Free Republic

Women's rights advocates are angry after an amendment restricting abortion access and funding was added to the health care reform bill, which the House of Representatives passed on Saturday. "We had the most pro-choice candidate in decades, but we don't have the most pro-choice president," said Terry O'Neill, president of the half-million-strong National Organisation of Women. "The Stupak-Pitts amendment is a giant leap in the direction of making abortion completely inaccessible to all of us," O'Neill said. Sixty-four Democrats joined 176 Republicans to vote for the amendment, named after co-authors Representative Bart Stupak, a Democrat, and Republican lawmaker Joseph Pitts....

For me, the sum effect of this conversation was a demand upon my conscience to take a firm pro-life stance now and in the future. Abortion is a liberty issue. The pro-choice movement has effectively hijacked the concept of liberty and misapplied it to the mother’s capacity to kill her unborn child. In truth, liberty’s stake in the issue has to do with the arbitrary devaluing of human life to justify murder for personal gain. There is no rationalization for abortion that does not ultimately rely upon an arbitrary definition of human life. If we can define human life arbitrarily,...

Pattern of Threats and Intimidation Escalates Into an Assault on a Pro-Life Volunteer at a Prayer Vigil FRESNO, CA – Right to Life of Central California (RLCC), one of the largest pro-life organizations west of the Mississippi, today condemned the pattern of threats and intimidation targeted at pro-life volunteers, that escalated into an assault Thursday afternoon. On October 15th, Day 23 of our 40 Days for Life campaign, a pro-choice woman shouted obscenities at 40 Days volunteers, before attempting to break the event security camera and assaulting Victor Fierro, director of Latinos4Life. The attacker cut Fierro’s arm with an unknown...

Like a big lump of clay, Teddy Kennedy is being worked and reworked into an immortal. The mainstream media and other liberal apologists are seeing to the handiwork. They even want us to believe that Kennedy was squared with his Catholicism. But how could he be? He was unapologetically pro-abortion. Time magazine gave it go, though. It published an article last week about Kennedy's "quiet Catholic faith." For a man so vocal about many things, he certainly did keep quiet about his faith. And with good reason. Egregious apostasy was Teddy's way. On every major abortion vote, the late Senator...

"It's The Same Thing" is a shocking, unforgettable Pro-life film which will leave you stunned and either infuriated or in solumn agreement. Here's the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RzaSkw2vktg Reactions in it's first day on-line have been by turns tearful, grateful, enthusiastic, and heartfelt while the pro-death camp has been predictably rabid in their denial of the one simple truth: Abortion=Murder-It's The Same Thing. I encourage all Freepers to view the controversial video, which takes a different approach to make this point-the emotional path. We must first engage the emotions before we can hope to change minds, touch hearts, and save the lives...

Abortion: White House says surgeon general pick is pro-choice Margaret Talev and William Douglas WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama's nominee for surgeon general is a Catholic best known for founding an Alabama clinic that treats the poor, but her lesser-known support for abortion rights puts her at odds with her church and some of the groups that have praised her work. Regina Benjamin's Bayou La Batre Rural Health Clinic doesn't perform abortions. A clinic employee who declined to be identified said by telephone that patients seeking information about abortions would be referred to providers in the state. White House spokesman...

In 1984, a video called The Silent Scream helped change the way people think about the unborn child. The footage of an actual abortion and the fetus’s reaction reminded us that abortion involves the death of a real person. A recent bit of footage has similar potential, only it couldn’t be more different from The Silent Scream. The footage was part of a recent PBS special, The Music Instinct: Science & Song. The program was an exploration of, among other things, music’s “biological, emotional and psychological impact on humans.” Part of this “exploration” included how music affects babies. If we...

Funding UNFPA Last year, a young Chinese woman—let’s call her Dan Li—ran afoul of the Chinese government. She had become “illegally pregnant.” By the time the authorities found out, Dan Li was seven months along. Family planning officials tied her to a bed, induced labor, and, when the baby was born, killed the baby. What happened to Dan Li is an abomination—one, however, that tragically takes place regularly in China. But now, thanks to the U.S. Congress, you and I will be paying for it. Last March, without fanfare, Congress passed a bill providing $50 million for the United Nations...

A Minnesota judge has ruled a 13-year-old boy with a highly treatable form of cancer must seek medical treatment over his parents' objections. Brown County District Judge John Rodenberg ruled Friday that Daniel Hauser of Sleepy Eye has been "medically neglected" and is in need of child protection services. Rodenberg said Daniel will stay in the custody of his parents, but Colleen and Anthony Hauser have until May 19 to get an updated chest X-ray for their son and select an oncologist. Doctors have said Daniel's Hodgkin's lymphoma had up to a 90 percent chance of being cured with chemotherapy...

MINNEAPOLIS -- A Minnesota judge is expected to decide whether a family can refuse chemotherapy for a 13-year-boy's cancer and treat him with natural medicine, even though doctors say it's effectively a death sentence. With chemotherapy, Daniel Hauser has a 90 percent chance of surviving his Hodgkin's lymphoma, according to his cancer doctor. And without it? "It is almost certain that he will die," said Dr. Bruce Bostrom, a pediatric oncologist at Children's Hospital and Clinics of Minnesota. Bostrom, who diagnosed the disease, is an ally of the legal effort in southwestern Minnesota's Brown County to make Hauser submit to...

Also, fewer think abortion should be legal “under any circumstances” PRINCETON, NJ -- A new Gallup Poll, conducted May 7-10, finds 51% of Americans calling themselves "pro-life" on the issue of abortion and 42% "pro-choice." This is the first time a majority of U.S. adults have identified themselves as pro-life since Gallup began asking this question in 1995.

Primarily, we are concerned with getting people to think of the child as a person from the moment of creation. It is much harder to murder a person than it is to "remove a lump of tissues," and it is only when we finally get the nation thinking in those terms that we will be able to make abortion a crime, as it should be. Just by wearing the T-shirt and being out there in public, you will help to accomplish that goal.

The Obama administration's string of pro-choice appointments and actions in its first 100 days has awakened pro-life Americans in a growing tidal wave of enthusiasm and action. "There was a concern that after the president was elected, the pro-life movement would be so demoralized that it would be almost a death blow," said Charmaine Yoest, president and chief executive officer of Americans United for Life, the oldest national pro-life organization in the country. "But in fact, just the opposite is true." Yoest told WND that news of Obama's victory in November launched an immediate surge of pro-life activism, including over...

Ten priests from the order that founded the University of Notre Dame say the school risks its "true soul" and could distance itself from the Roman Catholic Church by inviting President Barack Obama to campus next month. The members of the Congregation of the Holy Cross, which helps run the university, asked the Rev. John Jenkins, the Holy Cross priest who is Notre Dame's president, and the university's board of fellows to reconsider the invitation to Obama because he supports abortion rights. "Failure to do so will damage the integrity of the institution," said the letter published Wednesday in Notre...

The University of Notre Dame made twin announcements that President Barack Obama would be giving the commencement speech and Ambassador MaryAnn Glendon would be receiving the university’s Laetare Medal this past weekend. The first news about Obama came on Friday, and blogger extraordinaire Rocco Palmo broke the story about Glendon Saturday evening. Whoever devised this timing in the Notre Dame press office deserves a raise! Maybe even a bonus! The right wing of the Catholic Church was, as we noted on Saturday, up in arms within a twinkling of the eye over any honor being given to the President. Mr....

The article says that the stem cell debate which claims those in favor are enlightened and those opposed benighted is a triumph of propaganda over journalism. It cites many medical researchers who are oppposed. http://www.thebulletin.us/articles/2009/03/12/top_stories/doc49b8ed8396a14904658428.txt

Now, the story surrounding this important appointment may be taking an even more troubling turn. If the rumors prove to be true, the replacement for Tom Daschle may be the Governor of Kansas, Kathleen Sebelius. Catholics and all who recognize that the inalienable right to life attaches to all human persons from the moment of conception have serious reason to be alarmed if they are true. Governor Kathleen Sebellius is an outspoken Catholic dissident who views the taking of the lives of children in the first home of the whole human race as a “health service” and a “choice”. If...

"It would bring shame on her family," explained my friend. While the age old tradition in China of 'checking the sheets' after the wedding night to make sure the bride was a virgin may be fast fading away, most Chinese parents are afraid of 'losing face' in front of their family members in friends. An unmarried daughter with a child would be a constant source for rumors and gossip. Having sex before marriage is one thing, but having a baby before marriage would most definitely bring shame upon the girl's entire family..

In an era when so many people seem to be focused on "the first" of any group to do something, maybe it was not so surprising when someone on television pointed out the first Australian to play in a Super Bowl. After all the hoopla over Barack Obama's becoming the first person of his complexion to become President, it was perhaps inevitable that there would be a small echo of that when Michael Steele became the first black head of the Republican National Committee. For those of us who are still so old-fashioned as to be concerned about someone's ability...

The election of Michael Steele as the new chairman of the Republican National Committee is a ray of hope in what has been a pretty dark and dreary season. I am a long time Steele fan with high expectations, but I realize there is only so much one man can do. Republicans have some serious problems and one person is not going to be able to wave a magic wand and make everything better, but I believe Steele can make a big difference and can re-energize the party. He brings with him a confidence and a freshness Republicans have been...

Women’s Rights Rehabbed by: Heather Latham, January 29, 2009 A women’s rights activist wants addict mothers to follow the example of Amy Winehouse and avoid rehab. Malika Saada Saar, founder and executive director of the Rebecca Project for Human Rights, argued for “mothering with dignity”: “We see the reproductive rights discourse in the courtrooms where mothers lose their children because of maternal incarceration for non-violent, drug-related felonies,” she told an audience at the Center for American Progress (CAP). Like Saada Saar herself, CAP strongly supports abortion. “We see the reproductive rights language, vision, and discourse expanded into the slow corners...

The first thing I want to say is, you don't have to be Pro-Life to join this group! There are already plenty of people that have joined that are Pro-Choice. This group is against FOCA, if you would like to learn about it, it takes only a few minutes. A second thought, before anyone ignores this group because they think it's a group against Obama, let me tell you that it's not. This group's sole purpose is to help keep FOCA from being passed. If you read my guidelines at the bottom, I do not tolerate any severe comments against...

Here's why I think the "pro choice" argument is stupid and flawed.. -- Pro Choice .. who’s choice? The “choice” of the persons wanting to kill the unborn infant. Why isn’t the “choice” of the infant wanting to live taken into account? Does the victim’s choice not matter? Given this argument to be valid, all crimes can be justified. Rapists can commit rape becuase it is their “choice” and of course the victims “choice” wouldn’t matter (as is the structure of this argument). Don’t want to have babies? Be responsible. Your carelessness does not give you the right to kill...

Conservative reaction to the Kirsten Gillibrand appointment thus far has been mixed. Some approve, on the grounds that it will bother liberals. "LIBERAL DEMS HOWL," heds the New York Post. Wake Up America is happy that liberal blogs are unhappy. NewsBusters says the mainstream media's refusal to use their terminology is proof of bias. "When will the mainstream [media] begin labeling Gillibrand as a 'Maverick Democrat?'" they demand. "Or is the 'maverick' label applied by the MSM only to Republicans who are liberals or 'moderates' (really meaning liberal)?... If she holds to her views then she would definitely be qualified...

The Elliot Institute has released a report that exposes America's forced abortion epidemic. Elliot Institute spokesperson Amy Solby tells OneNewsNow that one study found 64 percent of women who had abortions reported they felt pressured to abort by others. "Something like 80 percent of them said that they didn't get the counseling they needed to make a good decision, that often they were not given counseling at all, or that the counseling they had was inadequate," she explains.

Answers to "pro-choice" thinking 1. The "pro-choice" philosophy says, "We have the 'choice' to abort a child." It is a proven medical and scientific fact that the "choice" some people accept is the killing of a person. Defenders of slavery used this same strategy. "I'm not going to own a slave, but I don't have a right to tell you what to do." Abortion is the killing of a human being. The choice is always wrong. "Father of Modern Genetics" Dr. Jerome Lejeune told the Senate, "To accept the fact that after fertilization has taken place a new human has...

Go to Change.gov, the Web site of President-elect Barack Obama, and you'll find a document titled "Advancing Reproductive Rights and Health in a New Administration." Signed by dozens of pro-abortion groups, including Catholics for Choice, this 55-page document provides an overview of the marching orders for the Obama administration in removing all present restrictions on abortions while dramatically increasing abortion funding. Anyone who has bought into the myth that Obama is "moderating" his positions should notice that the first section is titled "Steps for the First Hundred Days." The groups that have spent millions supporting pro-abortion members of Congress, including...

It wasn’t that many years ago that Tom Daschle was the pro-life movement’s worst congressional nightmare. Over the years, as a Senator and Senate Minority Leader, he constantly supported pro-choice legislation and initiatives. In 1997, for example, Daschle proposed what he called a "compromise" regarding partial-birth abortion, banning the procedure while allowing exemptions for any woman who claimed mental or physical health reasons for having such a late-term procedure. Most saw this tactic as a smokescreen to guarantee the option to abort children by this grisly procedure akin to infanticide. Describing himself as a Catholic, in 2003 the 61 year-old...

For years the "pro-choice" mantra has gone something like this: abortion should be between a woman and her doctor, we can't tell women what to do with their bodies, women have a right to choose, etc. Yet, a recent forced abortion incident in China proves so-called "pro-choice" advocates are nothing more than pro-abortion. Arzigul Tursun and her family understand the length to which the oppressive Chinese population control regime will go to keep to its limited birth quotas. Six months pregnant, Tursun found herself captive at a local hospital with the impending threat of a forced abortion. But "pro-choice" groups...

By McCainiac Let's say you have two candidates, Candidate X and Candidate Y. Candidate X has a very poor track record as a fiscal conservative but is a rabid social conservative whose is solidly pro-life. Candidate Y has a reputation and record as a very fiscal conservative but has a slightly different opinion on abortion than the pro-life party line. Which candidate would win the Republican nomination for President? I think any honest Republican knows the answer to that hypothetical scenario. Candidate X could be George W. Bush. Candidate Y could be Barry Goldwater. When it comes to the Presidency,...

A Grave Mistake and an Abiding Hope November 6th, 2008 by Fr. Frank Pavone Americans have made a grave mistake in electing Barack Obama to the presidency. Yet America herself remains great and is not a mistake, which is why so many of her citizens will continue, with even greater energy and determination, to defend her founding principles.The man elected to the Presidency said during the campaign that he does not know when a human being starts to have human rights. How can one govern from that starting point of ignorance? Governing is about protecting human rights; to do it...

An abortion centre that performs abortions up to the sixth month of pregnancy has worked out an arrangement with two area hotels to provide substantially discounted room rates for women seeking abortions. Based on reports from local citizens participating in the 40 Days for Life prayer vigil outside the Cherry Hill Women's Center, New Jersey Right to Life has confirmed that the Clarion Hotel in Cherry Hill offers a reduced rate of $59 for a room originally priced at $109 to those women who provide a receipt from the abortion mill that says they have to stay overnight. In addition,...

An abortion centre that performs abortions up to the sixth month of pregnancy has worked out an arrangement with two area hotels to provide substantially discounted room rates for women seeking abortions. Based on reports from local citizens participating in the 40 Days for Life prayer vigil outside the Cherry Hill Women's Center, New Jersey Right to Life has confirmed that the Clarion Hotel in Cherry Hill offers a reduced rate of $59 for a room originally priced at $109 to those women who provide a receipt from the abortion mill that says they have to stay overnight. In addition,...

News from the Trenches (Editor’s Note: We reprint the item below at the request of Jack Smith, editor of The Catholic Key, official newspaper of the Diocese of Kansas City. In his blog entry below, Mr. Smith points out that a group calling itself “Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good” is really a front organization sponsored by the Democratic National Committee. “This group has been treated as legitimate by CNS and other Catholic news sources,” noted Mr. Smith in an email to California Catholic Daily.) WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 3, 2008 Cardinal George Slams 'Common Good' Fraud Catholics in Alliance for...

Reading the words carries an impact, but nothing compared to when you listen to them: It happened when a Planned Parenthood worker is asked to accept a donation specifically to abort a black child, and her response is: "Understandable, understandable." Now, however, those interested in the controversy over Planned Parenthood's large role in the nation's abortion industry may have to settle for seeing those words, since YouTube has decided to censor several audio recordings that had been posted by pro-life activists documenting the corporation's willingness to accept donations on the basis of race.

Hello, I’m going to go against what a very nice, well-meaning freeper warned me NOT to do just after joining FR and start an abortion discussion thread. Why? Because I’ve been thinking about these things, and my views on the issue are changing. I would like people’s input and hope that that input can help me shape my thinking(as I wrote in my introduction thread, I’m a 25 year old who is in this election for the first time going to vote republican)… Anyways, this isn’t a troll thread. I’m finding my views on this issue are morphing the more...

I wonder to myself how people can read the Bible, believe in God, love Jesus and or sit in church every Sunday and think it is okay to be Pro-Choice instead of Pro-Life. I have tried not to be tunnel visioned about this. And, as the elections heat up every cycle, I come back to this same head scratcher. People who know me know that I truly do not understand this. I have never gotten a reasonable answer.

I heard John Roberts' angry question towards Palin's choice for her baby (born April 18 this year) questioning whether Sarah could take care of a baby with Down's Syndrome and also manage to be Vice President. This was echoed on TV (again voiced by democrat male reporter), and by several seminar-callers to radio shows on Friday afternoon. Several radio show hosts - most in-depth was Hugh Hewitt with two interviews with DS organizers - skewered John Roberts about his attitude, and his assumption that having a child "with special needs" (as he put it) would take too much time, that...

Because I am addicted to arguing, I sometimes stray from Free Republic to go lock horns with liberals in their haunts. I don't go to DU, they delete you the minute they sense your shadow casting its blue shade across their tofu. I go to IMDb, where everyone roams free. The Obamites hold forth endlessly about how Bush has crippled women's sexual freedom. Any restriction on abortion, you see, cripples women's sexual freedom. How can anyone get laid if you can't have RU-486 via drive-thru?Now, I'm not really particularly interested in the abortion issue. I used to care, and was...

Infidels are Cool discovered this shocking audio from 2002: VIDEO LINK Barack Obama argues for death of babies that survive an abortion in 2002: In this audio Obama coldly claims two doctors helping a baby born alive after a botched abortion would be a burden when he was arguing against the Born Alive Infant Protection Act at the Illinois state legislature April 2002: "Essentially adding an additional doctor who then has to be called in an emergency situation to come in and make these assessments is really designed simply to burden the original decision..." Speechless.HotAir confirmed the legitimacy of the...

In wombs all across America, unborn children suck their thumbs and think, “I hope the next vice president isn’t in favor of aborting me!” OK, no they don’t. But plenty of Republican voters are apparently thinking it for them, which brings us to the latest symbolic litmus test to which John McCain is being subjected to mollify the conservative base, which still can’t quite come to grips with the fact that McCain is the Republican nominee for president. McCain, who thinks for himself and has been known to come to conclusions with which this column disagrees, let slip in a...

By Michelle Malkin  •  August 19, 2008 09:11 AM Scroll down for updates… Wouldn’t put it past him. Would you? Which is why, despite all the encomiums he’s received from his Saddleback appearance, I haven’t joined the ga-ga bandwagon (and won’t).Rich Lowry reports: NR has learned that the McCain campaign has been calling key state GOP officials around the country the last couple of days and sounding them out about the consequences of a pro-choice VP pick. The campaign is asking about the reaction of conservative grass-roots activists to such a pick and whether a pro-choicer can be sold to them....

According to National Review, McCain has been calling around floating the idea of a Pro-Choice VP. This is our opportunity to influence McCain's decision. Here, we'll post phone numbers, email addresses, and templates so you can contact your local and national party headquarters and let McCain know how Conservatives really feel. It is time to remind folks of the FReeper Voice! To start, here are the contact numbers to a lot of talk shows. The Alan Colmes Show Alan Colmes 1-877-FOR-ALAN M-F, 10pm - 1am ET Battle Line with Alan Nathan Alan Nathan 1-800-510-TALK M-F, 12pm - 3pm PT Bill...

DENVER - The request befuddled Leah Daughtry. The experienced political hand in charge of planning next month's Democratic National Convention - a self-described "black chick from Brooklyn" and ordained Pentecostal minister who keeps a Bible in her purse - didn't know what to tell the atheists. Daughtry, 44, was preparing for an Aug. 24 interfaith service that will open the Democrats' gathering here - a first for a party that hasn't always gotten God. Before her was an angry letter from a secularist group that wanted to know whether atheists would be on the podium. "Atheists speaking at an interfaith...

In his column of June 24, Wall Street Journal writer William McGurn looked at the mostly NARAL-friendly Catholics named to the Obama campaign’s National Catholic Advisory Council. Noting that Obama enjoys a NARAL approval rating of 100%, and that — while in the Illinois State Senate — he voted against a measure similar in intent to the unanimously approved 2002 Federal Born Alive Act, McGurn wonders how the council and other Catholics for Obama can rationalize support for a candidate who stands in such profound contrast to the church’s firm teaching that abortion is “an intrinsic evil.” The…line of argument...

An abortionist who claims to have destroyed more than 20,000 unborn children and who once was Hillary Clinton's OB-GYN says he is doing "God's work" when he terminates a pregnancy. "Embryos and fetuses spontaneously aborted – most, but not all of those 'canceled' by 'God' – are ... luckless human souls," wrote William Harrison, referring to an ancient poem describing the plight of mankind. "But a few spontaneous abortions occur in desired pregnancies with no discernable abnormalities. For those girls and women and their families whose circumstances would make their babies 'luckless human souls,' I 'cancel' them before they become...

Back in my pro-choice days, I read that in certain ancient societies it was common for parents to abandon unwanted newborns, leaving them to die of exposure. I found these stories to be as perplexing as they were horrifying. How could this happen? I could never understand how entire cultures could buy into something so obviously terrible, how something that modern society understands to be an unthinkable evil could be widely accepted among large groups of people. Because of my deep distress at hearing of such crimes against humanity, I found it irritating when pro-lifers would refer to abortion...

Return to the Article June 30, 2008Obama's Callous IndifferenceBy Peter Kirsanow Washington Post columnist Richard Cohen declares that Barack Obama is " 'likable enough' -- in fact, so much so that he is the most charismatic presidential candidate I have seen since Robert F.Kennedy." Well, even though I've  never spoken with Obama, I don't like him very much  (I did testify with him [and a few others] once about a bill he'd sponsored on voter intimidation, but at the time he didn't impress me as unlikable, just a little intellectually lazy) . This hasn't always been the case.  Until...

Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- To draw attention to the way abortion disproportionately affects the African-American community, black pro-life advocates will be protesting outside the upcoming annual meeting of the nation's largest organization representing blacks. The NAACP protest will also reach the Democratic presidential candidate. Rev. Clenard Childress, a New Jersey pastor, told LifeNews.com about the protest and said pro-abortion presidential candidate Barack Obama and former candidate Hillary Clinton will be at the convention.  "Because 2008 is an election year, the presidential candidates will undoubtedly speak at the convention. This gives us a national stage to make our case to the...

by Steven Ertelt Bristol, England (LifeNews.com) -- A new report indicates a teenager died just one week after having a legal abortion -- providing more evidence that legal abortions are not safe for women. Manon Jones, an 18-year-old student from Caernarfon, Gwynedd experienced heavy bleeding after the abortion and eventually died. After the abortion, Jones felt light-headed over subsequent days and began experiencing abnormal bleeding. She then became what is believed to be the fourteenth woman to have died after using the dangerous abortion drug