LifeNews.com Pro-Life News Report
Saturday, January 15, 2011
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Current Headlines
Top Stories
• Republican Party Selects Pro-Life Reince Priebus as New Chair
• Seventy Five Percent of Americans Want Obamacare Law Changed
• Pro-Life Advocates Making Final Plans for March for Life
• Walk for Life West Coast Expects 35,000 Pro-Life PeopleMore Pro-Life News
• NARAL Report Gives America D Grade For Limiting Abortions
• Court Sides With Pro-Life Advocates Shackled, Strip Searched
• Abortion Advocates Concerned Filibuster Reform Hurts Them
• New Hampshire to Consider Parental Notification on Abortion
• Michigan Planned Parenthood Meets Opposition to Auburn Hills Abortion Ctr
• New York Figures: Abortion Not Rare, Used as Birth Control
---> LifeNews.com needs your help. We're looking for readers who can help us grow our email readership by taking signup sheets to the March for Life or local pro-life events this month. If you would like to us help keep more pro-life people informed, email us atnews@lifenews.com for more information. These are great for March for Life buses.
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Republican Party Selects Pro-Life Reince Priebus as New Chair Priebus, the Wisconsin Republican Party chairman, received the support of conservative members of the GOP, including pro-life attorney Jim Bopp, the legal counsel for the National Right to Life Committee. "I believe, absolutely, that life begins at the moments of conception," Priebus declared during his pre-vote conversation with the Susan B. Anthony List, a pro-life political organization. "It's a core principle of mine." "If I was to be elected chairman of the RNC that would be something that I would have an even bigger obligation to uphold the position I have on abortion. And I think it would be a huge disappointment to God if I didn't," Priebuspledged, frequently evoking his faith in his answers in an SBA List interview. Steele dropped out of the RNC chairman race prior to the 5th round with the statement, "I hope you all appreciate the legacy we leave. At this time I will step aside so others may lead." From the podium he endorsed long-time Republican activist Maria Cino, who some pro-life advocates said has not fully explained her time working with a pro-abortion group. The chairmanship of the GOP is important because the party apparatus will lay the groundwork for the massive get out the vote campaign necessary to defeat pro-abortion President Barack Obama. Full story at LfeNews.comSeventy Five Percent of Americans Want Obamacare Law Changed The question they differ on is how that change should take place — by repealing the bill, de-funding it, or modifying it in other ways to ferret out some of the problems and lessen the damage it could cause the country. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 75% of likely voters want to change the law, while only 18% want it left alone. Those figures include 20% who want the law repealed and nothing done to replace it, 28% who want it repealed and then have its most popular provisions put into a new law and 27% who say leave the law in place but get rid of the unpopular provisions. "It is worth noting that a majority (55%) take one of the middle ground approaches—repeal and replace or leave it and improve," pollster Scott Rasmussen notes. "Overall, 48% take an approach that starts with repeal." Full story at LifeNews.com Pro-Life Advocates Making Final Plans for March for Life The March for Life is a somber reminder of the 38 years of the destruction of human life before birth following the 1973 Supreme Court decisions Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton that allowed virtually unlimited abortion for any reason at any point during pregnancy. The decisions have culminated in more than 53 million abortions that have claimed the lives of little boys and girls. In Pittsburgh, several buses will be making their way towards the nation's capital filled with pro-life advocates participating in the noon rally at the National Mall and the march towards the Supreme Court. There, they will hear from women who have had abortions and regret their decision calling for changes. Tim Babyak of St. John the Baptist Parish in Perryopolis is heading up one group of people from western Pennsylvania, making its eighth consecutive trip. Barb Skinner, developmental director of Indian Creek Valley Christian Family & Children's Center is heading another group that she says is excited to "to take a stand for life," as she has done for 25 years. "Being in D.C. is really an amazing thing," she told the Pittsburgh newspaper. "While we're there that day we do go and meet with our legislators and it's just such a great experience." Full story at LifeNews.com Walk for Life West Coast Expects 35,000 Pro-Life People The speakers will include a couple whose decision to abort their first child wreaked havoc on their lives for nearly two decades before they found healing. "It is important for men to confront this issue and refuse to stand on the sidelines anymore," said Rev. Brian Walker who with his wife Rev. Denise Walker founded the Minnesota post abortion healing ministry Everlasting Light Ministries. "Abortion can drain a man of his sense of purpose and vision." Full story at LifeNews.com NARAL Report Gives America D Grade For Limiting Abortions "It is clear that the results of the 2010 elections could pose serious threats to the progress we celebrated in previous years' reports," NARAL president Nancy Keenan complained. "Some of our key pro-choice champions in Congress and in the states are not returning to their positions." "Some of their successors hold the most extreme anti-choice views ever seen," she added. "And these changes mean women's access to safe, legal abortion and other reproductive-health care could be further jeopardized. Our opponents will attempt to equate their election with presumed public support for anti-choice policies." Full story at LifeNews.com Court Sides With Pro-Life Advocates Shackled, Strip Searched This week, the Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals roundly rejected an appeal taken by defendant police officers in a suit brought by Defend Life, a Maryland pro-life group that sponsored the event featuring pro-life signs held along a busy street in August 2009 The court granted a motion to dismiss the appeal filed by Thomas More Society's special counsel, Patrick Gillen. Full story at LifeNews.com
Republican Party officials gave their votes, after several rounds of balloting, to Reince Priebus to replace embattled chairman Michael Steele as the party and pro-life movement prepare for the 2012 presidential election.
A new poll finds 75 percent of Americans say they want the Obamacare law that prompts abortion-funding and rationing concerns changed.
Across the nation, local pro-life advocates young and old are making plans to attend the 2011 March for Life, where hundreds of thousands will gather to mark opposition to abortion.
Organizers expect more than 35,000 peaceful pro-life activists for the rally at Justin Herman Plaza and walk along the Embarcadero to Marina Green at the annual West Coast Walk for Life in San Francisco.
This Pacific coast companion to the March for Life will have headline speeches from the former director of a Planned Parenthood clinic and a couple who chose abortion and regretted it. The 2010 Walk drew a massive crowd with media estimates ranging from 23,000 to 35,000 people and organizers expected more this year, in the 7th Walk that will be held on January 22.
A prominent abortion advocacy group released a state-by-state report on the status of state laws on abortion heading into the 2011 legislative session, and it says America deserves a D grade for limiting abortions too much.
A federal appeals court has sided with a group of pro-life advocates, including young women, who were shackled and strip searched after peacefully protesting abortion in Maryland.
Maryland state troopers handcuffed and arrested 18 pro-life advocates for sharing a peaceful pro-life message along a Bel Air, Maryland public street in August 2008. Among those arrested were three young women who were later shackled, strip-searched, and detained overnight by other police.
 Medical professionals are on the front lines of battle. From abortion to assisted suicide, we are challenged in the workplace. The National Association of Pro-life Nurses has been here for nurses since the beginning. Join with us. www.nursesforlife.org |
Abortion Advocates Concerned Filibuster Reform Hurts Them Staffers with NARAL and other pro-abortion groups have raised the concerns with their pro-abortion friends in the Senate about the push by Senators Tom Harkin, Tom Udall, and Jeff Merkley. The lawmakers want to revise the filibuster rules to make it so lawmakers actually have to go to the Senate floor to filibuster — debate and talk — as opposed to threatening to do so without carrying through with the endless debate. Full story at LifeNews.com New Hampshire to Consider Parental Notification on Abortion The U.S. Supreme Court unanimously upheld states' rights to require parental involvement in 2006 when it held hearings on a New Hampshire law that abortion advocates took to the high court in a legal challenge after it became state law. Full story at LifeNews.com Michigan Planned Parenthood Meets Opposition to Auburn Hills Abortion Ctr New York Figures: Abortion Not Rare, Used as Birth Control While New Yorkers are noted for sticking together and accepting one another, regardless of background, creed or ethnicity, they've all but abandoned the unborn. The contradiction is not lost on some pro-lifers. "Our boast is the Statue of Liberty, not the Grim Reaper," Archbishop Timothy Dolan told reporters last week. "This New York community, which prides itself on its gritty sensitivity to those in need, is letting down the smallest and most helpless of them all." Full story at LifeNews.com Encourage Friends to Sign Up for Free Pro-Life News From LifeNews.com
When it comes to plans to reform the way in which filibusters work in the Senate, one group that stands to lose the most is mounting some opposition to the idea.
Abortion advocates tell Politico they are concerned about efforts by Senate Democrats to take away or limit the rights of the minority party in the Senate to use the filibuster to stop legislation, amendments or nominees. Under the filibuster rules, senators wanting to vote on legislation or amendments must obtain 60 votes before they can move ahead with a vote, as opposed to the traditional majority.
The New Hampshire legislature will once again consider legislation to allow parents to know when their minor daughters are considering an abortion — a topic that has reached the Supreme Court.
Republicans, who enjoy a majority control of the state House, announced their legislative agenda yesterday and it included legislation helping parents not be in the dark when their daughters are contemplating an abortion. Without such a law in place, parents would have to pick up the pieces after their daughter has an abortion and potentially be required to pay for medical bills related to problems afterwards without knowing about the abortion in the first place.
Michigan pro-life advocates are continuing their opposition to Planned Parenthood's plans to put together a new abortion center in Auburn Hills.
Residents of the area and pro-life people from all over the Detroit Metro area will voice their opposition to the proposed Planned Parenthood abortion business at the recently-purchased location of 1625 N. Opdyke Road at a Saturday rally. at 1:00 p.m. Citizens for a Pro-life Society and Right to Life LifeSpan are behind the protest and a planned rally at the Auburn Hills Christian Center afterwards. Full story at LifeNews.com
by Brad Mattes
The most populous city in the nation is also the most deadly for unborn babies. The New York City Department of Health recently reported that a startling 41 percent of pregnancies in the city ended in abortion. That's almost double the national rate of 24 percent.
