Gallup poll groupings don’t change pro-life agenda

Gallup poll findings this week showed a range of Americans opinions on abortions: all should be legal (25%), ‘most’ should be legal (13%) only ‘few’ should be legal (39%) and all should be illegal (20%).

In the previous post, it was asserted that the 13% wishing to preserve ‘most’ abortions can be a convenient middle ground position to answer a pollster, but that such a conviction is not evidenced as a guiding premise in letters to the editor or in testimony for abortion legislation.

Perhaps there do exist people who consistently believe legal abortion to be a good thing, but are so disturbed at the existence of one facet (like partial-birth abortion) that they identify themselves to pollsters as the 13% wishing to preserve ‘most’ abortion. But that is open for speculation since Gallup never asks what abortions the 13% don’t want to be legal.

Similarly, what are the ‘few’ abortions acceptable for those 39% in the poll who want abortion illegal with reservations?   While not specified by Gallup, legislative battles nationwide over the past decades have shown the major “exceptions” that pro-life advocates have tolerated:

• the mother’s life is threatened,
• rape/incest caused the pregnancy,
• the unborn child is diagnosed with medical problems.

Twenty years ago these three situations held greater weight during debate toward achieving legislative consensus, today they no longer

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Gallup poll’s “most, but not all” abortion category nonexistent

Tuesday’s Gallup poll results from May 3–6, show that 50% of citizens label themselves as “pro-life,” as compared with a new low of 41% calling themselves “pro-choice.” (see NRLC analysis here) Other Gallup questions attempt to further characterize abortion positions:

• 20% of Americans said abortion should be “illegal in all circumstances,”
• 39% said that it should be “legal only in a few circumstances,”
• 13% said it should be “legal under most circumstances,” and
• 25% said it should be “legal under all circumstances.”

However, the polling questions don’t specify which abortions are not supported by the 13% who want to be distinguished from the group of 25% accepting all abortions.

Other than representing a convenient construct on the pollsters’ continuum, we see no evidence of such a sector of opinion supporting “most, but not all” abortions. Certainly, the Kansas mainstream media does not belong to this group, as they never recommend even qualified support for any abortion-restricting provision. 

Supporters of “most, but not all” abortions never show up to testify about abortion-restricting measures at the Statehouse!  We only hear from the all-abortion crowd, and they oppose every abortion restriction.

As an example, after an eight-year federal battle

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Judge agrees with KS AG: no abortion attorney payment

A.G. Schmidt

Kansas pro-lifers got good news from a federal court May 18^th: two Kansas city-area abortion clinics will have to pay their own attorney fees of over $220 thousand dollars without Kansas’ taxpayer reimbursement. Judge Carlos Marguia ruled the clinics had not “prevailed on the merits,” and thus did not qualify for state reimbursement.

Attorneys from the Center for Women’s Health (CWH) and Aid for Women (AFW) had been petitioning for state payment of their attorney fees incurred when the clinics filed to halt both the new state abortion facility licensure law and the provisional clinic regulations written by the Kansas health department (KDHE).

The clinics had sought a permanent injunction in a rushed proceeding July 1, 2011 in front of federal Judge Murguia, claiming irreparable harm would ensue if the law went into effect that day. Judge Murguia awarded only a temporary injunction, largely in order to “maintain the status quo” while issues moved forward.

In November 2011, KDHE issued permanent abortion facility regulations, using a slightly modified version of the original set. Both clinics dropped the federal lawsuit, but the injunction was retained and the lawsuit was refiled in state court by only one clinic CWH (the business of abortionists Herb Hodes and Traci Nauser).

The office of Attorney General Derek Schmidt had filed motions in opposition to paying all the abortion attorneys involved, arguing they were not entitled because such reimbursement is available for “claimants who had prevailed on the merits” in civil rights cases.  [Yes, this is a civil rights case because (hold your groans) one of the claims is that clinic regulation violates a woman’s civil right to obtain an abortion.]

Beyond ineligibility for reimbursement, the Attorney General claimed national and local abortion attorneys had inflated billable hours and wage rates to make a “windfall” off of Kansas taxpayers.  The irony is evident: abortion advocates have been complaining that the defense of pro-life laws is a wasteful depletion of the treasury, and then their own attorneys try to rip-off that same treasury!

Thankfully, that won’t happen at this juncture, due to the litigators working for the AG office.

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Media inflames tempest over Kansas conscience bill

The Healthcare Rights of Conscience Act, H sub 62, was signed it into law last Friday by Gov. Sam Brownback. The law is basically a modest update of a conscience law Kansas has had on the books since 1969.  Seven other states have similar protective laws.

The new law will provide job loss protection for medical practitioners who might otherwise be penalized for refusing abortion involvement, and provides protection from lawsuits against medical facilities which do not perform or refer for abortions.

Courts have consistently ruled that the legalization of abortion in the Roe v Wade ruling does NOT simultaneously require that practitioners must perform abortions.  Under this law, refusing to make abortion referrals or to fill prescriptions for abortion-inducing drugs will be explicitly protected.

It is a medical fact that abortion takes a human life. The right to refuse is based on the first amendment right to exercise one’s conscience. That evaluation may or may not be based on religious tenets.

Unfortunately, a misleading story from CJOnline, wrongly interprets rights of conscience as a “Catholic thing”. The reporter then proceeds

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Gov. Brownback signs Healthcare Rights of Conscience

Gov. Brownback

Pro-life Kansas physicians and pharmacists will have less reason to fear retaliatory discharge due to the Healthcare Rights of Conscience Act signed into law by Gov. Sam Brownback late Friday. State Rep. Lance Kinzer (R-Olathe), chair of the House Judiciary committee, was the bill’s author and Sen. Garrett Love (R-Montezuma) was chief sponsor in the Senate.

Seven other states have similar conscience-protecting laws. Courts have consistently ruled that the so-called right to an abortion does not require that all medical professionals be forced to perform them.

Under the Healthcare Rights of Conscience Act, professionals will also not be forced to refer for abortions. The law also expands conscience protection to apply to all medical facilities, not just hospitals.

Kansans for Life targeted passage of the bill as a top priority especially since the current federal climate is showing increased hostility to religious liberty and is pushing healthcare to include abortion without exclusions.

Kansas law first extended the right to refuse to perform or participate in abortion in 1969, long before abortion-causing drugs were mainstream. Rep. Kinzer said the new law was intended to cover the abortion drug RU-486.

But adding to the moral confusion– especially for pharmacists– is the fact that drugs labeled contraceptive, like “Ella”  are more chemically identical to drugs specifically designed to induce abortion. Testimony supplied to the House Judiciary committee relayed that labels for oral contraceptives all include warning of a “post-fertilization” abortifacient effect.

This is why the bill’s language covers drugs and devices “reasonably believed” by the professional to  cause abortion. Rep. Kinzer  explained,   “If someone were fired or sued for refusing to provide a drug, he said, he or she could then litigate whether there was a basis for believing the drug would cause an abortion.”

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Kansas doctors disbelieve Planned Parenthood claims

Cecile Richards

Planned Parenthood (PP) never misses a chance to misrepresent pro-life legislation for fund raising, so it is unsurprising what they’re telling national supporters about the Kansas Pro-Life Protections Act (introduced in February as HB 2598, now House sub 313).

In a national email appeal this weekend, PP president, Cecile Richards writes that this bill contains “outrageous attacks on women’s health [that] will spread to state after state.” Further, with bold emphasis, Richards says:

“Kansas state lawmakers are set to force doctors to lie to women about abortion — and allow doctors to withhold information from pregnant women.”

In fact, the Pro-Life Protections Act forces NO doctor to deceive women.

The Kansas Medical Society takes no position on abortion, but watches EVERY legislative proposal. Be assured that if ANY of their members were being forced to do ANYTHING, they would have stood up against it. Yet they have been silent about this bill, despite four months of internet agitation by abortion supporters.

The Pro-Life Protections Act does NOT mandate that any practitioner “tell women” anything, period. The bill codifies i

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KS Senate prez derails pro-life bill with phony excuse

Sen. Steve Morris

What kind of double-speak from Senate President Steve Morris (R-Hugoton) is being reported without question by the Kansas press corps?

Despite Morris’ (debatable) claim today that “he will always fight for pro-life values,” he is using the University of Kansas Medical Center (KUMC) propaganda as a pretext for NOT advancing a pro-life bill.

Morris has derailed Senate action on Hsub 313 (the Pro-Life Protections Act) and claimed that it was due to his concerns that it could negatively affect KUMC accreditation. This is a phony excuse.

Moreover, the KUMC language in Hsub 313 is the EXACT LANGUAGE that already exists in all of this year’s budget proposals in both chambers– including the versions Morris voted for!

Which raises the additional question, will Morris now also attempt to remove the KUMC language from the current budget proposals?

As Kansans for Life has repeatedly explained, accreditation of KUMC is not in jeopardy. 1996 federal legislation (the Coats amendment voted for by then-U.S. Senators Dole and Kassebaum) intentionally protects state med schools from losing accreditation when banning actual abortion participation.

That federal protection was created after the independent accreditation agency for medical schools kowtowed to abortion trade groups to demand all graduate medical training include actual abortion practice. (Read more here, here, here and here)

The Coats law was intended to counteract bullying of state legislatures by the accreditation agency and it focuses on states’ right to keep the entire graduate program out of abortion training,

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Kansas House passes Pro-life Protections Act

The Pro-Life Protections Act, House sub 313, passed the Kansas House 88-31 today on final action.  The bill would:

• end tax advantages for businesses that perform abortion,
• stop tax-funding for abortion including abortion training at KU Med school,
• ban sex-selection abortion,
• uphold the civil rights of the unborn throughout gestation to match their protection in criminal law,
• protect the rights of parents to accurate medical information about childbirth.

Kansans for Life executive director, Mary Kay Culp, commented, “This common sense bill simply insures women have access to medical information compiled by Kansas health department professionals, protects human dignity in civil law, prevents Kansas taxpayers from subsidizing abortion, and poses zero threat to medical school accreditation.

Abortion supporters have relied on the Huffington Post and other liberal outlets to spread falsehoods about the bill, and have launched several internet campaigns to shut down the webpages of our governor. The  ACLU has promoted Google ads for months (pictured), falsely telling the nation that, under this proposed pro-life law, Kansas will

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Pro-Life conscience protection headed to KS governor

Sen Garrett Love

The Healthcare Rights of Conscience Act, Hsub 62,  passed  the Kansas Senate tonight: 23 -16,with 1 absent, under the shepherding of Sen. Garrett Love (R-Montezuma). The bill had passed the House  on March 29 by a vote of 95-29, 1 absent, having been introduced in the House Judiciary committee by Rep. Lance Kinzer (R-Olathe), chairman.

The Healthcare Rights of Conscience Act updates 40-years-old state law protecting health professionals’ right to refuse participation in abortion and sterilization. Specifically, it  will:

• broaden the institutions covered to any medical facility, not just hospitals,
• widen the category of morally objectionable procedures to include drugs and devices that are reasonably believed to have abortion-causing effects; and
• protect against forced referrals for such procedures, drugs and devices.

This bill was needed because the definition of abortion covered by conscience protection, did not include drugs and devices provided to non-pregnant women, i.e. birth control. Yet the line is increasingly blurring between abortion drugs like RU486– intentionally given to cause abortion– and chemically-similar “contraceptive” drugs like ‘Ella’.  And the intense moral decision-making  falls on doctors and pharmacists who actually effectuate the termination of human life.

Medical professionals have the right to keep their first amendment freedom of religion, especially in a culture of death where med schools have largely abandoned the Hippocratic oath. This is an important step to prevent Kansas pro-life medical professionals from being run out of medicine.

Sen. Love ably defended the bill, refusing to get sidetracked from the main issue  by the usual confusing meanderings of pro-abortion

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State medical board seizes files of Kansas ex-abortionist

Judge Franklin Theis

Judge Franklin Theis of Shawnee County (which includes the state capitol of Topeka) has allowed the Kansas state Healing Arts Board temporary custody of patient records from ex-Kansas City abortionist, Krishna Rajanna.

By law, medical records are supposed to be kept in safe storage for ten years after a licensed practitioner closes,  but thousands of abortion records turned up in a recycling bin in northeast  Kansas near Rajanna’s residence in the Kansas City suburb of Overland Park.

Associated Press reports today, “The State Board of Healing Arts went to court last week for custody of the discarded documents plus others still in the possession of Krishna Rajanna. Shawnee County District Judge Franklin Theis granted the board’s request Monday.”

A woman who accidentally found the medical records in a school recycling bin brought them to The Kansas City Star newspaper March 24. Two days later, “The Star reported about the discovery of the records, mostly from 2001 and 2002, in a recycling bin outside an Overland Park elementary school. The records included patients’ names, addresses, phone and Social Security numbers and health histories, along with details of their pregnancies.”

According to the follow up Star report, Rajanna claimed he “wasn’t jeopardizing the privacy of women… he was protecting the environment by not burning the paper records of the services they’d received.”

The Star continued, “Peter Brownlie, chief executive officer of  the Planned Parenthood of Kansas and Mid-Missouri, called the dumping of the records ‘awful’.”  [This is an ironic comment coming from the very Planned Parenthood accused of falsifying patient records found missing during prosecution for illegal abortions--a prosecution stalled by destruction of official state abortion records under the Sebelius administration!]

Kristin Neuhaus, another failed abortionist who started out with the Aid for Women Clinic, is in the final stage of losing her medical license for failure to meet standard of care. She still retains patient records and discussed how she periodically burns them here.

RAJANNA  BACKGROUND
Kansans for Life records show that after he failed as an internist, Rajanna joined the Aid for Women abortion clinic

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