Disclaimer: The linked items below or the websites at which they are located do not necessarily represent the views of The Illinois Federation for Right to Life. They are presented only for your information.
A week ago today, a 22-year-old woman named Emmie -- who'd found herself unexpectedly pregnant -- wrote to Lisa Belkin's Motherlode blog seeking advice. Belkin reprinted her e-mail.
Belkin asked her readers to be "kind and wise" in response, "not political and scathing." And guess what: Kind and wise they were. Yes, the comments are moderated. But even without the brickbats and dingbats (and remarkably, Belkin says she deleted only 4!), nearly 700 thoughtful comments remained, citing personal experiences both rejoiced and regretted, and floating a range of options for Emmie: Can you defer your program? Could you consider adoption? Might you manage with subsidized campus day care, good insurance, food stamps, WIC? Are you this close to deciding to terminate, but just need a virtual hand to hold?
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Scott Roeder, who is charged with the murder of abortion provider George Tiller, and James von Brunn, who is charged with last week's shooting death of a Holocaust Memorial Museum guard, "appear to be murderers, not terrorists," Jonathan Turley, a professor of public interest law at George Washington University, writes in a USA Today opinion piece. Although "liberals denounced" the tendency of conservatives to call "every possible crime an act of terrorism" while former President George W. Bush was in office, now that there are antiabortion-rights and anti-Semetic suspects, "there is an insistence that these crimes must be treated as terrorism -- as if to call them 'murder' or 'hate crimes' would diminish their significance," Turley states.
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Advocates on both sides of the abortion-rights debate are anticipating the White House's release of its "common ground" reproductive health proposals, including policies aimed at preventing unintended pregnancies and reducing the need for abortion, U.S. News & World Report reports. President Obama in February tasked the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships with determining how to "support women and children, address teenage pregnancy and reduce the need for abortion." Along with the new White House Council on Women and Girls, the office since April has been conducting meetings with advocates on both sides of the abortion-rights debate to develop policy proposals. U.S. News reports that according to some involved in the process, the results could be announced as early as this summer. According to U.S. News, whether the White House can attract more support from conservative groups without alienating abortion-rights advocates at its base represents the "biggest test yet" of Obama's "vow to be a peacemaker in the nation's culture wars."
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California's budget crisis has prompted Planned Parenthood affiliates to fight proposed rollbacks in state programs which fund the organization. The organization has praised a budget committee for rejecting the proposed cuts and is trying to rally further opposition to budget changes through a publicity campaign.
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger had proposed to roll back a rate increase for the Family PACT program, the California Catholic Daily reports. It provides free "family planning" services to qualified recipients under the state's Medi-Cal system. Though it does not pay for surgical abortions, it provides the "morning after pill," a drug some believe to have abortifacient properties.
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