Life Advocacy Briefing

Call Committee Again on Steve Six

FIVE JUDICIAL APPOINTEES WERE ADVANCED by the Senate Judiciary Committee last Thursday. Controversial nominee Steve Six was not among them; his nomination to the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals was on the agenda last Thursday but was held over yet again.

A new round of calls to Judiciary Committee members could help keep it that way. Judiciary Committee Senators may be called via the Capitol switchboard at 1-202/224-3121. Here is the roster:

Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and Democratic Senators Dianne Feinstein (CA), Richard Blumenthal (CT), Christopher Coons (DE), Al Franken & Amy Klobuchar (MN), Dick Durbin (IL), Charles Schumer (NY), Sheldon Whitehouse (RI) and Herb Kohl (WI).

Ranking Member Charles Grassley (IA) and Republican Senators Jeff Sessions (AL), Jon Kyl (AZ), Tom Coburn (OK), Lindsey Graham (SC), John Cornyn (TX) and Orrin Hatch & Mike Lee (UT).

Readers who are unfamiliar with Steve Six’s connections to the abortion industry may review Phill Kline’s commentary in the June 20 Life Advocacy Briefing, which can be found on the Internet at https://lifeadvocacy.wpengine.com/ArchivedNewsletters/2011/larp_062011.html.

Taking on Planned Parenthood

TWO FIRST-TERM MEMBERS OF CONGRESS HOSTED A NEWS CONFERENCE last Thursday to boost attention to Americans United for Life’s report, The Case for Investigating Planned Parenthood, on which we reported in last week’s Life Advocacy Briefing.

Rep. Renee Ellmers (R-NC) sent a letter to colleagues inviting them “to review the findings of this report and to join us on Thursday as we voice our concerns about the issues raised … and express our renewed commitment to seeking accountability for taxpayers and for investigating whether taxpayers are funding an organization that misuses government funding and violates state laws.”

Rep. Ellmers notified her colleagues she would be “hosting a press conference on Thursday … together with Rep. Randy Hultgren (R-IL) to discuss the AUL report’s extensive documentation of the systemic fraud and abuse inherent within Planned Parenthood and the need for Congress to investigate how Planned Parenthood is using federal money.”

In Need of Our Prayer & Intervention

THE HEALTH – and POSSIBLY SURVIVAL – OF A HERO FOR LIFE is in jeopardy in Red China.

The wife of Chen Guangcheng recently smuggled a letter out of the Communist country to alert the world to her husband’s fragile and worsening health “because of beatings, malnutrition and an intestinal illness,” reports Reggie Littlejohn, president of Women’s Rights Without Frontiers, in a news release. Ms. Littlejohn is working with renowned human rights advocate Bob Fu of China Aid to call attention to the plight of the blind activist, who is being held in house detention after more than four years in actual prison.

The two are calling upon the international diplomatic community to intervene officially with the tyrants in Beijing. Further, they are calling upon individuals to write to Chinese diplomats at embassies and consulates and to sign a petition to Free Chen Guangcheng, which can be found via the Internet at www.womensrightswithoutfrontiers.org/index.php?nav=chen-guangcheng#petition.

Chen is known worldwide for his 2006 arrest for exposing 130,000 forced abortions and involuntary sterilizations in Linyi County, Shandong Province, PRC, in a single year.

He was saluted by Time magazine as one of “2006’s Top 100 People Who Shape our World” and was awarded the 2007 Magsaysay award, known, notes Ms.Littlejohn, as “Asia’s Nobel Peace Prize.”

Worldwide diplomatic pressure was brought to bear before on the Chinese authorities in Chen’s case, but when his release from prison was secured in September 2010, it was to a sentence of home detention. “Both in prison and under house arrest,” reports Ms. Littlejohn, “Chen has experienced mistreatment and beatings. He and his wife and daughter are not allowed sufficient food and are isolated from all outside contact.”

Stressed Mr. Fu: “The abuse of Chen Guangcheng is unconscionable and contrary to the rule of law. His mistreatment under house arrest is deplorable, including beatings, constant surveillance, as well as confiscation of his computer, cell phone, books, his blind cane and the toys of his young daughter.”

Noted Ms. Littlejohn: “Chen sacrificed everything to tell the world the brutal truth about forced abortion in China. He is a warrior for women’s rights. Now it’s our turn to sacrifice on behalf of Chen by fighting for his freedom.”

Louisiana Tightens Informed Consent Law

LOUISIANA GOV. BOBBY JINDAL (R) HAS SIGNED legislation tightening the state’s Abortion Informed Consent law. “‘Women deserve to know their legal rights and the protections already afforded to them under the law,’” said the popular governor during a bill-signing ceremony, quoted by the New Orleans Times-Picayune. “‘We are confident that the more they know, the more they will choose life.’”

The new law requires the state’s health agency to post on an “abortion alternatives and informed consent” website the information abortionists are required to furnish to their customers at least 24 hours before an abortion. The abortionist is required to refer the customer to the website, reports Times-Picayune writer Bill Barrow, “as part of pre-procedure consultations.

“Clinics also must post signs in public waiting spaces,” writes Mr. Barrow, “that read in part: ‘It is unlawful for anyone to make you have an abortion against your will, even if you are a minor. … The father of your child must provide support of the child, even if he has offered to pay for an abortion. … The law allows adoptive parents to pay costs of prenatal care, childbirth and newborn care. … Many agencies are willing to help you carry your child to term and to assist after your child’s birth.’ …

“The new law also includes several rhetorical changes,’” notes Mr. Barrow. “The word ‘fetus’ is replaced with ‘unborn child,’ while references to the ‘physician’ who would administer the procedure,” he writes, “becomes the ‘abortion provider.’”

Of 144 Members in the Louisiana State Legislature, notes Mr. Barrow, only five voted “no.”

Elections Have Consequences

HAVE YOU EVER NOTICED how abortion advocates always expect to have everything their own way? A great example is their reaction to the appointment by pro-life Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback (R) of a known pro-life attorney to the Kansas Board of Healing Arts. What did they expect from Gov. Brownback, a long-established hero of the pro-life movement? Such matters were settled when voters went to the polls in November, 2010.

“Pro-abortion groups are having a fit over the appointment of this attorney,” remarked Operation Rescue president Troy Newman in an OR news release, “because he is openly pro-life.” Wichitan Rick Macias “is an excellent attorney,” said Mr. Newman, “with a high reputation for integrity and honesty.” (Could that be the problem?) “He will be a great addition to the Board of Healing Arts,” Mr. Newman declared, “which is undergoing reform after being wracked with scandal and corruption under the pro-abortion Sebelius Administration.”

Health & Human Services Secy. Kathleen Sebelius was the last elected Kansas governor before former Sen. Brownback was elected to the post. Her backing of the abortion industry and close friendship with the late notorious abortionist George Tiller were scandalous. Indeed, OR notes that the former governor “once appointed disgraced abortionist Howard Ellis to serve on the Board of Healing Arts, even though he had recently surrendered his Missouri medical license in order to avoid discipline. It was not long before [Mr.] Ellis resigned under pressure,” reports OR, “and two months later was charged by the [Kansas] board with attempting to persuade a physician to falsify records.”

The board to which Mr. Macias was appointed is supposed to be a watchdog over the Kansas medical profession, including the abortion industry. But, noted Mr. Newman, “the old board was filled with pro-abortion cronies who worked to protect abortionists from accountability under the law. The new board,” he said, “has undergone a major house cleaning and is beginning to be a functional agency again. …

“Elections have consequences,” commented Mr. Newman. “The abortion fanatics, who want to protect child-killing at any cost, just need to deal with it.” Or better yet, close up shop!

Unsafe, Legal & Hardly Rare

WE ARE ALWAYS SHOCKED – as well we should be – when evidence surfaces of the disturbing conditions within the shops of America’s least-regulated business.

The latest shocking reports are out of Albuquerque, New Mexico, where Operation Rescue (OR) is demanding “immediate intervention from the New Mexico Board of Medical Examiners to stop [the] shocking spate of life-threatening abortion injuries.”

Prompting the call was OR’s release of tapes and transcripts from two 911 calls related to “life-threatening complications from late-term abortions that took place at Southwestern Women’s Options earlier this year.” The two recordings are the fourth and fifth such tapes of 911 Albuquerque calls released by OR within the past 15 months.

“These 911 recordings show that the lives of women are placed in extremejeopardy at the shocking rate of one every three months,” said OR senior policy advisor Cheryl Sullenger in an OR news release. “This presents an unacceptable risk to women,” she added, “and we demand that the New Mexico Board of Medical Examiners intervene in the interest of public safety.”

One of the tapes documents transportation of a 23-year-old aborting mother to a hospital “in the middle of the night,” says OR, “to save her life.” She had suffered “‘heavy hemorrhaging’ after an abortion on Feb. 19, 2011,” reports OR.

Another recording stemmed from an incident at Southwestern Women’s Options on May 1, 2011, when an abortuary worker summoned emergency transportation of an aborting mother in her 20s who, reports OR, had “suffered a ruptured uterus during a ‘late-term’ abortion. A ruptured uterus,” notes OR, “is a life-threatening condition that is considered a serious medical emergency that usually requires hysterectomy in order to prevent death. It is unknown,” notes OR, “[whether] she survived her injury.”

Here are the synopses of the earlier Albuquerque 911 abortion recordings as summarized by OR:

“A 30-year-old woman who suffered ‘uterine bleeding’ – a sign of a possible punctured womb – after a first-trimester abortion;

“A 17-year-old girl who suffered from a fever – a possible sign of infection – a rapid pulse and uncontrolled bleeding after a second-trimester abortion;

“A 35-year-old woman, who at one point had stopped breathing, could be heard on the recording groaning and struggling for life.”

Said Ms. Sullenger for OR: “There is an abortion injury crisis in Albuquerque that must be immediately addressed. With virtually no accountability, the abortion clinics in New Mexico pose a huge public danger,” she said. “It’s been about two-and-a-half months since the last known abortion emergency,” she warned. “Women walking into Albuquerque abortion mills today are playing Russian Roulette with their lives.” And dooming their babies to painful, unjust deaths.

The Tragedy of Sex-Selection Abortion

July 11, 2011, BreakPoint commentary by Charles Colson, copyright BreakPoint

On Sunday, June 26, CNN aired a heart-breaking report, “Nepal’s Stolen Children.” The documentary, narrated by actress Demi Moore, told the story of Nepalese girls who were sold into slavery and turned into prostitutes in neighboring India.

During the broadcast, Moore broke down and cried and spoke about making sure this kind of thing never happens again.

While no one can disagree with that, the problem is that we are ignoring an important part of what is driving this inhumane traffic in innocence.

That “part” was the subject of a New York Times column the day after the broadcast. The title, “160 Million and Counting,” referred to the number of “missing” women in the world. Not “missing” as in “disappeared” – rather, as in “never born in the first place.”

As Times columnist Ross Douthat reminded readers, 20 years ago, the number of “missing” women was estimated by experts to be 100 million. They examined the skewed sex ratios in places like China and his native India and rightly concluded that something terrible was happening.

Twenty years later, the estimate has grown by 60% and now, as then, people who ostensibly are concerned about these sorts of things are still reluctant to name the cause: abortion.

Citing the work of social scientist Mara Hvistendahl, Douthat points out an uncomfortable truth: what Times readers would no doubt see as “female empowerment” lies behind the missing women. According to Hvistendahl, in places like India, “women use their increased autonomy” to abort their daughters and “select for sons,” who enhance their social status.

While the practice of sex-selection abortion originated among the more affluent, it eventually spread down the social ladder. And this brings us back to the tragedy in Nepal.

The impact of selective abortion goes beyond the lives ended in the womb, horrid as that is; it affects society. A 2008 article by two Loyola Law School professors found that by reducing the number of potential brides, selective abortion in India increased the demand for sex workers.

And one way that “demand” is being filled is through the Nepalese girls featured in the CNN documentary. The “lucky” ones are “smuggled and purchased from poor countries like Nepal and Bhutan to be brides for Indian men.”

The more unfortunate are sold into the Indian sex trade.

The social ills and the accompanying suffering caused by sex-selection abortion is why India and China have outlawed the practice. But the practice and suffering still continues. Cultural norms are hard to overcome.

That’s as true in the West as in Asia. Douthat notes that sex-selection abortion puts Western liberals “in a distinctly uncomfortable position.” They can’t deny the reality of the practice, but at the same time, their own worldview leaves them hanging in mid-air.

After all, they insist “that the unborn aren’t human beings yet, and that the right to an abortion is nearly absolute.” One hundred sixty million missing women and all the suffering that radiates in all directions tells you where that kind of thinking inevitably leads.

It’s hard to imagine a better example of the poverty of modern thinking: faced with a great evil and unable to address the answer. That’s something more to cry about.