Where is the Abortion Movement Today?

[Dr Fuji Kamikaze]

How many babies have been agonizingly and gruesomely murdered as a result
of King Wilhelm I vetoing the banning of partial birth abortion -- TWICE?

Where is the Abortion Movement Today?
Mona Charen
January 7, 2000
http://www.newsmax.com/commentmax/articles/Mona_Charen.shtml

As the grim anniversary of Roe vs. Wade approaches, it seems a good time to ask
where the "abortion rights" movement (as the press usually characterizes it) is
today.
The last decade of the 20th century was not kind to abortion-on-demand. The
Supreme Court upheld limits on abortions in Planned Parenthood vs. Casey. The
Congress changed hands, going from majority pro-choice to majority pro-life.
And, but for two presidential vetoes, a ban on partial-birth abortions would
have become the law of the land.

Since Roe vs. Wade was decided in 1973, there have been more than 35 million
abortions in the United States, though the rate declined 16 percent during the
1990s. The number of doctors willing to do abortions also declined during the
1990s by 14 percent.

The response of the abortion movement to all this -- and to the existence of an
articulate and committed pro-life movement -- has been close to hysterical.
Though there is virtually no chance that the United States will return to the
legal regime in place pre-Roe (few states would reinstate the strict limits
then in place), you would never be able to tell that by listening to the
abortion advocates.

Shrill doesn't begin to capture it. Consider this fund-raising letter from
Planned Parenthood. "For years Planned Parenthood has fought off constant
attacks from the politically powerful Christian Coalition and the violently
radical Operation Rescue. Now, we also battle newly formed groups with
misleading names like the Family Research Council and Focus on the Family. All
of these groups are politically astute, extremely well-funded and have a
fanatical -- often militant -- approach to achieving their goals. ... To some
of these groups, this might mean bombing a clinic ... blockading a door ...
harassing a patient ... stalking a doctor."

Notice the sly insertion of the words "some of" and "might mean." That's how
they can wriggle out of a libel suit. But it's a libel just the same. The
overall impression left by the repetition of the names Focus on the Family and
Family Research Council alongside descriptions of violence leaves the clear
impression that the named groups go in for that stuff.

The Family Research Council has never engaged in violence of any kind. (The
same cannot be said for Planned Parenthood, which engages in violence against
the unborn for a fee.) Nor has the FRC ever given aid or comfort to violence.
As Chuck Donovan of the Family Research Council put it in a letter to Planned
Parenthood president Gloria Feldt, "FRC has never condoned the bombing of an
abortion clinic, never advocated stalking abortionists, never tried to block
clinic doors, never sought to harass patients -- never. ... When abortionists
have been shot, we have been among the first to denounce the killings."

The pro-abortion movement resorts to lies on a regular basis. There is simply
no other conclusion. During the debate over partial-birth abortion, spokesmen
for the pro-abortion cause first adamantly denied that the procedure even
existed, then asserted that the baby was already dead (killed by the anesthesia
administered to the mother) before the operation began, then argued that it was
so rare as to be negligible, and finally argued that it was necessary to
protect the lives and future fertility of women.

Each and every one of those assertions was false and was known to be false, as
Ron Fitzsimmons, a spokesman for the abortion cause, admitted months later.

Why this hysteria? Why the need to smear every opponent as violent, extreme or
crazy? Perhaps it's because demonization is much easier than debate. When your
case is weak, avoid debate at all costs.

But the lies have taken their toll on the movement. Polls show more
conservatism on abortion than was seen a decade ago. The National Abortion
Rights Action League is sponsoring TV ads this campaign year, but not, reports
the National Journal, aimed at voters. No, NARAL president Kate Michelman says,
"Our target audience ... is the media."

That is the one group on whom the abortion movement can still rely. But will it
be enough to blunt the consciences of the rest of the nation?

COPYRIGHT 1999 CREATORS SYNDICATE, INC.

God Bless America
Dr Fuji Kamikase

"We hang the petty thieves and appoint the great ones to public office." --
Aesop
"A liberal is a man who will give away everything he doesn't own." -- Frank
Dane