by Hans Johnson

Logan Fairbanks of Hartford, Michigan, got home from school and was asked by his photographer father Josh to sit down and read a letter as he videotaped. Wondering if he was in some trouble, the 11-year-old did so as his mother Michelle looked on off-camera:

[youtube]http://youtu.be/dYcaoRzu9JM[/youtube]

Email dailyvid@jillstanek.com with your video suggestions.

[HT: The Blaze]

Talk about blatant bias. Although crowdfunded site Kickstarter refused the makers of the new Gosnell movie permission to fundraise, the same company hosted the recent After Tiller late-term abortionist documentary….

~ LifeSiteNews.com, April 4. Donate to the Gosnell movie project at Indiegogo.

This weekend’s question taps into the re-percolating immediatist vs. incrementalist debate.

In its pro-abortion way, ThinkProgress.org, gets much of the controversy right:

Over the past several years, state legislatures have enacted a record-breaking number of abortion restrictions. That pace hasn’t abated during this year’s legislative sessions, as lawmakers are rushing to pass measures to shut down abortion clinics and create additional red tape for women seeking abortions. But even though the assault on reproductive rights has been steadily gaining ground, there’s one type of restriction that hasn’t been able to win enough support, even among some anti-choice Republicans.

So-called “fetal heartbeat bills,” a radical proposal to cut off legal abortion services at just six weeks — before many women even realize they’re pregnant — are failing in states across the country. Although the far-right abortion opponents who push six-week bans claim that the procedure should be outlawed after a fetal heartbeat can first be detected, they can’t always get their other colleagues to sign onto the effort….

In general, abortion opponents haven’t decided whether it’s better to continue gradually chipping away Roe v. Wade piece by piece, or whether it’s necessary to take a bold stance to ban nearly all abortions….

But so far, anti-choice lawmakers have actually had more success with the first, incremental strategy. That’s largely because radical restrictions like six-week bans, which are obviously extreme on their face, tend to capture headlines and spark outrage — while more subtle efforts to undermine abortion rights are able to slip under the radar.

Yes, there is the problem of political cold feet, such as in Colorado, where Republican U.S. Senate candidate Cory Gardner is backing away from a state personhood ballot initiative similar to those he previously supported.

But there is also the question of strategy. Some pro-lifers believe the U.S. Supreme Court at this point would reject personhood measures or six-week bans. The numbers aren’t there.

Other pro-lifers believe we must step out in faith, and if we do the number of strict constitutionalists on the Supreme Court will pleasantly surprise us if and when such a case lands.

These pro-lifers also say the six- and 12-week bans, and personhood initiatives, educate and persuade the public about the youngest of humans.

And there are yet others, like me, who think we should throw everything at them but the kitchen sink.

What do you think?

by Susie Allen, host of the blog, Pro-Life in TN, and Kelli

We welcome your suggestions for additions to our Top Blogs (see tab on right side of home page)! Email Susie@jillstanek.com.

• Pro-Life Wisconsin shares a clever informational video about the economics of sex:

[youtube]http://youtu.be/cO1ifNaNABY[/youtube]

• Fr. Frank Pavone denounces the recent death of Lakisha Wilson and her preborn child during an abortion. He calls on the US Senate to pass a ban on abortions past 20 weeks:
  

  This bill is meant to protect unborn children from the brutal and painful death of a dismemberment abortion, but it also would save the young mothers who are often butchered during this procedure. Lakisha Wilson had her whole life ahead of her but she died because our nation still allows abortion on demand through all nine months of pregnancy.

• Pro-Life in TN says many pro-lifers are wondering why on earth pro-life Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker has chosen a vocal pro-choicer as his office’s spokesperson.
• Reflections of a Paralytic has a post regarding the miscarriage suffered by the wife of Florida’s head basketball coach, Billy Donovan. Donovan found solace and comfort from two other coaches who had also lost children.

• Michele Herzog says a group of concerned citizens in Kissimmee, Florida, have taken a stand by asking city commissioners not to allow Planned Parenthood to build a mega-facility in their community. The outpouring from post-abortive women, pastors, parents of children with special needs and others moved the commission from “we can’t do anything about this” to contacting state legislators.
• Right to Life of Michigan says that potential Democratic gubernatorial nominee Mark Schauer “has selected Oakland County Clerk Lisa Brown as his running mate” who is reportedly “one of the most pro-abortion politicians in the state of Michigan.” One of Brown’s former employees even reported Brown’s extremely inappropriate behavior toward her when she was pregnant:
  

  … [Ericah Caughey] said Brown made her “feel very uncomfortable” with unprofessional behavior, including an incident in which she says Brown made a vulgar suggestion alluding to abortion.

  “She was looking out of a window at the Capitol lawn, where there was a pro-life rally happening. She kept saying to me, ‘those people disgust me,'” Caughey said. “She told me, ‘I should take you down there and walk behind you with a coat hanger.'”

• Pro-Life New Mexico is increasing public awareness of the lucrative late-term abortion industry in Albuquerque. A local abortion business recently relocated, and some in the new area aren’t happy with the negative attention. One neighborhood resident commented:
  

  It is just not a good look for Albuquerque as a whole to have tourists come off the airplane and see hundreds and hundreds of people picketing on your main stretch of street about abortion and pro-life….

  As a neighborhood leader, we are not against the abortion clinic, but we are against where they are putting the abortion clinic.

In response to a state law passed in 2012, the Arizona Department of Health Services issued new rules in January specifying that the administration of the abortion drug RU-486 must follow FDA guidelines.

This meant that come April 1 Arizona abortion clinics would only be able to dispense RU-486 up to 49 days (7 weeks) after the first day of a woman’s last period rather than up to 63 days (9 weeks), as is abortion industry practice.

In addition, the dosage clinics currently gave of RU-486 (i.e., mifepristone, which kills the baby) and its chaser Cytotec (i.e., misoprostol, which flushes the dead baby), would have to revert back to FDA guidelines – a higher 600 mg dose, rather than 200 mg, of the wildly expensive ($270 per 600 mg/3 pills) killer drug, and a lower 400 mcg dose, rather than 800 mcg, of the insanely cheap ($.40-.50 per 200 mcg pill) flusher drug.

Plus, both medications would have to be given one day apart at the clinic – by the abortionist. Industry practice (aside from telemed) is to give RU-486 at the clinic and have the pregnant mother take the Cytotec at home.

Thus, providing medical abortions per FDA protocol negatively impacts the profit margin of abortion clinics in at least three ways: 1) shorter window of time of availability; 2) more expensive dosage; and 3) additional office visit/additional office day for abortionist.

The impact is significant. The Arizona law is based on AUL’s model legislation and findings.

If medical abortions (per PP, $300-800) become more expensive and/or cumbersome than surgical abortions (per PP, $300-950), enough pregnant mothers will opt for surgical abortions to put many pill-only clinics out of business.

That is what Planned Parenthood of Arizona fears. It and some other groups sued to stop the new rules from taking effect. And on April 2, the 9th District Court of Appeals overruled another federal judge and halted enactment of the rules, “saying the court needed more time to consider a full briefing,” according to ABC News.

So nothing is final, either way. But the debate itself is difficult for abortion pushers to surmount, in all kinds of ways, not just in trying to defend off-label use of abortion drugs.

PPAZ backed itself into a corner by telling the court “the new rules could force its Flagstaff abortion clinic to suspend operations,” quoting MyFoxPhoenix.com – this, remember, against Planned Parenthood’s constant claim that abortion accounts for only 3% of its business.

PPAZ CEO Bryan Howard came on NAZ Today April 3 to try to walk that back, since PP’s Flagstaff center just moved to a new location in February, spending $100,000 in the process to remodel. The last thing PPAZ needs right now is for word to get out that the Flagstaff clinic is closing.

Yet Howard is caught between a rock and hard place, because he already told the press the Flagstaff abortion clinic has a $400,000 annual budget and commits 400 medical abortions a year, meaning it derives 1/3+ of its income (400 x $300 = $120,000) from RU-486. And Howard already told the press he was only able to get an abortionist in the clinic one day a week.

So Howard tried to thread the needle in his interview, claiming on one hand everything is fine and on the other the situation is dire. Quoting from 1:28 on in the video:

I want to make clear our presence in Flagstaff will be uninterrupted. The concern that we have is that if these restrictions are allowed to take effect, they will potentially make it very hard to continue the provision of abortion – abortion healthcare – in Flagstaff, and our facility is the only place that women in northern Arizona can abortion care north of Phoenix [JLS note: albeit only since February].

[youtube]http://youtu.be/F05JmXoJHLQ[/youtube]

As an aside, I notice Bryan has aged quite a bit in the three years since his photo shoot for Tucson Weekly. Maybe he’s worried about potentially having to take a cut in his $200,000 annual salary.

by LauraLoo

From Chris Fabry Live and The 700 Club comes a video from Dr. Kevin Leman on parenting powerful, challenging children. He believes every child is given their personality for a distinct purpose – even the kids who drive their parents crazy. His 44th book is entitled, Parenting Your Powerful Child:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5XR-_Fr3PoQ[/youtube]

Email dailyvid@jillstanek.com with your video suggestions.

I would do this for living if I could…. I really enjoy pregnancy a lot…. All the stuff that’s been happening has all been really cool stuff.

~ Cancer victim Elizabeth Joice (pictured), in an interview with director Christopher Henze of the documentary 40 Weeks.Elizabeth, who refused to abort after the cancer had returned during her pregnancy, died six weeks after giving birth to her daughter Lily, as reported by ABC News,  April 3

On March 29 the National Right to Life Committee announced it was disaffiliating Georgia Right to Life.

In the same statement NRLC announced it was credentialing a new state pro-life organization, Georgia Life Alliance.

Read NRLC’s press release here, but its rationale for severing ties with GRTL boiled down to insubordination: GRTL had publicly attempted to thwart two pieces of NRLC’s “top-priority federation legislation,” the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act last year, and the No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act this year.

In its statement, NRLC subtly responded to GRTL’s reason for defying its parent organization, which was that GRTL opposed the rape/incest exceptions in the aforementioned bills:

NRLC and its affiliates seek to restore legal protection for all unborn children from the moment of their conception. Until the Supreme Court allows broad protections for unborn children, we work to protect as many children as possible by passing the strongest possible laws at the state and federal level. That legislative strategy has helped save millions of lives – and continues to save lives today.

Likewise, in its response, GRTL subtly explained its reason for defying NRLC:

In 2000, GRTL changed its candidate endorsement criteria and legislation policy to ensure that all pre-born children are protected, except in cases where the life of the mother is threatened.

As a result, Georgia is the only state where all its statewide constitutional officers do not support rape or incest exceptions. Georgia is one of only two states that have kept exceptions out of their legal codes….

GRTL PAC has an 89% success rate in helping to elect candidates who are truly pro-life and do not support rape and incest exceptions.

LifeSiteNews.com spelled out the disagreement:

The national pro-life group decided Saturday to affiliate instead with [GLA], a new group that says it aims to protect all unborn children, but will support legislation that includes the exceptions as an incremental strategy. GRTL has opposed exceptions – except for the “life of the mother,” provided that the health care provider tries to save both lives – since 2000.

The GRTL/NRLC split is symptomatic of an ongoing battle within the pro-life movement between those who think certain incremental legislation is immoral and those who think either the all-or-nothing personhood/immediatist approach, or more sweeping legislation (such as a 12-week abortion ban), is imprudent.

Some on Facebook have taken my use of the term of “insubordination” as a judgment call in favor of NRLC. It isn’t. I, myself, was fired for “insubordination,” as it was written on my termination letter, for publicly opposing my hospital’s pro-abortion policy. Firing is what organizations do when subordinates are… insubordinate.

I saw this picture and caption yesterday and thought it provided a good example of what I’m talking about. In this case General MacArthur publicly stated he wanted to expand the Korean War into China, which President Truman opposed….

I’ve heard versions of what went down between NRLC and GRTL from well-placed sources within both camps. And I think both sides are responsible for some rights and some wrongs, as is usually the case. If I thought one group was clearly in the wrong, I’d say so.

I’m generally for doing anything to move the ball forward, so I’m usually happy to see personhood/immediatist endeavors as well as incremental endeavors. Then again, I’m no strategist.

What I don’t like is when either camp undermines the other camps’s efforts, of which both camps are guilty.

And I don’t like when personhood/immediatist pro-lifers attack incrementalist attempts as immoral or not pro-life.

I agree with Ryan Bomberger (pictured right), the adopted biracial pro-lifer who is the product of rape. Ryan wrote in an email (which he gave me permission to post):

I was born as a result of rape and am often expected to solely advocate “no-exceptions” policies. I do believe in Personhood as a concept. But just as with slavery, the 13th Amendment didn’t materialize out of thin air. It was a long exhausting haul of political failure and seemingly impossible triumphs.

I long for the day when abortion is unthinkable. But we have to perform massive “heart” surgery for millions out there including many in our own camp along the way.

I’m a passionate abolitionist… an incrementalist… a realist. I cheer when 20 week abortion bans stand up to judicial scrutiny. I applaud when Pain-Capable bills pass. As a parent I rejoice when parental notification and consent laws ensure the State doesn’t meddle in our children’s personal lives. I tear up when I see mobile ultrasound units uninhibited by bogus zoning restrictions as they provide services where they’re needed most. Some victories are bigger than others, but none are too small in this monumental battle.

I admire different approaches. As a creative professional, I firmly believe that one-size-never-fits-all…. We can be unified yet still diversified.

I support GRTL/Personhood USA’s efforts to establish the legality of personhood at conception. But GRTL was just as wrong – according to its own “no exceptions” standard – to oppose a 20-week federal ban with a rape/incest exception as it was to support a state 20-week ban with no rape/incest exception – but which excepted all babies under 20 weeks.

Here is GRTL’s rationalization, which is instructive to read, taken from page 33 of Pillars of Personhood Educational Handbook. Click to enlarge:

IMO, the above is Pharisaic blather to rationalize GRTL’s support of a 20-wk ban with no exceptions, etc.

GRTL’s analogy…

Passing laws that discriminate against such classes with the intent to “come back and save them later” is essentially the same as running into a burning building and saving who you can but then shooting those you can’t on your way out.

… is false. All abortion-bound babies will “burn” if not saved by incremental laws. Pro-lifers don’t shoot the ones they are unable to save. These babies are going to die anyway.

Likewise, to support a 20-week ban that laudably excludes a rape/incest exception is still to “shoot” all babies under 20 weeks left in the burning building. And to support a ban on taxpayer funded abortion is still to “shoot” all babies aborted with personal funds. Even to ban any and all abortions in Georgia is still to “shoot” babies burning in 49 other states.

How can GRTL not see its own hypocrisy? It’s quite frustrating. Mirroring it own principles back at it shows it, too, is guilty of classism (prejudice against preborn babies whose mothers have money), geographical prejudice, and ageism.

That the very nature of abortion is ageism is something I’m reminded of every day, because I carry these drop cards by Created Equal in my wallet to leave in public places…

My final thought is that NRLC’s disaffiliation of GRTL has lit a long smoldering spark into a fire. It will be seen as a tipping point. I have no evidence, only a strong sense, that other NRLC disenfranchised affiliates like Cleveland Right to Life and Colorado Right to Life (which birthed American Right to Life), together with Personhood USA, whose National Field Director is Dan Becker (pictured right), the president of GRTL, and another group or two I can think of, will coalesce into a new national pro-life organization to rival NRLC.

I don’t fear or abhor this potentiality. Although unity is preferred, God uses adversity to advance the message as well. My only concern is whether this development will hinder or help everyone’s goal to stop abortion.