Life Advocacy Briefing

Dems to Go After ‘Hyde’

THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY RELEASED LAST WEEK THE DRAFT of the platform which will be offered for adoption at the party’s late-July national convention in Philadelphia, betraying a deeper radicalism in its “Reproductive Health, Rights & Justice” plank than even was adopted for the election of the abortion king, President Obama.

“Democrats are committed to protecting and advancing reproductive health, rights and justice,” the plank begins.

After asserting that “reproductive health is core to women’s, men’s and young people’s health and well-being,” the platform gets down to specifics, pledging to “stand up to Republican efforts to defund Planned Parenthood health centers.”

And the proposed platform language calls for repeal of the four-decades-standing Hyde Amendment, which bars Medicaid funding of abortion at taxpayer expense.

House Panel Acts on Baby-Body-Parts Trafficking Revelations

THE U.S. HOUSE SELECT INVESTIGATIVE PANEL ON INFANTS’ LIVES has used some of the information it has uncovered about the abortion industry to issue “a criminal referral,” reports Charlie Butts for OneNewsNow.com, “to New Mexico Atty. Gen. Hector Balderas,” seeking investigation and ultimately prosecution of the University of New Mexico and Albuquerque’s Southwestern Women’s Options abortuary for “violat[ing] state and federal law … [in] the harvesting of aborted baby body parts for the university.”

The arrangement between the university and the notorious late-term abortuary was previously brought to the attorney general’s attention last July, according to Protest ABQ’s Tara Shaver, quoted by Mr. Butts. She indicated her pro-life group had sought Mr. Balderas’s cooperation in probing the arrangement “‘because we had compelling evidence from Southwestern Women’s Options’ consent form showing that the women were not even able to opt out of designating their aborted baby body parts for research.’” She indicated, writes Mr. Butts, “‘It was just mandatory for them to sign this form to get their abortion.’”

No response resulted from the local pro-life group’s complaint, but we can hope Mr. Balderas will take more seriously a referral from the Congressional panel, chaired by Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), which the House of Representatives established to look into the baby-body-parts harvesting scandal brought to light by undercover videos released by the Center for Medical Progress beginning last July. The involvement of institutions like the University of New Mexico has been among the many troubling implications uncovered by the ongoing probe.

The toll-free telephone number listed on his official website for the New Mexico Attorney General’s office is 1-866/627-3249. Taxpayers throughout the United States are forced to pay expense of outfits like the University of New Mexico.

Notch a Victory!

REP. TOM COLE (R-OK) HAS ACHIEVED A VICTORY for the cause of Life and for taxpayers weary of Obama Regime diversions of their tax dollars to the killing of preborn boys and girls.

“Just two months after an inspector general blew the lid off a scandal at AmeriCorps,” reports Family Research Council president Tony Perkins in his June 30, 2016, Washington Update, “the program’s healthcare branch is shutting down for good.”

Rep. Cole had much to do with the move, as chairman of the Appropriations subcommittee which “controls the purse for Congress’s healthcare spending bills,” notes Mr. Perkins. The Oklahoma Representative “said he was outraged by the terrible misuse of taxpayer dollars,” Mr. Perkins reports, after “AmeriCorps volunteers” were caught “shuttle[ing] women to abortion centers and offer[ing] ‘emotional support’ as their innocent unborn children were destroyed.

“Unfortunately, this wasn’t the first time,” notes Mr. Perkins, “AmeriCorps landed in hot water over its abortion advocacy. In 2011 the group’s workers were discovered at Planned Parenthood centers, serving out nine-month terms as ‘volunteers.’”

Rep. Cole issued an exultant news release July 1 when the Corporation for National & Community Service (CNCS) “terminated a grant to the National Assn. of Community Health Centers (NACHC),” notes the release, “after an oversight investigation by the CNCS Office of Inspector General found the latter to be out of compliance with the law regarding ‘doula’ services in conjunction with abortion procedures.”

Having sent a letter in April to the CNCS CEO “calling for the termination of grant funding to the NACHC,” Chairman Cole expressed his pleasure “that the grant for NACHC was not renewed. What was occurring,” he said, “was completely illegal and unacceptable.” He said in his release that he was “appalled that federal tax dollars were being spent on abortion services. We demanded that this program be terminated.” And he has prevailed in his demand.

Judge Restores Tax Dollars to Planned Parenthood in Kansas

A FEDERAL JUDGE IN KANSAS HAS RE-OPENED THE FLOODGATES of state funding for Planned Parenthood of Kansas & Mid-Missouri.

Judge Julie Robinson ruled, reports Claire Chretien for LifeSiteNews.com, “that Medicaid patients have ‘the explicit right to seek family planning services from the qualified provider of their choice’” and thereby handed Planned Parenthood a temporary injunction barring the State of Kansas from excluding the discredited abortion giant from state-administered Medicaid funding.

The ruling restores, for now, state funding for two Planned Parenthood shops, according to Ms. Chretien.

“A spokes[man] for Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback,” writes Ms. Chretien, “said his office will continue litigating and fighting to make Kansas a pro-life state.”  Mr. Brownback (R) was a pro-life leader during his tenure in the US House and Senate before his 2010 election as governor.

Whom Are They Trying to Kid?

IF THE ‘BLACK LIVES MATTER’ TROUPE were not a roving, paid mob of the Left and were in the streets because they actually care about the lives and destiny of black Americans, their wrathful focus likely would be on the abortion industry, where the death toll among babies of all races is painfully high in the United States.

Walter B. Hoye, president of the Issues4Life Foundation and a California-based black pro-life leader, issued a news release in late June with which we concur, a news release based on a truly shocking statistic. “If black lives matter,” he asks in the release, then “how come black American abortions outnumber black American homicides 69 to 1?”

Mr. Hoye got more specific, citing a recent report from the Violence Policy Center: “There were 6,217 black American homicides for the year 2013. When compared to black American abortions,” he declares, “the 429,000 abortions in black America for 2013 represent 69 times the number of black American homicides” that same year.

And Mr. Hoye goes on to quote a recent report by Dennis Howard, president of the Movement for a Better America, noting “that out of every 1,680 pregnant black American women 15-44, 1,000 will give birth to their child and 680 will abort their baby.” He indicates Mr. Howard’s study is based on analysis of 2013 data from the US Statistical Abstract and the National Vital Statistics Report dated Jan. 15, 2015 (Vol. 64, #1). “In other words,” comments Mr. Hoye, “for every three black babies born in America, two will be aborted. …

“When you understand Planned Parenthood is subsidized by half-a-billion taxpayer dollars each year and wholeheartedly supported by both the Democratic Party and black leadership in high places,” comments Mr. Hoye, “you have to conclude that black American abortions representing 69 times the number of black American homicides are an entirely intended consequence of legalized abortion.”

In Hot Water Again

THE OCALA ABORTUARY OPERATED BY FLORIDA’s MOST NOTORIOUS abortionist James Pendergraft has closed “permanently,” according to a receptionist answering the facility’s phone, reports Operation Rescue’s Cheryl Sullenger. The closing follows his recent grand jury indictment on six drug-related charges, including, notes Ms. Sullenger, “what appears to be possession of LSD.”

The late-term baby butcher “was initially arrested on Oct. 5, 2015,” writes Ms. Sullenger, “during a traffic stop in South Carolina. There, sheriff’s deputies,” she reports, “discovered surgical instruments that were covered in blood and human tissue from abortions he had illegally performed throughout South Carolina. He was also,” she notes, “in the possession of illegal narcotics.

“At the time of his arrest last fall,” writes Ms. Sullenger, “Spartanburg County Sheriff Chuck Wright told a press conference, ‘We got a guy and a girl early in the week that was a traveling abortionist. He traveled around the state of South Carolina without a medical license, with drugs and with medical tools, performing in-home abortions. So basically,’” he said, “‘we got an illegal baby killer.’”

Infinite Sense

WITH ‘HOLLYWOOD’ SO DEEPLY INFLUENCING AMERICA, it is encouraging to uncover a pro-life advocate in “Tinseltown” and especially one who is willing to apply logic in speaking truth to society.

We ran across just such a bold spokesman in a LifeSiteNews.com report July 6 by Claire Chretien, quoting Emmy winner Kelsey Grammer from an interview in the UK-based The Times.

“‘It gets a bit dishonest to call something reproductive rights,’” he said in the Times interview, “‘when you clearly have a choice well before a baby is conceived.’” The actor added, “‘If someone has to die as a result of rape, then we should kill the rapist, not the unborn child.’”

How Would You Define It?

Major excerpt from June 15, 2016, commentary by Bradley Mattes, president, Life Issues Institute

Every day patients in America are diagnosed “brain dead,” and more than half, according to one organ procurement individual, become organ and tissue donors. What’s alarming is that most Americans are clueless regarding the subjective nature of a brain-death diagnosis.

The more I read on this topic, the better I understand the motivation behind the growing popularity of brain-death diagnoses. Recently, I’ve discovered a piece that made things much clearer.

Nancy Valko, a legal nurse consultant who’s spent decades in critical care, explains how one hospital can treat a patient that another hospital would declare brain dead. She points to research published in the JAMA Neurology that showed of over 500 hospitals, there were huge discrepancies in how they determine a patient is brain dead.

In 2010 the American Academy of Neurology guidelines were updated to help provide continuity in brain-death diagnoses. However, Valko also points out that an analysis of these new guidelines demonstrates this guidance is opinion-based.

Let that sink in.

Subjective conclusions might explain why Alan Shewmon MD identified scores of cases where so-called “brain-dead” patients continued to live with functioning bodies. These “heart-beating cadavers” (the description given to those declared brain dead) maintained a body temperature, their wounds healed, they fought infections, organs and tissues kept functioning, women continued to nurture their pregnancies and children sexually matured and grew. Does this fit your description of brain death? …

When Roe v. Wade put a price tag on human life, it began a corrosive effect on the value of life by many in the medical community. We see it all the time when a problem arises with a pregnancy or the baby is diagnosed with Down syndrome. Abortion is often presented, recommended or even forcefully pushed by the attending physician.

To doctors who see patients as nothing more than a carbon footprint, those who can no longer give back are considered a drain on resources. Their value ends when their organs have been harvested for other more productive citizens.

But the cavalry’s on its way. Anesthesiologists, according to [The Undead author Dick] Teresi, are leading the medical community questioning brain death. They’ve seen firsthand evidence of signs of life when beating-heart cadavers are sliced into to harvest their organs. One saw a patient spontaneously breathe and move in reaction to the scalpel, but the surgeon proceeded over his objections because they had already deemed him unable to recover. I would venture pulling his organs had something to do with his prognosis.

Signs of life are routinely ignored as spontaneous movement. One surgeon called them “bodily reactions to noxious stimuli.” Yes, I’m quite sure an aware patient would consider surgically removing his liver as “noxious stimuli.”

Still others would call it murder.

Abortion Is Not Health Care!

July 4, 2016, commentary by Cheryl Sullenger, senior vice president, Operation Rescue

Less than a week after the US Supreme Court nullified certain abortion safety laws, a medical emergency at the Planned Parenthood abortion facility in St. Louis, Missouri, has illustrated how women have been left in jeopardy by the nation’s high court.

It happened on Saturday, July 2, 2016, a heavy abortion day. Paramedics were photographed by pro-life activists as they removed a Planned Parenthood patient from the abortion facility and loaded her into an awaiting ambulance. Abortion workers and an armed security guard attempted to conceal the incident by holding up large brown tarps.

This medical emergency represented the 60th time since 2009 that ambulances have been dispatched to the St. Louis Planned Parenthood to render aid to patients that Planned Parenthood was not equipped to provide. Planned Parenthood is currently the only abortion facility in Missouri.

Provisions that were struck down by the Supreme Court last week included requir[ing] hospital privileges for abortionists that must be maintained within 30 miles of their abortion facilities. Missouri has a similar law, and if that is eventually nullified, Missouri women will be left with few if any protections against substandard abortionists that cannot qualify for hospital privileges.

“The situation in Missouri is bad enough without stripping away one of the only safety measures in place to protect women. If you don’t think they need protecting from quack abortionists, you have never heard of Kermit Gosnell, Steven Brigham, James Pendergraft or any number of currently practicing abortionists that [display] no concept of medical or ethical standards,” said Troy Newman, president of Operation Rescue (OR).

In response to a lawsuit filed by OR, the St. Louis Fire Department recently released a list of 58 medical emergencies at the Planned Parenthood facility from Jan. 1, 2009, through April 6, 2016 – nearly twice the number expected. The list included the type of injuries sustained by patients, which ranged from allergic reactions to serious hemorrhaging. It did not include yet another medical emergency at the St. Louis Planned Parenthood facility that occurred on May 13, 2016.

“In the current rush to abandon safety regulations in response to the Supreme Court decision, we should remember that abortion facilities in America remain under-regulated, with little or no accountability, even to regulators, legislators and law enforcement,” said Newman. “When abortion businesses operate without regulatory oversight, women suffer, women die and babies die.

“Unfortunately, the Supreme Court drank the Planned Parenthood Kool-Aid,” he said, “and now, tragically, we can expect to see many more injuries inflicted by arrogant abortionists who hold themselves above the law.”