LifeNews.com Pro-Life News Report
Wednesday, May 25, 2011
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Current Headlines
Top Stories
• Taxpayer Funding Blamed for Rise in Abortions on Poor Women
• Obama Appeals Court Nominee Hides Pro-Abortion Views in Hearing
• House: Obamacare Can t Fund Abortion Training for Med Students
• Pro-Life Groups: Boycott Pepsi for Using Aborted Fetal Cell Lines
More Pro-Life News
• Social Conservatives to Play Major Role in 2012 GOP Primary
• Abortions on Disabled Babies: The Prenatal Testing Sham
• Wisconsin Hearing Covers Bill to Not Fund Abortion in Obamacare
• Annual Symposium Focuses on Building Euthanasia Opposition
• Prayer Chapel Opens Next to North Dakota Abortion Business
• New Hampshire Senate OKs Parental Notification on Abortion
• Minnesota Gov Vetoes 20-Week Abortion Ban, Taxpayer Funding Ban
• New York Special Election Race No Bellwether for Democrats
• Alabama Senate Passes Several Pro-Life Bills Limiting Abortion
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Taxpayer Funding Blamed for Rise in Abortions on Poor Women
A major pro-life group is responding to the study released by a pro-abortion organization saying abortion rates have fallen for women as a whole but increased for women below the poverty line. The National Right to Life Committee blames taxpayer funding.
As LifeNews reported, the new study in the journal Obstetrics & Gynecology indicates the abortion rate has decreased in the United States good news because it means more pregnant women are opting against having an abortion. However, the report presents news that should spark a drive to help more women below the poverty level find pregnancy resources and support because it indicates poor women are having abortions at a higher rate than before.
The new report was published by the Guttmacher Institute, a pro-abortion research group formerly affiliated with the Planned Parenthood abortion business. According to Guttmacher, poor women accounted for 42% of all abortions in 2008, and their abortion rate increased 18% between 2000 and 2008, from 44.4 to 52.2 abortions per 1,000 women aged 15 44. In comparison, the national abortion rate for 2008 was 19.6 per 1,000, reflecting an 8% decline from a rate of 21.3 in 2000.
NRLC officials disputed Guttmacher s claims that restrictions on abortion disproportionately affect poor women.
Data showing an eight percent drop in abortion rates across the board from 2000 to 2008 are encouraging, said Randall K. O Bannon, Ph.D., National Right to Life director of education and research.
Guttmacher suggests that higher abortion rates among poorer woman and abortion restrictions are somehow connected, yet it s a thesis that goes undefended, O Bannon further noted. How common sense regulations like right-to-know laws, which tell women about abortion s risks and alternatives which are better for both them and their unborn children, and similar protective measures, are supposed to hurt poor women is hard to fathom. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/05/25/taxpayer-funding-blamed-for-rise-in-abortions-on-poor-women/
Obama Appeals Court Nominee Hides Pro-Abortion Views in Hearing
Steve Six was a thorn in the side of pro-life advocates in Kansas wanting to hold the abortion industry there accountable for violating late-term abortion laws, but you wouldn t know that by his responses at a Senate committee hearing.
President Barack Obama nominated the pro-abortion former Kansas state attorney general to serve on the U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals, setting up another battle over abortion and a top judicial pick. Obama selected former Kansas Attorney General Steve Six and he faced a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing yesterday.
In October, 2007, District Attorney Phill Kline filed 107 charges including 23 felonies, against the Planned Parenthood abortion business for allegedly violating state law. Kline alleged the abortion business potentially engaged in illegal abortions and violated state record-keeping laws by changing abortion data in an attempt to cover up late abortions done outside Kansas law.
After Kline filed the charges, Six, who was appointed by pro-abortion ex-Gov. Kathleen Sebelius (now the Obama Secretary for Health and Human Services), placed a gag order on a state judge who allowed Kline access to Planned Parenthood abortion files needed to prove his case. Anderson was told not to comply with the District Attorney s subpoenas by Six s office even though two judges determined that the files show probable cause that the abortion business violated state abortion laws and falsified medical records.
During the hearing, according to the Washington Examiner, pro-life Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa, the ranking Republican on the panel, asked Six about abortion and whether he believed the new Kansas law that bans abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy based on the scientific data showing unborn children can feel intense pain is consistent with U.S. Supreme Court decisions. The question is important because, if abortion advocates ever file a lawsuit challenging the law, Six would likely determine its fate if he becomes a member of the appeals court. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/05/25/obama-appeals-court-nominee-hides-pro-abortion-views-in-hearing/
House: Obamacare Can t Fund Abortion Training for Med Students
The House of Representatives voted today to ensure that taxpayer funds can t be used under the Obamacare health care law to pay for abortion training for medical students at federally-funded health centers.
The House voted 234-182 for the Foxx Amendment to stop the abortion funding with Republicans voting 221-10 for the amendment and Democrats voting 172-13 against it.
The Obamacare law, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, created direct funding for graduate medical education in qualified teaching health centers which are defined as community based, ambulatory patient care centers that operate a primary care residency program. Title X clinics are specifically listed as eligible grantees and obstetrics/gynecology is one of the specific training areas.
House Republicans promoted a bill, HR 1216, to remove the direct funding stream for this program and instead make funding for qualified teaching health centers contingent on annual appropriations.
Rep. Virginia Foxx, a pro-life Republican from North Carolina, proposed an amendment to ensure none of the funds authorized for qualified teaching health centers can be used to pay for abortion or training in the provision of abortions. The amendment also protects conscience rights by making sure funds are not made available to any teaching health center that discriminates against individual or institutional health care entities on the basis that the entity does not provide, pay for provide coverage of, or refer for abortions.
Foxx said taxpayer dollars should not be used to pay for abortion training; and training centers that discriminate against pro-life students, doctors and nurses are not the kind of centers that should be selected to provide training under this program. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/05/25/house-obamacare-cant-fund-abortion-training-for-med-students/
Pro-Life Groups: Boycott Pepsi for Using Aborted Fetal Cell Lines
Dozens of pro-life groups are calling on pro-life Americans to boycott PepsiCo because it has contracted with a company that uses fetal cells from babies victimized by abortions to test and produce artificial flavor enhancers.
LifeNews.com reported on the controversy in March when information came to light showing biotech company Senomyx was found to be testing their food additives using fetal cells from abortions. Senomyx ignored a letter from the pro-life group Children of God for Life, which complained about its practices.
The company s key flavor programs focus on the discovery and development of savory, sweet and salt flavor ingredients that are intended to allow for the reduction of MSG, sugar and salt in food and beverage products, the Senomyx web site says. Using isolated human taste receptors, we created proprietary taste receptor-based assay systems that provide a biochemical or electronic readout when a flavor ingredient interacts with the receptor.
Debi Vinnedge, of the pro-life group, explained, What they don t tell the public is that they are using HEK 293 human embryonic kidney cells taken from an electively aborted baby to produce those receptors. They could have easily chosen animal, insect, or other morally obtained human cells expressing the G protein for taste receptors.
After exposing the practice, Vinnedge s group called for pro-life people to contact the companies using Senomyx to test their products. While some companies stopped contracting with it, others did not.
Now, Vinnedge says today that PepsiCo is funding the research and development by paying royalties to Senomyx to use the human embryonic kidney cells to produce flavor enhancers for Pepsi beverages.
There are many options PepsiCo could be using instead of aborted fetal cells, including animal, insect, or other morally obtained human cells, she told LifeNews. The revelation a potential public relations nightmare motivated Campbell Soup to sever all relations with Senomyx. However, PepsiCo continues their business relationship despite the abortion connection. Their response earlier this year drew public ire when they wrote that our collaboration with Senomyx is strictly limited to creating lower-calorie, great-tasting beverages for consumers. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/05/25/pro-life-groups-boycott-pepsi-for-using-aborted-fetal-cell-lines/
Social Conservatives to Play Major Role in 2012 GOP Primary
Guess whose photo appears right underneath an article in the latest edition of The Economist with the headline, The silence of the right: Social conservatives and the tea-party movement are still waiting for their candidate in the Republican nomination race?
With Mike Huckabee out of the presidential race, there is much debate about which candidate will garner the bulk of the social conservative vote in the upcoming Republican nominating contest. Why is this segment of Republican primary voters so crucial? Numbers don t lie. ABC s former polling director Gary Langer found that, In 2008, self-identified evangelical Christians constituted 44 percent of all Republican presidential primary voters.
Evangelical Christians represented a majority of 2008 GOP Primary voters in 11 of the 29 states in which exit polls were conducted. In Iowa and South Carolina . . . evangelicals provided exactly 60 percent of the vote. In 10 other states, including many outside the Deep South, evangelicals represented between one-third and 46 percent of the vote.
If those numbers are not enough to convince you about the impact of social conservative voters, take a look at the map here and focus on the percentages in states like Ohio, Florida, Texas, and even California. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/05/25/social-conservatives-to-play-major-role-in-2012-gop-primary/
Abortions on Disabled Babies: The Prenatal Testing Sham
Each year, March 21st is World Down Syndrome Day (WDSD). The date 3/21 was chosen as a representation of the genetic cause of the condition, a triplicate of the 21st chromosome. WDSD seeks to raise awareness of a genetic condition that may very well diminish to the point of disappearing. This is due to the prenatal testing sham.
Since the beginning of the year, headlines have touted advancements in prenatal testing. Laboratories are promising a prenatal diagnostic test for Down syndrome based solely on a blood sample from the expectant mother. This would be an improvement over current diagnostic testing, which involves the insertion of a needle into the womb and a risk of miscarriage. The promised new testing is on the verge of realization as soon as next year.
This new testing is being justified for its ability to provide mothers with information about their pregnancies more safely and earlier than ever. News reports relay how the new testing will save babies, eliminating the risk of miscarriage inherent in current diagnostic testing and promoting healthy births. Once available, it is expected that the testing will have almost universal uptake. Indeed, the test developers are banking on this literally, in the case of Sequenom, a publicly traded company whose stock price is rebounding after plummeting from earlier, false reports about its testing.
But what is less reported in the coverage on the new testing is its likely impact. Already, existing prenatal testing is followed by high termination rates, exceeding 70 percent in California, and 90 percent in England and Europe. At this high percentage, it is more accurate to call it an elimination rate. With each advance in prenatal testing, the next generation of children born with Down syndrome is smaller, so much so that there are close to 50 percent fewer children born with Down syndrome than if all were carried to term. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/05/25/abortions-on-disabled-babies-the-prenatal-testing-sham/
Wisconsin Hearing Covers Bill to Not Fund Abortion in Obamacare
Wisconsin lawmakers in the Senate Public Health Committee today held a hearing on legislation that would make it so the state opts out of the taxpayer funding of abortions found in the Obamacare legislation.
When Congress passed the government-run health care bill, it did so without any limits on abortion funding and language mandating taxpayer financing of abortion in certain circumstances.
Obama eventually issued a controversial executive order supposedly taking the abortion funding issue off the table. However, virtually every pro-life group said it would not mitigate the abortion funding because it doesn t have the effect of law, could be reversed in the future, and because it didn t tackle much of the abortion funding in the bill. The Obama administration could also ignore the order and not put it in place when the health care law goes into effect.
The Obamacare legislation requires state health insurance exchanges created under the legislation to cover abortions, but the law allows states to opt out of requiring abortion coverage. The ban extends to the state exchanges the Obamacare legislation would set up because the funding for abortions would come at taxpayer expense through the exchanges, which would be funded with federal subsidies.
Under the new health care law, states will be in charge of their own health care exchanges that are available for individuals and small businesses. The exchange doesn t go into effect until 2014 and states are filing lawsuits seeking to stop the pro-abortion health care bill in its other pro-abortion provisions entirety, but states are moving now to exercise their right to opt out of some of the abortion funding. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/05/25/wisconsin-hearing-covers-bill-to-not-fund-abortion-in-obamacare/
Annual Symposium Focuses on Building Euthanasia Opposition
A collection of people of all stripes disability rights advocates, bioethicists, pro-life people and religious leaders will gather together in western Canada next month for the next installment of an international conference on euthanasia. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/05/25/annual-symposium-focuses-on-building-euthanasia-opposition/
Prayer Chapel Opens Next to North Dakota Abortion Business
The Catholic Diocese of North Dakota has opened a prayer chapel next door to the lone abortion business operating in the state with the hopes that prayer will encourage women considering abortions to find alternatives. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/05/25/prayer-chapel-opens-next-to-north-dakota-abortion-business/
New Hampshire Senate OKs Parental Notification on Abortion
The New Hampshire state Senate today approved legislation the state House already passed to allow parents to know when their minor daughters are considering an abortion so they can help them find better solutions and alternatives. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/05/25/new-hampshire-senate-oks-parental-notification-on-abortion/
Minnesota Gov Vetoes 20-Week Abortion Ban, Taxpayer Funding Ban
As expected, pro-abortion Minnesota Gov. Mark Dayton vetoed two pro-life bills that would have banned late-term abortions and prohibited taxpayer funding of abortions in the state. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/05/25/minnesota-gov-vetoes-20-week-abortion-ban-taxpayer-funding-ban/
New York Special Election Race No Bellwether for Democrats
In an unfortunate turn of events yesterday, pro-abortion Democrat Kathy Hochul edged out a victory in the special election for New York s 26th District. Despite the district s Republican tendencies, one of the few New York districts that McCain carried in 2008, Democrats were able to pull an upset by capitalizing upon a divided conservative electorate. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/05/25/new-york-special-election-race-no-bellwether-for-democrats/
Alabama Senate Passes Several Pro-Life Bills Limiting Abortion
After the Alabama state Senate voted to not participate in the abortion funding that will take place under the Obamacare law, legislators then approved a slate of pro-life bills that would limit abortions. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/05/25/alabama-senate-passes-several-pro-life-bills-limiting-abortion/
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