A video produced by Eric Holmberg and Vorthos Forum (a/k/a The Apologetics Group, Reel to Real Ministries) got the attention of the Margaret Sanger Papers Collection website at New York University.

http://www.nyu.edu/projects/sanger/sightings/index.html

Margaret Sanger: Solid as Barack

Sanger’s name has cropped up in several right wing blogs that attacked Barack Obama for his support of a woman’s right to choose. For instance, on Aug. 24, 2008 in Human Events Online, Senator Obama was condemned for opposing the Born Alive Infant Protection Act, legislation that would require hospitals to care for infants who survive an abortion. Obama, who viewed this as an anti-abortion rights law, recognized that doctors already have a legal and ethical obligation to preserve life in the rare instance when a baby survives an abortion procedure. Nevertheless, the columnist warned “somewhere in hell, Margaret Sanger is filling out her absentee ballot.” Similar attacks on Sanger and Obama appear in a YouTube video that links them to a plot to eradicate the black race through abortion www.youtube.com/watch?v=YI67MuPwsX0, and yet another piece on black genocide.

Another of the videos produced by Vorthos Forum, “A Tale of Two Babies,” points out that Obama did not vote for Illinois’ version of the “Born Alive Infant Protection Act” because he feared it could be used to curtail abortion rights. The struggle to outlaw all late term abortions of viable infants ought to be the next step in the pro-life movement’s focus.

I am now reading the book, Wrath of Angels, which chronicles how the pro-life street activist movement branched off the political lobbyists. The book then focuses on the so-called “violent fringe” of the pro-life movement. Having known some of the people in the book personally, I see not everything is accurate. But the book reads like a novel and is interesting if you can read between the lines of two “pro-choice” journalists attempting to be objective. (I recommend the book because it has some good insights that I agree with and I’ll be posting a review later on.)

Many pro-lifers saw the reality that Roe v. Wade was far too sweeping a measure of judicial activism. It had to be repealed either by stacking the court with constructionist justices or with a constitutional amendment.

They saw that we do need to dramatically change public opinion first. To get a human life amendment to the Constitution was and still is too big of a step. Baby steps need to be taken. Exposing late-term abortion is a key first step. Even though it’s only two or three percent of all abortions, the legal victory is not what is important. It is getting the vast majority of the public to see the humanity of a viable child and to provoke outrage at the legalized killing of these little ones. Right now most are in the dark. Many think it is already illegal. Others cite the “danger to the life and health of the mother” exception. We heard this lie in many of Dr. George Tiller’s eulogies, for instance. However, a viable baby never needs to be aborted. In the case of a danger to the life of the mother, the baby simply needs to be delivered (by c-section if necessary) and cared for. In the vast majority of cases, these little ones can be saved.

But according to Planned Parenthood’s research arm, the Alan Guttmacher Institute, are the list of reasons women had not obtained the abortions earlier in their pregnancies. The results were as follows:

71% Woman didn’t recognize she was pregnant or misjudged gestation
48% Woman found it hard to make arrangements for abortion
33% Woman was afraid to tell her partner or parents
24% Woman took time to decide to have an abortion
8% Woman waited for her relationship to change
8% Someone pressured woman not to have abortion
6% Something changed after woman became pregnant
6% Woman didn’t know timing is important
5% Woman didn’t know she could get an abortion
2% A fetal problem was diagnosed late in pregnancy
11% Other

Dr. Tiller, of course, was lauded as a saint by abortion rights advocates because of all the women’s lives he saved. But according to Planned Parenthood’s own statistics, this simply isn’t the case.

In the second chapter of Wrath of Angels, “The Struggle for Roe,” the authors explain how prior to 1973 some states had loopholes in their restrictive abortion laws to allow for the “mental health of the mother” to be an exception. All that was needed case of the “danger to a mother’s life or health”

The book also points out that the original language of Roe v. Wade allowed abortion in cases of the danger to the health and life of the mother, rape or incest in the the first trimester of pregnancy; and danger to the health and life of the mother in the second trimester. A key component of allowing this was the “right to privacy.” During the oral arguments, Sarah Weddington conceded that if the humanity of the child could be established she would have no case.

Doe v. Bolton then extended the right to be defined as a private decision between a woman and her doctor under the protection for the “right to privacy.” This was the slippery slope leading over the cliff to what almost all now consider to be infanticide. At this point, there was assured a “right to abortion” through all nine months in any case in which the doctor and the woman decided that her health dictated she could not bear a child. Mental health and “thoughts of suicide” are often cited, for instance.

We need to consider that the so-called exceptions to abortion (rape, incest, the health of the mother) are accepted even by many so-called pro-life advocates such as Sean Hannity and John McCain.

Many “pro-life” politicians and pundits are actually pro-Roe, but merely anti-Doe. Their argument is that these exceptions are no more than two or three percent of all abortions.

“Wouldn’t we would gladly take that victory than none at all?”

Or so the argument goes. However, it is a defensive tack that cannot result in a reversal of our current culture of death. The abortion matrix needs to be exposed from the other extreme two or three percent — those infants who are killed after viability (now at about 22 to 24 weeks). On the surface, it seems too small a victory to pursue. However, securing the right to life for any unborn infant can ultimately reverse Roe at least back to it’s original intent. We must do that by establishing in the public consciousness the humanity of these late-term babies that are being slaughtered by the thousands each year.

If we can do that we have a secured beachhead and ultimately we may end up saving millions.

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