To the stars through difficulties is the Kansas state motto. One star has been steadily rising in Kansas, leading her party and state through difficulties often brought on by social conservative ideologues and an agenda that distracts many politicians from doing what they were elected to do, govern. Governor Kathleen Sebelius, winning her second term in a cake-walk, is a bona fide national leader with accomplishments forged of collaboration and pragmatism. She did that without dodging or compromising her beliefs on difficult social issues in red state Kansas. As an unapologetic pro-choice Catholic, she places social issues in the larger context of issues that genuinely matter to the vast majority of people, like education, the economy and health care. But she does not ignore them.
Sebelius does not define herself by focusing on social issues. She starts from a place of inclusion and collaboration, understanding that America is a pluralistic democracy that must have space within the law for people to make private decisions based on individual beliefs and values. She makes government work not by forcing her beliefs on others, but by respectfully disagreeing where she must, and reminding people she was elected to serve all Kansans.
Congratulations on surviving the midterm elections! But wait a sec - we're not done with the big news yet. Today is critical for reproductive health. With the news circus leading up to yesterday's elections, today's Supreme Court case on the federal abortion ban hasn't garnered much press. Ian wondered where the "pro-life" lobby has been, but it turns out that the pro-choice lobby hasn't been very vocal on this issue either (as of Tuesday afternoon). Let's take a quick look at news from our side of this important case.
This was the best Halloween ever. No tricks, just one big treat. After three long years of denial and delay, the new ‘dual label' packages of Plan B were shipped out last week. That means sometime this week, those of us who are 18 and over and have identification to prove our age should be able to walk into area pharmacies and buy Plan B without a prescription. There is a difference of opinion within the reproductive health and rights community about whether this current situation constitutes a victory. Recently I was involved in a lively email exchange with a colleague who takes strong issue with my use of the word "victory" to describe the Plan B decision. He rightly points out that "the FDA's approach [to Plan B] violates fundamental principles of bioethics, including beneficence, autonomy, and justice." That it does. And I will continue to fight to make sure that when the moment is right, the FDA and Barr roll back the unwarranted restrictions on access to Plan B. In the meantime, though I am celebrating the fact that Plan B will be easier to get for many and that we arrived here with the Administration's begrudging acquiescence. Why do I believe this?
Today is Election Day 2006, the day that political pundits and average Americans alike have been wondering about for months, because the faces of government are likely to look a lot different tomorrow than they do today. There has been a lot going on in light of this election, and conservative interest groups have a lot of election issues on their plates. But considering the significance of abortion to so many of these "pro-lifers," does it surprise anyone else that so few of these groups are talking about the abortion-related Supreme Court cases that begin tomorrow?
October 26th, the Nicaraguan National Assembly voted to criminalize therapeutic abortion, making Nicaragua one of only three countries in the Western Hemisphere where abortion is illegal even in cases where a pregnant woman's life is in danger. Nineteen medical associations opposed the ban, and now that it's likely to be signed into law, physicians are understandably alarmed. The proposed ban carries four- to eight-year prison sentences for women who seek abortions, as well as anyone who assists them - a scenario that could force doctors to choose between upholding the Hippocratic Oath and respecting the Nicaraguan Penal Code.
Two days after the National Assembly voted, the Nicaraguan Society of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (SONIGOB) sent an urgent letter to President Enrique Bolaños and the Minister of Health asking what actions would be taken to protect both patients and health workers in light of the new law.
Kansas Attorney General Phill Kline finally obtained private medical records from Kansas abortion clinics last week, though months ago the Kansas Supreme Court made efforts to protect people's medical privacy by limiting the scope of information. Someone else had been seeking them too, Fox News' own Bill O'Reilly, who said on his program Friday that he had been seeking these records for months and months, and finally got them, from an "inside source."
According to John Hanna of the Associated Press in Topeka, Kansas, a spokesperson for the Attorney General said they assumed the "inside source" for the O'Reilly Factor must have been inside the clinic. But if the O'Reilly Factor's source was "inside the abortion clinic" why would the news of those records not have been televised before this?
It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure that Kline's efforts to obtain private medical records, allegedly to pursue criminal cases against rapists, has resulted in those records being obtained by a cable network news anchor to air just days before an election. Coincidence? According to the AP, the records do not contain names of patients, so they could not be used for any criminal investigation. The clinics have asked for further investigation into Kline and O'Reilly's use of these private medical records.
Originally from the east coast, Donna McNichol is the mother of two teenagers, regional director of Planned Parenthood Shasta Diablo, and spends her weekends watching her daughters play soccer.
A couple of months into my first pregnancy, I feared that something may be wrong. I started bleeding. While some days the bleeding was lighter than other days, I bled every day. We kept hoping that I would stop and my pregnancy would continue normally. Since we did not know the cause of my bleeding, my doctors did not know how to stop it. My health was at risk.
[img_assist|nid=1353|title=Special Series|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=89|height=100]I was very concerned about being able to continue the pregnancy and the possibility of giving birth to a baby that would die. My family and loved ones were also concerned about my health. The hardest part was not knowing what to do. There was not a right or wrong answer.
My husband and I, after consulting with my family, my doctor and my loved ones, decided to end the pregnancy in order to protect my health. I was only halfway into my pregnancy, approximately 20 weeks. I never once considered asking my elected officials what I should do. It was so very personal.
Priests for Life claims to be "the nation's largest Catholic pro-life organization." However, in 2000, the group claimed a mere 13% of the nation's priests as members. Today, it reports no membership income on its tax returns and has lost even more ground among priests.
After more than 15 years trying vainly to grow his Catholic antichoice group into the mass clerical movement envisioned in its rhetoric, its leader, Frank Pavone, now finds himself banished to a Texan wasteland and able to count on a mere 2.5 percent of the nation's priests (some 1,000) as supporters.
His hagiographic campaigning style, with unapologetic electoral campaigning, and unabashed cooperation with some of the most militant antichoice figures, has led him from New York to Amarillo, Texas, where he broke ground on a seminary for his new order of priests, Missionaries of the Gospel of Life. On the same day, the Religion News Service reported the new order had only one member, Pavone himself.
Women who come to my office for late abortions are, without exception, in extreme distress. The most difficult situations are those in which the pregnancy is desired but a diagnosis of fetal abnormality or genetic disorder has been made. Also, medical conditions occur that require termination of the pregnancy, sometimes under emergency conditions. These are not uncommon, especially in a practice such as mine that specializes in late abortion. The anguish that women and their partners and family experience under these circumstances is profound. It is a major life event and it is a terrible loss.
There are teenagers who have become pregnant following a[img_assist|nid=1353|title=Special Series|desc=|link=none|align=right|width=89|height=100] first sexual intercourse and who are uninformed about anatomy, physiology, and pregnancy. They are often terrified and don't know what to do until a family member sees the obvious evidence of advanced pregnancy. Outside of tribal societies in which adolescent pregnancy and family formation is the norm, what 14 or 16 year-old girl in this society is prepared to raise and nurture a child? The medical risks of adolescent pregnancy are very serious, and they have life-threatening and life-altering effects.
We do not endorse candidates, parties, ideologies, or faiths. We endorse the truth. We endorse responsibility. We endorse reality.
On Wednesday, nine justices of the United States Supreme Court will choose between the health of the mother and if it should be considered when writing legislation, or if her unborn child's rights supercede hers. The case was decided six years ago, but now the make-up of the court has changed.
We will see if Justices Roberts and Alito will truly evaluate these cases on their merits. We will see if they are true to their sworn testimony about stare decisis. These are sham cases. Women having late-term procedures did not simply "change their mind" about their pregnancy: their lives or their fetus were in danger and they needed medical help.
The Supreme Court's choice follows the choice millions of Americans will exercise next Tuesday. If a choice is partisan, based more in ideology than fact, made from fear, or against anyone or any party, then expect the consequences of that choice. Instead, if a choice is made from a place of hope, faith in something better, not faith in being better than someone else, but faith in each other to work together solving tough problems, then one could expect more positive results.
