Stanek wkend Q: Should pro-lifers disqualify Rand Paul as presidential pick over Plan B support?
From CNN, September 30:
“If life starts at conception, should medicine that prevents conception like Plan B be legal?,” a woman asked him during a question-and-answer session here.
Paul at first gave a terse answer: “I am not opposed to birth control,” he said.
After a pause, Paul elaborated. “That’s basically what Plan B is,” he said. “Plan B is taking two birth control pills in the morning and two in the evening, and I am not opposed to that.”…
Paul stood by his answer after the event, when asked about the exchange by reporters.
“Plan B is taking birth control,” he said. “I am not against birth control and I don’t know many Republicans who would be indicating that they are against birth control.”
Rand Paul’s representation of Plan B is untrue. As Family Research Council’s Tony Perkins tweeted:
W/due respect to @SenRandPaul, Plan B isn’t "basically" birth control. Its function is to create conditions hostile to human life in utero.
— Tony Perkins (@tperkins) October 2, 2014
Plan B’s own packaging agrees.
Actually, Plan B is not alone in potentially aborting a 5-to-9-day-old tiny human who hasn’t yet implanted in the wall of his or her mother’s uterus, which the drug blocks. Hormonal birth control – the pill, implants, etc. – and the IUD can do the same.
This is the reason Hobby Lobby owners sued the U.S. government. They opposed being forced to provide certain forms of birth control that can cause abortions.
The “emergency contraceptive” Ella can also kill an embryo, but directly. It contains the same “embryotoxic” chemical compounds as RU-486.
Should pro-lifers disqualify Rand Paul as a presidential contender because he supports forms of contraception that can abort the youngest of humans?
[Graphic via Daily Beast]
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.
Personally, I am tired of a president that lives in his own dream world of conveniently ignored facts.
I would like to support someone who sees with clear eyes…regardless of the politics.
Insisting that a drug acts only in one way and never in another way (which it does) is a dreamy weak argument.
I think the votes will be pretty well split around here.
I did like some of his dad Ron Paul’s positions, but the Ronster was also so far out in left field on some things that he wasn’t gonna get in.
During the last Presidential election, Pro-lifers rallied around a guy who never voted anything pro-life in his life. Why would they ever disqualify Paul? If he’s the guy elected, pro-life conservatives will throw 100% of their support behind him – no doubt.
Ex-GOP has a point: Pro-lifers will support a mostly pro-life guy against an ardent abortion supporter. Many Republicans and Stupak-style Democrats (like Ben Nelson) have played pro-lifers because our devoted support is so easy to get when the other side is so bad.
I have not paid attention to Rand Paul, so I won’t speak to him in particular.
In general: If a politician is of good heart and pro-life, then he is willing and able to learn the facts about abortifacients that masquerade and are marketed as contraception. He should be able to correct himself, and be statesman-like enough to save face as he does so. Such a guy is presidential material. GW Bush knew how to admit when he had made a mistake.
Another voting principle that I hold: I need a President who supports pro-life. He needs to speak of life with respect, and he needs to sign pro-life legislation. He needs to nominate judges who understand that there is no other justice when the right to life is not protected. He does not need to be “totally pure” as a pro-life activist.
Presidents are not important much. People get all excited about presidential elections, but a president does not intrude in our lives and families as much as a local school board member can.
To be sure, Obamacare, his “war on women” and his denial of our conscience rights and religious freedom have been a major distraction. But the school board are the ones who invite Planned Parenthood in and hand out condoms to our kids. Mind your local politicians with fierce vigilance!!!
I’d like to know what Rand Paul’s stance on smoking is. Needs to be outlawed if EVERY BLASTOCYST COUNTS.
No. Two reasons:
1. There is good reason to think Plan B doesn’t affect implantation. See:
http://lti-blog.blogspot.ca/2014/02/what-about-fda-information-serge.html
http://lti-blog.blogspot.ca/2014/01/be-careful-out-there-when-discussion.html
2. If he wins the nomination, he’ll still be way more pro-life than whoever his opponent is (much like Romney, McCain, and most of the past GOP nominees). You don’t vote to get everything you want, you vote to get the least of what you don’t want.
Dr. Ben Carson for president!
C’mon, Truthseeker, where’s your sense of history?
Pat Paulsen, baby.
Plan B is basically birth control pills. But I used to take the pill. It stated right in its packaging that it changes the lining to prevent implantation should ovulation still occur. So why some pro-lifers and Rand Paul still say “NO IT DOESN’T!!! DOES NOT! DOES NOT! DOES NOT!” is beyond me. It does. Maybe not all the time. But it does. And the manufacturers of the pill and Plan B admit it.
Line is drawn in the sand people. Does life begin at conception or doesn’t it? And does every life count or not? Do older babies matter more than younger babies? We’ve got to stop dancing around this issue with our heads in the sand.
I don’t have a problem with contraception. But I do have a problem with birth control…things that prevent BIRTH. Which these pills do. And abortion does. But Rand Paul has no problem with that.
Not gonna get my vote Rand. This is a litmus test issue for me.
Politicians aren’t going to save the world, but I’d vote for a mostly pro-life candidate over a mostly pro-abortion candidate if those were my two choices.
And yes, every blastocyst deserves to keep on developing without deliberate and deadly interference.
“Disqualified”? You’re looking at a movement that voted en masse for Mitt Romney, who didn’t simply support murdering the children of rape and incest, but actually *ran television ads* promoting his anti-life stance to the voters.
Pro-lifers will, as always, support the best pro-life candidate on offer. Rand Paul proved here that he is imperfect (although he may well be educable; his comments on this are verrrry tentative, and I don’t think he sounds up-to-date on his abortifacient science). But I can’t remember the last time the GOP ran a candidate for president who was not, in some important way, defective — if not on abortion, then on some other life issue, like torture. We will have to wait and see who Rand is up against in late 2015.
Unless she drops dead it will be Hillary.
What was Mitt Romeny’s response, did he not attend a fundraiser thrown by the manufacterers of Planned B abount five months before the election and during the primaries and not a peep from the PLM on that condidates support of birth control. Romeny was also in favor of abortion being used as birth control in cases of rape & incest. I am a little dissipointed Rand is not bringing up the major, major anti-woman flavor of birth control as not being a drug that fully discloses it’s full health impacts or the incredibly significant factor that it “works” as feticide and that, that kind of an abortion also increases the risk of cancer by up to 9% ( breast cancer), and that, to me is a major issue he should be pinging this with. We cannot ask Rand to be a saint when we accept Mitt as a sinner. I do disagree with his language though, but I understand the language being thrown at him was not of his choosing and specifically asked in a manner that would trap him.
Rand is not always as much of a political player as he could be, and tends to love egg heads from private liberal arts colleges which I think can have a limiting impact, but largely increases his appeal to conservative minded-democrats and left leaning liberal republicans. If they can peg him as anti-woman in any way shape or form, it will hurt our republican front runner, because ALOT of Americans DO NOT wish to have a woman president. Things may have changed since that survey was taken, BUT you would have to look against women if you wanted those people to vote for a woman president. This is not about sexism, but it easily could be if the Republicans ask Americans to take any more of their Rhino hypocrisy to the health clinic. Sadly Rand may be our best hope, as I can easily see another John McCain jumping the shark on this race which could be a solid win for Republicans in a post Obama America. Hillaries appeal is that she is a continuation of that legacy of “women’s rights” and liberal sexual values of power and anti-war dominance over the media, and she’s got a lot of bluster and a shiny veneer, but childish ways to go with that. Who we pick has to seam pretty honest comparably and that visual comparison, just an honest man you can trust with your wallet, next to her, may be enough. Sadly alot of people didn’t feel that with Mitt or with John. Rand may hold a larger appeal on those who have been fleeced, and that is the feeling alot of Americans have; “I’ve been ripped off, where’s my Macchiato, the one thing I can trust, lol.” It would be nice if there was some one out there who could explain to American’s clearly and in catchphrases why they feel that way, but my fear is that Hillary’s speechwriters will do that and in the same dishonest fashion we have been seeing the devil work in that party for the past thirty years; by pushing abortion and other products of despair as a freedom.
…
Then again, that is a dangerous response in a way, because if one of my friends had taken that pill, her little boy Cameron, who is totally wild and amazing for a five year old, would not have been, so it was a very hard decision for her to make, and she made the right one, but with soundbites like this one… I’m not sure if she or little Cameron would have made it, so he needs to correct himself REALLY FAST if he wants to be seen as not a Rhino on this one truly major issue. DARNIT RAND. :-(
CityOfAngels.US: egg heads from private liberal arts colleges :P
While I’m not sure, I do think that McCain “really wanted to be President.”
Romney, though – seriously, I don’t think his heart was really in it.
Oh, Man, Doug. I think he had it going on, but too little too late. What’s going to happen to this country, if we get another 4 years of abortion on demand… we’ll have nothing left. We deff. have to beat Hillary.
Another woman I know lost a child to planned B, Catholic. At least I think it was that, from what I remember her telling me… she didn’t mention the sort of pain UR 486 -the intentional miscarriage- causes, so I don’t think that was it. He’s drawing a line in the sand, Rand is, I don’t know if he’s done enough research, who ever wins this is going to have to know more about women’s rights, than most women’s rights activists… whoever wins this is going to have to know more about women’s rights than the average person, and about as much about women’s rights as the pro-life activist does… because women’s rights are essentially mothers rights, which got shoved under the carpet with feminism, which evolved into feminizm and then faminazizm, and now it’s straight up hedonism which is the libertine movement in America as we have it now.
It’s not going to be enough to just run for president and to have the values that are good enough – who ever runs is going to have to be a wordsmith, a master of political thinking, with the heart and support team (a following, a family, and an inner circle ). Perry was shelved pretty quickly because he was so effective the liberals had to can him. Whomever goes up against Hillary is going to have to come at these people with a unified front. The abortion cartel is a nation without borders, like ISIS. If only the Catholic Church could get it’s game together.
Santorum tried to come on behalf of the Catholics, but he came too late with too little, falling short in the opposite way as Romney did. Ron Paul was against supporting Israel, which even many of the most liberal of the Democrats opposed. Newt was smart, efficient with his words, effective in many ways as an operator, politically astute, but he came out early and said what they all ultimately say which is:
“it’s not a life until implantation.”
And yet it hurts the same when you love it and lose it. How come then, it’s not a life?
these are women’s rights issues… women’s rights to know the pain the abortion will cause, emotionally and physically AS IT DOES CAUSE PAIN, and PASS IS VERY REAL. Women have a right to know their clinics are below the standards of all other clinics. And women’s rights to access the necessary resources to make actual choices instead of the obligatory response to irresponsible male behavior. We see abortion as irresponsible female behavior… but as some one pointed out above… the school board invited this chain abortuary in to teach them about abortion at the same time they showed them how to have sex. Abortion is responsible female behavior according to most public educators. Churches don’t want anti-abortion information in their parishes because they don’t want to appear intolerant of “choice”, while they invite in homo sexual outreach groups to show tolerance towards recreational sex practitioners… it has nothing to do with who women are attracted to, everything to do with the aftermath…
Women are going to vote for their grandMother, because they won’t be want to vote for their father or grandfather, they don’t trust them. But women voters want to, and in way this should be an easy win for the Republicans, especially after female voters voted for their boyfriend and it so tragically didn’t work. Women who had abortions during the Obama administration, who voted for Obama, believe me, they want a way out of this… not only that… a part of them wants revenge. This should be an easy win, but Republicans can’t see the pain these women are going through.
Unfortunately, as was pointed out at the end of the post, all forms of hormonal birth control also can cause early abortions. So Rand Paul is correct and consistent. If you are against Plan B, you should be against the Pill. Conversely, he is not against birth control, so he is not against Plan B.
Plan B is simply a higher dose of a synthetic hormone commonly found in other forms of birth control. But birth control is the sacred cow of the sexual revolution and the massive cultural changes that resulted. It has become so ingrained in society as a “right” that many, if not most, Christians don’t know or don’t want to know it kills babies. To threaten birth control is the political third rail–touch it and instant death. Truth be damned.
Even the Family Research Council, not usually afraid to stand up for what’s right, doesn’t understand how birth control works. When I received their email regarding Rand Paul, I sent them an email with links to package inserts, with explanation. I ended my email with:
“Please open your eyes to the truth about hormonal contraceptives, that they kill untold numbers of babies in their earliest stages every year. I know it’s hard to imagine that all the good, pro-life, Christian married couples, perhaps even those at FRC, could have unintentionally killed some of their own children through contraception. It’s not something you want to think about. But it needs to be thought about–for the future, for couples who love life and wouldn’t want to do anything to harm their children. They need to know. Repentance and renewal need to start with the Body of Christ, His Church.
PLEASE DO NOT BE AFRAID TO TELL THE TRUTH!
May God give you courage.”
It took a while but I was able to get through to my 18yo daughter about the dangers of hormonal contraception. She stopped taking it after the first month. I was worried about beast cancer and was able to get her to see the truth. According to this government web site:
“Overall, birth control pill use within the past year was associated with a 50 percent increased risk of breast cancer risk compared with former use or no use of birth control pills, Beaber found.”
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/news/fullstory_147633.html
I can’t believe doctors prescribe this stuff.
True that it does make the uterine lining less receptive to human life but the way the BC industry has kept the breast cancer increase thing below women’s radar is astonishing. My daughter didn’t believe me when I told her. And when she researched on the Internet it is hard to find the real statistics. They use words like slight increase. But she sees the truth now. Praise the Lord!
Plan B is an early form of abortion. It is a deliberate attempt to end the life of an innocent child at the earliest stages. I am afraid that if Rand Paul cannot understand this, then he can’t understand what it means to be pro-life: that life begins at conception. The truth is that hormonal birth control also acts as an abortifacient, by altering the uterine lining. However, most people do not want to acknowledge this. If instead, we saved what needs to be saved for marriage and within marriage, there would be no desire for contraceptives. Natural Family Planning is available for married couples who need to avoid pregnancy for grave reasons. For people who are unmarried, yes, relations can and should result in pregnancy. Contraception has turned our world inside out and upside down to the point that many people think that marriage is unnecessary and outdated, and that it is completely unnecessary, and in fact disgusting to have a number of children. Having a large number of children, something so natural and good is now viewed with disgust and repugnance by many in society. Many view contracepting as “the responsible thing to do” (thank you, Margaret Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood), and view large families as overpopulating the Earth and draining its resources. No, I do not want Rand Paul – someone who cannot see that abortion is the back up plan for failed contraception, and who can not see the evils of contraception to begin with. Rather, I would like to see Santorum – a man who has actively fought for the lives of the unborn babies, and a man who was open to life himself – in the seat of the presidency.