Tag: abortion

A Revolution, Televised

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Yesterday, Texas’ state senate was poised to pass anti-abortion legislation so restrictive that it would leave the state with only five remaining clinics. It would have banned all abortions after 20 weeks of gestation, would have required that the procedures be done in surgical clinics, and the doctors performing the procedures would have to have admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles. It would have closed 37 of Texas’ 42 clinics. 

One Democratic female senator – Wendy Davis – stood on the floor of the Texas Senate for over 13 consecutive hours to filibuster this bill. The rules are more stringent than in the US Senate – she could not so much as lean on a desk, and the topic of her marathon talk had to be related to the bill at hand. 

Among the things she read from the podium were stories she solicited from Texas women, telling the story of their own abortions. The debate over this bill included one female sponsor of the filibustered anti-abortion legislation to declare that exemptions weren’t needed for victims of rape or incest because rape kits can prevent unwanted pregnancy. Republican state representative Jodie Laubenberg said that in “the emergency rooms they have what’s called rape kits, that the woman can get cleaned out, basically like a D and C” — dilation and curettage surgery, often performed after miscarriages. Ms. Laubenberg is wrong – rape kits do not ‘clean women out’. 

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=REU_cfdRWi8]

There was drama as midnight approached and the Lieutenant Governor tried to shut down the filibuster, but the Democrats began to filibuster that. In the end, the bill failed thanks in great part to the efforts of one brave woman. 

The abortion “debate” isn’t one anymore. Most Texans didn’t support the added restrictions on abortion that failed yesterday. A 75/25 majority of Americans agree that abortions should be legal in some circumstances. Nobody has to like abortion, but that doesn’t mean you get to restrict a woman’s right to choose whether to terminate a pregnancy in the 1st trimester. 

And here I thought Texas Republicans hated regulations on business. 

The war on women and reproductive rights is in full swing throughout the country – not just in the South. The American right wing works diligently to roll back liberties won over the last century – health care, equality, reproductive rights, civil rights, human rights – all of them are under siege in a country whose highest court declares that racism is over and a key portion of the Civil Rights Act is, therefore, applied unconstitutionally and invalid until Congress changes it. Next up, they’ll look to roll back Social Security. The America they envision is one that is of the rich elite, by the rich elite, and for the rich elite. An America that protects the Paris Hiltons and Kardashians of the world at your expense and the expense of your family from cradle to grave.

That revolution wasn’t televised. It just wasn’t the revolution Mr. Scott-Heron envisioned.  Now America needs to recapture what it’s lost. 

Abortion: Politicking versus Real Life

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Many people don’t realize that the 2012 Republican platform demands a ban on all abortions, with no exception made for rape, incest, or even to save the life of the mother. While some individual Republicans go along with those provisos, the party as a collective does not. This, in part, explains the rape eruptions from idiots suggesting that women can’t get pregnant from “legitimate rape”, or that a pregnancy from rape is “part of God’s plan”, differentiating “emergency rape“, or that some women “rape easy” and what – deserve it?  

2012 Republican Platform: “Renewing American Values” : Repealing Obamacare 

Through Obamacare, the current Administration has promoted the notion of abortion as healthcare. We, however, affirm the dignity of women by protecting the sanctity of human life. Numerous studies have shown that abortion endangers the health and well-being of women, and we stand firmly against it.

2012 Republican Platform: A Restoration of Constitutional Government: The Sanctity and Dignity of Human Life

Faithful to the “self-evident” truths enshrined in the Declaration of Independence, we assert the sanctity of human life and affirm that the unborn child has a fundamental individual right to life which cannot be infringed. We support a human life amendment to the Constitution and endorse legislation to make clear that the Fourteenth Amendment’s protections apply to unborn children. We oppose using public revenues to promote or perform abortion or fund organizations which perform or advocate it and will not fund or subsidize health care which includes abortion coverage. We support the appointment of judges who respect traditional family values and the sanctity of innocent human life. We oppose the non-consensual withholding or withdrawal of care or treatment, including food and water, from people with disabilities, including newborns, as well as the elderly and infirm, just as we oppose active and passive euthanasia and assisted suicide.

Republican leadership has led the effort to prohibit the barbaric practice of partial-birth abortion and permitted States to extend health care coverage to children before birth. We urge Congress to strengthen the Born Alive Infant Protection Act by enacting appropriate civil and criminal penalties on healthcare providers who fail to provide treatment and care to an infant who survives an abortion, including early induction delivery where the death of the infant is intended. We call for legislation to ban sex-selective abortions – gender discrimination in its most lethal form – and to protect from abortion unborn children who are capable of feeling pain; and we applaud U.S. House Republicans for leading the effort to protect the lives of pain-capable unborn children in the District of Columbia. We call for a ban on the use of body parts from aborted fetuses for research. We support and applaud adult stem cell research to develop lifesaving therapies, and we oppose the killing of embryos for their stem cells. We oppose federal funding of embryonic stem cell research.

We also salute the many States that have passed laws for informed consent, mandatory waiting periods prior to an abortion, and health-protective clinic regulation. We seek to protect young girls from exploitation through a parental consent requirement; and we affirm our moral obligation to assist, rather than penalize, women challenged by an unplanned pregnancy. We salute those who provide them with counseling and adoption alternatives and empower them to choose life, and we take comfort in the tremendous increase in adoptions that has followed Republican legislative initiatives.

Woman ‘denied a termination’ dies in hospital: Irish Times November 14, 2012

The doctor told us the cervix was fully dilated, amniotic fluid was leaking and unfortunately the baby wouldn’t survive.” The doctor, he says, said it should be over in a few hours. There followed three days, he says, of the foetal heartbeat being checked several times a day.

“Savita was really in agony. She was very upset, but she accepted she was losing the baby. When the consultant came on the ward rounds on Monday morning Savita asked if they could not save the baby could they induce to end the pregnancy. The consultant said, ‘As long as there is a foetal heartbeat we can’t do anything’.

“Again on Tuesday morning, the ward rounds and the same discussion. The consultant said it was the law, that this is a Catholic country. Savita [a Hindu] said: ‘I am neither Irish nor Catholic’ but they said there was nothing they could do.

“That evening she developed shakes and shivering and she was vomiting. She went to use the toilet and she collapsed. There were big alarms and a doctor took bloods and started her on antibiotics.

“The next morning I said she was so sick and asked again that they just end it, but they said they couldn’t.”

Ms. Halappanavar developed sepsis and died. Had the abortion been performed when it became clear that she was miscarrying, Ms. Halappanavar, a 31 year-old non-Irish, Hindu dentist, might still be alive today. I realize that the example is from Ireland, but Ireland’s prohibition on abortion is what the Republican Party in the United States wants to implement. Nowhere in the party platform is an exception made for the life of the mother, rape, or incest.