" Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) on Tuesday threatened that he may work with Republicans to torpedo healthcare reform unless he gets a vote to strip abortion-related provisions out of the House bill.
Stupak wants a floor vote on a measure that would prohibit taxpayer funds from being used for abortions. And in an interview on C-SPAN on Tuesday, he suggested if Democratic leaders don’t give him the vote, he’ll work with Republicans.
Stupak said one way or the other, there will be a vote on the abortion language, either “though a rule, or on the floor, or on a motion to recommit.”
A motion to recommit is a parliamentary tool used by the minority in the House to kill legislation. While some Democrats occasionally vote for motions to recommit, it is unusual for Democrats to strategize with Republicans on how best to use the procedural motion."
"A 37-year-old man was booked early this morning on suspicion of murder in the death of an unborn child believed to be his, Los Angeles police said.
Joshua Woodward, whom police described as a businessman with "ties to Chicago and Miami," was taken into custody by homicide detectives about 3:15 a.m. today in the 3600 block of West Third Street. He was booked at the Wilshire Jail and is being held in lieu of $2 million bail, police said.
Woodward's arrest followed an investigation of "the suspicious circumstances of a miscarriage" reported Oct. 19, around the 13th week of gestation, police said. They released no other details but said the case would be presented to the Los Angeles County district attorney's office on Tuesday.
Anyone with information about the case is asked to call homicide detectives at (213) 473-0446. After hours or on weekends, calls should be made to (877) LAPD-24-7."
"Abortion kills more black Americans than the seven leading causes of death combined, according to data collected by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for 2005, the latest year for which the abortion numbers are available.
Abortion killed at least 203,991 blacks in the 36 states and two cities (New York City and the District of Columbia) that reported abortions by race in 2005, according to the CDC. During that same year, according to the CDC, a total of 198,385 blacks nationwide died from heart disease, cancer, strokes, accidents, diabetes, homicide, and chronic lower respiratory diseases combined. These were the seven leading causes of death for black Americans that year.
A total of 49 jurisdictions reported their abortion numbers for 2005 to the CDC. These included all 50 states--except California, Louisiana, and New Hampshire--and New York City and the District of Columbia. Of these 49 jurisdiction, only 36 states plus New York City and the District of Columbia reported the number of abortions by race..."
"The ACLU has filed another lawsuit to block Illinois' parental notification law for abortions performed on minors.
The law, passed in 1995, has never been implemented because of numerous lawsuits. Recently, a federal court ordered the law into effect by early November.
Tom Brechja of the Thomas More Society, who has been heavily involved in the litigation, says they are gathering their forces. The attorney argues it is just logical for parents to know about a child's request for an abortion, especially when a child just needing a tonsillectomy requires parental consent.
Tom Brechja (Thomas More Society)"The attorney general of Illinois would be the main counsel defending this case," Brechja says, "but frankly we don't trust him -- and we want to get in there and intervene on behalf of parents of minor girls and some of the states' attorneys of various counties in Illinois and fight this. It's ridiculous.”
He believes the court ought to bring a halt to the challenges and let the law go into effect. Brechja adds that 80 percent of Illinois parents -- whether pro-life or pro-abortion -- want the law to be implemented. He believes they just want to communicate with their children on such an important issue.
Brechja also finds it interesting that the American Civil Liberties Union claims to be all for free speech -- except for speech between parents and their children."
"Operation Rescue is working to draw attention to a San Diego abortionist who may not be working legally.
Physician Andrew Rutland had his medical license suspended over the death of a baby during childbirth.
Cheryl Sullinger (Operation Rescue)"It was a baby who was supposed to be born," explains Cheryl Sullinger of Operation Rescue, "but because of his negligence -- it was a forceps delivery -- he crushed the baby's head and the baby was born dead."
There were other reasons for the suspension too, says Sullineger, but Rutland sought to push the action aside by reapplying for his license.
"[And] he was granted it," Sullinger continues, "but he's on probation and he cannot operate unless he has another physician supervising him."
The problem is that Rutland, according to Operation Rescue, has been operating for at least the last seven months at an abortion clinic in the San Diego area without any supervision.
Sullinger hopes publicity on Rutland will generate enough calls to the California Medical Board to prompt an investigation. Coincidentally, he is operating the same abortion clinic run by Bertha Bugarin, who currently is serving a prison sentence for doing abortions without a medical license."
"A pro-life person who participated in the 40 Days for Life event in Fresno, California was assaulted on Thursday afternoon by an abortion advocate. Victor Fierro, director of the Hispanic pro-life group Latinos4Life, was the victim of an assault by a woman who first tried to intimidate him.
Yesterday, a pro-abortion woman shouted obscenities at participants in the 40 Days for Life event, which is part of a national campaign.
The woman first attempted to break a security camera pro-life advocates installed to protect themselves and catch any harmful activity on tape. The attacker then cut Fierro’s arm with an unknown object, drawing blood, stormed back to her car and fled the scene.
Josh Brahm, the education director of Right to Life of Central California, told LifeNews.com that much of the encounter took place right behind the camera, but the audio was captured by the device. It also registered her face and license plate number.
“We're just trying to hold a peaceful prayer vigil out here. We're law-abiding citizens, standing on a public sidewalk, with the full support of the Fresno Police Department," he told LifeNews.com.
"Yet, several pro-abortion-choice people have been harassing us since day one. Now it’s turned physical," he added.
Brahm said the pro-life advocates have already filed a police report regarding another individual who dropped by the event several times stealing signs and making threatening remarks.
In addition, a man called the Fresno Right to Life office this morning with several threats.
He said, “when you go and shoot doctors that are just trying to offer a service to women it’s not good,” and “there’s a lot of hate out there, and one day it’s going to blow up, and a lot of people are going to get hurt."
Laced in profanities, another hateful statement asked the people working at the pro-life office, "why don't you just die?"
Brahm said, “Fresno Right to Life has a long and undeniable history of peaceful pro-life activism, which we will proudly continue even in the face of bullying and intimidation.”
Brahm told LifeNews.com that local media ignored the story of yesterday’s assault on their evening newscasts.
KMPH Fox 26 told Brahm that they weren't going to cover the story since Victor “wasn't stabbed, just scratched."
KFSN ABC 30 shot footage at Planned Parenthood and interviewed both Josh Brahm and Victor Fierro, but didn't use the story, replacing it with a piece on the new “chocolate-covered bacon” stand at the local fair, and a man who believes he sees the virgin Mary on a rock."
"Almost all of them occurred in less developed countries with restrictive abortion laws," said the report, which estimated that — beyond the tens of thousands of women killed annually from unsafe abortions — another 8 million women suffer complications because of them.
The report makes three major recommendations:
_Expand access to modern contraceptives and improve family planning services.
_Expand access to legal abortion and ensure that safe, legal abortion services are available to women in need.
_Improve the coverage and quality of post-abortion care, which would reduce maternal death and complications from unsafe abortion..."
"I went about doing the procedure as usual," she writes. "I used electrical suction to remove the amniotic fluid, picked up my forceps and began to remove the fetus in parts, as I always did. I felt lucky that this one was already in the breech position - it would make grasping small parts (legs and arms) a little easier."
With my first pass of the forceps, I grasped an extremity and began to pull it down. I could see a small foot hanging from the teeth of my forceps. With a quick tug, I separated the leg. Precisely at that moment, I felt a kick - a fluttery "thump, thump" in my own uterus. It was one of the first times I felt fetal movement. There was a leg and foot in my forceps, and a "thump, thump" in my abdomen. Instantly, tears were streaming from my eyes - without me - meaning my conscious brain - even being aware of what was going on. I felt as if my response had come entirely from my body, bypassing my usual cognitive processing completely. A message seemed to travel from my hand and my uterus to my tear ducts. It was an overwhelming feeling - a brutally visceral response - heartfelt and unmediated by my training or my feminist pro-choice politics. It was one of the more raw moments in my life. Doing second trimester abortions did not get easier after my pregnancy; in fact, dealing with little infant parts of my born baby only made dealing with dismembered fetal parts sadder.
Harris concludes that the "visually and viscerally different" component of a second-trimester abortion, as opposed to a first-trimester one, leads to questions such as: "What kind of dissociative process inside us allows us to do this routinely? What normal person does this kind of work?"
"We might conclude at this point that a provider who feels that abortion is violent is simply ambivalent, conflicted, is not really committed to women's abortion rights, and just shouldn't be doing this work," Harris writes. "'Pro-life' supporters may argue that the kind of stories and sentiments I've relayed spell the end of abortion - that honest speech acts regarding the reality of abortion will weaken the pro-choice movement to the point where it cannot sustain itself any longer.
However, she contests the point, arguing that, rather than weakening the argument for abortion, facing abortion with "honesty" can "be the basis for a stronger movement - one that makes it easier for providers and the teams they work with to do all abortions, especially second trimester abortions."
"The Senate Finance Committee voted 14-9 today to send the fifth version of health care reform legislation to the floor of a chamber of Congress. The Baucus bill, named for the chairman of the panel who is its main sponsor, would fund abortions with massive subsidies.
Lawmakers voted mostly along party lines with pro-abortion Republican Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine joining the committee's pro-abortion Democrats to pass the bill.
After rejecting pro-life amendments last week that would have ensured the Baucus health care bill does not fund abortions and to protect the conscience rights of medical professionals, pro-life groups urged opposition to the bill.
On a 13-10 vote, the Senate Finance Committee rejected an amendment from Sen. Orrin Hatch that would have the bill conform to current federal law prohibiting direct abortion funding.
The panel also rejected a second pro-life amendment that would have offered protection for medical workers who don't want to participate in or refer for abortions. A third amendment to stop rationing also went down in defeat.
The finance panel is the last of five Congressional committees -- two in the Senate and three in the House -- to approve different health care bills.
Each of them, including the Kennedy measure in the Senate and the three versions of HR 3200 in the House, include massive abortion funding and mandates.
Now that the committee has approved the legislation, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid will have to combine the contrasting Baucus and Kennedy bills into one measure for the Senate to consider. He has called for votes on a combined bill as early as next week.
Some new reports give pro-life groups tremendous concern and they indicate it is possible that Reid will use H.R. 1586 -- an unrelated tax bill passed by the House in March -- as the vehicle to move the pro-abortion health care package in the Senate.
Under a special procedure, Reid would offer an amendment to remove the entire language of the House-approved bill and replace it with the final legislation combining the Kennedy and Baucus bills.
The move would require 60 votes to end debate -- a chance for pro-life advocates to halt the bill unless Democrats can keep their coalition of 60 lawmakers together.
If Reid gets his 60 votes to amend the bill then the Senate debates and votes on the new bill itself. At that point, Reid could prevent any amendments from being offered -- including amendments to remove the abortion funding and mandates or rationing from the bill.
He may do so because any amendment that can't obtain 60 votes could threaten the passage of the pro-abortion health care bill itself.
The key to the strategy is that the House would be able to approve the Senate bill without allowing any amendments -- including the Stupak amendment to stop abortion funding -- and send it directly to President Barack Obama.
This potential strategy would shut pro-life advocates out of the process and virtually guarantee that the measure would contain abortion funding, mandates and rationing of health care for seniors and, potentially, other Americans.
However, with the support of Snowe, Reid may choose to move ahead with the combined bill in an attempt to secure enough votes without resorting to a much-maligned legislative process."
"Rep. Bart Stupak (D.-Mich.), co-chairman of the House Pro-Life Caucus, told CNSNews.com that Democrats who oppose government funding of abortion will try to block the health care reform bill from coming to a vote on the House floor unless House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D.-Calif.) allows a floor vote on an amendment to explicitly prohibit abortion funding in the bill.
Stupak was responding to a question from CNSNews.com about White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs’s contention at Friday’s press briefing that the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops were mistaken in their belief that the Hyde Amendment, which bars abortion funding in each year’s Health and Human Services Appropriation, would not apply to the new programs created and funded through the health care bill.
What Stupak wants to do is attach the language of the Hyde Amendment to the health-care bill itself so that abortion funding is permanently and explicitly barred in the federally funded health insurance plans..."
"A third woman in as many weeks was recently rushed to a local hospital from a southern California Planned Parenthood abortion center after an apparent botched abortion required urgent medical care. The latest incident occurred on Saturday morning and was photographed by local pro-life advocates.
Two women were hospitalized in recent weeks from a Planned Parenthood center in Orange, California after alleged botched abortions.
In this new incident, local pro-life advocates say a fire truck arrived at the Planned Parenthood abortion clinic in Riverside, California, followed by an ambulance with lights on and sirens blaring.
Witnesses observed a female patient taken from the building on a gurney. She was loaded into the awaiting ambulance, which sped away without the use of lights or sirens.
Operation Rescue president Tory Newman, who has been in contact with the pro-life advocates in southern California, says the woman's condition is unknown.
He said the fact that three apparent botched abortions have occurred at Planned Parenthood centers in recent weeks indicates "some grave internal problems."
"Whatever their problems are, they are placing the lives of women at risk," he told LifeNews.com.
Newman said the failed abortion follows an increase in suspicious activity at the Riverside abortion clinic..."
"Cheryl Sullinger of Operation Rescue tells OneNewsNow the convicted abortionist is serving a nearly seven-year prison sentence.
Bertha Bugarin"Bertha Bugarin, as you may remember, was a woman without any [medical] training," notes Sullinger. "She owned a chain of abortion clinics [in Southern California], and she was actually caught doing abortions herself."
Two of her workers who knew their boss had no medical license assisted Bugarin. Luz Catalina-Gomez and Paloma Yonna Solorzano-Rodriguez were both sentenced to prison for one year, but were given probation -- pending completion of community service -- and ordered to not take jobs in the medical industry.
"We're concerned about the fact that they simply got probation and were not given jail time because their actions endangered the lives of women," says Sullinger. Nevertheless, Operation Rescue is satisfied that the two are out of the abortion business.
Several women were injured as a result of abortion performed at the clinics. The district attorney of San Diego County said Bugarin's abortion clinics preyed on vulnerable women in Hispanic communities."
"With a Senate committee rejecting yet another pro-life amendment to make sure the health care bills in Congress don't include abortion funding, pro-life groups say there is one conclusion. That is that every one of the health care bills under consideration contains abortion funding.
The Senate Finance Committee this morning rejected the Hatch amendment to make it clear that the Baucus health care bill would not fund abortions.
"This action leaves no doubt that the health care bill that will come to the Senate floor in a few weeks will contain provisions that would result in massive subsidies for abortion coverage," Douglas Johnson of the National Right to Life Committee said.
Johnson told LifeNews.com after the vote the battles to stop abortion funding are not over as "the full Senate will have to vote on the pro-abortion subsidies, and other pro-abortion components as well."
The pro-life legislative guru also noted that the near unanimous opposition to the anti-abortion funding limits by members of President Barack Obama's party "is one more proof that President Obama's public statements that he does not want federal dollars used for abortion are completely phony -- part of an ongoing political hoax."
Charmaine Yoest, the president of Americans United for Life, agrees..."
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