New York Times op ed: “The year of the (pro-life) woman”
Good timing.
In conjunction with our weekend question and a previous post on the same general topic comes an op ed by Ramesh Ponnuru in the June 11 New York Times entitled, “The year of the (pro-life) woman.”
The entire piece is excellent. Here’s an excerpt…
… Gallup… has found that 48% of American women consider themselves pro-life, while 45% consider themselves pro-choice.
There are many millions of pro-life women, but there are only 13 in the House. The Senate has no pro-life women….
The number of pro-life women running for office has increased, perhaps paradoxically, because of the social changes of the last few decades. The first generation of women to become active in politics strongly identified as feminist and considered abortion rights central to their feminism. Pro-life women were more likely to be full-time homemakers. Their invisibility on the public stage contributed to an impression that the vast majority of women were pro-choice….
These days socially conservative women are likely to have careers, too. The growing number of Americans who consider themselves pro-life suggests that fewer people, of either sex, consider access to abortion to be crucial to women’s economic success. The pro-life stance generally wins Republicans votes in general elections, because pro-lifers are more likely to vote on the issue than pro-choicers are…..
Political journalists called 1992 “the year of the woman” because so many female candidates won Senate seats that year – including Barbara Boxer, who was elevated from the House. All those women supported abortion rights. “We have been waiting for our 1992,” says Marjorie Dannenfelser, the president of the Susan B. Anthony List, which encourages pro-life women to run for Congress. Her wait is coming to an end.
[HT: admin asst Kelli; Top photo L to R (click to enlarge): Sharron Angle, Republican pro-life candidate for US Senate in NV; Kelly Ayotte, Republican pro-life primary candidate for US Senate in NH; Carly Fiorina, Republican pro-life candidate for Senate in CA; and Nikki Haley, Republican pro-life primary run-off candidate for governor in SC; Bottom photo L to R (click to enlarge): Susana Martinez, Republican pro-life candidate for governor in NM; and Jane Norton, Republican pro-life primary candidate for US Senate in CO; and Star Parker, Republican candidate for Congress, CD-37]
Jill Stanek is a nurse turned speaker, columnist and blogger, a national figure in the effort to protect both preborn and postborn innocent human life.
Wooooo hooooo!!!!!
What have we learned these past 18 months? Just because a person in political office (or in-the-running) SAYS he/she is pro-life, doesn’t make it so. Pro-life is becoming a meaningless term. (Whoopi Goldberg –> “I’m pro-life AND pro-choice.”)
Have any of these women, by EXAMPLE, given any indication they are pro-life? Just asking.
Star Parker sure is, read her auto-biography “Pimps, Whores and Welfare Brats” her conversion from self-professed welfare queen to a Christian believer and moral Conservative is awesome. Her other books “Uncle Sam’s Plantation” and White Ghetto” are great as well. Does this mean Star won her primary in Californis? I had not heard whether she won last Tuesday in California?
Star was uncontested…she is in as the Republican Pro-Life candidate
http://beforeitsnews.com/news/76/935/Endorsed:_Star_Parker_8211;_37th_Congressional_District_of_California.html
You Go Girls!
Meg Whitman seems to be missing from the equation. But then she is more of the old fashioned fiscally conservative and socially liberal Republican that is a dying species. (Think Christie Todd Whitman) I will be curious to see how Kelly Ayotte does in New Hampshire as pro-life is not popular in New England. And as far as California, there hasn’t been a pro-life top office holder elected since 1988. California legalized abortion before Roe. And by “pro-life,” I would be curious to see their views broken down. Last year’s Gallup poll showed a slight majority of Americans identified as pro-life – but when categories of abortion were broken down, a solid majority believed in abortion under certain circumstances. In other words, those who identifed as pro-life did not necessarily believe that Roe should be overturned and abortion criminalized. And Star Parker – she’s running against Maxine Waters so I don’t think her candidacy has much of a chance.
Wow!
Praying for all of them!!
Hey Sammi I wouldn’t count Star out. God is able to give her the victory especially against the most radical, leftist, pro-abortion, socialist Black caucaus congresswomen in the country. Guys please pray and if you can help support Star try to do so. I made a donation to her campaign and will try to do so again, I don’t have much but every little bit helps. Did anyone else see on Glenn Beck last night, Maxine Waters was caught on video touting about how healthcare was going to give us “socialism” but she caught herself and tried to figure out a way not to say it. If anyone has access to that video segment or maybe the mods here do, please post it. I think everyone needs to see that clip. God is able to give Star and other pro-lifers the victory.
Wow – how did something this intelligent make it past the gatekeepers at the NYT?
I don’t know Lori, good question.
I love it – what the pro-death left hates most are pro-life women. I say – go – get elected and change the future of the nation.
Behold. Pro Life female candidates.
Never thougth I’d see so many of them grace the computer screen.
Looking forward to saying “Congresswoman Parker”.
Thanks for keeping us informed Jill. We live in exciting times to have so many pro-life women running for office. FIGHT ON!
If you have not heard Star speak you are missing a very powerful woman tell it like it is. I love her. I will send you whatever I can to help her get elected. She will run cirlces around Maxine Waters…the people in that district will be able to hear a very clear message of real hope from Star.
Thanks Ann Marie for your encouraging words about Star Parker. I heard her speak once and was thrilled. She is awesome and so are her books. We need to fight spritual warfare with our prayers and do whatever we can so she can replace the pro-death candidate Maxine Waters. I don’t know any people in California but there are probably many who post here who do and maybe they can help to get the word out, so she can to get some powerful campaign ads running so the people especially prolife organizations and churches learn about her. If God could answer the prayers of Christians against the Proposition to promote homosexual marriage in California (which they thought was a done deal), then he is able to help Star get elected to Congress. The reason that the Proposition in California was defeated was because the African American churches voted overwhelmingly against it even though they voted for Obama, they did NOT go along with the promotion of homosexual marriage. God is more than able to deliver the votes for this powerful pro-life woman.
Hi, Prolifer L @2:31 PM. I didn’t see Beck’s show. Any chance he played this clip of her comments about nationalizing the oil industry?
God is more than able to deliver the votes for this powerful pro-life woman. Posted by: Prolifer L at June 13, 2010 11:35 PM
Indeed, and so is the Tea Party. I don’t think they take Waters’ hypocrisy lightly. Please be forewarned that the video contains the f-word.
They look like a great group of ladies. I wish them all the best. Hope they win.
I am running against the vulnerable Laura Richardson in california 37th NOT Maxine Waters.I need 50,000 friends to send $50 each to beat her. Hope you all will be my friend as well as pass the word.Laura Richardson is a very weak incumbent and I can win!
Nine Reasons Why Abortions Are Legal
Abortion is never an easy decision, but women have been making that choice for thousands of years, for many good reasons. Whenever a society has sought to outlaw abortions, it has only driven them into back alleys where they became dangerous, expensive, and humiliating. Amazingly, this was the case in the United States until 1973, when abortion was legalized nationwide. Thousands of American women died.
Thousands more were maimed. For this reason and others, women and men fought for and achieved women’s legal right to make their own decisions about abortion.
However, there are people in our society who still won’t accept this. Some argue that even survivors of rape or incest should be forced to continue their pregnancies. And now, having failed to convince the public or the lawmakers, certain of these people have become violent extremists, engaging in a campaign of intimidation and terror aimed at women seeking abortions and health professionals who work at reproductive health clinics.
Some say these acts will stop abortions, but that is ridiculous. When the smoke clears, the same urgent reasons will exist for safe, legal abortions as have always existed. No nation committed to individual liberty could seriously consider returning to the days of back-alley abortions — to the revolting specter of a government forcing women to bear children against their will. Still, amid such attacks, it is worthwhile to repeat a few of the reasons why our society trusts each woman to make the abortion decision herself.
1. Laws against abortion kill women.
To prohibit abortions does not stop them. When women feel it is absolutely necessary, they will choose to have abortions, even in secret, without medical care, in dangerous circumstances. In the two decades before abortion was legal in the U.S., it’s been estimated that nearly a million women per year sought out illegal abortions. Thousands died. Tens of thousands were mutilated. All were forced to behave as if they were criminals.
2. Legal abortions protect women’s health.
Legal abortion not only protects women’s lives, it also protects their health. For tens of thousands of women with heart disease, kidney disease, severe hypertension, sickle-cell anemia and severe diabetes, and other illnesses that can be life-threatening, the availability of legal abortion has helped avert serious medical complications that could have resulted from childbirth. Before legal abortion, such women’s choices were limited to dangerous illegal abortion or dangerous childbirth.
3. A woman is more than a fetus.
Some people argue these days that a fetus is a “person” that is “indistinguishable from the rest of us” and that it deserves rights equal to women’s. On this question there is a tremendous spectrum of religious, philosophical, scientific, and medical opinion. It’s been argued for centuries. Fortunately, our society has recognized that each woman must be able to make this decision, based on her own conscience. To impose a law defining a fetus as a “person,” granting it rights equal to or superior to a woman’s — a thinking, feeling, conscious human being — is arrogant and absurd. It only serves to diminish women.
4. Being a mother is just one option for women.
Many hard battles have been fought to win political and economic equality for women. These gains will not be worth much if reproductive choice is denied. To be able to choose a safe, legal abortion makes many other options possible. Otherwise an accident or a rape can end a woman’s economic and personal freedom.
5. Outlawing abortion is discriminatory.
Anti-abortion laws discriminate against low-income women, who are driven to dangerous self-induced or back-alley abortions. That is all they can afford. But the rich can travel wherever necessary to obtain a safe abortion.
6. Compulsory pregnancy laws are incompatible with a free society.
If there is any matter that is personal and private, then pregnancy is it. There can be no more extreme invasion of privacy than requiring a woman to carry an unwanted pregnancy to term. If government is permitted to compel a woman to bear a child, where will government stop? The concept is morally repugnant. It violates traditional American ideas of individual rights and freedoms.
7. Outlaw abortion, and more children will bear children.
Forty percent of 14-year-old girls will become pregnant before they turn 20. This could happen to your daughter or someone else close to you. Here are the critical questions: Should the penalty for lack of knowledge or even for a moment’s carelessness be enforced pregnancy and childrearing? Or dangerous illegal abortion? Should we consign a teenager to a life sentence of joblessness, hopelessness, and dependency?
8. “Every child a wanted child.”
If women are forced to carry unwanted pregnancies to term, the result is unwanted children. Everyone knows they are among society’s most tragic cases, often uncared-for, unloved, brutalized, and abandoned. When they grow up, these children are often seriously disadvantaged, and sometimes inclined toward brutal behavior to others. This is not good for children, for families, or for the country. Children need love and families who want and will care for them.
9. Choice is good for families.
Even when precautions are taken, accidents can and do happen. For some families, this is not a problem. But for others, such an event can be catastrophic. An unintended pregnancy can increase tensions, disrupt stability, and push people below the line of economic survival. Family planning is the answer. All options must be open.
At the most basic level, the abortion issue is not really about abortion. It is about the value of women in society. Should women make their own decisions about family, career, and how to live their lives? Or should government do that for them? Do women have the option of deciding when or whether to have children? Or is that a government decision?
The anti-abortion leaders really have a larger purpose. They oppose most ideas and programs that can help women achieve equality and freedom. They also oppose programs that protect the health and well-being of women and their children.
Anti-abortion leaders claim to act “in defense of life.” If so, why have so many worked to destroy programs that serve life, including prenatal care and nutrition programs for dependent pregnant women? Is this respect for life?
Anti-abortion leaders also say they are trying to save children, but many have fought against health and nutrition programs for children once they are born. The anti-abortion groups seem to believe life begins at conception, but it ends at birth. Is this respect for life?
Then there are programs that diminish the number of unwanted pregnancies before they occur: family planning counseling, sex education, and contraception for those who wish it. Anti-abortion leaders oppose those, too. And clinics providing such services have been bombed. Is this respect for life?
Such stances reveal the ultimate cynicism of the compulsory pregnancy movement. “Life” is not what they’re fighting for. What they want is a return to the days when a woman had few choices in controlling her future. They think that the abortion option gives too much freedom. That even contraception is too liberating. That women cannot be trusted to make their own decisions.
Americans today don’t accept that. Women can now select their own paths in society, including when and whether to have children. Family planning, contraception, and, if need be, legal abortion are critical to sustaining women’s freedom. There is no going back.
Well, I’m convinced! Thanks Karen.
I guess the nightmares, depression, alcohol abuse, anxiety, shame, suicidal thoughts, suicide attempt and one dead daughter after my abortion were all in my head. That’s a relief.
Well, well, well…this wouldn’t happen to be one Karen Bell of Indianapolis, mother of deceased Becky Bell we’re speaking to is it? Or perhaps you’re someone else, but the name sounded familiar.
(Mods, please delete my prior post, it lent to a bad pun that wasn’t intended :P )
Posted by: Karen Bell at June 14, 2010 5:29 AM
Hey – newsflash everyone. 1 – Star Parker is running against Laura Richardson in CA-37, not Maxine Waters in CA-35. 2 – Anyone who thinks that a conservative candidate who only talks about tax breaks and pro-life issues can win in South Los Angeles clearly doesn’t know what’s going on.
Hi Bart,
See Star Parker’s post at 5:20am. Thanks.
So I guess these women are “anti choice fanatiques” instead of “anti-choice fanatics?”
Where can I send my donation, Star?
As a woman, and a voter. I am looking forward to the year of the pro-life woman!!!
May God grant these women wisdom and strength.
Karen Bell: I agree that abortion should remain legal, and I agree with a good part of what you posted. For example, I’m troubled by many in the pro-life movement who oppose contraception. After a few years of paying attention, however, I must disagree with this comment of yours:
“‘Life’ is not what they’re fighting for.”
I believe that the pro-life men and women who post here are sincerely fighting for what they consider innocent human life. While they may also have political views that you and I would find less supportive of born humans, what unifies them, at lieast at this site, is a belief that human life, from conception on, should be protected by law.
So, we can say they are wrong, and we can say that their ideas are unworkable, but I would no longer say that they “don’t care” about “born humans” or that they are not sincere in their desire to protect “unborn children.”
Hi Hal. I will think of you when I start training for the triathlon. :)
I appreciate what you said. I agree. So many of us truly love and care for both women and their babies. I have read the comments from prolifers that offer HELP.
Thanks Star for clarifying who you are running against and for stating that you can win this congressional seat. I believe you can definitely and will do what I can to help. God bless you and keep you in this campaign.
You had the right clip of Maxine Waters, Fed Up. I apologize I was mistaken, the clip was about the take over of the oil industry not about healthcare. Thank you for the clarification. I do appreciate all of you who are much more computer savvy than I am. God bless.
“but I would no longer say that they “don’t care” about “born humans” or that they are not sincere in their desire to protect “unborn children.””
Thanks so much Hal. IMHO, prolifers are the most compassionate group of people on the planet. If someone respects all human life from conception to natural death, they are much more likely to respect me and you as well.
Peace.
Thanks Hal for allowing a space where in fact we do care about the born. Many of my fellow pro-lifers volunteer at schools, nursing homes, soup kitchens, raise money for other charities. Even one of my pro-choice friends volunteers distributing food to local families.
However, Bell, the most empowered woman is a born woman. Dead fetal baby women: not empowered. You can list all the beliefs you like about why you think abortion should be legal and why its so easy for you to believe a fiction that we exist to oppress women. The kind of women we are fighting for need a little more time to develop in their mother’s wombs. These gals just need a little time. Is that too much to ask?
Thanks Hal — many of us here care about the same things you do — poverty, inequality, the environment. And not all of us are opposed to contraception!
phillymiss, I certainly acknowledge a diversity of views on non-abortion issues. There does generally seem to be a correlation between pro life views and other “conservative” views, however.
Thank you, Hal, for your 9:39AM comment!
“Every child a wanted child.” … If women are forced to carry unwanted pregnancies to term, the result is unwanted children. Everyone knows they are among society’s most tragic cases, often uncared-for, unloved, brutalized, and abandoned. Posted by: Karen Bell at June 14, 2010 5:29 AM
The majority of maltreated children were wanted children at birth. You are perpetuating a myth suggesting that only “unwanted” children are maltreated. And despite the legalization of abortion, deaths due to child maltreatment are increasing. I am not claiming that abortion is the reason for this, but I do believe we need more research into the effects of abortion on society. One study found a correlation between maternal history of abortion and subsequent child maltreatment.
At the most basic level, the abortion issue is not really about abortion. It is about the value of women in society. Should women make their own decisions about family, career, and how to live their lives? Or should government do that for them? Do women have the option of deciding when or whether to have children? Or is that a government decision?
That line of reasoning is an epic fail. Pro-aborts do not object to government intrusion into women’s lives. We know this because all the major pro-abort groups supported passage of Obamacare, which puts government in the middle of every aspect of a woman’s health care. Because pro-aborts did not object to a law giving government decision-making power over a woman’s health insurance benefits, out of pocket expenses, or even the care her physican may or may not recommend without penalty, they cannot credibly claim to support freedom from “government decisions.”
Their only credible claim can be that government should selectively enforce rights of the unborn based on the wishes of the unborn child’s mother. I say “selectively enforce” because fetal homicide laws and inheritance laws pertaining to the unborn tell us that the unborn do indeed have rights. Abortion stands for suppression of a right to life or selective enforcement of such right.
Star Parker is going to take California District 37, but she cant do it with your help. Spread the word that she is running and needs our help. Here is a link of one of her recent speeches. This women is magnificent speaker and PRO LIFE!!!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ohRs-AaFMM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lne2-pMOD4w
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jhjIVUT1Y_Q
http://www.starparkerforcongress.com