LifeNews.com Pro-Life News Report
Saturday, September 5, 2009
Current Headlines
Cardinal Confronted Obama on Abortion, Health Care at Kennedy Funeral
Public Option Trigger May Be Senate Compromise, Reid Misleads on Abortion
House Speaker Pelosi Demands Public Option in Pro-Abortion Health Care
Republicans Want Networks to OK Response to Obama on Health Care
Stopping Intentional Blindness: Tell Congress Abortion is Not Health Care
Pro-Life Youth Groups: Students Should Protest Obama Speech to Schools
Another Election Expert: Massive Pro-Life Gains in 2010 Election Cycle
UNFPA Drops Name From UNESCO Guide Pushing Abortion on Children
Blinded by the Light of Discovery: Gene Therapy Presents Problems
Planned Parenthood Promotes Hotlines for Abortions in Latin America
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Cardinal Says He Confronted Obama on Abortion, Health Care at Kennedy Funeral
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- Cardinal Sean O'Malley, the Catholic bishop of Boston, has drawn fire from pro-life Catholics for attending the funeral of the late pro-abortion Sen. Ted Kennedy. O'Malley says he did so with a purpose -- to confront President Barack Obama about abortion funding in the government-run health care bills. Cardinal O'Malley posted a blog late Thursday in response to criticism of him participating in a funeral honoring the Massachusetts abortion advocate. I had the opportunity to speak briefly with President Obama, to welcome him to the Basilica and to share with him that the bishops of the Catholic Church are anxious to support a plan for universal health care," he writes. O'Malley says he warned Obama that "we not support a plan that will include a provision for abortion or could open the way to abortions in the future." "The President was gracious in the short time we spoke, he listened intently to what I was saying," the bishop writes. Obama has come under fire for saying that pro-life advocates are lying about the inclusion of abortion funding in the government health care bills. Obama said last month that pro-life advocates are making "phony claims" about the legislation. Full story at LifeNews.com
ACTION: Contact members of the House and Senate and urge strong support for any amendment to exclude abortion and rationing from their health care bills. Ask them to oppose any health care bill that allows abortion funding or rationing. Call 202-224-3121 or go to http://www.House.gov and http://www.Senate.gov for specific contact information.
Public Option Trigger May Be Senate Compromise, Reid Misleads on Abortion
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- Developments in the health care standoff in Congress late Friday signaled some direction on where the debate will go when lawmakers return from their August recess. A compromise bill maybe in the works that would have a public option trigger that would likely still include abortion funding. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid indicated he may be open to compromising on the public option -- the government-run health care plan generating significant opposition. Reid said members of the Senate Finance Committee are looking at a bill that would make it so the public option is not immediately employed, but would go into play if the private insurance industry does not meet certain deadlines for making sure a certain percentage of the public has health insurance. Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus said he could lay out that plan as early as Saturday and that members of the panel have been working for weeks on it. Baucus has led a group of six lawmakers to put together this trigger compromise and has waited to announce it until all of the provisions are put together. Members of the Senate could accept the idea and replace the current Kennedy bill pro-life groups oppose with it, or they could balk at the idea and reject both plans altogether. Full story at LifeNews.com
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi Demands Public Option in Pro-Abortion Health Care
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- In some of her strongest comments yet, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is demanding that the final government-run health care bill Congress approves contain the "public option." That is the national health insurance plan run directly by the federal government that would open the door for massive abortion funding. President Barack Obama appears to be retooling his strategy on promoting the bill and is said to be considering asking members of Congress to drop the government option. Obama would have to battle with members of the House, who are demanding the government-run system be kept in HR 3200. But, he is also battling members of the Senate who say they can't envision the chamber approving the bill with the public option. According to Politico, Pelosi said late Thursday any bill "without a strong public option will not pass the House." She presented the supposed need to keep the public option in place as a battle with insurance companies. Any real change requires the inclusion of a strong public option to promote competition and bring down costs, Pelosi said. Full story at LifeNews.com
Republicans Want Networks to OK Response to Obama on Pro-Abortion Health Care
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- If President Barack Obama gets time on the national networks to promote his pro-abortion government-run health care bill, the top Republican in the House says his party should get a chance to respond. The request for time would be similar to the response the minority gets to the State of the Union address. Obama will reportedly detail what he wants in a health care proposal in a speech next Wednesday night. Aides to Obama say that he may not insist on the public option -- the national health insurance plan run directly by the federal government that would open the door for massive abortion funding. Today, House Minority Leader John Boehner, an Ohio Republican, asked networks for a chance to respond to the Obama address, planned for 8 p.m. Wednesday. "The opposing party has typically been granted this opportunity not only in the case of the annual Presidential State of the Union Address to Congress, but at other times when the President has come before Congress as well," Boehner wrote in a letter to ABC. Full story at LifeNews.com
Stopping Intentional Blindness: Tell Congress That Abortion is Not Health Care
by Theresa Notare
It seems I'm constantly at the eye doctor monitoring my poor eyesight. This life-long condition has caused me to reflect on other ways I have been short-sighted or blind. As I struggle to have clear vision in my life, I have to contend not only with my own faults, but also with false cultural messages that promise easy answers to all our desires:
• Want sexual freedom? Use contraception.
• Want a relationship without the hassle of commitment? Live together.
• Want a baby with your own genes even though you are 45? Pay a surrogate-mother to do it for you.
• Don't want to be pregnant right now? Get an abortion.
False cultural messages are repeated so much that eventually they take up residence in our interior homes, causing us to think that they are okay. One of the more insidious things false messages can do is to masquerade as necessary parts of basically good things, for example, that women s healthcare includes access to abortion. Let s talk about this last point. Civil law is the great educator of a people. If something is legal, many of us presume it must also be good. When the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1973 that abortion was a constitutional right, it taught that the human being in the womb is of no value. The pre-born person was, in fact, disposable. Full story at LifeNews.com
Pro-Life Youth Groups: Students Should Protest Obama Speech to Schools
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- Three pro-life organizations for youth are asking students next week to protest a speech President Barack Obama will give that will be carried in schools across the country. They are asking students to make their peers aware of how Obama has relentlessly promoted abortion since taking over the White House. In a Tuesday speech, Obama will address America's returning students in a special address to welcome them back to the classroom and encourage them to excel in their education. The speech, originally planned to discuss how America's youth could assist the needs of Obama, was altered today and will instead address personal education goals. However, because abortion has claimed the lives of 50 million unborn children since 1973, many of whom would be in classrooms next week, three pro-life groups say it is disingenuous. Full story at LifeNews.com
Another Election Expert Predicts Massive Pro-Life Gains in 2010 Election Cycle
Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- Another elections expert is predicting massive gains for the pro-life movement in the 2010 election cycle. This time it is Larry Sabato, a University of Virginia political science professor frequently cited in the mainstream media for his election expertise. Sabato has correctly forecasted other midterm election results, including the 2006 elections where he was one off of the Democratic gains that year. The professor has correctly predicted the winners of last five presidential contests more than two months before Election Day with an average margin of error of one percentage point. Given his track record, political observers are already talking about his latest election analysis, released today. "It now appears that Republicans will make above-average gains in the U.S. House of at least 23 seats," he explains, whereas the average pickup of the party out of power in a midterm election is 17 seats. While there are pro-abortion Republicans and pro-life Democrats, most Republicans in Congress are pro-life and most Democrats back abortion. The Democrats who control both the House and Senate now strongly support abortion and have prevented votes on some pro-life amendments to limit abortion funding. Full story at LifeNews.com
UNFPA Drops Name From UNESCO Sex-Ed Guide Pushing Abortion on Children
New York, NY (LifeNews.com) -- A new sexual education guide from UNESCO that saw the UN agency calling for children to promote abortions across the globe was too much for the UNFPA. That agency has pulled its name from the document, according to news reports out today. The New York Times indicated today that criticism from pro-life groups, published in LifeNews.com, led the UNFPA to pull back from the proposed guidelines and ask that its name be left off the final published materials. Bill Poehler, the communications director for the Global Outreach program of Minnesota Citizens Concerned for Life, which brought up the children-abortion connection, told LifeNews.com the pro-life group "is very pleased that the organizations responsible for creating the UNESCO sex education guidelines have pulled back. "UNESCO would be wise to acknowledge that cultures across the world will not support the promotion of abortion to our children," he said. "Even the UNFPA has recognized how radical the guidelines are in promoting abortion rights among young children." Full story at LifeNews.com
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Blinded by the Light of Discovery: Gene Therapy Manipulation Presents Problems
by Ken Connor
Sometimes fairy tales are better than non-fiction at communicating essential truths. Anyone who has read Shakespeare or been transfixed by the tales of Tolkien or C.S. Lewis understands this well. In Steven Spielberg's blockbuster movie interpreting Michael Crichton's Jurassic Park, viewers experienced firsthand the terrifying consequences that result when man, the creature, tries to assume the role of God, the creator. Early in the movie one of the characters, Dr. Ian Malcolm, warns of the dangers inherent in venture capitalist John Hammond's unprecedented experiment: Malcolm: "The lack of humility before nature that's been displayed here staggers me.... Don't you see the danger, John, inherent in what you're doing here? Genetic power is the most awesome force ever seen on this planet. But you wield it like a kid who's found his dad's gun.... Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could that they didn't stop to think if they should!" Hammond: "I don't understand this Luddite attitude, especially from a scientist. How could we stand in the light of discovery and not act?" Recent reports of an unprecedented development in gene therapy indicate that humility before the mysterious and awesome power of nature is a lesson mankind has yet to learn. Like Crichton's Hammond, the scientific community seems unable to resist the Siren song of "discovery," even when the future of humanity may well be at stake. Full story at LifeNews.com
Planned Parenthood Promotes Hotlines for Dangerous Abortions in Latin America
by Carlos Polo
The International Planned Parenthood Federation and its allies have come up with a clever new tactic in its war on the unborn. They have decided to simply ignore existing laws protecting the sanctity of life and set up abortion hot-lines to encourage women to abort themselves. Women who call these hot-lines are told about the abortifacient drug, misoprostol. They are briefed on how they can obtain it, and how they can use it to abort themselves. In Latin America, this campaign is already well underway. Over the past four months, abortion-minded groups in Ecuador, Chile and Argentina have set up such abortion hot-lines. The lines are advertised as offering "free information services for women with unwanted pregnancies," but what you hear when you call is an advertisement for misoprostol-induced abortions. There is no question that these groups know that by promoting misoprostol abortions, they are violating the law. For example, Maria Teresa Urbina, who is the president of the Venezuelan branch of IPPF, acknowledges that "abortion is illegal in Venezuela, and admits we are not giving information about that." Full story at LifeNews.com
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