Several months ago Michael Voris admirably apologized for an unintentional gaffe he made in one of his ChurchMilitant.TV videos.

Voris’s March 10 video, “Abortion change?” calls for a similar retraction.

I’d call Voris a friend. We have tussled over the Catholic/Protestant issue a time or two, but I always look forward to sitting down with him for a beer when we’re in the same place. I admire his courage and conviction.

I contacted Voris to give him a heads up about this post, and I appreciate his attempt to respond, but we seemed to talk past each other.

Nevertheless, I cannot let his numerous false statements made against the pro-life movement go answered.

Here was the premise of Voris’s video:

When it comes to the specific issue of abortion, a serious look has to be given to the entire state of the movement. Forty-two years and counting, and nothing has changed of significance.

I agree more could be done, and mistakes have been made. But the examples Voris listed as evidence to demonstrate the pro-life movement’s failures were inaccurate. Citing no sources, Voris claimed neither the number nor rate of abortions is declining, nor is the number of abortion clinics.

Students for Life of America has ably addressed Voris’s numerous misstatements, and I’d like to add my two cents as well.
 

Voris claim #1: The number of U.S. abortions isn’t actually decreasing, because annual totals do not include chemical abortions, only surgical.

 
Per Voris, emphasis his:

In the United States, reports indicate that chemical or medical abortions are 25% of the number of surgical abortions. That means you have to look at the number of surgical abortions and add 25% of that number back in to the surgical abortion number to arrive at the true number of total abortions.

So, in 2011, the last year for which the number of chemical abortion numbers are available, there were 1,058,000 surgical abortions in the U.S. If you take 25% of that… roughly, 250,000, and add it back to the 1,058,000 thousands, you get right around 1.3 million total abortions. 1.3 total abortions is the annual number from the year 2000 before chemical abortions became widely available.

So, there hasn’t been any real change in the overall number of abortions, just the type of abortions being done.

This is mostly wrong. Voris didn’t list his source, but the 1.058 and 1.3 million figures came from Guttmacher, and Guttmacher clearly indicated it included chemical abortions in its totals – with the exception of hospitals, for which numbers were not available, but which reportedly commit only 4% of all abortions:

Between April 2012 and May 2013, we surveyed the known universe of abortion providers in the United States….

All respondents were asked the number of induced abortions that were performed in their facilities in 2010 and 2011, and whether early medication abortions (defined as procedures at or before nine weeks’ gestation) were offered. Clinic and physician providers (but not hospital providers) were also asked about the number of early medication abortions performed, with separate items for mifepristone, methotrexate and misoprostol alone….

We asked fewer questions of hospitals because hospital informants typically have access to less information about the specifics of abortion service provision. Information restricted to nonhospital facilities represents the experience of most women having abortions, since these providers performed 96% of all abortions in 2008.

Guttmacher’s abortion numbers have never included chemical abortions at hospitals, so its totals from year to year use the same sources – apples to apples.

Also important is the population of the United States has increased by 100 million since 1970 – up from 200 million to 300+ million today. This means more women are having fewer abortions.
 

Voris claim #2: The rate of abortion isn’t going down either.

 
Per Voris:

Why is it that various pro-life organizations are so quick to tout headlines saying, “Abortion rates decline,”when the reality is that’s only half the story. It’s just surgical abortions, not overall abortions, declining. At the end of the day, roughly the same number of children are dying.

But, referring back to Guttmacher, both the rate (abortions per 1,000 women aged 15-44) and ratio (abortions per 100 pregnancies) are declining along with the number, which, again, includes chemical abortions (from Y2K onward anyways, the year RU-486 was legalized)…

Voris claim #3: The number of abortion clinics isn’t declining either.

 
Per Voris, emphasis his:

When you hear about various abortion chambers closing up or going out of business, don’t be so quick to let your thoughts carry you to wrong conclusions. Many abortuaries close up because the demand for surgical abortions has been substituted for by the demand for chemical abortions.

But we do keep track of the number of both chemical and surgical abortion clinics. Of course the number of chemical abortion clinics has gone up. Chemical abortions weren’t legal before 2000. But the total number of abortion clinics is still drastically down, from a high of 2,176 in 1991 to 737 at last count….

Voris also said opinions on abortion haven’t changed much. SFLA listed several charts and stats to indicate otherwise.

Voris concluded, “A whole new strategy needs to be devised, because the day of ‘no abortions, no exceptions’ is just as illusory and out of reach as it was on that fateful day of January 22, 1973. We are doing something wrong.”

I’m all for new strategies and see many emerging.

But here’s the thing. By all measurable standards Voris proposed, we are winning. The number, rate, and ratio of abortions is down, the number of abortion clinics is down, and public opinion is changing for the better.

by Hans Johnson

March 25th will be a major anniversary for the Queensland, Australia, couple Kate and David Ogg. It will have been five years since their twins were born three months prematurely. The first, a boy, made no sound, while his sister, two minutes later made that relieving baby’s cry. For 20 minutes they worked on the boy, to no avail.

Finally, the doctor sat on the edge of the bed and asked Kate if they had chosen a name for a son. She answered, “Jamie“, and was told that they had done all that they could do:

I saw him gasp but the doctor said it was no use. I took Jamie off the doctor, asked everyone to leave. He was cold and I just wanted him to be warm. We had tried for years to have kids and I felt so guilty. I just wanted to cuddle him. I unwrapped him and ordered my husband to take his shirt off and climb into the bed. I know it sounds stupid, but if he was still gasping there was still a sign of life so I wasn’t going to give up easily.

We were trying to entice him to stay. We explained his name and that he had a twin that he had to look out for and how hard we tried to have him. He suddenly gasped… then he opened his eyes. He was breathing and grabbing Dave’s finger. If we had let the doctor walk out of the room with him, Jamie would have been dead.

Now he is as healthy as his sister Emily, and proof of the importance of skin-to-skin contact post-birth. Their little brother Charlie will proudly tell anyone: “When I was born I was fat and the twins were skinny. Jamie was also dead but now he is alive”.

[youtube]https://youtu.be/MPnpSaFtBaA[/youtube]

Email dailyvid@jillstanek.com with your video suggestions.

[HT: LauraLoo]

by Kelli

If society does not respect life in the womb – the dignity of that life in its most defenseless form – how can we expect them to see the dignity in that girl or boy who’s trafficked? How can we expect them to see the dignity in that woman or man who stars in a porn film?

Want to teach a generation to value each other – to do good? Then, start with the child in the womb. It’s that straightforward.

~ Alice Paul Group founder Annie Celotto, discussing why other social issues “seem more socially acceptable to fight against than abortion,” as quoted by Christina Martin, Live Action News, March 16

[One of Alice Paul Group’s most popular social media memes pictured above.]

by Kelli

Abortion is sold as a quick, easy, uncomplicated procedure that only takes a few minutes. But botched abortions are happening more often than the abortion industry would care for the public to know.

On February 25, 2015, a 911 call was made from National Health Care, Inc., an abortion facility in Peoria, Illinois, reporting a patient who was bleeding heavily and needed emergency assistance.

Several times, the staff member says, “We need someone very quickly.” No age is given (it seems the staffers who call 911 rarely have the patient charts in hand), and the 911 dispatcher has to ask several times for further details on the patient.

For this patient and many others, abortion was not a quick and easy or safe procedure:

[youtube]https://youtu.be/C8i6U5m-5tg[/youtube]

Neither was it quick, easy, and safe for this woman at the Planned Parenthood in St. Louis, Missouri, on March 7th.

Email dailyvid@jillstanek.com with your video suggestions.

[HT: Pro-life Action League]

by Carder

As an intersex person, it’s difficult for me to understand why we’re perceived as so scary that we’re unwelcome to exist in the world. I have had, and continue to have, difficulty reconciling my strong belief that all pregnant persons must have the right to choose to obtain an abortion with my anger and sadness that someone who wants to raise a healthy, beautiful child would choose not to raise that healthy, beautiful child if they were intersex.

The implied message is that acceptable people aren’t intersex: Don’t be intersex, or don’t be at all.

~ Claudia Astorino (pictured), RH Reality Check, March 11

Good morning, and Happy Sunday! Here were my top five favorite political cartoons this week. Be sure to vote for your fav in the poll at the bottom of this post!

 by Nick Anderson at GoComics.com…

 by Gary Varvel at Townhall.com…

 a twofer by Michael Ramirez at Townhall.com…

 by Nate Beeler at Townhall.com…

At the sound of Mary’s greeting, Elizabeth’s child leaped within her and she was filled with the Holy Spirit.

~ Luke 1:45, Living Bible translation

[Drawing (click to enlarge) via jaredhollier.com]

In a March 13 LifeSiteNews.com article, Canadian pro-life activist Jonathon van Maren quoted Center for Bio-Ethical Reform leader Gregg Cunningham’s observation, that “liked reformers are rarely effective and effective reformers are rarely liked.

I often think of this, for obvious reasons, sometimes referring back in my mind to Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, which lists the desire to be liked on a lower “self-actualization” plane than the desire to be respected. In my own life I translate this to mean the desire for respect is a greater human value than the desire to be liked.

The issue for pro-lifers is complicated, because we are also dealing with an opponent who engages in ridicule as a tactic, taken from the Alinsky playbook’s Rule #5, “Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon.”

So, the inherent aversion of the abortion issue by torn people who innately know it’s wrong but don’t want to stop it for whatever reason (Pontius Pilate) is exacerbated by those trying to stir up negative feelings (the mob) against those bearing the pro-life message.

Yet, the issue of public relations is something to be considered.

Is it possible or desirous – as far as it is within our power to do so – to seek personal affirmation when spreading the pro-life message?

UPDATE 3/16, 6:45p: Jonathan van Maren has written an excellent follow-up piece.