lives "ethical," we cannot imagine.

Melanie Childers

Thanks to all who took a stand for Andrea and valued her despite her health related struggles and the decisions of her hospital. We extend our deepest sympathies to Andrea's family and our thoughts and prayers are with those who now mourn the loss of their sister and mother.

In California, a girl who is under 18 year-old can't get a flu shot or an aspirin from the nurse without her parents knowing. But, she can get a secret abortion. Pro-life groups are hoping to change that and have four days left to get signatures on a petition for a state vote to do so. The Parents' Right to Know group is collecting signatures on a petition to have a second chance at a vote to require parental notification before a teenager can get an abortion. For anyone wanting to sign the petition, May 8 is the last day to mail them. The group is getting close to its goal of 900,000 valid signatures and, as of late April, more than 700,000 signatures had been collected. More than one million petition sheets have been distributed and mailed to individuals and churches in California since February to get the initiative on the November ballot. Visit the web site and sign the petition today! Petitions can be mailed to Parents' Right to Know, 1703 India St., San Diego, CA 92101. Visit www.parentsright2know.org or www.YESon73.net for more information.

A few weeks ago I posted an entry on the Vital Signs Blog about an abortionist in Virginia having his license yanked after repeated cases of negligence and malpractice. Now, of course, hurting women is inherent in the abortive act, no matter how “clean or competent” the abortionist claims to be. A woman’s health cannot help but be damaged by the extremely unnatural act of wrenching her baby from her womb by violent force. And, by being such an obvious, grievous sin, a woman’s mental and spiritual health cannot help but be damaged as well. So, it is simply a given fact that any and all abortionists hurt women. Any and all abortionists operate outside of and contrary to proper medical care. And any and all abortionists should (if the world ran according to any degree of rationality) be denied by state officials the chance to further hurt women and kill babies.

But, of course, the world doesn’t yet run according to rationality (let alone righteousness) and this Virginia case is a tragic example. Indeed, this guy (Dr. Reffat Kamel Abofreka) only had his medical license yanked after repeated complaints of malpractice and after his license had already been at times suspended by the Virginia Medical Board and after South Carolina had denied him further license to do abortions. Get the picture here? The culture of death retains such a grip on America’s political and medical officials that an abortionist has to mistreat, maim and mangle many women before there’s even a chance that he might be bothered by the powers that be. And even the clumsiest, most coldhearted abortionists often go their whole careers without any interference from health and medical officials at all.

Yesterday, Jivin commented on the controversy concerning a pregnancy center in Indiana which Planned Parenthood alleges "deceived, lured, and harassed a pregnant 17-year-old girl."

John from the Generations for Life blog has taken the time to call the Indianapolis Police Department to see if they had any records that would corroborate Planned Parenthood's version of events. He says they came up with nothing. If I was a pro-choicer right now, I think I'd be questioning why Planned Parenthood has provided no evidence to support the version of events in their story and why the evidence seems to be stacking against them and their version of events. I'd also be wondering why this girl and her mother and Planned Parenthood would let the CPC in question get away with that kind of harassment and never complain to the authorities.

Generations for Life, a Chicago-based pro-life youth outreach, is calling on Planned Parenthood to come clean about an inflammatory story they are circulating about a pro- life pregnancy resource center (PRC) in Indiana. The story, circulated widely via e-mail and published on numerous websites, alleges the PRC engaged in "a campaign of harassment and intimidation" against a pregnant 17-year old girl who had "unwittingly" walked into the center, which shares a parking lot with the Planned Parenthood facility.

By Jim Sedlak

May 5, 2006

I was giving a talk in Rapid City, South Dakota the other night. During the talk, I asked the audience to take a look at a book that I carry around with me. The book is being pushed for use by children age 10 and up.

As people thumbed through the book, the reaction was the same as I had received at numerous talks over the last 10 years. There were gasps of disbelief. There were some who quickly put the book down in disgust. And others who couldn't believe that anyone would think the book would be distributed to teens, much less 10-year-olds.

We've found that the gut reaction of regular people is one of the best ways to determine if something is worthwhile or just trash. In community after community across the country the reaction to this particular book has been universal. Normal people hate it. Normal people can't believe anyone would give this book to a child. Normal people want to walk away from it.

From LifeNews

A leader of a United Nations lobbying group says women who have been victimized in the difficult and brutal conflict in Darfur, Sudan should be given abortions, especially if they have been raped. Tamara Fetters, a researcher for Ipas, a population control advocacy group, says all refugee health facilities should be doing abortions

Call For Life Today & Tomorrow -

Join us today & tomorrow for the nationwide Monthly Call for Life at MarchTogether.com.

Click here to continue reading

May 19 is approaching fast and Christians and Catholics are scrambling to organize protests, educational seminars and other activities to fight the lies of the popular book-turned-movie The DaVinci Code. But, what do pro-lifers and Christians in Hollywood suggest we do? Hit them in the pocket book—go see Over the Hedge that weekend as an alternative!

We have all seen the recent drama regarding “fake abortion clinics.” The abortion providers know that providing healthy alternatives to pregnant women through pregnancy resource centers works! It is no good to tell a woman not to abort if we are not willing to fulfill her real needs as she prepares for the birth of her child. This life-saving alternative hits the abortion providers where it hurts—their pocket book.

So... Because the ratings of new movies are usually done in comparison to other movies that come out the same weekend or within a few weeks of the new flick, going to see Over the Hedge during opening weekend is especially important. While protests and educational seminars can raise public awareness, this healthy, entertaining alternative can also be productive in lessening the impact that a bad movie has. Personally, I think it’s nothing short of a miracle that a fantastic, family-friendly movie comes out the same day as DaVinci.

Spread the word!

Displays have been damaged nationwide lately. This has been pointed out by ProLifeBlogs, Jill Stanek & others.

ProLifeBlogs Article

In addition to those, back in February, a GAP (genocidal awareness project) display was vandalized soon after we left the location. Fortunately there was still someone onsite with a camera.

Click here to continue reading at ProLifeNews.tv

In the past few weeks we’ve written about the vandalism of pro-life displays by supporters of abortion. There was the incident involving a Northern Kentucky University tenured professor who lead her students in what she called was an exercise of "free speech". Local law enforcement disagreed and she, along with her accomplices, are being charged with misdemeanors.

At Princeton University abortion advocates destroyed a pro-life display of 347 flags set-up to remember the estimated number of students that were missing from the student population due to abortion.

Jill Stanek, in a provocative column titled "Vampires on Campus", recalls,

Also in March, Harvard University pro-aborts repeatedly defaced or stole pro-life posters on campus depicting the growth of embryo "Elena." A college newspaper editorial decried the posters, stating they "misrepresent[ed] the pro-choice members of this campus as bloodthirsty baby killers."

LifeNews now reports more vandalism aimed at silencing pro-lifers, this time at Western Washington University:

The WWU student did $2,700 worth of damages on Tuesday to a pro-life display set up on campus.

David Janus Zhang, who is 21, jumped over a fence surrounding the display to destroy it.

Dave Doughty, assistant chief of the Western Washington University Police Department, told the Bellingham Herald that Zhang then “went on a rampage" tearing and destroying the elaborate display of posters and billboards.

By NRLC's Holly Smith

If you've ever walked through your local mall, you've likely had your picture taken and seen it instantly appear on a t-shirt, hat or poster, surrounded by graphics. This was made possible courtesy of a young person trying to earn money for a car or college by working at the photo kiosk.

Just as likely, you walked right by, not giving it a second thought.

Now imagine walking through your mall and instead of seeing you and your family or friends in the kiosk's television screen, you see beautiful 4D ultrasound images of unborn babies, full of life in their mothers' wombs. Not only would it interrupt your train of thought, you would probably stop to watch it for a few minutes and it would move you.

The innocence of unborn babies and the amazing technology that allows us to see them at once at their most vulnerable, and at the same time, the most safe and sound they'll ever be, and needless to say, cute as can be. All those thoughts flood the mind at once and one cannot help but be moved.

Mike and Maureen Nuzzi of Atco, New Jersey are counting on the impact of 4D ultrasound videos to awaken and educate their community about the humanity of the unborn child.

AlterNet | Exposing Anti-Choice Abortion Clinics, by Amanda Marcotte:

According to a recent Planned Parenthood email, a 17-year-old girl mistakenly walked into a crisis pregnancy center thinking it was Planned Parenthood, which was next door....

Here's the proof:

I contacted Jennifer Jorczak of Planned Parenthood of Indiana to verify this story, and while she was unable to provide details out of respect for the patient's privacy, she confirmed that everything in the initial action alert email was true.

C'mon, you can do better than this! Interviewing a Planned Parenthood spokesperson about crisis pregnancy centers? And these are the people who like to accuse FOX viewers of being ignorant and easily-fooled....

Actually, someone did better than this. JivinJ has been quite tenacious in his research. That post links to a journalism project from 2004 by a University of Indiana student. While it is impossible to say for sure this is the "evil CPC" in Planned Parenthood's story, the circumstances seem to fit. Now, look at this picture, which clearly shows both the CPC and the Planned Parenthood clinic. Yes, they share a parking lot, but it is very hard to imagine how someone could confuse one of these locations for the other.

This story has all of the earmarks of an urban legend. Someone whose identity can't be confirmed, just enough specifics to seem real (but not enough to confirm the story), despicable behavior on the part of someone the (pro-choice) audience hates, a sympathetic victim who has been abused ... it's all there except for the chupacabra. What astounds me is how quickly people are believing this stuff without any credible evidence. Even the I'mNotSorry blog (very pro-choice, but usually smarter than this) featured the "Evil CPC" story, back when it was still a PP action alert. Now that the story has been covered by a "real" news organization like AlterNet, I think we can expect to see the story gain even more momentum.

As it does so, keep an eye out for any real proof. If you find some, please let me know. A CPC who is engaging in such awful behavior would deserve to be exposed. CPCs depend on trust in order to function, and a slimy CPC like the one in this story would kill the credibility of all of the CPCs who are doing good work. If this story is real, I'll participate in exposing the evildoer.

Needless to say, I don't think the story is real. Quick show of hands: Who here has heard of HIPAA? The Health Insurance Portability & Accountability Act has numerous provisions related to the safety of a patient's personal information. If the CPC was covered by HIPAA (which seems likely), they would have been in gross violation of that law. If not, they still would have been guilty of fraud for posting as something they're not. Either way, the guilty CPC would be fined, sued, and generally dragged to justice. Strangely, this has not happened to the CPC in the story. No prosecution, no lawsuits, no action of any kind has resulted from this flagrant violation. Of course, silence does not prove anything, but it sure makes me suspicious.

Michelle Malkin interviewed Ramesh Ponnuru about his book, The Party of Death: The Assault on the Sanctity of Life. The video of their conversation, available at HotAir, incudes commentary on Andrea Clark’s fight for life.

Related:

Andrea Clark's Struggle for Life

Good News About Andrea Clark! Sister and Attorney Comment

Andrea Clark is being treated - Internet users made a difference

We'll publish more information through-out the next week on the report, Abortion in Women's Lives, just released by the Alan Guttmacher institute (if you've written commentary email us a link). The first response of the day comes from Concerned Women for America:

Concerned Women for America (CWA) called into question a Guttmacher report released today titled “Abortion in Women’s Lives.” The paper attempts to deny the ever- accumulating evidence that abortion harms women physically and psychologically.

“This report reveals the way abortion advocates choose to address the problem that abortion harms women is by ignoring the increasing evidence and women’s testimonies of their own experiences,” said Wendy Wright, CWA’s President. “A study by Guttmacher Institute on abortion should be taken with as much seriousness as a tobacco industry study on nicotine.

Urgent help needed--Signed Petitions needed immediately.

PROBLEM: In California, a girl under age 18 cannot get a flu shot, a cavity filled, or an aspirin dispensed by the school nurse without a parent knowing. But a doctor can perform a surgical or chemical abortion on a young girl without even informing a parent or guardian. Planned Parenthood staff almost never report to Child Protective Services the obvious fact that pregnant young girls they abort have been victims of sexual exploitation and abuse.

SOLUTION: The "PARENTS’ RIGHT TO KNOW AND CHILD PROTECTION" initiative will require that a physician notify in writing a parent or guardian at least 48 hours before performing an abortion on a minor girl. Parents know their children’s needs best. Parents have invested time and attention in raising their daughter; they care about her future. A young girl who is pregnant needs the advice and support of a parent who can help her understand all her options, not pressures from a stranger who profits from secret tax-payer funded abortions.

For further information visit: www.parentsright2know.org or www.YESon73.net

According to the North Country Gazette's June Maxam, Pinellas County probate court judge George W. Greer has crossed the line.

Greer appeared this past weekend as the lead speaker at the 10th anniversary symposium of the University of Pennsylvania Center for Bioethics in Philadelphia, Pa., the theme of which was "The Legacy of the Terri Schiavo Case: Why Is It So Hard To Die in America" and spoke on the topic of "Who Should Decide: Courts/Legislators".

Read the rest: click here

MarchTogether.com - American Life League Press Release:

How come Planned Parenthood doesn't get it? You can't have Mother's Day without … babies!

Washington, D.C. – "How is it possible for Planned Parenthood, operator of the nation's largest chain of abortion clinics, to conduct a fundraising campaign with a Mother's Day theme?" asked American Life League president Judie Brown. "It's simply horrifying to think that anyone involved in abortion – even Planned Parenthood – could have the audacity to claim any association at all with a day designed to salute a mother's selfless love for her children."

For those interested in the hullabaloo about the pregnancy center in Indiana which according to Planned Parenthood deceived, lured, and harassed a pregnant 17-year-old girl, I've come across a 2004 journalism project by a student at the University of Indiana named Rachel Conner which included a story about and pictures of the inside/outside of the pregnancy center in question.

After viewing the pictures of the inside and outside of this clinic, I have an extremely difficult time believing that anyone (much less a girl, her mother, and her boyfriend) could mistake this pregnancy center (filled with prolife brochures) for a Planned Parenthood.

John from the Generations for Life blog has taken the time to call the Indianapolis Police Department to see if they had any records that would corroborate Planned Parenthood's version of events. He says they came up with nothing. If I was a pro-choicer right now, I think I'd be questioning why Planned Parenthood has provided no evidence to support the version of events in their story and why the evidence seems to be stacking against them and their version of events. I'd also be wondering why this girl and her mother and Planned Parenthood would let the CPC in question get away with that kind of harassment and never complain to the authorities.

Related: Some people will believe anything

On January 13, 2005, a healthy 19-year old disabled girl named Christin Alysabeth Gilbert died at a hospital in Wichita, Kansas, from complications to a third trimester abortion procured at Women’s Health Care Services, and abortion mill owned by the notorious George R. Tiller.

LifeNews reports that a Kansas judge has ordered a grand jury to convene later this month to consider the case. The announcement comes after county residents filed more than 7,000 petitions calling for an investigation.

The surviving family of Terri Schiavo rallied Monday at the University of Pennsylvania’s Biomedical Research Building to opposen Judge George Greer’s participation in a pro-euthanasia symposium titled: The Legacy of Terri Schiavo: Why is it so hard to die in America?

Statement of Bobby Schindler, the brother of the late Terri Schindler Schiavo on behalf of the Schindler family and the Terri Schindler Schiavo Foundation Center for Healthcare Ethics:

I am here today at the University of Pennsylvania to speak out against the participation of Pinellas County probate court Judge George Greer in the University's so-called 'Bioethics symposium.' Our family publicly stated for years that Judge Greer has a pro-euthanasia, pro-death bias, which tempered his decisions in my sister’s case and caused him to unethically, immorally and illegally ordered her to die.

A Case Western Reserve University law professor has been awarded a $773,000 grant from the National Institutes of Health to develop guidelines for the genetic enhancement of human subjects. Researchers will determine whether there are any conditions under which it would be ethical to conduct research on genetic enhancement using human subjects. - (Press Release - grant application)

The Center for Bioethics and Human Dignity today denounced the decision by the NIH to fund the project aimed at promoting the genetic re-engineering of human beings for non-therapeutic purposes under the rubric of "enhancement."

"This is a violation of the spirit of the NIH-sponsored Human Genome Project," says CBHD Senior Fellow C. Ben Mitchell. "Providing this grant signals a fundamental and dangerous change in the policy of the NIH, resurrecting the mistaken goals of the eugenics programs in the United States and Europe in the early twentieth century."

In my last LifeSharer letter (the monthly news/commentary report sent out to friends of Vital Signs Ministries), I shared a few of the things I "imagine" would change if the world ran according to some degree of rationality and morality. Here is a very compelling column from Jennifer Roback Morse which entertains a similar approach. It is entitled, "I Have a (Pro-Life) Dream" and, like just about everything Jennifer writes, it is a real winner.

There has been a surge in pro-abortion violence on college campuses this spring.

Most recently, Professor Sally Jacobsen at Northern Kentucky University became so enraged by a display of little white crosses commemorating children lost to abortion that she incited her students to destroy it - in broad daylight with a newspaper photographer snapping away.

Could Jacobsen be so tormented by crosses because she's a vampire?

Read my theory and about other recent vandalism committed by abortion proponents at such universities as Baylor, Harvard, and Princeton in my WorldNetDaily.com column today, "Vampires on Campus."

The futility care proceedings to end Andrea Clark’s medical treatment have been discontinued and her care has been transferred to Dr. Matthew Lenz, a physician with privileges at St. Luke's Hospital. The Houston Chronicle quotes Andrea's new doctor:

"The odds are against her," acknowledged Dr. Matthew Lenz, the doctor assuming Clark's primary care. "She's in critical condition and any new complication could be life threatening, but we're going to give her a fighting chance."

The same article noted that St. Luke's is continuing an "an aggressive search" for a facility to provide for Andrea’s long-term medical treatment and highlighted efforts aimed at changing the Texas law the led to the controversy:

The case, the second in a week in which a Texas hospital backed off plans to take a patient off life support, shined a light on a controversial state law that gives hospitals such authority. Ongoing meetings aimed at reforming the law in the 2007 Legislature are being held in Austin.

"The discussion of these cases is going to produce changes in the law," said Greg Hooser, an Austin attorney and consultant leading the meetings. "In hopes of making the law better, we're looking at safeguards to prevent problems that have arisen."

Two patients in different Texas hospitals are alive today because of the protest raised by the public following their doctor's decision to discontinue medical treatment, this according to their attorney.  Andrea Clark's fragile health is improving and she has been transferred to a new doctor.  Yenlang Vo, a patient in St. David's North Austin Medical Center, has been given an additional 30 days to locate another facility for treatment.   Both had been designated for death via the removal of life sustaining treatment under the Texas Advance Directives Act of 1999, a law that permits an unelected, self-appointed, anonymous ethics committee to forcibly remove care.

Jerri Lynn Ward, an attorney truly dedicated to her client's best interest writes,

For those looking for our earlier post click here.

No, it's not ready yet. But the foundations are being successfully built using adult stem cells:

NEW ROCHELLE, N.Y., May 2, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The results of a study published in the April issue of Stem Cells and Development suggest that human stem cells derived from bone marrow are predisposed to develop into a variety of nerve cell types, supporting the promise of developing stem cell-based therapies to treat neurodegenerative disorders such as Parkinson's disease and multiple sclerosis.

Stem Cells and Development, a peer-reviewed journal published by Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., carries the paper, entitled "Human Mesenchymal Stem Cells Express Neural Genes, Suggesting a Neural Predisposition." (online here http://www.liebertpub.com/scd)

The surprising results lend a new perspective to stem cell differentiation and suggest that multipotential stem cells may express a wide variety of genes at low levels and that stem cells achieve their remarkable plasticity by downregulating the _expression of many of these background genes.

While many scientists believed stem cells were the most primitive cells, the study suggests otherwise. In an accompanying editorial, journal Editor-in-Chief, Denis English, Ph.D., Professor of Neurosurgery and Director of Cell Biology at the Center of Excellence for Aging and Brain Repair Research at the University of South Florida College of Medicine in Tampa, writes, "contrary to our current thinking, stem cells are in no sense primitive cells. In fact, stem cells may well be the most advanced cells the organism produces."

There were four women who went in to the building on 46th Street yesterday morning to have their preborn children killed. We were there to offer alternatives to those women and to let them know the facts about abortion that they were certainly denied by the abortionist’s staff. We were also there to pray. And though we’re sure the Lord lovingly heeded our entreaties, the abortion clients didn’t. They decided to turn away from the message of truth and compassion we presented.

They usually do.

And frequently they do so with a brazen blasphemy...

Austin, TX, May 1, 2006 -- The publicity surrounding the struggle to save the life of Andrea Clark - sentenced to die under Texas' "Futile Care" Statute - has brought attention once again to little-known hospital policies regarding so-called "futility." There is also a second case in Texas right now that hasn't gotten as much attention involving a Vietnamese woman named Yenlang Vo, in Austin, TX. Ms. Clark is in a hospital in Houston, TX.

This isn't the first time the Texas law on "futile care" has received national attention. During the struggle for Terri Schiavo's life, Sun Hudson, a 6-month-old boy with a serious condition was removed from a feeding tube over his mother's objections under the Texas law. It received brief attention from Democrats pointing out that Sun Hudson was dying against his mother's wishes under a law signed by ex-governor George Bush. But the critics (U.S. Rep. John Conyers for one) seemed more motivated to score political points than in having serious moral qualms about the Texas "futile care" law.

Texas Right to Life provides the following information about the dramatic turn of events in the Andrea Clark case (click here for background):

On Tuesday, May 2, the treatment team at St. Luke's convened to further discuss Andrea's condition and treatment plan. At this meeting, Dr. Matthew Lenz, a physician with privileges at St. Luke's, transferred Andrea's care into his own hands. This physician became involved at the request of Texas Right to Life and has since taken a personal interest in protecting Andrea's life. His goal is to nurse Andrea back to a point where she can then be transferred to another facility for further rehabilitation. Andrea's condition is very fragile, and she requires a lot of specialized care, yet her condition is no justification for speeding her to her death by abruptly ending treatment and care that has been working. Dr. Lenz is now the new attending physician, and he has already begun to see improvements in her care. Andrea must undergo a surgery tomorrow to have her septic gall bladder removed, and this surgery does pose risks to Andrea's fragile condition, but the removal of the diseased organ should lend to Andrea's overall improvement.

Visit Join my fast.

Yesterday was the day Andrea Clark's hospital originally said they would end her life sustaining medical treatment. As a result of the efforts of her family and friends, Andrea's sister sent us the following email today:

How am I doing? I am doing FABULOUS! My sister, Andrea, is GETTING WELL. Her white blood cell count has been down to normal for the FOURTH day in a ROW now, and she has been able to get off of the blood pressure raising drugs that she has had to be on for MONTHS. She is doing GREAT. Her new doctor ... has also halved the amount of pain medications that she is taking, so that she can talk to her family. He says that her condition is "serious," but that she does have the ability to get much better.

The futility proceedings are stopped now. Because this new doctor took over her case, it is all stopped.

I'm so happy I don't know what to think, or say, or do. Not only is my sister NOT going to be put to death by St. Luke's Episcopal Hospital, but it also looks like she is RECOVERING from her heart surgery, finally.

Melanie

Update: John Hawkings adds a caveat. Lone Star Times comments, "Anything could still happen. Let’s keep her in our thoughts and prayers shall we?"

Update 2: From Andrea's attorney, Jerri Ward:

I want to let you know that St. Luke’s is doing the right thing in this case now. The physician team met with the new attending and it went well. The team is on board and the medical futility procedure has been stopped. For the time being, Andrea will continue to receive life-sustaining and appropriate treatment at St. Luke’s.

St. Luke’s, and the involved physicians, are to be commended for reconsidering and deciding to continue Andrea’s care.

Thank YOU and everybody who helped, including pro-life bloggers, Terri Schindler’s family and all your readers. God Bless you all.

Ramesh Ponnuru has an excellent column on the press and partial-birth abortion at the National Review Online which will give you a taste of his new book, The Party of Death. Although the issue was a disaster for abortion proponents, the press bought and promoted the false representations of NARAL and its allies.

The Los Angeles Times reported that there were only 200 such abortions a year. “Typically, it is used in late pregnancies to save a mother’s life or after the detection of severe fetal abnormalities.” A New York Times story also echoed the abortion lobby’s talking points. USA Today, the New York Daily News, and syndicated columnist Ellen Goodman all repeated the claim that anaesthesia killed the fetus before the scissors made contact. None of these stories even acknowledged that pro-lifers disputed these claims.

All of them were false.

*Andrea Clark's Life Hangs in the Balance at St. Luke's in Houston*

Texas Right to Life has been working for the last three weeks with the family of Andrea Clark, a patient at St. Luke's Episcopal Hospital in Houston, who was slated to have all life-sustaining treatment (including food and water) removed against her wishes on Sunday, April 30. This decision was made by Andrea's primary physician and then approved by the St.Luke's ethics committee—chaired by a prominent Houston abortionist, RobertJ. Carpenter, Jr. *(Yes, it's true—this prestigious medical institutional lows an abortionist to spearhead all the ethical decisions of the hospital.)*

Click here to read the rest at ProLifeNews.tv

Update: Good News here.

Andrea Clark's life hangs in the balance today, as a result of a potential death sentence handed down by a hospital ethics committee in Houston, TX. Eleven days ago, St. Luke's Hospital gave Andrea's family 10 days to find another facility to treat her, before her current lifesaving treatment would be withdrawn. To-date, no facility has been found to provide care.

"We are pleading with health care professionals to come forward and admit this sick woman into your care," stated Burke Balch, J.D., director of the NRLC Robert Powell Center for Medical Ethics. "Andrea Clark is not brain dead- she is a sick patient with a family desperate to ensure that she continues to receive medical treatment and we at the NRLC Robert Powell Center for Medical Ethics ask that she not be left to die."

The most fundamental common denominator of the powers arrayed against Terri Schiavo and a Culture of Life was and continues to be materialism. In fact for most well articulated arguments in favor of euthanasia, materialism is a prerequisite. This empirical worldview is so all-pervasive in our society that we have forgotten how recently it came to be so widely held. As a result, it's validity is assumed and goes largely unchallenged.

Read the rest at Marlowe's Shade

Pamela Hennessy put to words:

(...) Andrea's case got to all of us -- left, right and everywhere in between. You may be surprised to learn that one of the more active internet message boards discussing Andrea's situation is housed at the Democratic Underground (www.democraticunderground.com). The people there are supporting Andrea's right to live.

I tell you that so that I can tell you this: All that rhetoric about clinical killing being a religious or right-wing speak-piece? Rubbish.

Amid the united efforts I've been asking, "Where's the press?" Pamela takes on this question as well.... click here.