Bill O'Reilly, like his fellow anti-abortion extremists, hates Planned Parenthood and is more than willing to use his show to promote anti-abortion lies and propaganda such as supporting GOP lawmakers' efforts to de-fund Planned Parenthood and validating Lila Rose's bogus "sting" videos. The latest bit of anti-abortion nonsense was generated as a result of comments made by a Florida Planned Parenthood representative during a hearing on a Florida bill that would tighten abortion law, including a provision dealing with fetuses "born alive" during a botched abortion. As noted on Slate, "born alive" laws are the anti-abortion movement's "white whale" in that they believe it's a real problem and that because Pres. Obama didn't support an Illinois "born alive" bill, he supports infanticide. So it's no surprise that forced birther O'Reilly would be peddling the same infanticide lie on his show in order to, once again, slam an organization that, unlike O'Reilly, supports women.
Last night, after showing video of the Planned Parenthood rep being subjected to "gotcha" questions from anti-abortion pols, O'Reilly congratulated himself for predicting that "extreme elements in Planned Parenthood and other pro-abortion groups" (Bill never uses the word pro-choice but rather the designated pro-life lobby term, pro-abortion) "would eventually come to infanticide because they don't see the fetus, the baby, whatever the situation is as a human being with any rights at all and this is proven to come true, is it not?" (Bill believes in fetus rights - women's rights, not so much!) Kirsten Powers, who consistently ignores the reality that some late term abortions are medically necessary, said that these procedure are infanticide and that it's outrageous that anybody would let the fetuses die on the operating table.
Bill accused the PP rep of "being honest." He claimed that what she was really saying was that babies have no rights "even if they're sitting on the table." (She actually said, regarding resuscitating the baby, that the decision to provide care for it is between the women and the doctor.) He pontificated "we all know" about "extreme elements" in the organization. (This, from an anti-abortion extremist) Powers said that while she supports family planning she doesn't support PP's "extreme" position on late term abortion.
O'Reilly cued right wing Kate Obenshain with his comment that "as a conservative woman" she doesn't have any use for PP. (He Bill, GOP Sen. Lisa Murkowski supports it!) As expected, Obenshain whined about her tax dollars supporting it. O'Reilly then said she was in agreement with the majority of Factor viewers who don't want their money spent on "abortion mills" (an anti-abortion term).
O'Reilly: the majority of work done by Planned Parenthood is abortion when it is only 3%. O'Reilly: "most Americans are opposed to abortion" when the majority still support it.
O'Reilly, not a doctor, claimed that abortion is against the Hippocratic oath. (another anti-abortion talking point) After telling Planned Parenthood to stop taking his tax dollars, Bill asked if the women knew which countries allow infanticide, Obenshain (on cue?) didn't know the answer but asserted that President Obama "supports infanticide," a popular and discredited anti-abortion lie. O'Reilly interjected that Obama "has a horrible abortion record." Obenshain interjected "supporting infanticide."
Bill claimed that girl babies are being thrown in the Ganges river and how, if NARAL gets its way, "this is the road we're going down." Never wasting an opportunity to smear Dr. Tiller, he added that while he didn't condone his murder, what was happening in Kansas was "frightening." (The extremism and harassment of women fueled by O'Reilly?) Obenshain whined about babies being "born alive" and actually cited the discredited lie from anti-abortion extremist, Jill Stanek, that "babies" were being placed in "soiled linen closets." O'Reilly expressed hope that Dr. Gosnell would be convicted. (The anti-abortion movement loves the Gosnell case because, although this type of thing is rare, it "proves" that abortions are unsafe.")
Once again, aging, divorced, devout Catholic and pro-life Bill O'Reilly distorts reality to promote his extremism. He didn't cite Planned Parenthood's statement which supports giving care to infants born alive. But if O'Reilly and his fanatic friends get their way, the road we'll be going down is the road to lots more Gosnell's because abortion will be back in the alley - except, of course, for rich (and in many cases, Catholic) women who get "procedures" done in hospitals. Ah, good times....
Trust me Bile "Planned Parenthood is a wonderful and much needed organization.And I find your obsession with sex,women ,babies and children ,very creepy to say the least.
Alisa LaPolt Snow appeared before the Florida State House of Representatives on Wednesday March 27 to discuss HB 759, the so-called “Infants Born Alive” bill which was sponsored by Republican Cary Pigman. Planned Parenthood initially opposed this bill, noting it to be “politically motivated and inflammatory language”. Planned Parenthood has also noted that the bill doesn’t break new ground – it states what is already part of existing medical procedures and Planned Parenthood policies. Meaning that the bill isn’t going to save lives – it was intended to call attention to what is a very rare situation that is already covered by existing practices in a manner that would do what was possible to save the life of an infant born as part of an abortion procedure. But this bill was never intended to save lives, was it? It was intended as another way to chip away at Roe v Wade, as I discussed in my earlier post. That has been the intent of GOP politicians and pundits ever since they failed at their last major challenge at the Supreme Court.
During Ms Snow’s appearance, as preserved online, she was questioned by four Florida state legislators. The first three – Jim Boyd, Daniel Davis and Jose Oliva are all Republicans, who have been heavily featured in GOP outlets like Fox News with the “gotcha” questions they took the opportunity to throw at Snow. Their intent was clearly to get her to make a definitive statement they could use as a soundbite to help their cause. Snow realized this and refused to give them that opening. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure that out – the bill was specifically crafted to be an attention-getter, to rile up the GOP base. The sponsor is apparently trying to convince his House colleagues that he’s addressing some kind of a loophole, but Snow made clear in her comments that this matter was addressed last year in the Federal Born Alive Infants Protection Act of 2012, specifically in the Neutrality Clause. A fourth representative, Democrat Mike Clelland, asked Snow some questions, trying to tie her down as to why Planned Parenthood opposed this bill, noting that Cary Pigman had stated that he didn’t think the federal law applied in this specific case, thus allowing him to introduce this bill. Snow corrected Clelland as simply as she could. He pressed her as to Planned Parenthood’s opposition and Snow clarified that there were two areas of concern – the biggest one being the surrender language.
To be clear, the original language of HB 759 had language that required the birth mother to surrender any infant born during an abortion procedure. This was a big part of the inflammatory nature of the bill, since the rest of it just restated what is already on the books. Planned Parenthood opposed this as it was clear the point of it was “to shame and judge a woman” rather than to accomplish anything helpful. There was a second issue having to do with the logistics of what measures could be taken to try to take an infant in this situation to a hospital. The point of the transportation element had to do with the requirement that this be done – Planned Parenthood had a logistical question about what happens when the travel time and distance is too great, the infant dies, and the physician is then held responsible for not fulfilling that part of the law. This part of the law still hasn’t really been answered.
But after this hearing, Cary Pigman backed down and removed the surrender language, at which point Planned Parenthood dropped their opposition and the bill passed the Florida House. I note that Mike Clelland also had issues with that language and only voted to approve this after the language was removed. Clelland was surprised to hear about this potential situation (a live birth during an abortion procedure) and was concerned to make sure that all attempts were being made to protect any life involved. We should be aware that Clelland ran in a newly-drawn, GOP-leaning district in 2012. Taking this position will no doubt help him in his re-election campaign with his conservative constituents. That’s the reason he used the language you cited.
I note that there weren’t two Democrats questioning Snow in the footage. Only one – Mike Clelland, for the reasons I gave above. And I note that it’s the GOP who’s been trying to make hay out of it ever since, whether that be Reince Priebus or Florida House Speaker Will Weatherford. So your implication that this is a bi-partisan bill is a bit of a reach. Having one Democrat, who’s running in a conservative seat, and who has fallen for a GOP semantics gambit, say something in support of a bill that he thinks might be advantageous to him, does not constitute bipartisan support. HB 759 was a politically motivated bill that had no real purpose other than to generate headlines for the GOP and rile up their base.
Andrew, now that we’ve dismissed your first concern, let’s move on to the second. You bring up Kermit Gosnell, an unscrupulous doctor in Philadelphia who is on trial for eight counts of murder, and who has been in serious trouble before. Not sure why you’re mentioning him, since his situation is irrelevant. If your only comparison is the rare situation where an infant survives a late term abortion procedure, you really need to do a little more research about Gosnell before bringing him up. His methods and character have been condemned by Planned Parenthood. He was not running your typical women’s health clinic. He was running a very specific operation – mostly providing procedures to poor minority and immigrant women. It’s been alleged he does not have certification in gynecology or obstetrics. And his real racket was providing, at a high cost, a very late term procedure that no doctor in their right mind should be doing. That’s not the same thing at all as a professional doctor trying to save the life of a patient. Gosnell was bilking the clients he could, who would come to him too late to get a legal abortion, and essentially delivering near full-term children. Gosnell’s trial started last month. We’ll see how it turns out, but I doubt it will be a happy conclusion for him.
But again, what’s the point of discussing this guy? Planned Parenthood doesn’t send women to people like Gosnell – they specialize in women’s health and preventative planning. That’s most of their work. The GOP would like gullible people to think that all they do is run “abortion mills”, which is patently false. Someone like Gosnell was running a racket like that, and an extremely dangerous one. But that’s something which is already illegal and is being punished under the law as it is. The Florida GOP’s attempted “gotcha” has nothing to do with Kermit Gosnell and it’s odd that you would think that it did.
Now, Andrew, since I’ve addressed your concerns as clearly as I can, I think we can all agree that the matter is nothing like the way you presented it, right? Right. (By the way, are you sure you haven’t posted here before, under another name perhaps?)
Let’s be be very clear about why the Florida GOP state legislators crafted their bill: They are doing their part in the long term GOP strategy to undermine Roe v Wade. This is done by “chipping away” at the specific procedures that are allowed, and establishing editorialized definitions that will allow them to eventually get another full whack at it. Never mind that the majority of women, including GOP women, support having the right to deal with this issue themselves and not have it dictated to them. Never mind that the particular situations the GOP are citing are usually extremely unlikely ideas that 99.9% of women would never encounter. Never mind that Planned Parenthood’s primary emphasis is on women’s health – exams, screenings – particularly for women who have no other place to turn.
GOP politicians and pundits are aware of all of those facts, yet they continue to bang this drum – for the same reason that they bang the “Illegal Aliens” drum – it riles up their base, even in the face of an election where they were effectively spanked in public. It’s clear to me that the purpose of all this is to try to stir up the usually dependable GOP voters to give them more traction in the midterm elections next year.
The specific hearing in question with the Planned Parenthood spokesperson was clearly intended as a “gotcha” moment by the GOP. You have several GOP state legislators asking extremely loaded questions to the PP rep, specifically to get her to identify an aborted fetus from a wildly unlikely situation as a “newborn infant”. If they could get her to publicly make such a statement, Fox News would have been running with that 24/7 – “Planned Parenthood Spokesperson Admits They’re Killing Infants!!!” It’s a ridiculous leap. The rep was actually saying, repeatedly, that the medical procedure being discussed was between the doctor and the patient involved, and that since she wasn’t a medical doctor, she didn’t have the wherewithal to be commenting on what medical care was appropriate. This is partly due to the fact that in such a procedure, the fetus will not be able to survive under any circumstances. For example, in the rare case of a pregnancy where the fetus has both extreme issues of its own and where the pregnancy itself is endangering the mother’s life, you could see a late term procedure happening – and in that case, the fetus won’t survive due to all the existing issues. But the GOP doesn’t want you to hear all that. They want you to think that people are happily going in to have this kind of procedure out of meanness or some other such thing.
The PP rep was smart enough to avoid the easy pitfall the Florida GOP guys tried to walk her into, which left them with only a petulant response of: “Well then she must support infanticide!!!” But that’s not what she said, and Planned Parenthood made that clear in a second statement afterward. This is similar to the attempts to paint President Obama’s voting record in Illinois and Washington as somehow hostile to babies. The reality is that Obama deftly avoided several GOP attempts to “gotcha” Democrats with staged votes on things like this – staged votes that were designed to make them either be painted as supporting “infanticide” or as supporting the GOP position. Any politician with a grain of street smarts knows to avoid that vote, since it is but the first stage of a character attack based on nonsense. And Obama dealt with the “gotcha” votes in a fairly intelligent manner, as he has continued to deal with the continuing intransigence of the GOP.
The result of the current non-event is that you have Bill O’Reilly once again yelling about how he doesn’t want tax dollars going to support Planned Parenthood, and about how all these supposed awful things are happening at PP. Let’s say we give Bill what he wants – the government cuts off all funding for the health clinics and leaves them to privately solicit funding to keep their doors open. While we’re doing that, we should also pull all the tax dollars from supporting right wing military contractors too, right? Because most of us don’t want to spend millions of our tax dollars (far more than Planned Parenthood receives) on companies like Haliburton and the formerly named Blackwater. And we should also pull all the tax dollars going to right wing charter schools, home schools and the like, right? And we should pull any tax dollars like matching funds going to right wing political groups too, right? This is a thread on a sweater that Bill O’Reilly should think twice about tugging.