Over seventy people turned out in Charlotte today to defend a clinic that has been harassed every weekend for several years by anti-woman religious zealots… and kept the goons and creeps in Operation Save America from even turning up.
On July 15, the news broke that the Obama administration included a ban on abortion coverage that basically meets the notorious Stupak restrictions that had been the focus of attention months ago within the health care reform debates.
This means that the compromise that was satisfactory enough to the anti-abortion Democrats months ago to push through the "reform" has been surpassed with this measure; leaving many pro-choice activists asking "why did he do that? he didn't have to!"
Here's the answer, women, short and sweet: Obama is not your friend, advocate, or representative.
If you are looking for a non-profit (unpaid) internship with the opportunity to learn a lot and contribute to the utterly unique and dynamic national organization that is World Can't Wait, get in touch right away. Email
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with "Internship" in the subject line. Write what you think of World Can't Wait's mission and our plans, particularly around abortion rights. Enthusiasm is much more important than experience!
By Debra Sweet, Director of World Can't Wait
Dr. George Tiller was killed almost a year ago, on May 31, 2009. His murder, for World Can't Wait, and others, brought a renewed commitment to stand up for women, and build a movement to stop the spreading attacks on abortion & birth control.
Access to abortion is as limited now as it's ever been since 1973, with new laws in 10 states being considered, and these passed:
* Nebraska has criminalized abortions after 20 weeks -- that's before viability! This law, which is in direct violation of Roe, is designed only to stop Dr. Leroy Carhart from working in Nebraka. It will be challenged in the courts -- but it could also be the basis for the Roberts Supreme Court to overturn Roe.
04.27.10 - (PRESS RELEASE) Today, the Center for Reproductive Rights filed a challenge against Oklahoma legislation which prohibits a woman from getting an abortion unless she first has an ultrasound, is shown the ultrasound image and listens to her doctor describe the image in detail. The lawsuit follows the Oklahoma Senate voting to override Governor Brad Henry’s veto of the legislation this afternoon.
(PRESS RELEASE) Dr. LeRoy Carhart, a Nebraska abortion provider, issued a statement regarding the two abortion bills signed into law yesterday by Governor Dave Heineman. One law bans abortion after 20-weeks of pregnancy. The other requires doctors to perform extensive screenings of women for any "risk factors" before providing an abortion.
"I am extremely saddened that my state has passed two laws that seriously jeopardize women's health under the awful pretense of protecting them.
It has been 17 years since Dr. David Gunn was shot and killed on March 10th. He was the first abortion provider murdered by the so-called "pro-life" movement.
Begun by the group Refuse & Resist in 1996, March 10th: "Abortion Providers Appreciation Day" is marked by people who care about women and our continued right to control our reproduction.
I was marching this past weekend to commemorate International Women's Day (actually on March 8th). It's the year 2010, but there couldn't be a better time to get in the streets and take a stand for women here and around the world. See the latest attack on women's right to abortion in Nebraska: the "fetal pain" law being debated. What about the pain of the woman? ABCLocal Affiliate
On January 29, Scott Roeder was convicted of the murder of Dr. George Tiller, the courageous doctor who provided abortions for women. Roeder gunned down Dr. Tiller in a church, shooting him in the head on May 31, 2009. A Wichita jury found Roeder, who confessed to the killing, guilty after just 37 minutes of deliberation.
Dr. Tiller, whose watchword was “trust women,” was one of the few doctors in the U.S. who specialized in performing late-term abortions. Women came to him from around the country, often under very stressful medical and/or personal conditions.
We at World Can’t Wait are excited to announce the new film Abortion, Morality and the Liberation of Women is now available on YouTube!
From the description of the film:
A whole generation of women and men have been kept in the dark from the basic facts around abortion rights, and left disarmed in the face of the anti-abortion, anti-women movement which will not stop nor find common ground with women's right to control the most basic of decisions affecting their lives. This film, Abortion, Morality, and the Liberation of Women, documents an August, 2009 discussion between Susan Wicklund, M.D., author of This Common Secret: My Journey as an Abortion Provider (available at bookstores and on ) and Sunsara Taylor, writer for Revolution newspaper (find A Declaration: For Women's Liberation and the Emancipation of All Humanity at revcom.us), and aims to bring scientific and moral clarity to the topic of women's right to abortion.
In memory of
Dr. George Tiller
August 8, 1941 - May 31, 2009
A production of World Can't Wait
Contact us at
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or (866) 973-4463 to organize resistance to the anti-abortion movement and help spread this film, and this message. DVD copies are available to student groups, teachers, and others who want to organize public showings.
Note: The trial of the admitted murderer Scott Roeder, an anti-abortion activist who says he shot Dr. Tiller last May because he was “saving babies” and is arguing justifiable homicide in the Wichita courtroom started last Friday (on the anniversary of Roe v. Wade, ‘coincidentally’). Debra Sweet has a piece about it. You can also see the updates on RH Reality Check.
Right now, the most media buzz about abortion centers around CBS’s decision to reverse their policy of prohibiting all “advocacy” ads during the Superbowl, and accept millions of dollars from Focus on the Family for a 30 second ad attacking women’s right to abortion.
Women and men, in D.C., San Francisco, Austin, Houston, and other cities mobilized last week to confront Christian Fundamentalists out to abolish abortion. As Jamilah Hoffman said on a Houston tv station, “if women don’t have control over their bodies, they are enslaved”. The protests against those out to enslave women were important, angry, and powerful – but they must grow in numbers and determination.
Below are some notes from Debra Sweet’s blog, and a video from the San Francisco protest.
In front of the Supreme Court on January 22, 2010, I waded into the crowds of anti-abortion kids (followed by photographers and video, including the clip below featured in the Washington Post coverage) on a mission. I wanted to know what and how they think; how they are being told to think, and challenge them. In every group, there was that one or two who listened, and looked me in the eye, and communicated that they had never heard anyone say what I said, and were intrigued and thinking.
Message to Wichita, Kansas vigil honoring Dr. Tiller
Hello to everyone here showing your respect for Dr Tiller and your belief in the freedom of choice. I am sorry I am not physically here with you, but please know that I am here in spirit
None of us can pretend to know what Dr Tiller would say to us right now. We know what he used to say about understanding the heart of a woman. We know what he believed about each woman having the knowledge to really understand what was best for HER.
Sign the petition to the Attorney General of Nebraska
Last spring, after Dr. George Tiller was gunned down by one of their own, the anti-abortion movement was emboldened in its threats towards abortion providers and patients. Dr. LeRoy Carhart, the courageous, caring abortion provider and long-time associate of Dr. George Tiller, has stepped forward to take up Dr. Tiller's cause to "Trust Women" in the face of threats both violent and legal.
Recently, he announced he is providing abortions as Dr. Tiller did, to women who need them at 22-28 weeks, or later if medically necessary.
Anti-abortion groups, including "Operation Rescue," which hounded Dr. Tiller for 10 years and is now moving to Omaha to target Dr. Carhart in the same way, are calling Dr. Carhart "Target #1" in an effort to intimidate him, his staff, and his patients. They are filing complaints with the Nebraska Attorney General, asking for investigations of the doctor, who has a completely clear record in terms of medical licensing. This is another form of harassment, and it should be opposed by those who care about the humanity of women.
Shortly after pioneering Kansas abortion provider Dr. George Tiller was murdered on May 31 and his Wichita clinic subsequently closed, other abortion physicians bravely stepped into the breach. Among the most public was Nebraska-based Dr. LeRoy Carhart, who for 11 years had traveled to Wichita monthly to perform late abortions at Tiller’s clinic. Carhart quickly announced he would continue Tiller’s work either at his Nebraska clinic in Bellevue or in Kansas.
And just as quickly, anti-abortion forces switched their campaign against Tiller to focus on Carhart. In an eerie similarity to Tiller’s struggle to defend himself against relentless legal attacks by former Kansas Attorney General Phill Kline, Nebraska’s attorney general Jon Bruning spoke about Carhart in a disparaging manner that signaled possible future legal action.
Last Friday afternoon, the Dean of Students at the University of Houston sent an email letting the university community know that a group calling itself the Center for Bioethical Reform was “using its First Amendment rights” to present something called the “Genocide Awareness Project” (GAP) at the campus for three days. I read the email thinking Darfur, Rwanda or Serbia, places where real genocides have occurred.
But actually, this group makes the outrageous and infuriating comparison between abortion and actual genocide, and is going to campuses around the country showing enlarged and graphic photos of alleged aborted fetuses, trying to mobilize opposition to a woman’s right to abortion among college students.
I was pissed off and figured I had to do something. But what was that going to be? The U of H campus is not known for its radicalism or even activism. It would be difficult to corral a bunch of students to protest this outrageous display, but I knew these people couldn't go unopposed. That's when I thought of Norma Rae.
Opposition Grows to Stupak Amendment Banning Abortion in Healthcare Bill;
National Group Confers on Action Plans
Panel of women leaders “Abortion, Womens' Lives, & the Democrats' Woman-Killing Abortion Ban.”
When: Saturday November 21 2:00 to 4:00pm EST
Where: 16 Beaver Street New York City and by live webcast
Why should the right-wingers in Congress set the terms for women's lives? Why should the "tea-baggers" and racist lunatics be the only ones protesting in the streets? What does the Stupak-Pitts Amendment to healthcare reform mean for women’s lives?
These are questions being address Saturday at the national meeting of World Can’t Wait, a group formed in 2005 to pursue the Bush regime’s program of pre-emptive wars, torture, illegal spying, and its alliance with a “narrow and hateful brand of Christian fundamentalism.”
Participants are:
Fran Luck, Producer of “Joy of Resistance” on WBAI Pacifica Radio
Erin Matson, Vice President for Action, the National Organization for Women
` Sunsara Taylor, writer, Revolution Newspaper
Plans to protest the Stupak-Pitts Amendment will be announced and further developed during the discussion. The National Organization for Women and World Can’t Wait have called for the Amendment to be defeated, and for people to vocally protest its premise that women will not be allowed to purchase coverage for abortion even with their own money, if they participate in the public option plan.
In a related action, National Organization for Women President Terri O’Neil will be leading a protest at the office of Joseph Pitts, the amendment’s co-author, in ChesterPA on Saturday at 10:30 am.
“This action by the House is a stronger attack on abortion access than we saw during the terrible years of the anti-abortion Bush administration. It’s a grave threat to women’s control over their own bodies, pushed by Democratic leaders. If these restrictions pass, they will lead to the deaths of women, endangering the health and hopes of women forced to carry unwanted pregnancies,” said Debra Sweet, Director of The World Can’t Wait.
As the House version of the "Affordable Health Care for America Act" drew to conclusion, a fateful Friday night vote took place. Suddenly a debate over health care turned into a last minute up or down "compromise" vote about the future of abortion.
The so-called compromise titled the "Stupak Pitts Amendment," backed by anti-abortion Democrats, has done more to set back and effectively wipe out the right to abortion than anything the religious right was able to accomplish during 8 years of the Bush regime.
Women everywhere are shocked and appalled by the passage late last Saturday night of the “Stupak Amendment” to the House health insurance reform bill, which further strips us of our right to abortion, and thus, our right to make the most fundamental decisions that affect our lives.
Many progressive activists had argued for the past 10 months that while it would take time for President Obama to fix the problems of the ongoing war and torture, focusing our efforts on supporting his domestic agenda of providing expanded health insurance coverage was in our best interests. “Wait on the war; give him time.” Given that this agenda was supposedly progressive enough to ignore bloodshed, women and those who care about women are reeling by the way we were just “thrown under the bus.”
Last week, with the aid of some 60 Democrats, women's rights were effectively negated by the US Congress as the House passed the Stupak amendment to HR 3962, the Affordable Health Care Act of 2009.
More in-depth analysis of how we got here is forthcoming. But one thing is clear: The US Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) apparently is running the US government, aided by a cadre of "faith-based advocacy groups," the House Democratic leadership, the White House and members of the Senate.
If you didn't know that before, be clear about it. Know it now.
Women seeking abortions in Oklahoma are to be forced to reveal an array of personal information, such as the state of their relationships, how many children they have and their race, which will be posted on an official website.
Abortion rights groups say the new law is intended to intimidate women because, although it does not require them to reveal their names, other information to be made public will sometimes be enough to identify them.
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04.27.10
(PRESS RELEASE) Dr. LeRoy 
By Debra Sweet
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Women and men, in D.C., San Francisco, Austin, Houston, and other cities mobilized last week to confront Christian Fundamentalists out to abolish abortion. As Jamilah Hoffman said on a Houston tv station, “if women don’t have control over their bodies, they are enslaved”. The protests against those out to enslave women were important, angry, and powerful – but they must grow in numbers and determination..jpg)
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