By Dave Andrusko
Regardless of the Senate vote today on cutting off federal funds to Planned Parenthood and its affiliates — 42 in favor and 58 opposed–there is no “give” in the position of pro-lifers. We will work unceasingly until it comes to pass. The vote, regrettable though it is, is only a speed bump.
Remember the three most important considerations as we move ahead.
Prior to the most recent election, no one would have thought that the House of Representatives would vote to take away federal funds from the largest abortion provider in the United States. That makes the 240-185 vote in the House two months ago a genuinely historic first step.
Congressman Mike Pence
Moreover, while it is true that PPFA got in its shots—nobody pushes the hysteria button better than Planned Parenthood—more important is there is a public discussion going on about the billion dollar organization’s abiding (and lucrative) abortion advocacy.
As you read in Dr. Randall K. O’Bannon’s fine analysis “Why the Claim that Abortion is ‘Only 3% of Planned Parenthood’s Services’ is so Radically Misleading,” it is not easy to get beyond PPFA’s sound bite obfuscation. But the bottom line—literally—is that PPFA admits in one of its own fact sheets that the percentage of its clients receiving “abortion services” is actually 12%, not 3%.
To quote Dr. O’Bannon, “That means that not one in every 33, but nearly one out of every eight women walking through the door of a Planned Parenthood clinic has an abortion.”
In addition, today’s Senate vote, as was the House vote on February 18, puts elected officials on the record. Voting not to cut off federal funds to PPFA means that our tax dollars will help underwrite the 332,000+ abortions Planned Parenthood will perform this year. And those numbers WILL go up.
PPFA is actively promoting the use of chemically-induced abortions (RU486), which has had the effect of persuading physicians who would not perform surgical abortions to become RU486-dispensing abortionists. Moreover, an edict has come down from on high: each affiliate must have at least one clinic performing abortions by 2013.
Doesn’t this suggest that abortion is Job #1 for the #1 performer of abortions?
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