Life Links 6/9/09

The New York Times has an article on the prolife movement in Wichita, its history and the effect of George Tiller's murder and the possible closing of his clinic.


This is weird. Some guy named Randy Alcorn (and I'm presuming it's not the same Randy Alcorn who's the author of "Pro-Life Answers to Pro-Choice Argument" and "Why Pro-Life") has an editorial in the Daily Sound which argues that abortion is prolife because our world can't sustain all our lives, so some of us have to go. Mr. Alcorn, of course, doesn't volunteer to sacrifice his life to save the rest of the human race. It's much easier to push for abortions and population control efforts in developing nations.


Ross Douthat's editorial in the New York Times notes how the lack of ability to strictly regulate abortions is one of the reasons why third trimester abortions receive so much attention.

Indeed, the argument that some abortions take place in particularly awful, particularly understandable circumstances is not a case against regulating abortion. It’s the beginning of precisely the kind of reasonable distinction-making that would produce a saner, stricter legal regime.

If anything, by enshrining a near-absolute right to abortion in the Constitution, the pro-choice side has ensured that the hard cases are more controversial than they otherwise would be. One reason there’s so much fierce argument about the latest of late-term abortions — Should there be a health exemption? A fetal deformity exemption? How broad should those exemptions be? — is that Americans aren’t permitted to debate anything else. Under current law, if you want to restrict abortion, post-viability procedures are the only kind you’re allowed to even regulate.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution has an editorial of a medical student who plans on offering abortions as part of her practice if and when she becomes an OB-GYN entitled, "Why I Plan to Emulate Dr. George Tiller."

I still have a long way to go in my medical training. I’ve never witnessed an actual abortion procedure...

I wonder if she'll change her mind after actually seeing abortions performed especially since it's difficult to imagine someone who doesn't "claim that abortion is morally acceptable" regularly performing late-term abortions.


A team of Canadian researchers has discovered another way of creating induced pluripotent stem cells without using viruses.