LifeNews.com Pro-Life News Report
Friday, December 11, 2009
| For news updated throughout the day, visit LifeNews.com. |
Current Headlines
• House Approves Omnibus Spending Bill That Funds Abortions in Nation's Capital
• Ben Nelson Still Backs Filibuster of Senate Bill Without Abortion Funding Ban
• Opposition to Health Care Bill Shoots Up After Abortion Funding Ban Defeated
• Report: Senators Get More Money From Pro-Abortion Than Pro-Life Groups
• Govt Funds Wisconsin Planned Parenthood That Misled Women on Abortion
• Congressman Chris Smith: Human Rights Day Should Include China, Abortion
• Abortion at Charlotte, North Carolina Center May Have Killed Woman, Video Taken
• Canada's National Post Paper Promotes China's One-Child, Forced Abortion Policy
• Chinese Delegation Pushes Population Control at Copenhagen Climate Change Mtg
• New Whole Life Pro-Life Group Upset by Barbara Mikulski's Pro-Abortion Facade
• Another Major Problem With the Senate Health Care Bill: Sex Education Promotion
--> Is your Right to Life group or pregnancy center looking for an affordable speaker? Need a speaker for a conference, convention, church presentation or on short notice? Consider LifeNews.com Editor Steven Ertelt. Email us for details.
House Approves Omnibus Spending Bill That Funds Abortions in Nation's Capital
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- The House of Representatives on Thursday approved an omnibus spending bill that would overturn a decades-long policy preventing taxpayer funding of abortions in the nation's capital. One pro-life group suggests overturning the policy could increase abortions by as much as 1,000 a year.
The Dornan Amendment has prevented the federal government from paying for abortions in the District of Columbia, whose budget is overseen by Congress. But the omnibus spending bill, a collection of appropriations bills needed to fund the federal government, includes language overturning the amendment.
House members approved the omnibus bill on a vote of 221-202-1 despite calls from pro-life groups to oppose the legislation because of the taxpayer funding of abortion.
No Republicans voted for the measure and 28 Democrats were concerned enough about the abortion funding (or other issues) to vote against the measure as well. A survey of the Democrats voting against the measure reveals many who have longstanding pro-life voting records.
Before today's vote, National Right to Life Committee legislative director Douglas Johnson wrote to members of Congress urging them to oppose the bill because of the abortion funding in the District of Columbia.
"Prior to the initial adoption of the congressional ban, public funds were used to pay for over 4,000 abortions annually in the nation's capital," Johnson notes. "If the pro-life policy is lifted by enactment of H.R. 3288, public funding of elective abortion will resume, and the predictable result will be that the number of abortions performed will increase, probably by around 1,000 per year," he explains.
The omnibus bill now heads to the Senate, where 35 pro-life lawmakers have already said they plan to filibuster the bill because of the abortion funding. However, whether they will be able to get six more votes to help them stop abortion advocates from getting the 60 votes they need is another question. The Senate is expected to cast a vote on the measure this weekend. Full story at LifeNews.com
ACTION: Contact members of the House about the vote for the bill. See how your members voted here. Also, Contact members of the Senate at 202-224-3121 or http://www.Senate.gov and urge them to oppose the omnibus bill because of the taxpayer funding of abortions in the District of Columbia.
Harry Reid Could Use Manager's Amendment for Phony Abortion Funding Ban
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- As the Senate moves forward following the defeat of the Nelson amendment to prohibit abortion funding in the health care bill, amendment sponsor Ben Nelson says his position is still that he will filibuster the bill if his amendment or something like it is not added to the bill.
Nelson, a Nebraska Democrat, has caught some flack for comments that made it appear he would reconsider his prior position -- an absolutist one supporting a filibuster of a pro-abortion Senate bill.
"My position hasn't changed," he told Radio Iowa today, "but I am allowing an opportunity for another compromise to be considered even though I don't know what else could work other than my amendment," he said.
"Our proposal to ensure that the Senate health care bill doesn't open the door to public funding of abortion was reasonable," Nelson said. "It was rational because it followed established federal policy and it was right because taxpayers' dollars shouldn't be used to pay for abortions."
Nelson told the radio station that he is still hopeful a compromise can be reached, but he said he can't support the bill without clear language banning abortion. Full story at LifeNews.com
Opposition to Health Care Bill Shoots Up After Abortion Funding Ban Defeated
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- Americans take a much stronger stand now opposing the government-run health care bill now that the Senate has defeat an amendment that would remove abortion funding from it. A new CNN poll shows opponents of the pro-abortion health care bill outweigh supporters by a 25-point margin.
Last month, CNN recorded 46% in favor and 49% opposed to the health care bill. But a new national poll CNN released today has 61 percent of Americans opposing the bill compared with just 36 percent that supported it.
Meanwhile, Fox News is out with a new poll today that shows 57 percent of Americans oppose the current pro-abortion health care reform legislation while just 34 percent favor the legislation. In fact, opposition to the abortion-funding bill is so great that 54 percent of Americans (compared to 41 percent who want it now) say they would rather Congress do nothing than push the bill forward.
The Fox News poll found 87 of Republicans and 66 percent of independents opposed to the bill while only 63 percent of Democrats currently favor it.
The bill is also costing President Barack Obama support with 54-39 percent of Americans saying they disapprove of his performance in supporting the pro-abortion health care bill. Full story at LifeNews.com
Report: Senators Get More Money From Pro-Abortion Than Pro-Life Groups
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- There may be a good explanation as to why the Senate voted earlier this week to keep the massive taxpayer funding of abortion in the Senate government-run health care bill. A new report shows they receive more campaign money from pro-abortion groups than pro-life organizations.
At minimum, the report from the campaign finance watchdog Center for Responsive Politics shows pro-abortion lawmakers may have an election advantage when it comes to funding. Its report shows pro-abortion senators receive roughly five times the campaign funding from pro-abortion groups as they do from pro-life organizations.
Individuals and organizations on the pro-abortion side have contributed about $3.4 million to current senators since 1989, according to the Center. By contrast, individuals and PACs classified as pro-life have contributed just $559,000 to current senators during the same period.
The report also showed senators voting against the Nelson amendment to ban abortion funding received an average of nearly $60,000 from pro-abortion groups while senators backing the amendment received an average of only $12,300 from pro-life interests.
The fundraising figures may show an advantage for abortion advocates because pro-life groups tend to rely much more heavily on independent expenditures than abortion advocates. Those contributions to political candidates tend to come through mailings and radio advertising on Christian radio stations rather than direct donations to candidates from pro-life political action committees. Full story at LifeNews.com
Govt Funds Wisconsin Planned Parenthood That Misled Women on Abortion
Appleton, WI (LifeNews.com) -- A new video sent shockwaves through the Internet yesterday that shows staff at a Wisconsin Planned Parenthood abortion center purposefully misleading women considering an abortion about its nature and the development of their unborn children.
The footage shows staff and the abortion practitioner misleading women about when the heartbeat of an unborn child begins and falsely claiming abortion is safer than childbirth.
Today, a Wisconsin pro-life group informed LifeNews.com that the county government where the Grand Chute, Wisconsin Planned Parenthood is located is funding the abortion business in question.
An open records request conducted by Pro-Life Wisconsin earlier this year revealed that, in 2008, five Wisconsin counties wrote checks to Planned Parenthood.
The pro-life group told LifeNews.com that Outagamie County, where the Appleton-area Planned Parenthood is located, paid Planned Parenthood a total of $10,872.59 in 2008. Pro-Life Wisconsin also noted that the Appleton Planned Parenthood received $429,462.88 in 2007 under Wisconsin's Family Planning Waiver Program. Full story at LifeNews.com
Congressman Chris Smith: Human Rights Day Should Include China, Abortion
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- As the world marked Human Rights Day, one of the most-respected pro-life members of Congress said it should include abortion awareness. Congressman Chris Smith painted a grim picture of human rights abuses in China and other nations and said most pressure must be put on them.
Smith, a senior member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee and a leading human rights advocate, said 2009 was not a "good year" for many people across the world.
"Many have continued to see their human rights violated by their own governments which are supposed to look out for them," he told LifeNews.com.
Last month, Smith led a hearing of the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission (TLHRC) on China's "brutal" one child policy. Smith focused on the hearing on the Asian nation's treatment of women under the policy and said many of them are subjected to abortions, sterilization and are left without jobs, little money and no dignity because of their treatment under the regime.
Those who speak out against the forced abortion policy are subjected to imprisonment, fines, and house arrest -- and that one attorney who is helping Chen Guangcheng, a leading forced abortion opponent, saw just that after testifying at the hearing. Full story at LifeNews.com
Abortion at Charlotte, North Carolina Center May Have Killed Woman, Video Taken
Charlotte, NC (LifeNews.com) -- A legal abortion on a woman at a Charlotte, North Carolina abortion center may have clamed her life. Local pro-life advocates shot video footage of an ambulance taking a woman from the A Preferred Women's Health Center abortion facility on Sunday.
The video shows a woman taken on a gurney from the abortion center to a waiting ambulance.
However, she was completely covered from head to toe with no sign of movement and the man who took the video says this is different than other women who have suffered from botched abortions who have been transported to local medical centers.
The pro-life advocate who shot the video provided it to the pro-life group Operation Rescue and said the ambulance drivers showed no sense of urgency and took nearly 10 minutes to place the patient in the ambulance.
That leads OR president Troy Newman to believe the young woman may have died from the abortion.
"Based on the footage, it is our concern is that this patient may not have survived," he told LifeNews.com today. "Abortion clinics just don't call ambulances unless there is a life-threatening emergency. If indeed this patient succumbed to her injuries, there is concern that the incident will be covered up," he added. "That will only endanger the lives of other women who are not aware of the dangerous history of this abortion clinic." Full story at LifeNews.com
Canada's National Post Paper Promotes China's One-Child, Forced Abortion Policy
Ottawa, Canada (LifeNews.com) -- Canada's nationwide newspaper, the National Post, is generating controversy today with an editorial that promote China's one-child, forced abortion policy. That's the program that makes it so couples can't have two or more children and it has been enforced with human rights abuses nationwide.
Diane Francis, of the Post writes today that, "The whole world needs to adopt China's one-child policy" -- calling it an "inconvenient truth."
The editorial comes at a time when international leaders are meeting in Copenhagen, Denmark to discuss the much-disputed climate change theory.
"The 'inconvenient truth' overhanging the UN's Copenhagen conference is not that the climate is warming or cooling, but that humans are overpopulating the world," Francis writes. "A planetary law, such as China's one-child policy, is the only way to reverse the disastrous global birthrate currently, which is one million births every four days."
"Ironically, China, despite its dirty coal plants, is the world's leader in terms of fashioning policy to combat environmental degradation, thanks to its one-child-only edict," she claims.
Francis says none of the policies any governments could enact will do anything to curb supposed environmental problems "unless a China one-child policy is imposed."
But, she says that won't happen because pro-life groups are around to condemn the population control position and its mandates, forced abortions and other human rights abuses -- none of which she named in her article as resulting from the Chinese policy. Full story at LifeNews.com
Contact Francis with your rebuttal at dfrancis@nationalpost.com
Chinese Delegation Pushes Population Control at Copenhagen Climate Change Mtg
Copenhagen, Denmark (LifeNews.com) -- The Chinese delegation to the international climate change summit isn't pushing reducing carbon emissions or promoting recycling as a way of protecting the environment. Instead, Chinese officials say population control is an important part of promoting environmental policies.
In China, population control means a one-child policy that prohibits couples from having two or more children. To enforce the draconian measure, Chinese family planning officials have resorted to forced abortions and involuntarily sterilizations to get women and couples to comply with the national law.
Other couples and their families have faced imprisonment, loss of job, home detention, forced labor and other political, economic and other punishments for not following the pro-abortion policy.
According to a China Daily news report, Zhao Baige, vice-minister of National Population and Family Planning Commission of China, promoted population control at the summit.
"Dealing with climate change is not simply an issue of CO2 emission reduction but a comprehensive challenge involving political, economic, social, cultural and ecological issues, and the population concern fits right into the picture," the member of the delegation said. Full story at LifeNews.com
New Whole Life Pro-Life Group Upset by Barbara Mikulski's Pro-Abortion Facade
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- The producer and primary actor associated with the highly-regarded pro-life movie Bella have founded a new group focused on extending the pro-life ethic from conception to natural death. The new Whole Life group is making its start by tagging pro-abortion Sen. Barbara Mikulski.
Jason Jones, producer of "Bella" and its leading actor, Eduardo Verastegui are behind the new Whole Life organization. The new organization is a grassroots social justice project that defends all life from the children in Darfur to the elderly to unborn babies threatened by abortion.
Jones told LifeNews.com he is disappointed that, during the debate on abortion funding in the Senate government-run health care bill, Mikulski hijacked the term "whole life" in her Senate floor speech. Mikulski, a Maryland Democrat, claimed to advocate for protecting women though the entirety of their lives and assumed that was a pro-life ethic -- even though she conveniently left out children in the womb who are threatened by abortion from her counterfeit definition.
"Healthcare reform is the most important social justice vote that we will cast in this decade. Universal access to health care is a basic human right," she contended. "This bill is pro-life. Making it a debate about abortion is misguided and wrong … These are pro-life principles… they are 'whole life' principles."
Jones told LifeNews.com that Mikulski's comments are off the mark.
"Sadly, Sen. Mikulski's statement demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding on her part about what it means to be Whole Life," Jones said. "Any legislation that compromises the dignity of the human person, including the sanctioning of abortion, as Sen. Mikulski's does, is No Life." Full story at LifeNews.com
Another Major Problem With the Senate Health Care Bill: Sex Education Promotion
by Colin Mason
It's funny, the things that never make the news.
Take the recent amendment to the Senate health care plan by Senate Finance Committee chairman Max Baucus (D-MT). This language allocates hundreds of millions of dollars of your money toward "Personal Responsibility Education for Adulthood Training."
What can this possibly mean? According to the amendment's mostly vague language, $400 million from the years 2010 to 2015 will be spent on "evidence-based effective programs" that will supposedly teach kids "healthy life skills," including things like "goal-setting, decision making, negotiation, communication and interpersonal skills, and stress management." This looks like standard Washington-speak: a great pile of words that mean whatever they need to mean.
That is, it looks that way until we get to the part of the amendment that deals with sex. Here we find reference to very specific "activities to educate youth who are sexually active regarding responsible sexual behavior." The amendment claims to implement "evidence-based effective programs ... that have been proven on the basis of rigorous scientific research to change behavior, which means delaying sexual activity, increasing condom or contraceptive use for sexually active youth, or reducing pregnancy among youth." Full story at LifeNews.com
Encourage Friends to Sign Up for Free Pro-Life News From LifeNews.com
