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How many of you have heard the statement:  I am a fiscal conservative and a social moderate.  Or:  I wish the Republican Party would stay off the social issues.

Those statements usually mean “don’t touch the abortion issue.”  It just causes trouble and by the way I am all for a woman’s “right to choose.”

Given the legislation that passed in New York, the proposed legislation in Virginia and the statements made by the Rhode Island Governor it is time for the Republican Party in Sonoma County to discuss this issue.

First of all:  abortion is not a religious issue.  Abortion is a life issue.  There are many atheists, agnostics, liberals and conservatives who are “pro life.” 

Science has proven that a fetus is a living human being.  Contrary to the Planned Parenthood message, the fetus is not a clump of cells.  The DNA is established from the first moments of conception.

What should be a government’s prime obligation:  To protect the life and well being of its citizens.  The majority of abortions are not done because the life of the mother is in danger of being lost.  The majority of abortions happen because of finances, inconvenience and failure to use birth control.  In fact, abortion is often used as birth control.  The smallest citizens have no voice.  If they are inconvenient, they are simply removed. 

Roe v. Wade held that states could prohibit abortion late in pregnancy only if they made an exception for abortions meant to protect the pregnant woman’s health.  Justice Harry Blackmun’s majority opinion in that case mentioned several health harms that unwanted parenthood could cause.  Roe’s companion case, Doe v. Bolton written by the same justice and handed down the same day – also suggested that health should be read broadly.  As Blackmun put it, “the medical judgment may be exercised in the light of all factors – physical, emotional, psychological, familial and the woman’s age – relevant to the well-being of the patient.”  An exception this broad would negate any prohibition.  Anyone performing an abortion would always be able to say in their professional judgment that the birth of the child would have adverse emotional or familial consequences.

New York’s latest abortion law is not a great change much from what already exists.  Abortion law moved from the penal code to the health code, decriminalizing it.  New Yorkers could always get an abortion in the first 24 weeks (almost six months) of pregnancy.  They just needed to give a reason.  Now, during the first two trimesters no reason is needed.  What is very interesting is that for years the need for legal abortion (performed by licensed physicians in sterile clinics or hospital settings) was the demand to stop back alley abortions.  The New York law removed the requirement that a physician perform abortions.  Now, nurses or other health care practitioners can perform abortions.  Other changes include the removal of protections (including medical care) for any infant born alive as well as the removal of conscience protection from doctors and medical professionals objecting to abortion in conscience.

The state of Virginia’s proposed law which was voted down at this time basically allowed for infanticide.  Virginia Governor Ralph Northam, a pediatric neurologist, stated that “When we talk about third-trimester abortions, these are done with the consent of obviously the mother, with the consent of the physicians, more than one physician, by the way.  And it’s done in cases where there may be severe deformities, there may be a fetus that’s non-viable.  So in the particular example, if a mother is in labor, I can tell you exactly what would happen.  The infant would be delivered.  The infant would be kept comfortable.  The infant would be resuscitated if that’s what the mother and the family desired and then a discussion would ensue between the physicians and the mother.”

Democrat Kathy Tran in the Virginia Assembly was very clear in her goal for the Virginia abortion bill.  A woman could request an abortion as she is about to give birth if a physician said it could impair her “mental health.”

Now, here is a question.  If the infant is resuscitated and the decision is made to terminate its life how will that be done?  Will the infant be injected with a drug to end its life?  Will the comfort mentioned above be removed and will the infant just be left on the table to slowly expire?  What is the end?

Deciding who lives or dies is a very slippery slope.  We already have elderly people and disabled children who are refused basic fluid and nourishment so that they are no longer a burden and cost to society.  If this sounds unreal it is time to check up on what is going on around the world.

In 1999, Professor Peter Singer was hired at Princeton University and appointed to the Ira W. DeCamp Professorship of Bioethics at the university’s Center for Human Values.

Dr. Singer was widely considered the father of the international animal rights movement.  This was the same man who argued that parents should have the right to euthanize newborn children who had severe handicaps.  In his writings, Singer stated that children less than one month old have no human consciousness and do not have the same rights as others.  In one book he wrote:

“Killing a defective infant is not morally equivalent to killing a person.  Sometimes it is not wrong at all.”

What is unknown to many people nowadays is that Margaret Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood was a racist who wanted to eliminate people who did not measure up to her standards.  This included many immigrants in the 1920’ and 1930’s and certainly African Americans.  That is one of the reasons why so many Planned Parenthood clinics are based in black neighborhoods.

Today, Planned Parenthood receives $500 Million a year in tax money from the federal government.  The organization just acknowledged that their major work is performing abortions.  Interestingly, much of that tax money is donated to Democrat politicians running for office.

Many people are very concerned with the concept of freedom and liberty.  There are constant challenges to the rights of the individual.  In fact, around the world governments are deciding who lives and who dies.  That is the constant duty of a citizen:  be watchful for government encroachments because that is how freedom dies.  Those intrusions don’t stop at one place.  They continue to multiply.  Unfortunately, there are legislators who appear to be comfortable with infanticide.  Their confusion often rests in their desire for a perfect world.  They actually believe that legislation will make that happen.