Fruits ‘N Nuts: Journalists Charged with Practicing Journalism in California
In 2015, pro-life organization The Center for Medical Progress began exposing via undercover videos the shocking practices of Planned Parenthood clinics that have been involved in the harvesting and selling of tissue and organs from unborn children. Several videos—one more disturbing than the next—showed high-level PP executives admitting to CMP undercover journalists that they often alter their procedures in order to preserve vital organs of these unborn babies in order to sell them to various companies who sell them for scientific research. (Check out the original postings here and here).
Just last week, with the release of another video, two CMP journalists, David Daleiden and Sandra Merritt, were charged with 15 felonies by California’s Attorney General Xavier Becerra. Becerra’s charges center on “invasion of privacy” issues, saying that recording someone without their knowledge is against California law.
It should be noted that Beccerra is a former Democrat member of Congress, and his predecessor, Kamala Harris has a long and friendly relationship with the nation’s largest abortion provider. Harris ran successfully for the U.S. Senate due in part to help from her friends at PP, that were undoubtedly paying her back for not going after them 2 years ago when the first videos were being released. Like Becerra, she too went after the whistleblowers at the Center for Medical Progress, but all those charges were eventually dropped as having no validity.
In this newest video, Dr. DeShawn Taylor, Medical Director Emerita of Planned Parenthood Arizona, is captured on tape making some pretty callous comments about her work, and how she profits off the destruction of the unborn. At one point, she talks about the strength that it takes in her upper arms to perform abortions where “disarticulation”—a fancy word for dismemberment—is done with the forceps. Remembering her glory days as a young Fellow training to kill innocent children, Dr. Taylor recalls having to “hit the gym for this. [laughs]. I need to hit the gym.”
As if that weren’t enough, this medical professional, when asked about how signs of life are determined during an abortion, Dr. Taylor admits, “the key is you need to pay attention to who’s in the room, right? And like, you know, because the thing is the law states that you’re not supposed to do any maneuvers after the fact to try to cause [fetal] demise. So it’s really tricky. It’s really tricky so, most of the time we do dig [digoxin], and it usually works. And then we don’t have to worry about that because Arizona state law says if any, if there’s signs of life, then we’re supposed to transport them. To the hospital.” Dr. Taylor also expresses her distaste for the word choice of those who do the paperwork once her job is done: “We have the people who do our paperwork for the fetal death certificates; they email us calling them ‘babies’. Baby this, baby that, baby so-and-so, and I’m like, that’s creepy!”
In Dr. Taylor’s world, calling an unborn human being a “baby” is creepy. No, what’s creepy, doctor, is that you go on to actually find some compassion—for your staff, who according to you, get creeped out when a baby actually comes out looking like—a baby: ““It’s not a matter of how I feel about it coming out intact, but I gotta worry about my staff and people’s feelings about it coming out looking like a baby.” If you can take watching the entire video, you can watch it here.
CMP journalists Daleiden and Merritt were only doing what journalists used to do as a matter of practice. Going undercover to break a story goes back a long way in our history as part of our Constitutional Freedom of the Press. It seems the attorney general’s office in California only cares about the state’s privacy laws when the journalists doing the exposing are those who agree with a particular worldview. As a California Democrat, it would be hard to imagine that Becerra himself hadn’t benefited from Planned Parenthood as he pursued public life. It’s also very strange that other undercover journalists using the same tactics as CMP had not been charged with breaking privacy laws there in the past few years. For example, in 2014 and 2015, a California animal rights group, Mercy for Animals, released some videos that showed cruelty against animals at a chicken farm. The organization was never charged with violating privacy laws, but the government did investigate the farm. This was also the case for incidents with other animal rights groups who exposed similar incidents of cruelty.
If California is going to limit freedom of the press there, they should do so across the board instead of making examples of David Daleiden and Sandra Merritt. Then they can free themselves from their already sketchy attachment to the U.S. Constitution. Better yet, maybe that whole succession movement in the Land of Fruits and Nuts will actually take hold.
All Unborn Lives Matter
The annual gathering of pro-life advocates took place today in Washington, where just one week ago, Donald Trump was sworn in as our 45th president. As so often happens, those who march come from all over the country, braving the typical January gloom and cold weather in order to take their stand for the most innocent of human lives with this year’s theme being “The Power of One”.
Since the Supreme Court decision Roe v. Wade in January 1973, more than 58 million innocent lives have been snuffed out—many for a profit—as was exposed by the horrific videos from an investigation done by the Center for Medical Progress in 2015. Hundreds of thousands showed up to hear speakers ranging from Vice President Mike Pence, Rep. Mia Love (R-Utah) and Baltimore Ravens team member Benjamin Watson. Watson issued a challenge to men to be leaders in the pro-life movement, telling the cheering crowd, “It is past time that we be the leaders, caretakers and providers that we were meant to be… even if it wasn’t demonstrated for you by a father, you can be different, you can change the course of [a] generation.”
Vice President Pence brought renewed energy that the new administration will be more open to the pro-life cause than the preceding one was. He is the first vice president (or president) to address the March for Life crowd in person. Before the march this morning, Pence encouraged participants by telling them, “Life is winning in America because of you…let this movement be known for love, not anger. For compassion. Not confrontation.”
That may have been a thinly-veiled jab at the lunacy, bitterness, and filth that came from the likes of Madonna and Ashley Judd, who led profanity-laced rantings at the Women’s March held last weekend after Trump’s inauguration. Of course, pro-life women were excluded from that one.
The March for Life comes just after a newly-released undercover video from the organization Live Action exposing the continual lie of Planned Parenthood that they are all about prenatal healthcare for women. Watch the video and you’ll see that they called and visited PP offices across the country—and found only 5 that actually offered it.
More good news for the unborn came earlier in the week when Congress voted for a permanent ban on taxpayer-funded abortions. The law also bans the federal government from subsidizing elective abortions. For his part, President Trump re-instated a ban that had begun with President Reagan against U.S. government funding and promotion of overseas abortions.
This isn’t a bad start for the new president, especially where life issues are concerned…unless you’re Madonna, Ashley Judd or one of the thousands of women who marched last weekend. They seem to be obsessed with their own bodies (and body parts), and their message does nothing but set women back decades, making us all look bad. (More on this next time)
About Those Super Bowl Ads…
The fanatics of the National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL) have been having a hashtag hissy-fit over a Doritos ad that aired during Sunday night’s Super Bowl 50. It doesn’t take much to offend most people these days, but the religiously pro-abortion crowd at NARAL took to social media after the spot aired.
It features a couple in a doctor’s office. The woman is pregnant and is having an ultrasound, while her husband crunches through a bag of Doritos, much to his wife’s dismay. She apparently finds it an inappropriate time and place to be scarfing down chips. While he mindlessly enjoys his snack, we can see the unborn child on the monitor showing some interest in his (or her) dad’s Doritos. When the wife gets mad and throws a chip across the room…the baby decides to fly out after it.
NARAL failed to see the attempt at humor in the ad because they claimed it “humanizes a fetus”. Under the #NotBuyingIt, Twitter lit up throughout the game with tweets on spots they saw as sexist, and used #MediaWeLike for those that passed their politically correct test. Some of the other commercials that raised their ire: A Buick ad showing a wedding (for showing women fighting over a bouquet; an Audi ad (for having no female astronauts) and a Snickers ad (for being “transphobic” and claims it’s saying it’s “OK to objectify women as long as they have a snack”).
I have to comment on their objections to 2 of those ads. First, the Audi ad, called “Commander” is touching and nostalgic. It shows an elderly man who had once been an astronaut tearfully looking at photos on the wall of his glory days in space. Then his grandson comes by, and during a ride in an Audi R8, the older man’s spirits are lifted as a David Bowie tune plays. The NARAL complaint that there were no women astronauts shown is idiotic since there were not likely to have been any female astronauts back in his day.
Secondly, the Snickers spot is pretty clever and says absolutely nothing about objectifying women. Had the nags at NARAL bothered to check, they’d know that it’s one of a series of such ads telling viewers that people aren’t quite themselves when they’re hungry–until they have a Snickers. This is the “Marilyn Monroe” ad that spoofs her famous white-dress-blowing-up-around-her scene from the 1955 film “The Seven-Year Itch”. At first we see a director filming “Marilyn”, which is really a disgruntled dude in a white dress and heels—until someone gives him a snickers bar. Lo and behold, he is transformed into the real Marilyn now that Snickers has taken care of her hunger pangs. Snickers aired a similar commercial during last year’s Super Bowl with characters from “The Brady Bunch.” Talk about missing the whole point (and having no sense of humor).
They did manage to find at least one commercial that didn’t offend them, like the one by Axe for men called “Find Your Magic”. They liked that one because it showed “non-traditional” images of men…like a guy wearing high heels dancing in a nightclub.
As for that Doritos ad, perhaps the crazies at NARAL should get a grip and ask themselves why humanizing the “product of conception” (as Planned Parenthood clinics refer to the unborn) between two humans is wrong, offensive, extreme, etc. That’s not the image of a cat, a chicken or anything else on the ultrasound screen—it’s the image of a human being, and that’s the fact they can never get around. The personhood of the “fetus” upsets them because it forces them to see just what it is that is being destroyed on their altar of choice.
Super Bowls are known for their commercials and this year, sponsors paid $5million for a 30-second spot…but when they get people talking, tweeting and writing about their ads—for better or worse—that’s worth every penny.
The ad that made abortion supporters cringe.
Shooting the Messenger
What should have been one of the biggest news stories of 2015 took an unexpected—and seemingly political–twist this past week. The undercover investigator responsible for exposing Planned Parenthood’s illegal harvesting and sale of body parts from unborn children has been indicted by a Texas grand jury for purchasing them.
According to LifeNews, David Daleiden and another pro-life activist, Sandra Merritt, were charged with a felony for allegedly using a fake ID during their undercover investigations of various Planned Parenthood affiliates, including PP Gulf Coast in Houston. The biggest slap-in-the-face: they were also charged with a misdemeanor for buying human tissue. Their videos were released throughout last year by the Center for Medical Progress, renewing calls for Washington lawmakers to de-fund the abortion giant.
However, to no one’s surprise, it appears that politics and revenge could be behind the grand jury’s move. After the indictment was announced, it came out that Lauren Reeder, a prosecutor for the Harris county District Attorney’s office, was also on the board of the Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast—the same office the journalists were investigating. Harris county DA Devon Anderson told Houston media that Reeder would “not be involved in any manner with this investigation”. By the way, Anderson also said the investigation into Planned Parenthood itself was closed.
So she indicts the whistle-blowers, but ends the investigation against Planned Parenthood. Daleiden is being charged with buying human tissue, but doesn’t there also have to be a seller? Since he wasn’t there to actually buy anything and was only posing as a party that wanted to buy something, how can charges be filed against them, but not Planned Parenthood? Sounds a little fishy.
In his own defense, Daleiden said he was only using an investigative tool that journalists have been using for decades while exercising their First Amendment rights. He stated, “Planned Parenthood still cannot deny the admissions from their leadership about fetal organ sales captured on video for all the world to see.”
Daleiden is understandably receiving much support from the pro-life community. Cheryl Sullenger, Senior VP of Operation Rescue expressed her disappointment about what such an indictment could mean for future investigations that expose crimes: “This has the effect of chilling the First Amendment freedom of the press”, said Sullenger, “and could scare crime witnesses away from coming forward for fear that they might suffer similar retaliatory prosecution.”
If you’ve watched any of the videos, it’s hard to not be horrified by what is going on inside Planned Parenthood clinics across the country. They claim to be advancing healthcare for women, but their big money is made on the backs of frightened women—mostly young, poor and Black…and their unborn children. Even though the district attorney in Houston has misapplied the rule of law and chosen to go after the messenger, Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast is still under investigation by other agencies in the state of Texas. Pro-life groups have been asking state officials for an independent special prosecutor to be appointed for these investigations citing the obvious conflict of interest in the district attorney’s office.
The Center for Medical Progress will be holding an Emergency Briefing Webcast on Tuesday night at 9 pm Eastern (#IStandWithDavid).
Profits of Doom- Part 2
***UPDATE : 8/16/15: STEMEXPRESS BREAKS TIES WITH PLANNED PARENTHOOD^^^
***This is Part 2 of a 2-part posting that began last night…
The most recent video, the 6th one released by The Center for Medical Progress, begins the 2nd episode of their web series “Human Capital”. Released on Thursday, it has an interview with a whistle-blower who confirms that many women are pressured into donating their babies to research. She also claims she’s witnessed technicians go into the rooms of women who didn’t give consent and “take what they wanted”, especially in cases where the pregnancy was further along. Holly O’Donnell, former Procurement Technician with StemExpress, didn’t work for PP, but her work required her to be inside the abortion facilities every day, developing relationships with clinic staff members. She expresses sympathy and regret and speaks openly about what she was told to do: get the women to consent. If patients seemed reluctant, she often told them not to do it, even telling them not to get the abortion at all. This would get her reprimanded by her supervisors.
In one chilling segment, O’Donnell describes the PP clinic in Fresno, California as being “in an alley”, a poor area and very high-volume. This, she said, took a toll on her: “The environment was morbid, like you could feel it. You could hear…you could hear screaming, you could hear crying”.
Aren’t we always told by abortion supporters that women need this choice as a “safe and rare” alternative so that we don’t “go back to the days of back alley abortions”? A change in location doesn’t improve women’s health—the table only moved from the alley itself into a building in the alley. The end is still the same. It’s also not so rare. O’Donnell said during an 8-hour workday, the Fresno clinic would have more than 40 patients coming in for abortions.
She also mentions one doctor by name, Dr. Ron Berman, who “had a reputation for going viciously fast” in his work, and that she had to watch him or risk losing specimens. O’Donnell said he seemed agitated when he didn’t have a patient in the room, almost as if he enjoyed it. She described how he would go in, quickly do ‘the procedure” and move on.
Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger had always wanted there to be a place where poor people (especially people of color) and immigrants could go for “family planning”. She once said, “The most merciful thing that a family does to one of its infant members is to kill it.” She’d be happy to know her deadly legacy is continuing in assembly-line fashion in Fresno and in hundreds of other inner-city neighborhoods that are predominantly African American and Hispanic.
For their part, StemExpress, LLC, a small biotech company in California that partners with Planned Parenthood and other facilities to buy tissue and body parts for research, claims no wrong-doing. They put out a statement alleging the interview with Holly O’Donnell was “deceptively edited” and the allegations she made are untrue. CMP responded to their statement and they aren’t backing down. In fact, they’ve now raised some interesting questions about the PP-StemExpress relationship. It appears the Dr. Berman mentioned by O’Donnell was (and may still be) the Medical Director of StemExpress.
But then that raises even more questions. If Berman were profiting from intact parts as an executive for StemExpress, wouldn’t he want to take his time with each patient to make sure that was the case? Its possible Holly O’Donnell is just another disgruntled former employee with a bone to pick, but she’s making some pretty serious charges. Why would she do that if there weren’t some grain of truth to what she’s saying?
If you are someone against the use of fetal stem cells for research, visiting the StemExpress website is upsetting. They have order forms with drop-down menus and even a Wish List like you might see on Amazon or other shopping websites. The following screenshot shows there’s much money to be made in the aftermath of an abortion:
Screenshot from StemExpress site where orders for body parts are placed.
As you can see, StemExpress has no issue in putting a price on a life that never had a chance to live. I guess the high end of the spectrum would be for a more developed baby…$24,000 is a hefty sum, and how it gets divided up is one of many things that should be investigated. It certainly shoots down PP’s assertion that they don’t do this to make a profit. On the StemExpress website, where potential partners can go for information, “financial profits” is the first thing mentioned.
The words of Dr. Mary Gatter from an earlier video are eerie when you see a screenshot like the one above: “The patients don’t get anything, of course.”
Not that letting them in on the deal would make it better or more right. That would only make them one of many in the line of profiteers in what has become Big Abortion. More videos are on the way from The Center for Medical Progress. If any good is to come from the horrible things spoken of and shown in them (and I’ve barely scratched the surface), maybe women considering abortion will be repulsed at the prospect of a dollar value being assigned to the child they carry and will decide in favor of life.
Profits of Doom- Part 1
In case you’ve been away on vacation or depend on traditional newscasts for information, an organization called The Center for Medical Progress has been releasing videos nearly every week this summer that show Planned Parenthood reps at their worst. Even if you’ve only watched the short versions of each one—edited for time, not context—you can gather something very sinister going on with the nation’s top abortion provider. In the videos, they talk freely and casually about their practice of harvesting and selling fetal remains.
In one video, Dr. Mary Gatter, President of the Planned Parenthood Medical Directors’ Council, comes off as not just cold-hearted, but calculating as she talks numbers. Over lunch, the mad doctor haggles with the undercover researchers over the price of body parts like someone would haggle with a used car salesman. Incidentally, she may get to do that in time because she later laughs it off saying, “I want a Lamborghini”. Just in case you forget that Planned Parenthood is all about women’s health care, Gatter makes sure those she’s negotiating with understand where the money goes when she makes the stunning declaration, “The patients don’t get anything, of course.”
Of course. They’re just there to terminate their pregnancies and get on with their lives, right? They don’t care that PP sees them as another revenue stream. Wrong…the women don’t know going in how this is done or that people other than themselves will benefit financially from their “product of conception”, as the unborn child is called. They’re told it’s strictly for research—not profit, so it’s easy to imagine that a patient already stressed out by her situation may feel some comfort from that. Gatter seems totally detached from the idea that many of those women (and girls) are terrified, confused and heartbroken, or that being there is the last place they want to be.
If donating tissue for research is the way this is sold to the patients who come in for abortions, it’s presented in the same way to the general public. Dr. Savita Ginde, VP and Medical Director of Planned Parenthood Rocky Mountains, clearly admitted they have to present what they’re doing with fetal tissue as benefitting research as opposed to making a profit. According to Ginde, “..In public I think it makes a lot more sense for it to be in the research vein, than I’d say, business venture.” She continues, “Because if you have someone in a really anti state that’s going to be doing this for you, they’re probably going to get caught.”
When something is legal or good, you don’t have to worry about getting caught.
Perhaps the video featuring Dr. Deborah Nucatola, PP’s Senior Director of Medical Services, has drawn the most attention from conservative media because she’s shown eating salad and drinking wine while discussing the heinous harvesting process. She’s very matter-of-fact while giving graphic details about how she can preserve certain organs that will bring greater profits: “…we’ve been very good at getting heart, lung, liver because we know that, so I’m not gonna crush that part I’m going to basically crush below, I’m gonna crush above, I’m gonna see if I can get it all intact.”
Nucatola candidly admits some doctors do ultrasounds with the sale of the parts in mind, and will alter their normal procedures to get what they want (which is a violation of federal law). According to Nucatola, “… for that reason, most providers will do this case under ultrasound guidance, so they’ll know where they’re putting their forceps.”
I’m not sure how these people sleep at night. They must have to lie to themselves every day that what they’re doing is really helping women by ending an unwanted pregnancy that (they think) isn’t really a life at all but a mass of tissue.
How can they make that argument now? If it were just a clump of cells or tissue as they’ve always said, then why is it necessary to preserve certain parts? Why is it so valuable to them? Why, if there’s nothing wrong with what’s going on, do they cover their tracks by having their affiliates (local Planned Parenthood branches) contract directly for body parts sales? As Nucatola says, this is “too touchy an issue for us to be an official middle man.” So, if at some point (like now?) the grisly transactions are exposed, it will be the affiliates that will feel the heat, thereby shielding Planned Parenthood.
There is so much on these tapes, it’s amazing that there’s been hardly any outcry for something to be done. Even those we’ve put in power can’t agree that PP should be defunded, at least temporarily until there’s a full investigation into these activities. Women and unborn children are being abused and exploited by an organization operating under the banner of women’s health.
Part 2 of this posting will be published tomorrow (8/15) in the afternoon…video 6 just came out this week. In it, a whistleblower shares her story about what she saw inside the clinics.
Fifty Shades of Gray—One Shade of Red
Some parents may be hot under the collar this week as the premier of the overly-hyped film Fifty Shades of Grey hits movie theaters this Valentine’s weekend. It’s not the film itself, but the fact that the books that spawned it are being used for everything from middle school assignments (yes- you read that right) to promoting sexual activity to young teens.
In what can only be called a bizarre class assignment, some middle schoolers in a Pennsylvania district were given a worksheet: a word search puzzle with words “inspired” by the film/book. WTVR reported on the incident and had blacked out several of the words they deemed too inappropriate for TV. You can see that worksheet on their website if you must, but many of the non-blackened words are pretty risqué, especially for young, impressionable minds. The racy worksheet was brought to the attention of James Carter, whose 13-year-old son attends Monessen Middle School.
Oddly enough, it was passed out to 5 eighth graders, Carter’s son being one, and he showed it to his father. Carter said he asked who gave it to him and was told that a teacher had passed it out. The irate parent was not given any information by the school as to how this happened. School leaders aren’t talking, saying that it’s a personnel issue, and the head of the school board told WTVR that an investigation will take place.
In possibly a more troubling case, Planned Parenthood has been caught (again) on tape telling young girls they must read the erotic book. The non-profit pro-life group Live Action, headed by Lila Rose, has become known for sending hidden cameras into Planned Parenthood offices all over the country and catching them in some less-than-stellar moments.
In this case, undercover Live Action investigators posed as under-age clients seeking guidance about sexual matters, eventually bringing up issues that are the main theme of Fifty Shades. Some PP staffers loved the books, and some were not big fans, but at least a couple of them encouraged girls they believed to be 15 or 16 years old to read them.
The books have been described as “mommy porn”, so why promote them to minors? Lila Rose has a theory, and she wrote about it in the New York Post last year. Basically, she says, it’s good for Planned Parenthood’s business. Encouraging young girls to experiment with all manner of sexual experiences keeps them coming back for their other services like getting help for STD’s, and especially in bringing them back for their biggest money-maker: abortion. Planned Parenthood wants your daughters to know they’re there for them, especially when “accidents” happen.
Rose also mentions how dangerous it can be for girls to abide by Planned Parenthood’s notion of having a “safe word” they can use with their partners to let them know things are getting out of hand and they want it to stop. She related this to some disturbing scenes from the book when she writes, “In short, Planned Parenthood counselors told our investigators that “no” doesn’t mean “no” anymore. It, and everything else, means “yes” — or at least it does to those looking for a quick sexual fix. Note that in one “50 Shades” scene, Grey explicitly ignores the safe word and even punishes Ana for trying to use it. In several others, he shows outright contempt for the girl’s limits and has his way with her, to the point where the sex scenes read like rapes.”
So this is a movie that’s coming out for Valentine’s Day? It’s supposed to be a day known for love, not lust…and real romance—not selfish acts of dominance over another person. In the real world, young women are being trafficked and sold into lives similar to the one chosen freely by the character in Fifty Shades. Sadly, the film—like the book series—will be a huge hit.
Fathers and father figures raising young girls should use this weekend to give their daughters a different message. So dads, take your girls to lunch and show them how they should expect to be treated by the boys they date…tell her anything less isn’t good enough.
For Those Who Have No Voice
The annual March for Life draws people of all ages to the nation’s capitol.
Every year, they come. By car, by the busload. In fact, many, many busloads. Some are very old. Others very young. Teens, twenty-somethings, moms, dads, grandparents, veterans, religious and non-religious types, members of Congress…and women who themselves have been wounded in the name of “choice”.
They brave the cold, unpredictable and often dreary Washington, D.C. winter weather to stand in the gap for the most innocent and defenseless among us: unborn children. But today, sunny skies and moving testimonies ruled the day.
Unlike those in opposition to their cause, those who make the trip to the nation’s capital to take part in the annual March for Life aren’t there to celebrate the infamous decision that the Supreme Court made 42 years ago when abortion became the law of the land. They come to celebrate life. They come to speak for those unable to speak for themselves, and to remember all of those innocent children who never had a chance to speak: they are the nameless, faceless victims of more than 4 decades of “choice”. They committed no crimes for which they are being punished, but someone else’s choice sentenced them to death in the one place where they should have been safe: inside their mother’s wombs.
The theme of this year’s march, “Every Life is a Gift”, seeks to bring special attention to unborn children that are the most vulnerable: those who have been identified as having a disability prior to birth. One member of Congress, Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Washington), told the crowd how her own son, a 7-year-old with Down syndrome, has made her even more dedicated to the pro-life cause by repeating the theme of the day saying, “Every child and every life is a gift”.
Meanwhile, the “courageous” new Congress backed off on a vote that was to have coincided with the March for Life. The bill would have banned abortions after 20 weeks (when an unborn child can feel pain) except in cases of rape, incest or when the mother’s life is endangered. This was the same bill that was passed overwhelmingly by the GOP lawmakers in 2013, but some of the women in Congress are now concerned about the law’s requirement that in cases of rape, the woman must have reported it to police. They say this will adversely affect women in that situation, many of whom do not report incidents of rape out of fear. However, many of these same lawmakers were for this law…before they were against it.
The GOP did throw a bone to the marchers today…they passed a bill that bans taxpayer funds from providing most abortions, particularly through the Obamacare exchanges. They should have stayed strong and sent the 20-week bill to our veto-happy (now that Republicans control both houses of Congress) and very pro-abortion president. It would have been a good move to get him on record as president saying “no” to something that most polls say the majority of Americans are in favor of—more restrictions on late-term abortions. Isn’t it nice to know that the U.S. will remain one of just 7 nations in the world to allow this procedure? Two other big names on the list of seven are China and North Korea…such good company we’re in when it comes to valuing human life.
If the Republicans in Congress can’t manage to pass a bill supported by the majority of Americans when they hold both houses, how will they ever be able to tackle the really tough things the nation is facing?
Same stuff…different year.
Tricks and More Tricks
It’s somewhat ironic that Halloween falls so close to Election Day on the calendar. The inevitable deception, trickery and shenanigans that come with the political season are well-suited to this time of year when mischief takes center stage. This is certainly true in political ads as desperate candidates and their supporters make one last breathless plea for your vote.
Texas is a hotbed of tom-foolery this year. Feminist darling and pro-late-term abortion activist Wendy Davis is running for governor against Republican State Attorney General Greg Abbott. Davis has taken self-humiliation to new heights—or maybe it’s new lows— with one of her recent ads. The ad features an empty wheel chair, making a tasteless reference to Abbott’s disability. He was injured in 1984 when a tree fell on him and is confined to a wheel chair.
Even members of her own party thought that was tacky. But she didn’t stop there. She later accused Abbott, who is married to a woman of Mexican ancestry, of wanting to ban interracial marriage. As if these weren’t enough, she became a Twitter joke last week when she tweeted a picture of some young ladies that she said were some young supporters who had just voted early for her. It turns out that the photo was of a group of young Virginia College Republicans who were campaigning for Virginia gubernatorial candidate Ed Gillespie.
Until all these outlandish political stunts, Davis was best known as the abortion activist who lobbied hard against restrictions on late-term abortions in Texas in early 2013. This was around the time that Philadelphia’s own Dr. Evil Kermit Gosnell was on trial for running his House of Horrors for decades on the backs of poor women and their children.
Speaking of horrors, the National Abortion Rights Action League is hitting Colorado hard with ads against Republican senate candidate Cory Gardner. The Washington Examiner calls the ads “cartoonishly bad” and that is a pretty good description. The radio ad is so bad from start to finish that it’s hard to believe they paid someone good money to write it. It features a couple talking about their inability to locate any condoms at any store in town due to Gardner’s so called “banning of birth control”.
Meanwhile, long-time Louisiana Senator Mary Landrieu stuck her foot in her mouth by insulting the very people she needs to vote for her on Tuesday. Landrieu, who has been in the Senate since 1997, is in a close race with her Republican rival, and like other Democrats in her situation, she’s not real happy having to defend Obama’s actions. So, she suggested that the South is still racist and sexist and is hard on women and minorities like Obama. Referring to the South in general and Louisiana in particular, Landrieu said. “It’s been a difficult time for the president to present himself in a very positive light as a leader. It’s not always been a good place for women to present ourselves. It’s more of a conservative place, so we’ve had to work a little bit harder on that.”
She’s been elected and re-elected in Louisiana, as has Obama by the population as a whole. Where is the evidence of sexism and racism?
Continuing the race baiting in an effort to scare Black voters into going to the polls, Rep. Charlie Rangel (D-NY) was at a rally to get Governor Andrew Cuomo re-elected. He claimed the GOP was a hate-filled, racist collection of monsters that live as if it were 1862: “Some of them believe that slavery isn’t over and they and think they won the Civil War.”
Huh? They won the Civil War? Which they is he referring to? If only these idiots knew history. As has been documented here on this blog, it was Democrats in the South after the Civil War who formed the KKK, and it was a group of abolitionists after that same war that began what became the Republican Party in an effort get rid of slavery. Apparently, Rangel has long had a habit of comparing Republicans to Confederates…and he keeps on winning his own seat again and again.
So, in the waning days and hours before Election Day, it seems like Democrats keep resorting to the same, tired accusations. They try to get women to vote for them based on abortion and contraception, and Blacks to vote based on the fear of being returned to slavery.
When women, minorities or any other voter, for that matter, continue to choose the same people to represent them, even though they still don’t feel like any progress has been made, maybe they deserve to be tricked and not treated.
Why Some Give Cold Shoulder to Latest FB Fad
Several Catholic and other pro-life groups are encouraging people to cool it on the latest Facebook trend that’s leaving participants across the land– from politicians to grandmothers— with wet heads and cold feet.
So what could possibly be wrong with raising awareness and money for ALS, usually known as Lou Gehrig’s disease? After all, this is a terrible disease that strikes without warning. Though not as common as other diseases, it debilitates those it strikes and devastates their lives and the lives of those that love them. For anyone who has it or who knows someone suffering with it, anything that can draw attention and raise funds to help find a cure—no matter how offbeat it may seem—is a welcome thing.
It’s not the Ice Bucket Challenge itself that leaves Catholic leaders and others cold, it’s where the money is going and how it’s being used. You see, the ALS Association is using embryonic stem cells in its research. This may not be an issue for you, and that’s fine. But many pro-lifers struggle with the usage of embryonic stem cells to advance science for moral purposes.
The Superintendent of Catholic schools in Cincinnati has discouraged it’s students from participating in the challenge, and suggests all money raised should go to research facilities that aren’t involved in using embryonic stem cells in their studies. The Archdiocese there issued a statement stating, “The beneficiary of the ice-bucket challenge funds a study using embryonic stem cells, which can only be obtained by destroying embryonic life. For that reason, we have determined that our schools should not raise money for the ALS Association, and should instead – if they wish – donate to another organization doing ALS research.”
The ALS website clearly states that the possibility of using these stem cells “presents a great deal of ethical questions”, but for Kevin McCullough of the American Family Association, that’s not good enough. In his article warning against giving to the ALS, he states, “There should be no forced taking of any innocent person’s life just so that another may live longer. That is in essence philosophical cannibalism and moral persons should have no part in it.”
The American Life League, another pro-life organization, received an email from Carrie Munk of the ALS Association that states the organization is currently funding only one study that uses embryonic stem cells. Munk wrote in her email, “This research is funded by one specific donor, who is committed to this area of research. In fact, donors may stipulate that their funds not be invested in this study or any stem cell project. Under very strict guidelines, The Association may fund embryonic stem cell research in the future.”
So it looks like the ALS, while having only the one study at the moment that uses embryonic stem cells, will most likely continue down that road. That is definitely something to think about before you write that check if this issue concerns you. Or you can just get wet and get it over with, since from what I understand, only those that “wimp out” if challenged and decide not to do it are the ones that have to pay up. Apparently, there’s a lot more wimps around. Last I checked, the Ice Bucket Challenge has raised more than 109 million dollars***. That’s some pretty serious fundraising, and it has apparently set a record for them.
There are other options for pro-lifers who don’t want to unwittingly fund embryonic stem cell research. As stated above in the ALS representative’s email, you can specifically designate your donation not to go to that study. Another organization conducting research to find a cure for ALS is The John Paul II Medical Research Institute in Iowa that does not use embryonic stem cells.
As so many social media fads that have disappeared as quickly as they came (i.e. Kony 2012), let’s hope that the momentum for awareness for this crippling disease doesn’t fade when the leaves start to fall.
***UPDATED 9/5/14
President George W. Bush takes the challenge for ALS
Liberty Belle Blog 