President Obama to Overturn Ban on Funding International Family Planning Groups That Provide Abortion

Pro-lifers make up terminology
Like “pre-born” for human cytology.
It’s their sheer desperation
That a cellular formation
Have a soul, not just basic biology.

Biological - science defines what " human cells" are not holier than thou bible believers !!!

"This abortion issue will not go away until the consciences of every individual "understands" why it is wron !"

Folks think they are holier than thou
And tell biblical stories of how
Cells are a person
And abortion is worse than
What any of their commandments allow.

As long as there is "ANY" injustice in the world we are obliged to stand up and defend "ANY" cause . It's not about OUR ego !! Whose ego is being fed by helping people that are struggling with various injustices ? As long as we keep silent and continue to do or say nothing the injustices will continue. It's about helping - COMPASSION /CONCERN - FOR "ALL" Life born and pre- born !!! This abortion issue will not go away until the consciences of every individual "understands" why it is wron ! Maybe then if ever we will have a culture that is respectfull of ALL human life . If you can disrespect the preborn child why not the born - at any age - person ?

So is abortion wrong? Is abortion right?

Let’s be honest here shall we?...The endless amounts of energy spent debating this issue has proven ineffective time and time again. What’s really at stake here is your ego. It makes you feel superior and useful to protest abortion and those who support it, but how’s that worked out for ya??

You may find it more efficient and rewarding using all of your “passionate issue energy” to visit an inner city school or donate your time with underprivileged teens. Or how about this….. pretend you’re a sexually abused and pregnant 13 yr old minority with a mother who works two jobs, a dad that isn’t around, and a society who sees no further than the political games of voter-exploitation at your expense.

I’m confident that if you stepped outside of your fairytale and exercised compassion, rather than pointless condemnation, your chances of saving a precious life may just improve.

Why even call her a "MOTHER" if these are just a bunch of cells. Sorry ??those "human" cells ARE NOT part of the mothers body BUT are distinct and separate - depending on nourishment and using the mother's womb as a medium - to continue to grow/develop fully. The blood type and sex can and will be very - "indivduallistic"- from the "mother's" - if not destroyed. So when a "mother" decides she doesn't want these " human " cells to use her womb to continue to develop , she is destroyng / killing the earliest stages of "human" life . Or does your definition of "killing" mean a "fully developed" human "person" ONLY. Sounds like discrimination to me !! There's a legal presidence in our country's history when African- Americans ( fully - developed ) were not considered human beings.So just because abortion is now legal in our country does not mean it is a moral/constitutional right!

I'm no lawyer either, but I believe it has to do with the fact that those cells that eventually become a person are considered to be part of the mother's body, especially in early pregnancy. So the mother can decide to do what she wants with her own body, but somebody who wishes to harm her or her unborn child against her will does not have that right. There have also been cases where paramedics have been investigated for violating their scope of practice by performing an emergency caesarian on a dead full-term pregnant woman to save her unborn baby, so it would seem that the welfare of the fetus does not necessarily trump that of even a dead mother. But again, the true reasoning behind the legality of abortion is driven by epidemiological studies, and is to prevent it from becoming an underground practice performed by unskilled abortionists that leads to high maternal mortality. Women need to have the right to health care protected, and since abortion can be done very safely in a medical setting but is extremely dangerous outside of that setting (and often results in more late-term abortions), it is important to preserve this right.

Exactly, Mary Lou, those human cells may develop into a FUTURE person, but at those early stages they are nothing but a bunch of cells.

I'm no legal scholar, so I can't answer your questions on homocide cases.

And no word from Frank. It was fairly clear though the he used a poll commissioned by a religious organization to bolster his pro-life views.

The Pro - Life Stance - " at the moment of conception THERE EXISTS living "human" cells albeit "LIFE" ; not vegetable or mineral LIFE !!! If left to nature these cells develop into a fully - developed baby !!HUMAN - Conception - cells are just the earliest stage of "LIFE" ! And if a "second" party decides to "destroy" those human cells they have "denied" the Right - to- LIFE , LIBERTY AND THE PERSUIT OF HAPPINESS since these early developing human cells cannot decide to continue developing for themselves. Does anybody have the answer to the question about - a "DOUBLE HOMICIDE" charge when a pregnant woman and her unborn "baby" are killed during an outside attack ??

Frank, your comment posted Jan 28, 2009 5:39:58 PM contained numbers that coincided with a Knights of Columbus poll. Now you post a different figure. I couldn’t find a CNN/USA Today/Gallup Poll that seems to match up. Please provide more information about this poll, Frank.

Frank, you wrote, “It is considered a fetus at week 3 and is beginning development of the brain, spinal cord, and heart.”

Wrong, Frank. It is called an embryo until after the 8th week.

Then you wrote, “Your argument about the ‘ball of cells’ is mute because no surgical abortions occur until after the 6th week of gestation.”

My point is neither “mute” nor moot. In fact, my point has nothing to do with the timing of abortions. I have been talking about the pro-life stance that at the moment of conception, you get Instant Person.

Say What? said: you brought religion into the picture with your Knights of Columbus poll.

It's a A CNN/USA Today/Gallup Poll, it's 70% not 60%.

At conception: zygote
1-6 days: morula
6-12 day: blastocyst
It is considered a fetus at week 3 and is beginning development of the brain, spinal cord, and heart.

Your argument about the "ball of cells" is mute because no surgical abortions occur until after the 6th week of gestation (twice the time I've illustrated above) and it is not a "ball of cells" at that point.

Ok no, it will not be a spending spree, nor will it be any more money than we're already paying for international development. It will likely be less than what we have been spending on foreign aid - the Kaiser network just had an article today about the US and many other countries delaying or cutting their assistance to the Global Fund, for instance. I get that you're uncomfortable with the idea of "funding abortions" (I put that in quotes because most of this money does not directly fund abortions, especially in countries where it's illegal - they can't do that). But if I had my way, well, I wouldn't pay taxes at all. I'm sure the LA Times could churn out a poll in no time that would show that most Americans support my feeling on that one. But I can't stop paying taxes just because I don't like it. Likewise, we can't (or shouldn't) stop meeting our foreign aid requirements. And, one major goal of international assistance is reducing maternal mortality, as outlined in the millennium development goals, and you can't reduce maternal mortality very effectively until you address the issue of unsafe abortion. Maternal deaths negatively impact child health and economic development, etc. I would be tempted to tell you at this juncture that unsafe abortion causes up to 40% of all maternal mortality cases in some countries, but since you prefer newspaper polls to actual data, I'll refrain.

And while we're on the subject of stats - yes, it's a common phrase that you can do anything with stats, and true at times, but it's a matter of knowing how to interpret things and seeing through the common tricks that people do to manipulate their data. I'm not an epidemiologist or biostatistician, but I do have enough background in both subjects to be able to interpret raw data, and what the WHO is putting out on this matter has been solid, and if anything, the problem is underestimated (case reporting being tricky in things like this that involve something illegal or clandestine).

Anyway, we do agree that abortion is bad and education is one piece of the puzzle in fixing it. And cleaning up cultural problems is great too, but the problem is in actually doing that. If you know how to make an entire population not have sex, or only have sex with one partner, I'd love to hear about it. We could have fixed this years ago and stopped HIV with a wave of our hands. There was a really fascinating article in the New Yorker awhile back - I think it was called "Red Sex, Blue Sex" if you want to google it - that discussed how common sex and pregnancy are among evangelical teenagers. Yeah, the New Yorker is part of the liberal, pro-abortion establishment and all that, but it does criticize the behaviors of the children of social liberals too. The main point was that whether kids received abstinence only education or comprehensive sex ed, the average age of sexual debut was the same - around 16. The difference between them was that social liberals' children may wind up having more partners and delaying marriage, so there might be more STI's in that bunch. But teen pregnancy was much more common in the abstinence-only, evangelical crowd, because they were less likely to use or carry condoms, thinking it's morally wrong to buy them. So - there's a gap between sexual attitudes and actual practices, and people do have sex. Most of us, actually. That's the difference between your example of jumping out of a plane sans parachute and using contraception. Skydiving is a fringe activity, sought out by thrill-seekers. Sex is one of the most normal activities that nearly everybody does at some point, and thus how we educate our kids about it should be handled carefully. That New Yorker article mentioned something about the "abstinence plus" movement - encouraging kids to delay sex, but also giving them the information they need about how to protect themselves.

Kilgore Trout, I didn't say it was a spending spree, just that it's more spending that the majority of the public do not want. Americans have been pretty steady on this, they don't want to pay for abortions here or abroad. To say you are pro-choice is one thing to say I have to pay for it is something else.

I disagree with you about the image it portrays of us overseas. It’s saying, We'll help you to develop, but you must legalize abortion if you want our help. Your portrayal is very benign. The money is going to organizations that are pushing for, demanding in fact that countries that have some protection for the unborn change those policies. This aligns us with those efforts.

Unfortunately your whole argument is based on stats that you say come from reputable sources because they back you up. WHO in my view can hardly be viewed as impartial since they are an arm of the UN who definitely have a pro-abortion agenda. I do not trust stats from any source because every outfit and every individual in those outfits have their own agendas and you can do whatever you want with stats.

If you hand out contraception which is never 100%, people get a false sense of security and take the plunge much more often thinking they're safe. People never jump out of airplanes without parachutes. I understand the horrors that some women endure around the world and can appreciate the compassion you have for them, but what we are doing in this country and what we are forcing on other countries is infanticide disguised as compassion. Creating 2 victims, the post-abortive mother and the dead child is not the solution.

We need to use funds to help both mother and child and to help educate the world that there is no shame in pregnancy and that we can give every child a chance, and that abstinence does work 100% of the time when tried. If we didn't have such a sex crazed culture where abdication of responsibility is in vogue that would help immensely also. We need a total cultural cleanup. And it starts with education. You can trace all the ills of the world both in the past and now to the unwillingness of people to sacrifice. Right now we are going in the wrong direction. I believe people are basically good and fair and would do the right thing if given the option.

I see we both agree abortion is bad we just disagree which way to go to eliminate it.

But Frank, it's not like now that the Mexico City policy is overturned we will suddenly start throwing billions of dollars to pay for all the world's abortions. I believe someone earlier called this an "abortion bailout." Not at all - it simply means that, out of the pool of money that is budgeted by Congress and allotted to foreign aid, our donors can provide funding to any NGO that they want. As was discussed earlier, some very excellent NGO's had to shut down under the Mexico City policy because they felt that being unable to mention abortion in their counseling of young girls was very dangerous (especially being unable to counsel against the dangers of having an unafe/illegal abortion). So yes, each fiscal year Congress figures out a budget and yes, the financial crisis is taken into account. I believe some funding for HIV/AIDS has already been pushed back because of it, so I find it highly unlikely there will suddenly be a huge spending spree on international family planning.

"I disagree with you that this money cuts down on abortions and I don't want to play statistics tag with you. The more you encourage contraception the more people have intercourse and the more unplanned pregnancies there are thus the more abortions there are as the final contraception. I know this is very unpopular but why not teach abstinence in these developing countries it works 100% of the time."

I'm sorry, that is just patently false. Every bit of it. It would be wonderful if the world worked that way, but it doesn't. More people have sex if they're told that condoms exist? No. There is absolutely no evidence that abstinence and be faithful teaching works even 1% of the time in the absence of contraception counseling, and it only makes us look like a hypocritical nation when we try to demand that family planning agencies in other countries teach that way if they want money from us. I can give you numerous stats and charts if you like, from many diverse and reputable sources such as the World Health Organization, done by very excellent epidemiologists. You may find some quack here and there to back up your side of the argument, but the vast majority agree that increased access to contraceptives lowers the abortion rate, which is lowest in North America and especially Western Europe. Both of these regions have legal abortion and excellent access to contraceptives. Many governments are recognizing this and easing their abortion laws, even in places like Ethiopia and Pakistan. Romania tried to criminalize it for awhile, but quickly reversed that when they realized what it was doing.

I've spent some time working on the ground in women's health care in the Horn of Africa, so I've seen with my own eyes what kind of suffering women can endure and how naive it is to think that this will get better with abstinence teaching. Just to highlight how different the circumstances there are for women, infibulation is widely practiced in that part of Africa - this is an extreme form of female genital cutting that is often done to women as a ritual rite of passage or even during early childhood. Basically, everything gets sewn up, if you know what I mean. This can cause severe trauma to the woman when she has sex for the first time, and other problems obviously. I don't want to be culturally insensitive, but this practice does have its roots in a culture of male domination, as a method of controlling whether a woman has sex or not. Do you think that in this environment, that a health worker at a family planning clinic will do a bit of good telling a woman to just not have sex? That decision is very often not up to her. The only thing that might help her not wind up with 9 kids is if she can be offered something like birth control pills, which she can take without her husband's knowing if needed. Anyway. Yeah, abortion's bad, but it makes me sadder that people in this country would want to deny women and girls who live under conditions like that any kind of health care that we have at our disposal here.

How come when a " pregnant " human - cell/fetus/embryo/unborn "baby"- carrying mother or is she not a "mother" at any STAGE of pregnancy ; is physically attacked and the attack results in her death as well as the distruction of the "human" - life in her womb it is LEGALLY considered a "double"-HOMICIDE ?? Please define - "mother" and "human" pregnancy !! Use to hear the term about a pregnant woman /girl "she is with child" !! Is that term outdated for the convenience of this "Culture of Death " Society so that the conscience of the pro- abortion mentality is justified ??

Frank, you brought religion into the picture with your Knights of Columbus poll. Nice picture of the Pope on their home page.

Besides, it takes a lot of faith to believe a ball of microscopic cells is the same thing as a baby.

Rose you were simply wrong, wrong, wrong.

I did as you suggested and Googled: Fetus – Stages of development. The first site on the list describes the 3-week embryo as “a tiny ball of several hundred rapidly multiplying cells. The ball is called a blastocyst.”
LOL Rose, you got all up in arms when I called a blastocyst “a microscopic ball of cells.” But let’s move on to the next site since some of them start the timing of a pregnancy from the date of last menses rather than from time of fertilization.

“3 weeks: The embryo is now about 1/12 inch long, the size of a pencil point. It most closely resembles a worm - long and thin and with a segmented end. Its heart begins to beat about 18 to 21 days after conception.”
Hardly what you described, Rose. Let’s try the next web site on the list.

(This site doesn’t have a specific breakdown for week 3)
“Weeks One Through Four:
Ovulation occurs, Conception occurs, Gender is determined, Implantation
Neural tube forms - It will develop into the nervous system (Brain, spinal cord, hair, and skin). Already your baby has the foundation for thought, senses, feeling, and more!
Heart and primitive circulatory system rapidly form - While still in its beginning stages, this is the very life support system that will carry your child throughout his or her life.”
This site is highly suspect - hair and skin is not part of the nervous system!!! But anyway, again, not what you described, Rose. That’s three strikes, and you’re OUT.

Kilgore Trout, my point was that the LA Times did a poll stating the majority of people do not want tax dollars going to funding abortion especially during this financial time. It was a purely political move on Obama's part and he proved his is not really interested in "change" and in responsible spending in Washington.

I agree with you that we have responsibility to the rest of the world which is why we should not act irresponsibly. I disagree with you that this money cuts down on abortions and I don't want to play statistics tag with you. The more you encourage contraception the more people have intercourse and the more unplanned pregnancies there are thus the more abortions there are as the final contraception. I know this is very unpopular but why not teach abstinence in these developing countries it works 100% of the time.

I understand it's the "law" but just because something is the law does not mean it's right. History has proven that.

I will never understand the argument of allowing the killing of unborn babies because if we don't allow it people will do it anyway and they may hurt themselves doing it illegally. If these poor desperate woman had funds to help them have these babies then everyone wins except of course those who feel "choice" is a badge of honor.

BTW Say What? I never mentioned religion, just another diversion tactic of yours...

Saywhat - I didn't pull that information out of my ear. Google Fetus - Stages of development. You can click on various sites that tell you what happens at each stage of development of a fetus, not a ball of cells. You are wrong, plain and simple,and Frank you are very right - these people are trying to divert the issue to suit their needs. I won't even try to engage in intelligent conversation with them, because there is no such thing. They will rationalize to their death that abortion is not murder, and really believe that they are right. I am not imposing my religious beliefs - I am presenting the truth. Someday you will see that we are right, but then it will be too late for you. Rather than try to debate with people who obviously don't get it, and don't want to get it, I'll pray that you see the light. Debate the issue with God and see where you get. Obviously you don't converse much with Him or you would get it.