Abortion Has Claimed the Lives of 17 Percent of Americans

It’s the time of year when thoughts turn more concertedly to the ongoing tragedy – and travesty – of abortion.

Activists count back to the January 1973 decision in Roe v. Wade and produce new calculations on how many lives have been ended prematurely through the deliberate choice of their mothers—and with the often enthusiastic cooperation of medical professionals who have found their own ways of reconciling the destruction of life with their Hippocratic oath. (The latest addition tells us that a number roughly equivalent to the population of California, Oregon, Washington, Nevada, and Arizona has been subtracted from the human race.)

Partisans of “a woman’s right to choose” rejoice, taking shelter in the assertion that the decision to abort a child is a personal one, between a mother and … well, really, no one. A father’s rights are no longer any more sacred than the life in the mother’s womb, parents are often legally required to stand aside, and doctors these days are on hand less to offer medical counsel than to facilitate the mechanics or chemistry of destruction.

On that score: chemistry is rapidly trumping mechanics, as the efficiency of the abortionists grows. Planned Parenthood is making new fortunes in blood money through the increasingly widespread use of “tele-med” abortions, which negate the presence or participation of medical staff. An expectant mother simply steps into a room, confirms to a doctor via a video chat her determination to abort, follows his directions to press a specific button, and – voila! – a drawer pops open with two pills inside. “Take one now and one tomorrow,” the doctor says. No muss, no fuss … no baby.

Such simplicities make it easier for the body count to accumulate, and there, too, the abortionists are at an advantage, for as Joseph Stalin reminded us, “One death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic.” The more babies that die, the less unbearable the death of one more … a hundred more … a thousand more becomes. Abortionists know better than most that nothing succeeds like excess.

Stalin, though, had nothing on Shannon Dea, co-president of Planned Parenthood’s Waterloo Region, in Canada, who recently declared that “Medical science is irrelevant to the question of when a fetus becomes a human being – that matter is a legal and philosophical one, not a medical one.” But what, exactly, is to be gained by wading into debate with those who deem undeniable truth – and even facts – irrelevant?

Nothing, likely. But for the general benefit, let us consider one particular philosophical implication of all those lives, quenched in the womb. The roughly 53 million children aborted since 1973 equals about 17 percent of America’s current 312 million-plus population. Nearly one-fifth of us, simply taken out of the equation … the equation being our culture, our communities, our daily interactions, our myriad accomplishments as a people.

How would any of us begin to estimate the cost of losing not just the lives, but the extraordinary impact of one-fifth of our nation’s people? What diseases have gone untreated because the mind that could have isolated the necessary bacteria or virus never lived to see a laboratory?

Across those two lost generations, what outstanding leaders of business or industry, what eloquent voices of religion or politics, have been forfeited to a mother’s choice? What paradigm-shifting ideas and insights … what soul-stirring art and music and language … what heroic explorations and athletic accomplishments have never transpired because the unique imaginations and wills and endurances that would have achieved them were vacuumed from a woman’s womb?

How many of those aborted had within them the one-of-a-kind vision that might have accomplished peace … rolled back poverty … broken down racism … staved off tyrants and terrorists … translated, transformed, transcended some aspect of our civilization in a way no one ever had before?

A mind like Einstein’s … the eloquence of Martin Luther King, Jr. … the wisdom of Washington … the physical grace of Baryshnikov … these come along maybe once or twice in a generation. In our arrogance and near-sightedness, did we forfeit our most gifted ones to the expediencies of a self-centered, sex-obsessed culture?

We may never know – but we can wonder. In city after city, as child after child is destroyed without coming to fruition, what are we costing ourselves – and our own children and grandchildren? The abortionists are half right: abortion is as personal as a decision gets.

But it’s about far more – so very, very much more – than any woman’s “right to choose.”

LifeNews Note: Alan Sears, a former federal prosecutor in the Reagan Administration, is president and CEO of the Alliance Defense Fund.

One of our forum posters pegged the abortions since Roe vs Wade at 54 million. I found a 2007 resource that pegged it at 50 million then, so we’re not far off with a figure of 54 million.

At any rate, there are 21 states west of the Mississippi river in the lower 48 states. If the population of 17 of states were to suddenly drop dead, it would equal 54.2 million.

That would leave California, Texas, Washington, and Idaho as the only states with citizens left west of the Mississippi.

Think about those 17 empty states. That’s a massive area with no human life.

That’s the story of abortion. 54 million little beings have been snuffed out. 54 million wrong choices...

Newt DOES NOT believe life begins at conception!!!!

GINGRICH: Well, I think the question of being implanted is a very big question. My friends who have ideological positions that sound good don’t then follow through the logic of: ‘So how many additional potential lives are they talking about? What are they going to do as a practical matter to make this real?’

I think that if you take a position when a woman has fertilized egg and that’s been successfully implanted that now you’re dealing with life. because otherwise you’re going to open up an extraordinary range of very difficult questions

TAPPER: So implantation is the moment for you.

GINGRICH: Implantation and successful implantation. In addition I would say that I’ve never been for embryonic stem cell research per se. I have been for, there are a lot of different ways to get embryonic stem cells. I think if you can get embryonic stem cells for example from placental blood if you can get it in ways that do not involve the loss of a life that’s a perfectly legitimate avenue of approach.

What I reject is the idea that we’re going to take one life for the purpose of doing research for other purposes and I think that crosses a threshold of de-humanizing us that’s very very dangerous.

For any who have done genealogical research, just think about what you may find.

You might find a young teenage girl in your family tree who, in the 1860's gave birth to a boy child out of wedlock, and then, you might find that the man who grew from that child became a highly regarded artist or business man and community leader, who married and fathered 10 children.

Follow those 10 children, their marriages, their children, and their children's children, etc., etc., and by the Year 2012, that one little baby born in the 1860's became the ancestor of hundreds of successful citizens of America who contributed to the life of its churches, schools, its legal system, its manufacturing base, its military successes, and the freedoms all of us have enjoyed.

Now, suppose that young girl's family, in the 1860's, believed, as this President and his Party do, that she could not "fulfill her dreams" unless she could rid herself of the separate life beginning within her.

That family's shortsightedness on behalf of the "dreams" of their daughter would deprive the world of a man of faith who made an impact on the lives of many, whose children, and the generations following them continue to be productive citizens of their communities, their states, and the nation.

One may conclude that a leader of America who is so shortsighted that he could take the position this President has taken on such an important question does not understand the very foundations laid by our Declaration of Independence.

So by killing babies it fulfills our daughter's dreams? He also said it reflects the broader principles of America. As a state lawmaker in Illinois, he voted four times against legislation to protect the life of a baby that survived a botched abortion. Obama can only be described as ''pure evil.''

The MSM is complicit in this evil, because they cover up the Truth and promote propaganda. If the collective MSM chose to expose Obama (in countless ways) tomorrow, I am convinced he would be forced to resign within 2 weeks.

God alone is sovereign, and I will let Him deal with Obama, who will have a lot to answer for before the throne.

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