July 2007 Archives

Posted by Ruben on ContraceptionBlog.com, the official blog of the No Room for Contraception Campaign.

After being off of the market since 1995, the Today (r) Sponge contraceptive was reintroduced this past May.

A recent press release announcing a new marketing effort for the contraceptive paints a rosy picture of the effectiveness of this method.

The Today(r) Sponge is safe, effective and has been used by millions of women. In clinical trials, the Today(r) Sponge has proven to be 89% - 91% effective in preventing pregnancy with no serious adverse events reported in over 1800 Today(r) Sponge users(1).

Yet this press release doesn't tell the whole story. The 89% - 91% figures are for perfect use, and do not reflect real world ("typical") failure rates. For women who haven't given birth, sponge contraceptives have a "typical" failure rate of up to 16%, and for women who have, the failure rate is as high as 32% (Hatcher et al., 2000)

If this contraceptive becomes popular among younger, unmarried women, it is highly probable that their pregnancy rates will rise- especially if it is adopted by poor, cohabitating teens. This group already has a terrible track record with the pill and condoms, methods with lower typical failure rates.

Source:

Hatcher, R, et. al, Contraceptive Technology, 18th Revised Edition, Ardent Media, Inc, New York 2004.

The Franciscan Friars of the Renewal (CFRs) are sponsoring the "Future Depends on Love" Tour starting on Aug 3 in Philadelphia and ending on Aug 11 at the National Shrine in Washington, DC. The Tour will feature a series of talks, prayer vigis and a pilgrimage to help bring an end to abortion. Complete details including the novena prayer are found on their website.

Love... that's what this culture lacks. True love is the only way to build a culture of life.

The Tour is taking place Aug 3-11 with lectures in towns between Philadelphia and Washington, DC. Please join us.

In an attempt to raise Russia's low birth rate, the "Nashi" youth movement organized camps where young Russians are encouraged to marry and procreate for the motherland.

Remember the mammoths, say the clean-cut organisers at the youth camp's mass wedding. "They became extinct because they did not have enough sex. That must not happen to Russia".

Obediently, couples move to a special section of dormitory tents arranged in a heart-shape and called the Love Oasis, where they can start procreating for the motherland.

A Rand brief provides some of the reasoning behind the effort to encourage more births.

Both to mitigate health problems resulting from abortion and to boost the Russian fertility rate (which, at less than 1.2 lifetime births per woman, is one of the lowest in the world), some Russian officials are seeking curbs on both abortion and contraception. Some Russian nationalists, seeing in declining birth rates "a plot to smother Russia in its cradle," have, with the backing of the Russian Orthodox Church, campaigned successfully for reductions in funds for family planning programs. The chief obstetrician of the Russian Ministry of Health succinctly summarized the Russian political problems confronting family planning programs when he quoted lawmakers telling him "few enough of us were being born as it is, and then you come along with your [family planning] program."

Unfortunately, government run programs have limited effectiveness in opening people's hearts to the gift of children. Nationalism isn't the best reason for creating children, and is somewhat scary to say the least. Children aren't commodities for the state - they gifts from God.

It's one thing to oppose abortion and contraception, and another thing to raise an army of young nationalists...

Click here to go to ProLifeNews.tv & watch live of David Bereit from 2:00 - 2:45 pm.

Wichita, KS - July 30, 2007 Sidewalk counselors report that they believe post-viability abortions resumed last week at Women's Health Care Services (WHCS) for the first time since 19 criminal charges were filed against owner George R. Tiller for committing illegal abortions.

Sidewalk counselor Donna Lampkin, who maintains a near-daily schedule outside Tiller's facility, told Operation Rescue that she observed that the pattern of patients returning to the clinic over several days resumed last week with vehicles arriving from a number of states - a pattern that indicates post-viability abortions are being done.

From The Politico, yesterday:

Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA) plans to review the Senate testimony of U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel A. Alito to determine if their reversal of several long-standing opinions conflicts with promises they made to senators to win confirmation....

The idea for a review came to Specter when he said he ran into Justice Stephen G. Breyer at the Aspen Ideas Festival in Colorado.

Breyer, an appointee of President Bill Clinton, drew attention last month for suggesting that Roberts and the conservative majority were flouting stare decisis, the legal doctrine that, for the sake of stability, courts should generally leave past decisions undisturbed....

"I only noticed it in a couple of cases," Specter said of the court overturning or undermining precedents. But Breyer, in their Aspen conversation, said "there were eight."

The liberal concern for stare decisis is code for wanting Roe v. Wade left alone, which is pathetic. They know the ruling can't stand on its own.

Most disturbing is Breyer's overt attempt to undermine Roberts and also influence the political process in judicial selections, altogether compromising the separation of powers.

There was also this:

The Specter inquiry poses a potential political problem for the GOP and future nominees because Democrats are increasingly complaining that the Supreme Court moved quicker and more dramatically than advertised to overturn or chip away at prior decisions.

I didn't see before how a Bush nominee who was strict constructionist could make it out of the Democrat-controlled Senate alive. Now it seems impossible. On the bright side, Bush's legacy is already clear.

I recently heard the next Supreme nomination will be fought like the Battle of Armageddon, since the next justice could provide the Roe v. Wade tipping vote. Well, the Battle has just begun, even before there is a nominee to draw and quarter. Unable to get Supreme nominees to show their Roe hand, Democrats relied on their answers re: stare decisis. Now they'll say they can't count on that.

And stare decisis? Good thing it's not a rule written in stone. If so, Dred Scott would still be the ruling of the land, and we wouldn't have Brown v. Board of Education, which overturned Plessy v. Ferguson.

Interestingly, Roberts was asked during his confirmation hearings if he supported the Brown v. Board of Education decision.

Liberals should be asked the same question.

[Specter photo and caption are courtesy of The Politico.]

(NEW YORK -- C-FAM) Overturning a prior decision by the NGO accrediting committee, the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) voted to grant official consultative status to the Coalition Gaie et Lesbienne du Quebec (CGLQ) and the Swedish Federation for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Rights (RFSL) in Geneva last week.

The voting process was mired in confusion over unclear language. Several delegate requests for clarification interrupted the roll-call vote and led Pakistan to call for a point of order and ask for a re-vote. No re-vote was taken. The motion to grant ECOSOC status passed with 22 countries voting in favor, 13 against, 13 abstaining and 6 absent.

An attorney for one NGO at the Geneva meeting told the Friday Fax, "Increasingly in the past several months, at meetings such as the CSW [Commission on the Status of Women], the Human Rights Council and now the ECOSOC council, there have been serious issues regarding transparency in the voting process. After witnessing several of these types of incidents, one has to wonder whether voting at the UN really matters or if the result is preordained."

The International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC) and ARC International launched intense lobbying campaigns preceding the ECOSOC vote to ensure that both groups' applications would be approved.

In January, the 19-member NGO accrediting committee, a subcommittee of the ECOSOC, rejected CGLQ's application and deferred RFSL's request. Despite the fact that there had been a thorough examination of the evidence, the representative of the United Kingdom charged that the rejection of the homosexual rights groups was "straightforward discrimination."

Debates within the NGO accrediting committee meetings over applications from homosexual rights groups have become increasingly heated in the last few years. While the ECOSOC council almost always accepts subcommittee recommendations, it has made exceptions twice in the last year in order to accredit radical homosexual groups.

The International Lesbian and Gay Association (ILGA), an NGO that was stripped of its ECOSOC status because of ties to pedophilia and whose repeated attempts to regain ECOSOC status have been denied, launched an international campaign in 2006 to encourage all of its 550 affiliate organizations to submit NGO applications for UN consultative status. Many have applied and been accepted.

ECOSOC members voting in favor of granting status to CGQL and RFSL included the United States, the United Kingdom, Albania, Austria, Bolivia, Brazil, Canada, Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Germany, Greece, Guinea-Bissau, Iceland, Japan, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Portugal and Romania.

Voting against were Algeria, Belarus, Benin, China, Guinea, Indonesia, Iraq, Pakistan, Russian Federation, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sri Lanka and Sudan.

Speaking to the press after the ECOSOC vote, CGLQ's executive director and ILGA North America representative, Yvan Lapointe, said that his group now plans to use the UN as a platform for spreading "homosexual rights" to many of the same countries that voted against it.

Good news on the homefront...a boom of new babies are being born on U.S. military bases, according to the Associated Press.

How fitting.

Those who unselfishly serve our country and sometimes face death are procreating and welcoming bundles of new life to America. In Iraq, many dodge bullets as they nation build. When our fighting men and women come home, they're building their families.

The military hospital in Fort Campbell, Ky., "expects to deliver 210 babies a month soon, nearly twice the usual number of deliveries," reports the AP.

Brahms' lullaby plays over the public address system in Fort Campbell's hospital some seven times a day, each time a baby is born. A hospital spokesperson told the AP that they expect to deliver close to 2,300 babies this year, compared to 1,352 last year. That's a lot of lullabies.

Baby deliveries also rose considerably in military hospitals on Fort Stewart, Ga., and Fort Hood, Texas, bases.

May their babies bring our troops much joy and many blessings.

(c) 2007 Marybeth T. Hagan

Crossposted at http://www.mothermayibeborn.com

Erik Scheidler and Jack Ames

The Washington D.C. area Face the Truth Tour is hosted by DefendLife.org and will be held next week from July the 30th to August the 3rd. Stops will include Charlestown, WV, Naval Observatory, Holocaust Museum, Harford Comm. College and many more. Go to DefendLife.org for the entire schedule and to read more.

A Face the Truth Tour is an event where Pro-Life people show up at heavily trafficed areas, pull out large signs of aborted babies, and proceed to show people driving and walking by what abortion really is. This event is held around the country in different cities.

This year, ProLifeNews.tv will be broadcasting live video and audio from the field so people can see what a Face the Truth Tour really looks like. Go to the ProLifeNews.tv website on Monday for broadcast times and events.

The event is highly controversial, even in the Pro-Life movement. Many people say that the signs shouldn't be used in public because children might be exposed to them. Pro-Life people who use the signs say that not only have they saved lives after men and women have seen them, but that they are necessary to show people what the truth of abortion looks like.

Click here to continue reading at ProLifeNews.tv

Stand True Ministries will lead a protest at the MTV studios in Times Square on Friday, July 27th

"For years MTV has believed that they own this generation and have fed them complete garbage," said Bryan Kemper, President of Stand true Ministries. "MTV tries to portray themselves as hip and cutting edge, but they are nothing more than smut peddlers, and their target audience is the youth of America."

Click here for more information on how you can join them

New Jersey Department of Health officials recently found another abortion facility, Alternatives Clinic in the state's casino capital Atlantic City, to be a reproductive health hazard.

Alternatives gave new meaning to alternative medicine.

According to the Associated Press, violations at this abortion clinic included "Blood under operating tables, rusty IV poles, expired drugs and shoddy patient records," plus:

• A scrub area used for storage.


• Unlabeled drug-filled syringes.


• Sterile tubes in open packages.


• Soiled table pads.


• Nurses with expired licenses.


• An overcrowded, not private, recovery room.

This AC clinic is not the only one where women having abortions in the Garden State take a gamble. Rasheedah Dinkins, 20, nearly died after having an abortion at the Metropolitan Medical Associates clinic in Englewood. The Health Department shut down the "most experienced provider in NJ for over 30 years" earlier in 2007.

Metropolitan's abortionists are back in business and still offer their "Special Online Discount" on abortions coupon.

Life is cheap.

(c) 2007 Marybeth T. Hagan

Crossposting with http://www.mothermayibeborn.com

Ah, the pureness and goodness of abortion.

On July 18, an abortionist who goes by the name of Beket blogged at Daily Kos that getting one is equivalent to attaining angelic status:

[T]hey are kind of like in that old movie "It's a Wonderful Life," in which every time a bell rang an angel got his or her wings. [F]or many a woman the experience of having an abortion isoften one way of claiming her wings - her wings of independence....

So abortion mill workers, who help women become angels, must be so righteous one should wear sunglasses in their presence or risk being blinded by their radiance.

That's what feminists would have us think of the July 17 arrest of Gloria Gray, office manager of West Alabama Women's Center in Tuscaloosa. Reported Ms. Magazine:

Gloria Gray was arrested when a group of anti-abortion protesters trespassed on her property. Gray's attorney made the following statement, "In Gloria's efforts to aid the police and to let them know that the extremists were trespassing on her property, she was arrested for asserting her rights."...

Oh, the injustice, the unfair treatment of police toward the Mother Teresa of abortion workers, aptly named Gloria, who was trying to single-handedly protect her mill from anti-abortion rioters while guiding police, apparently indeed blinded by her presence, to their location....

I contacted the pro-lifer actually involved in the altercation with Gray, David Lackey.

Lackey said...

Continue reading my column today, "Shout and twist," on WorldNetDaily.com.

[Hat tip for Beket quote: JivinJehoshapat]

In case you missed it, here's an excellent post demonstrating logical fallacies that are often used in debates related to life issues.

A widely reported Associated Press story, "Experts: More Women Over 30 Are Seeking Help for Eating Disorders," made no mention that some women suffer from such disorders after abortions.

Sadly, the eating disorder/post-abortion problem link is one of those subjects deemed not worthy of discussion outside of pro-life circles, much like the premature birth/previous abortion link.

Theresa Burke describes her discovery of the connection between eating disorders and past abortions early in the groundbreaking book Forbidden Grief: The Unspoken Pain of Abortion that she wrote with David C. Reardon.

Reardon includes eating disorders in his article "A List of Major Psychological Sequelae of Abortion" on The Elliot Institute's website. "For at least some women, post-abortion stress is associated with eating disorders such as bingeeating, bulimia, and anorexia nervosa," Reardon wrote.

Meanwhile, the mainstream media dare not speculate that women's eating disorders could be connected to abortions in their past. Such speculation would upset politically correct comfort levels.

Holding back this information does women a grave disservice.

Knowledge of the eating disorder/abortion link might help some women grow more mentally healthy plus put on a few pounds.

(c) 2007 Marybeth T. Hagan

(NEW YORK -- C-FAM) Claiming that "the tide has turned" in favor of homosexual rights at international institutions, University of British Columbia professor Douglas Sanders' recent paper on "Sexual Orientation in International Law" published by the International Lesbian and Gay Association (ILGA) includes a detailed history on how homosexual rights have advanced in Europe and how the European example could be followed at the United Nations.

Sanders, the first openly gay individual to address the UN and deliver a speech on homosexual issues, concedes that "sexual orientation" and "gender identity are not mentioned in any of existing international human rights instruments" but that "through invoking provisions on personal privacy and general provisions on equality," homosexuals have been able to gain some recognition in the international human rights arena. Many Member States of the UN would disagree with Sanders analysis. The European Union is another story, though.

The Atlantic City Press lists the reasons why the Alternatives abortion clinic was shut down. Violations included "blood-stained operating tables," "expired drugs" and the absence of a scrub sink. The state health department found these violations after inspecting the clinic for the first time in six years.

The report also cited several sanitary issues, including "what appeared to be dried blood under the leg pads" on the procedure tables. Dust, rust, dirt and debris also were found on some equipment, and floors in the operating room, laboratory and recovery room were "soiled and stained."

Some of the sterilization problems may have stemmed from the clinic's lack of hot water. State standards require a licensed clinic to have hot water between 105 and 120 degrees. Based on routine water temperature checks during the past four years, the clinic failed to meet that standard 89 percent of the time, failing every check in 2004, 2005 and 2007.

Alternatives is the second abortion clinic which has been temporarily shut down by the New Jersey Health Department in the last year.

A liberal friend of mine recently asked me what I thought about doctors refusing to prescribe "emergency contraception" such as Plan B to rape victims. He referred to an MSNBC article on the subject.

In summary, a woman who had been raped went to an emergency room where she talked to a rape counselor and was examined by an ER doctor. The rape victim asked for the morning-after pill, and the doctor refused to prescribe it, allegedly because it was against his religion. She went back to the rape counselor who referred her to another doctor who wrote the prescription.

This happened a few years ago. Plan B is now available over the counter to people 18 and older.

The issue, however, remains. Should a person's desire for some form of medical care force the doctor to act against his or her conscience?

I believe the answer is a clear and resounding "No."

This week the pro-life billboard you see at left goes back up outside an Atlanta abortion center, giving a vibrant voice to babies in the womb.

For eight weeks in May and June of this year, the billboard stood directly across the street from the entrance to the Piedmont Pointe shopping center, which contains Summit Medical Associates, Abortion Advice Services, and one office of Atlanta SurgiCenter, among other businesses.

The billboard is paid for by Let Her Live, a non-profit group in South Carolina that aims to post these billboards in the immediate vicinity of abortion centers across the country as silent witnesses against the killing of the unborn. In addition to advertising the Let Her Live website, the billboard lists a pro-life hotline run by the Pregnancy Resource Center of Gwinnett.

While the impact of this billboard is impossible to measure, we know it is seen by thousands of people who drive Atlanta's busy Piedmont Avenue every day. It is also seen daily by the abortion clinic employees and by anyone who visits the clinic. Additionally, we know of two phone calls to the hotline during the billboard's last showing, and of a complaint from a media executive.

On Friday night, PBS aired a show focusing on abortion. It's entitled "Post Abortion Politics" and you can watch it online. After watching a couple of minutes of it, I was left wondering if anyone at PBS realizes how biased they are and how obvious those biases are to their audience.

The program portrays work by prolife organizations focused on how abortion affects women as "a seismic shift in strategy." A seismic shift in strategy? Prolifers have been noting how abortion hurts women for decades. PBS also seems to think prolifers think abortion should be illegal because it hurts women. This shows a very weak understanding of how prolifers view this issue. I don't know if I ever recall a prolifer or a prolife organization saying abortion should be illegal because it hurts women.

by Fredi D'Alessio

The Millennium Campaign (MC), an initiative of the United Nations, "inspires and encourages people's involvement and action for the realization of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs)."

On its website, the MC claims that improving the sexual and reproductive health of men, women and young people is essential for achieving all of the MDGs and that governments should "ensure universal access to reproductive health by 2015," as a target to measure progress towards achieving the MDGs at the national level, as well as in international and regional forums.

The MC further suggests that non-government organizations (NGOs) working in the areas of sexual and reproductive health (SRH) and rights, environmental sustainability, gender equality, development and other issues related to the MDGs, should develop a common strategy to ensure that sexual and reproductive health is integrated into community, regional, and national-level campaigns and initiatives so as to achieve the MDGs.

But what exactly is meant by "sexual and reproductive health" when used in this context at the United Nations? John Mallon, contributing editor for "Inside the Vatican" magazine, sums it up this way. "The first thing that strikes an objective reader in Adding it Up: the Benefits of Investing in Sexual and Reproductive Health Care, by the Alan Guttmacher Institute (AGI), is the presupposition that 'sexual and reproductive health' is a good thing. Normally, any kind of health is self-evidently a good thing but, as defined by AGI and their allies at the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) and the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF), 'sexual and reproductive health' consist of pouring huge quantities of contraceptive chemicals and devices into the world along with so-called 'safe' abortion. 'Health' in this sense, consists in disabling the reproductive system rendering it, in fact, unhealthy. This is frequently done in opposition to the cultural, moral and religious values of the peoples concerned, rendering these programs not only imperialistic but in some cases tyrannical."

The Millennium Project (MP), which was commissioned by the United Nations Secretary-General and is headed by Professor Jeffrey Sachs, stresses that expanding access to sexual and reproductive health information and services is a "quick win," a cost-effective action that can put countries on the road towards achieving the MDGs. The MP recommends that universal access to reproductive health services be added as one of the targets of the MDGs under Goal 5, so-called "To improve maternal health".

At the request of the UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, the UN Millennium Project identified practical strategies, which it describes in Investing in Development: A Practical Plan to Achieve the Millennium Development Goals. This document underscores the importance of sexual and reproductive health for the attainment of the Millennium Goals.

I know Clayton Cramer means well but one of his latest posts is off base regarding the 2008 presidential race and Bryan Fischer's column thereon. Fischer expressed his honest belief that Rudy Giuliani could not win the Presidency and would never have Fischer's vote. Clayton responds:

A few years back, gun owners self-righteously withheld their votes from George Bush, Senior. I understood their disgust, and I could not develop any enthusiasm for him, either. But the net effect of gun owners refusing to vote for Bush, who was a weak supporter of gun control, was to put in office Bill Clinton-an enthusiastic supporter of gun control.

We have been quietly testing a new feature at prolifeblogs.com that we're excited to announce to our readers and bloggers. Prolifeblogs.com is now accepting article submissions (posts) through this online form.

No longer do you need a blog or a personal website to become a blogger at prolifeblogs. You can post articles right here.

Perhaps you are a blogger whose excellent pro-life posts have gone unnoticed. You can now cross-post them.

You might manage a pro-life organization's website and want to gain further publicity for articles, events or action items. Submit your write-ups.

The one caveat, of course, is that all submissions must be pro-life, well written and strike one of our authors/editors as news worthy.

In an astute article published by the Politico, the Family Research Council's Chris Gacek suggests that April's Supreme Court decision to uphold the "partial-birth abortion ban" may have opened a new phase in abortion jurisprudence - "one in which abortion is largely permitted though disdained."

Here's what's interesting:

... What may be surprising is how greatly both sides of the abortion debate may have misread Kennedy in the past.

Many well-informed observers believe that Kennedy was set to overturn Roe v. Wade in 1992 in the case of Planned Parenthood v. Casey. At some point while the decision was being written, he changed sides and joined Justices Sandra Day O'Connor and David Souter in their decisive plurality opinion that affirmed Roe while emphasizing each state's "legitimate and substantial interest in preserving and promoting fetal life."

Don't miss the rest of Gacek's article - click here.

According to their own 2005-2006 Annual Report, Planned Parenthood received over a third of their income--$300 million-from government funding. Although the government monies are prohibited by law from being used for abortions, that funding still helps Planned Parenthood in its overall operations.

Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN) is offering an amendment to the Labor-Health and Human Services Appropriations bill that would prevent taxpayer dollars from being used to fund Planned Parenthood or its affiliates. Your support on this crucial amendment is needed.

Call your Representative TODAY and tell them to stop the flow of taxpayer money that is being funneled to the nation's largest abortion chain.

Click here to look up your representative's phone number.

Source: Family Research Council

The right to choose abortion is not enough for longing-to-be-First-Lady Elizabeth Edwards. She and her presidential hopeful husband John want to offer a health care plan that would pay for abortions.

Edwards spoke for her husband when she joined other Democratic presidential hopefuls, Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) and Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.), in addressing the abortion-friendly Planned Parenthood Action Fund group, reported the Chicago Tribune.

John Edwards' proposal would be "a true universal health-care plan," one providing insurance coverage for "all reproductive health services, including pregnancy termination," his wife said.

The Edwards' bold assumption -- that we the people would not mind paying for abortions -- made no mention of the cost of this plan or that taxpayers' pockets would be picked to pay for it.

Please note that Edwards is not the only Democratic presidential hopeful who wants to spread the hopelessness of abortion around.

Obama said that his insurance plan would include "reproductive-health services." The Tribune later contacted Obama's office and a spokesperson said abortion was part of his package.

Clinton has not yet released her health-care wish list this time around, but she "provided a bruising critique of Bush adminsitration policies and Republican conservatives on abortion rights and contraception policy," wrote the Tribune's Mike Dorning.

Edwards' wife and Obama danced around the word "abortion" during their remarks to PPAF about their health care plans. Clinton danced around presenting her health care plan to her PPAF pals.

All are out of tune with voters who believe in the right to be born.

(c) 2007 Marybeth T. Hagan
http://www.mothermayibeborn.com

SIRIUS RADIO show (get a 3-day pass to listen)

On Tuesday, July 24th, from 12-1pm, Theresa Bonopartis of Lumina/Hope & Healing after Abortion and some of the Sisters of Life will be on a Sirius radio program titled "Coming Home".

Sister Maria Pappas hosts the show which will address post abortion syndrome and the resources available to those suffering.

If you're interested in listening you can get a free 3 day pass.

Theresa can be reached at 1-877-586-4621 or emailed at lumina@postabortionhelp.org

Cross-posted on After Abortion blog

U.S. Senators Sam Brownback (R-KS) and Edward Kennedy (D-MA) today reintroduced the Pre-natally and Post-natally Diagnosed Conditions Awareness Act, legislation which would require that families who receive a diagnosis of Down syndrome or any other condition, pre-natally or up until a year after birth, will be given up-to-date information about the nature of the condition and connection with support services and networks that could offer assistance.

Those of us who advocate for the rights of the unborn, as well as for the rights of people with Down syndrome have been preparing for this. I see us organizing a welcome kit to parents expecting a child with Down syndrome, containing the book Gifts, the DVD Mr Blue Sky, my upcoming book, and lists of national and local Down syndrome advocacy groups, as well as pre-natal support groups like Be Not Afraid.net and Pre-natal Partners for Life. This support will also include contact information of parents like me, who can honestly tell what raising a child with Down Syndrome is like, for example read my piece, "A Special Mother is Born" published in May/June Faith and Family magazine on the birth of my daughter Christina.

Cross-posted: causa nostrae laetitiae

After his release from prison on June 1 for "good behavior," Jack Kevorkian, a.k.a. Dr. Death, resumed his promotion of assisted suicide as a humane conclusion for the terminally ill. He told Larry King that he felt it was important to speak to young people in high school and college about these issues.

Apparently the University of Florida agrees. According to the Terri Schindler-Schiavo Foundation, Dr. Kevorkian, a convicted felon and defrocked doctor, is scheduled to speak to the students there and will be paid $50,000 to do so by the University of Florida student government association.

Here's a recent letter from the Foundation's Bobby Schindler concerning the online petition that asks the University to rescind the invitation to Kevorkian:

You might have already heard that we started a petition against Kevorkian speaking at the University of Florida . If you can believe it, he's being paid $50,000 to do so.

If you haven't seen the petition I would love for you to take part in it and sign. Also, if you would also consider forwarding to others that might want to sign it...

Click Here to Sign Dr. Death Petition

It is starting to stir up some media as well.

Here is just one from the local paper where the University of Florida is located.

God bless,

Bobby

Mark Gietzen with Kansas Coalition for Life places 167 crosses in front of Tiller's abortion facility every morning. This number represents how many people are killed at this facility every month.

Almost 2500 Pro-Life Leaders, individuals and organizations from around America have already signed the Kansas Coalition for Life 2007 Pro Life Signature-Ad. This yearly ad is placed in top publications, national and local, including The National Catholic Register, The Wanderer Newspaper, Other Diocesan Newspapers, other Small Regional Newspapers and more.

B. Hussein Obama is an extremely inexperienced, screamingly liberal candidate who doesn't do a good job of hiding his radicalism - John Hawkings

Yes, it's true. Obama supports government directed sex education for Kindergartners. He also envisions a social contract the involves forcing taxpayers to fund child killing in the womb.

So what does his strength of his candidacy reveal about the state of the Democratic party?

Voices of sanity rise in a USA Today story examining the methods and ethics of testing to determine a preborn baby's gender.

"It's sort of a Wild West out there," medical geneticist Diana Bianchi of the Tufts-New England Medical Center in Boston told the newspaper.

Pro-lifers will find this portion of the USA Today story of interest:

Bianchi and Kathy Hudson, director of the Genetics and Public Policy Center in Washington, D.C., note that no government agency regulates the tests, so there's no quality control.

"These tests sort of shine a spotlight on inadequacies across the whole area of genetic tests," Hudson says.

Even if the tests were highly accurate, she says, "the question is: How are people going to use that information? I think it would be troubling if people were selectively terminating pregnancies based on the gender."

Jesse Reynolds, a policy analyst at the Center for Genetics and Society in Oakland, argues that "there are sex-selective abortions throughout the world. We shouldn't simply dismiss this as a problem that's 'over there.'

A mindset that rationalizes aborting a preborn infant because he or she is not a she or he is simply an extension of the rationale for the right to choose abortion over birth for our posterity.

A society that welcomed all babies would not tolerate this insanity.

(c) 2007 Marybeth T. Hagan
http://www.mothermayibeborn.com

Attention TEENS!!! What are you doing to beat the heat this summer? Want to make a difference in your world, but you don't know where to begin?

Generation Life has the answer! The Generation Life "How to Save a Life" summer is coming up this weekend! And, it's not too late to register!!!

Back by popular demand, the Generation Life summer conference will give you the knowledge, courage and peer support to build a culture of life in your family, school and community. Come learn how to put your pro-life views into action and be a voice for the unborn and for women.

July 16, 2007 Birmingham, Alabama

In the city where Dr. Martin Luther King focused world attention on the civil rights movement and the injustices against our Black American brothers and sisters, Operation Save America has come to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the remaining
two killing mills.

Where Birmingham once had seven abortion clinics shedding innocent blood,
two of the south's most notorious abortionists have closed up shop and only
two clinics remain.

Today hundreds of pro-life Christian street activists marched through downtown
Birmingham and stood boldly preaching the gospel to the New Woman, All Women
"Health?" Care clinic.

Diane Derzis, owner of the death camp, had quite a day.

From Operation Rescue:

Approximately 300 people, most wearing red cloth tape printed with the word "LIFE" over their mouths, have surrounded Women's Health Care Services, the largest late-term abortion mill in the nation to pray for an end to abortion and that 19 criminal charges filed against the clinic owner, George Tiller, would stick.

About a dozen young people from a California youth group called the Survivors, lay on the sidewalk in the fetal position surrounded by chalk lines, such as would be seen around a body at a murder site. They are covered with red cloth to symbolize the innocent blood that is shed and to protest the killing of innocent pre-born children.

With live Christian music playing on a sound system, hundreds who have come to Wichita with The Cause on their "God's Summer of Love" tour, prayed and read their Bibles while others attempt to dissuade women from entering the clinic for late-term abortions that Operation Rescue believes are a continued violation of the Kansas ban on post-viability abortions.

"The way the charges were filed against Tiller, he is allowed to continue doing the same procedure for which he has been charged. We think that is crazy, and a total miscarriage of justice," said Newman. "Those gathered here today are expressing broken hearts for the lives that are needlessly and brutally killed, and are beseeching the Heavens for mercy for the innocent victims and justice for the perpetrators."

The prayer siege, part of the Wichita Awakening hosted by Operation Rescue, is ongoing and is scheduled to conclude at 4 PM today.

The Wichita Awakening will finish the evening with a Praise and Worship Service at 7PM at the Mid- American Indian Center. A similar service Sunday evening drew a crowd of 570.

Wichita, Kansas - Hundreds gathered to pray for an end to abortion and to seek revival outside late-term abortionist George Tiller's infamous abortion mill. (Operation Rescue HT: Jill Stanek)

Saturday evening about 500 Christians surrounded Tiller's infamous abortion clinic to pray for closure of the site of alleged illegal late-term abortions and the death of a 19-year old Down Syndrome woman from a botched 3rd trimester procedure.

Despite transportation problems, about 130 Christians braved high heat and humidity to attend prayer led by Concerned Women for America President Wendy Wright, who flew in from Washington, DC to join other pro-life dignitaries, including Norma McCorvey, the former "Roe" of Roe v. Wade, in calling for a speedy prosecution of Tiller and a closure of his abortion practice.

A group of 570 mostly young people gathered Sunday evening at the Wichita Awakening to accept the challenge from Norma McCorvey, the former "Roe" of Roe v. Wade, that those born after the 1973 Supreme Court decision should partner with her generation to see an end to abortion.

Late-term abortions are expected to begin today, when the Wichita Awakening has planned an all day prayer vigil beginning at 8:30 AM. The event will culminate with a pr