"Continue pulling to disarticulate at the neck."

Here's a link to the 9th Circuit Court's decision on the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003. They declared it unconstitutional.

How sad is that Supreme Court precedent says something like this is constitutionally protected?

An intact D&E proceeds in one of two ways, depending on the position of the fetus in the uterus. If the fetus presents head first (a vertex presentation), the doctor first collapses the head, either by compressing the skull with forceps or by inserting surgical scissors into the base of the skull and draining its contents. The doctor then uses forceps to grasp the fetus and extracts it through the cervix.5 If the fetus presents feet first (a breech presentation), the doctor begins by grasping a lower extremity and pulling it through the cervix, at which point the head typically becomes lodged in the cervix. When that occurs, the doctor can either collapse the head and then remove the fetus or continue pulling to disarticulate at the neck. (If the doctor uses the latter option, he will have to use at least one more pass of the forceps to remove the part of the fetus that remains, and the procedure is not considered an intact D&E.)

(emphasis mine)

So some abortionists finish off a partial-birth abortion not by sucking the brains of the child out, but by pulling on the child's body until the child's body is separated from the child's head.

Justice Samuel Alito Jr.

That has a nice ring to it. 58 to 42. I was off by one vote. Senator Landrieu didn't come through for me. Interestingly, Justice Alito received less votes from Democratic Senators than Justice Thomas.

"So abortion is really the only choice she has in this matter..."

Is this pro-choice or pro-abortion?

This same blogger (who feels that her friend's only choice is to have an abortion) had a miscarriage and said, "there's not a day that passes where i don't feel the incredible hurt of losing a child, and not just any child, but the child of my best friend of 4 years....as sad as it is, it's probably the best thing that could've happened. after the miscarraige, i named the unborn embryo Skyler. i will keep him in my heart, always.
mommy loves you, skyler. "

She has also previously given birth and made an adoption plan for that child and had an abortion.

Predictions

The U.S. Senate will invoke cloture on the Alito debate with 65 votes.

Judge Alito will be confirmed with 59 votes.

Jack Bauer will kill or seriously injure someone on tonight's episode of 24.

In 24, the shadowy man behind the nerve gas scare is working for a military weapons contractor who is upset about the fighting terrorists (what President Logan called it)/disarmament (what the media in 24 have called it) agreement that President Logan and Russia's prime minister signed.

My wife will watch Skating with Celebrities tonight.

Massachusetts' Department of Social Services is not the best guardian

Dean Barnett has a good summary of what happened and what's happening in the life of Haleigh Poutre in the Weekly Standard.

"I hope he knows how much I loved him."

A long story about the birth of a baby with anencephaly in the LA Times and here's another from Right to Life of Michigan.

HT: Dawn Eden

Putting words in the mouths of past feminists

National Review has posted an excerpt of Kate O'Beirne's book, Women Who Make the World Worse: and How Their Radical Feminist Assault Is Ruining Our Schools, Families, Military, and Sports.

In the excerpt, Kate quotes America's early feminists as calling abortion things like, "the ultimate exploitation of women," "child murder," "infanticide," and "antenatal child murder." These early feminists also called abortionists "child murderers" and called places where abortions take place "infant butcheries." They said women who commit abortion were "awfully guilty" regardless of their motive and said it is "degrading to women that we should treat our children as property to be disposed of as we see fit."

To me these quotes are a strong indication that early feminists were opposed to abortion 1.) because it killed an unborn child 2.) it distorted the feminist values of equality and non-violence.

However, some feminists bloggers read things like "child murder" and "infanticide" and somehow come to the conclusion that the real reason early feminists opposed abortion because was it "was then a dangerous procedure often forced upon them by men" and "abortion was a symbol of male dominance–women could be raped, sent to abortionists against their will, left dead or disfigured, all because they were viewed as subhuman objects whose very lives were considered less important then men's desires. Abortion symbolized male control over women."

Also notice how Amanda (the latter link above) in her haste to erect strawmen arguments to knock down fails to read the first quote she takes from O'Beirne properly. She beats O'Beirne to death for quoting a feminist for life for saying that motherhood was against Victorian era social norms. The obvious problem is that O'Beirne is quoting a modern day feminist for life talking about today's social norms where we have a "wombless model of success society."

Motherhood wasn't looked down upon in Victorian era society but pregnant women were and that's something Stanton protested against by going out in public while visibly pregnant which was what was against Victorian-era society norms. According to a web site dedicated to Victorian era health "confinement" and "lying in" were synonyms for pregnancy. In the Victorian era, pregnancy was equated with an illness and pregnant women wore "invalid gowns."

Or as another web site notes: "The Victorian view of sex placed pregnancy in an unusual position. Maternity was thought to be a woman's glory, but at the same time it was an obvious result of sexual intercourse. As a result, pregnant women of the upper, more refined classes stayed indoors rather than show their change in condition."

Or as Dr. Raul Artal notes in his foreword of a pregnancy exercise book, "To the Victorian lady, pregnancy was a state of confinement and it was considered unseemly for pregnant women to engage in active recreational or social activities. It was even inappropriate to be seen outside her family setting."

Governor Granholm wants human cloning to come to Michigan

During her recent State of the State address to the citizens of Michigan, Governor Jennifer Granholm called on Michigan's legislature to pass a bill that would not only legalize non-therapeutic research on human embryos but would also legalize human cloning in the state of Michigan.

A little more than halfway thru her speech, Granholm said,

"If we are truly serious about improving both the cost and quality of health care in this state, we must tap the full power of modern science to combat life-threatening illnesses. Imagine having to watch your child suffer with juvenile diabetes. Imagine watching your wife lose her ability to speak, and walk, and even eat, as her Parkinson's worsens. Stem cell research holds the promise for finding cures and for improving the lives of thousands of people.

Talented researchers and businesses around the world are working right now on those cures…but we can't recruit them to Michigan to do their work because of the limits Michigan law puts on them. When human lives are at stake, we should lead the nation in this work, not put obstacles in our own path.

Tonight, I am asking you, our Legislature, to join with me in supporting this search for cures. Pass Representative Meisner's bill to remove the limits on stem cell research in Michigan, and do it now."

First, I should provide the current legal situation regarding stem cell research and human cloning in the state of Michigan. Human cloning was banned in Michigan in 1998. There are no limits on adult or umbilical cord stem cell research and the only "limit" on embryonic stem cell research is that you can't use a human embryo for non-therapeutic research in the state of Michigan. That means that researchers can't extract stem cells from human embryos (which kills the embryo) while in Michigan but researcher could import embryonic stem cell from another state or kill human embryos in another state and then bring their stem cells into Michigan and experiment on the stem cells in Michigan. And this is exactly what researchers from the University of Michigan are already doing. They have an official policy on embryonic stem cell research. They've imported some embryonic stem cells from James Thomson's stem cell lines and received federal funding and are planning on creating a $10.5 million stem cell center. So the whole "can't recruit them" because of limits is complete hogwash.

At the end of Granholm's quote she calls on Michigan's legislature to pass "Representative Meisner's bill to remove the limits on stem cell research in Michigan." Here's Meisner's bill. It's one of the most deceptive bills on human cloning that I've ever read.

The whole goal of the legislation is to remove the scientific definition of human cloning from Michigan's law books and replace it with a law whose definition of "cloning" allows unbridled human cloning as long as no clones are implanted for the purpose of bringing a clone to birth. The text could also possible be interpreted to allow for the implantation of human clones as long as the purpose was to kill the clones before they are born.

Here's my favorite part from Meisner's legislation (the scratched off text is the original cloning ban language that Meisner would throw out and the bolded text is the language he would insert):

a) "Human cloning" means the use of human creating or attempting to create a human being by using the somatic cell nuclear transfer technology to produce a human embryo procedure for the purpose of, or to implant, the resulting product to initiate a pregnancy that could result in the birth of a human being.

What's the "resulting product?" Could that be a cloned human embryo? What pro-cloning advocates can't get away from is that somatic cell nuclear transfer is cloning and that it creates a clone. This is evident in all of their legislation when they bar the implantation of the clone. They can't call the clone a "clone" because then the gig would be up. So they're left to making up terms life "resulting product" or "the product of nuclear transplantation" or "the product of somatic cell nuclear transfer."

Michigan's legislature is overwhelmingly prolife so it won't pass Meisner's bill anytime soon but Granholm's speech indicates that she's not just in favor of embryonic stem cell research but she's also in favor of human cloning for research purposes.

Related: Strengthen cloning ban by legalizing cloning

March for Life pictures

Zombietime has plenty of from the West Coast March and Jewel has a ton from the D.C. March.

LifeLinks 1/25/06

I just got around to catching up with the American Journal of Bioethics' blog. I missed some good times in the comments sections of one of Art Caplan's posts. Art's post and comments get taken to the cleaners by Wesley Smith, Bradford Short, Joe Carter and Richard Doerflinger.


Though I disagree with much of William Saletan's editorial in the New York Times, it is still worth the read.


Adam's has some photographic answers to some pro-choice arguments and links to a video of the pro-choice protestors in San Francisco.

Why are humans valuable?

Patrick Lee and Robert George have provided a priceless gift to prolifers regarding human embryo research and abortion.

Singer voices here perhaps the most popular argument in favor of embryo-destructive research and abortion. Few who accept this argument have followed it to its logical conclusion, however, as Singer has: If self-awareness is the ground of general immunity of being killed right not to be killed, not only abortion but also infanticide, and the killing of many helpless adults, are morally legitimate (see Singer's popular textbook, Practical Ethics, Chapters 2 and 4). In fact that conclusion is inescapable once one accepts Singer's premise. But one has decisive reasons to reject that premise as fatally flawed. It is true that an embryo or fetus (or infant) lacks the immediately exercisable capacity for self-awareness, rationality, or free choice. Yet, the embryo or fetus does have the basic, natural capacity for such actions as consequent to its nature, that is, as entailed by the kind of entity it is. The embryo or fetus, precisely in virtue of the kind of entity he or she is, has the capacity to develop himself or herself to the point where he will perform such actions. And no one has been able to give an intelligible reason why we should base full moral rights on immediately exercisable capacities — which can come and go — rather than on the basic, natural capacities that a human being at any stage of development has in virtue of the kind of entity it is.

Take the time to read the whole thing here.

So then it is a baby?

You've got to wonder about the level of cognitive dissonance that affects this pro-choicer. She calls the unborn child in her womb a "baby" yet is in favor of legal killing of other "babies" and for some reason thinks that her "baby" would also be in favor of the legal killing of other "babies."

March for Life pictures

Plenty of March for Life photos at Mommy Life and Yahoo!

Pro-choice quotes

Warning: follow the following links at your own risk as they will expose you to foul language and even worse thinking.

Daily Kos diarist Maryscott O'Connor: "Bottom line: that may well be a human being in there, but it's an awfully TINY one, and I'm going to have to lower the boom. I don't wish to house and feed it for 9 months, let alone 18 years; for reasons whose details are my OWN and NO ONE else's to examine, dissect, judge or measure, I do not wish to carry this potential human being to term. Thusly, I will make my medical decision and MURDER it, if you want to use that term."

Daily Kos commenter Teresa in PA: "why rare? that's kind of political pander is it not? Abortion is already rare and I think it should be more frequent since there are many women who would like to get abortions but can not because of circumstances beyond their control or because they have been quilted and misinformed."

Daily Kos commenter Felagund: "Thanks Teresa for raising this point. I wish abortion was more common. Mrs. F teaches in a local public school and it is obvious that at least half the children there were either unwanted at the time, still unwanted, or produced by people financially and/or emotionally incapable of caring for them. This makes the children themselves deeply problematic. It's no coincidence that the decline in rates of violent crime and the evidently temporary existence of legal abortion go hand in hand....There are lots and lots of people who have children they shouldn't, and we and society would be better off encouraging them to think of abortion as not only a practical but a moral good."

Lisaerei: "March for Life, today, outside my building.

Too bad I forgot my Glock 19 at home...

The other option was to simulate a pregnancy and have Joe do a home-made abortion by punching me in the stomach mid-march, although, i get the feeling that would either result in him being arrested or stoned to death."

Pro-choice Criticism of Roe

Timothy Carney has plenty of it.

Pro-choice rally on C-SPAN

I'm watching C-SPAN, they're playing the NOW pro-choice rally from Sunday night. There are not very many people there. It looks like less than 100 pro-choicers who were surrounded by prolifers.

Most of the speakers are taking their 4 minutes to rail against Judge Alito. The usual, "He'll take us back to the stone age" speech. He's "so far out of the mainstream," he "doesn't care about teenage rape victims," he's not right to replace Sandra Day O'Connor, he tortures toddlers for fun (just kidding), blah, blah.....

Jatrice Martel Gaiter, President of Metropolitan D.C. Planned Parenthood asserted that prolife people were racist, mean and indifferent to the lives of born children before she started screaming "Stop them! Stop them now!"

Blogging for Life

The following have something to say about abortion and/or the March for Life.

Between Two Worlds

La Shawn Barber

National Review

G. Tracy Meehan on the bad twins of Roe and Doe.

Susan Wills on Breyer's ludicrous hypothetical in Ayotte vs. Planned Parenthood.

Deacon Greg Shaffer

Godverbs

You can listen to the Blogs for Life Conference here

West Coast March for Life and Pro-choice Intolerance

The West Coast March for Life was another time for intolerant pro-choicers to come out and show their complete intolerance for prolifers and the prolife view.

A few pro-choicers held signs that said "Bigots go home" or "Keep your laws off my body and I'll keep my hands off your throat."



Lovely, huh? Also, notice the white sign with purple lettering in the background that reads "Free abortion on demand." Odd, because according Kate Michelman on Meet the Press, "I have never heard a woman demand to have an abortion. I think that that language reveals the lack of respect that those who oppose abortion have for women who face crises. We've got to get rid of that language."

Random Jottings has a photo of a large sign which reads "No to Women-Hating Christian-Fascist Theocracy."

Pro-choice intolerance is alive and well.

HT: After Abortion

My Bleeding Dream

A young woman named Brittany at her blog, My Bleeding Dream laments the loss of Emily, her aborted child. She also says that she and her boyfriend will be trying to have another child soon because "I need one to make me complete." It appears she was coerced into having an abortion by her mother and her boyfriend's mother.

"I miss Emily so much. Dustin and I had a fight last night because I was mad. I wasn't mad at him but I was upset. I wish she was back. I would be 20 weeks and 6 days pregnant today, but...i'm not because I had to have an abortion. I did NOT want to have an abortion, I wanted to keep my child. Dustin did too, he wanted his little baby to be born. He wanted to push her on a swing and teach her things. "

Abortion Clinic Days also has the sad story of a women who felt forced into an abortion because she was the family's sole wage earner, her husband is a drunk and her mother (who it seems was her support system and talked her out of abortion on two previous occassions) was no longer alive.

Life Links 1/20/06

Should humans be considered valuable based on their appearance?

Could George Tiller care less about women he's performing abortions on? Follow this link and listen to an employee named Marguerite from Tiller's abortion clinic call for an ambulance. Her first concern is "please, please, please" for no lights and sirens on the ambulance. Christin Gilbert, the young woman who needed medical care later died because her abortion was botched. It also seems that Tiller didn't want the medical condition of his victim to be disclosed to the emergency personnel over the phone.


Why would any parent not want a child?