by Diane Rufino, July 31, 2015
STEP ASIDE DR. MENGELE… There’s a new monster in town.
PLANNED PARENTHOOD EXPOSED! Planned Parenthood Uses Partial-Birth Abortions to Sell Baby Parts.
“It’s another boy!”, exclaims the Planned Parenthood “lab technician” who has just finished sifting through a glass pie pan filled with the remains of a second trimester baby’s body parts. “There’s an eyeball… and there’s a leg” is clearly heard and shown for the whole world to see. Those who will not watch these videos from the Center for Medical Progress are either (a) guilty of promoting, participating and condoning these murders, passed off as “choices” and wish to maintain “plausible deniability” or (b) do not want to confirm that there ARE TENS OF MILLIONS of Americans in group (a) and would rather just go back to the good ol’ days of welcoming Caitlyn Jenner to un-mutilated society.
Unless you have an emotional and/or financial interest in killing babies, you’re not buying Planned Parenthood’s excuses for the utterly devastating videos that have put abortion enthusiasts on defense. No, it’s not about “donating fetal tissue.” It’s not about “protecting women’s health.” It’s about killing people who can’t defend themselves, selling their organs, and lying about it. [From the Mike Church Show].
A series of four undercover videos from a pro-life group have rocked Planned Parenthood – and the national debate over abortion. The tapes, which are dated April 7, 2015, show staff from Planned Parenthood’s Rocky Mountains affiliate, located in Denver, Colorado, engaging in negotiations over human fetal body parts. In all of the videos, officials from the nation’s largest abortion provider discuss compensation for extracting organs from aborted fetuses, including, in one case, over wine and salad at lunch. The sale of fetal body parts is illegal under federal law. The punishment for such an act includes hefty fines and/or up to 10 years in prison. Much of the debate stemming from these videos, from a legal point of view, has been over whether the conduct of Planned Parenthood constitutes “sales” or “compensation.” The fourth video, in particular, shows the actual harvesting of fetus body parts.
Let’s put the “sale or compensation” question aside. The much larger issues concern how abortion has been sold, and what it truly is and what are the underlying social values that have given rise to this modern-day House of Horrors.
In his article on the subject, “How the Planned Parenthood Videos Expose Abortion for What It Truly Is,” Edward Morrissey explains this latest scandal:
The conversations clandestinely captured by the activist group Center for Medical Progress would sound familiar to anyone who has held negotiations with vendors and buyers over pricing. The level of compensation changes depending on the organs involved and how cleanly they can be separated. One executive claims that all Planned Parenthood clinics want is reasonable compensation, but if they “come out a little ahead,” they’re “happy to do it.” Another jokes that she wants a Lamborghini and doesn’t want to name a figure first for fear of getting “low-balled.”
In the latest video, which depicts an actual dissection of aborted material as a technician identifies the human organs for transfer, a vice president of a regional chapter of Planned Parenthood discusses the benefits of pricing the individual parts over a flat rate for each specimen. As the technician points out intact kidneys and a spinal column in a pie dish of the torn-apart remains of a first-trimester fetus, Dr. Savita Ginde tells the undercover reporter posing as a buyer that she prefers to transact as a “per-item thing.” That “works a little better,” Ginde says on hidden camera, “just because we can see how much we can get out of it.”
To many people, these conversations sound very much like Planned Parenthood is selling tissue based on market value. Even if the prices seem rather low on a “per-item thing,” the transfers reduce the costs for disposal, turning a cost into a revenue-producing action, as John McCormack notes at The Weekly Standard. If the transactions of human flesh don’t count as profit, they at least reduce cost.
Selling human organs and tissue for profit violates federal law. However, the law also allows for compensation for the costs to produce the tissue, a point that Planned Parenthood and its defenders have raised repeatedly since the videos started emerging. Does this fit within the law, or do Planned Parenthood and its buyers cross the line? The New York Times calls this “a gray zone, legally,” but does concede that the videos raise questions about “what the law allows.”
Certainly, Congress should look into how its exceptions for tissue donation have been exploited. But this isn’t the main issue seen in these videos.
Planned Parenthood wants to keep the debate on these points to deflect from the real debate – the nature of abortion itself, and the deliberate minimization in language that has allowed it. Abortion defenders claim that the procedure does not terminate life, and that it has no more moral meaning than excising a tumor or a cyst, a “clump of cells” in the most common construction. On Twitter, a young actor in Hollywood offered a more crude assessment this week. “A pile of goop should not have more rights than a human being,” Lucas Neff tweeted, “period.”
Now, though, we see that the same abortion clinics that argue for the “pile of goop” status see things very, very differently when it comes time to benefit from the results of their services. They adjust their techniques to extract and market human organs for buyers to meet demand, with the clear value attached on the basis of both their humanity and specificity. Clinic executives like Dr. Ginde want to negotiate those markets on a per-item basis because of the value that humanity and specificity provides to both parties, “just because we can see how much we can get out of it.”
The true danger to Planned Parenthood and the entire industry is the exposure of their hypocrisy. The two positions of “clumps of cells” and negotiating over human organs from abortions are mutually exclusive. One cannot extract human organs from “a pile of goop,” or from tumors or undifferentiated “clumps of cells.” Human organs come from human beings, and the only way to harvest them from unborn human beings is to kill them first. The videos cut through all of the misdirection, all of the antiseptic generalities used in defense of abortion, to expose its true nature – and that’s what has Planned Parenthood panicked over the videos.
For those who oppose abortion, the debate over sales of human organs and tissue is very tempting, and certainly should be engaged. However, the focus should be on the admitted humanity of those whose lives come to an end in those clinics rather than the legal technicalities of compensation and sales for the “products” that result from them. Expose the lie, and let’s finally have the conversation about the value of human life in all its stages that we have spent the last 42 years avoiding. [Edward Morrissey, “How the Planned Parenthood Videos Expose Abortion for What It Truly Is,” The Week, July 29, 2015]
CONTENT WARNING: The remainder of this article contains content material and references video footage that is offensive and shocks the conscience. The videos show Planned Parenthood staff sorting body parts such as kidney and heart from an 11-week human fetus. It includes admissions that some of the aborted fetuses are not yet dead but that they are subsequently terminated and then harvested for organs and tissue.
On July 30, the fourth video was released by The Center for Medical Progress. The video opens with a negotiation between Vice President and Medical Director of Planned Parenthood of the Rocky Mountains Dr. Savita Ginde and a potential buyer for fetal body parts. Ginde is seen saying, “I know I’ve seen livers, I’ve seen stomachs, I’ve seen plenty of neural tissue. Usually you can see the whole brain usually come out.”
To preserve the organs, Ginde says that “we’d have to do a little bit of training” to ensure staff “didn’t crush” the parts that were wanted. Ginde warned about legal risks saying “if you have someone in a really anti [abortion] state that’s going to be doing this for you, they’re probably going to get caught.” She continued that they told their lawyer that, “we don’t want to get called on selling fetal parts across states.”
Live Action News, on July 30, reported and summarized the video as follows:
The video then cuts to the laboratory where a Planned Parenthood technician can be seen sorting through parts of aborted babies. Dr. Ginde tells the prospective buyer that they would likely structure the arrangement on a “per item,” rather than a flat fee: “I think a per-item thing works a little better, just because we can see how much we can get out of it.”
The video can be viewed on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GWQuZMvcFA8
During the parts-sorting process of child terminated in the first trimester, Ginde notes, “Here’s a stomach, kidney, heart.” She further explains that the second trimester babies are “so big” that they won’t “be as war-torn.” An unnamed technician later exclaims, “And another boy!” after finding a body section with legs.
Live Action President Lila Rose issued a strong statement blasting the unethical and improper behavior of Planned Parenthood: “Even as more tapes emerge of top-level Planned Parenthood executives bartering and negotiating over the parts of aborted children, our nation will fund Planned Parenthood with over 1.4 million dollars today alone. As the outrage only continues to grow, Congress and the President must act immediately to stop the forced taxpayer funding of these horrific and barbaric facilities.”
In the first shocking video, which has been viewed almost 3 million times, Planned Parenthood Senior Medical Director Dr. Deborah Nucatola discusses the potential sale of fetal body parts. This first video can be viewed on YouTube – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jjxwVuozMnU.
The second shocking video was released on July 22 and shows a Planned Parenthood official haggling over the price of aborted baby tissue and body parts. During the gruesome conversation, Medical Directors’ Council President, Dr. Mary Gatter, even jokes that she wishes to buy a Lamborghini with the profits. The second video can be viewed on YouTube – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OGwV4NnJoCw.
The third video is perhaps the most graphic and gruesome of all. It shows the harvesting of the unborns’ organs. The video can be viewed at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jugZUvs0-y8.
Congress is conducting an investigation into the scandal, while President Obama remains silent on the matter. A measure has been introduced in the U.S. Senate by Joni Ernst, Rand Paul, and James Lankford to defund Planned Parenthood of taxpayer support. Senator Lankford remarked that, “It is time for federal taxpayer funding for Planned Parenthood to end and let community health centers use that funding to provide health care services for those in greatest need.”
The states themselves are conducting investigations as well. To date, Planned Parenthood has refused to appear and testify.
The full-length video exposing Planned Parenthood’s use of partial birth abortions to harvest and sell baby parts is over two hours and can be viewed on YouTube –https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H4UjIM9B9KQ.
On February 26, 2015, former director of Planned Parenthood who became a pro-life advocate, Abby Johnson, appeared on the Mike Huckabee Show. In the interview, she went into great detail on the horror that she saw during an abortion procedure and described how she watched an unborn baby fight for its life. Her interview can be seen at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Rx8hL4QSEs.
We cannot meaningfully address the moral blight of our time – abortion (equating it with a woman’s right of equality and choice) WITHOUT discussing its prevention: (1) shifting our social and cultural norms such that sex is not as pervasive, expressive, and cavalier as it has become; (2) making birth control mandatory OR emphasizing/teaching abstinence; (3) teaching in our schools what exactly happens to a fetus when a woman aborts it; and (4) empowering religious institutions in our communities to help raise our children with values that promote life, health, and dignity, and which further a culture of morality which our country is so sorely lacking.
National sins bring national calamities. We saw that with our first national sin – slavery. In 1773, probably one of our most prophetic Founding Fathers, George Mason, wrote: “Slavery is that slow Poison, which is daily contaminating the Minds & Morals of our People. Every Gentlemen here is born a petty Tyrant. Practiced in Acts of Despotism & Cruelty, we become callous to the Dictates of Humanity, & all the finer feelings of the Soul. Taught to regard a part of our own Species in the most abject & contemptible Degree below us, we lose that Idea of the Dignity of Man, which the Hand of Nature had implanted in us, for great & useful purposes. Habituated from our Infancy to trample upon the Rights of Human Nature, every generous, every liberal Sentiment, if not extinguished, is enfeebled in our Minds.” At the Philadelphia Convention in 1787, he warned that the newly-organized Union of states MUST abolish slavery or face the wrath of our Creator: ““Every master of slaves is born a petty tyrant. They bring the judgment of Heaven on a country. As nations cannot be rewarded or punished in the next world, they must be in this. By an inevitable chain of causes and effects, Providence punishes national sins by national calamities.”
Mason speaks to the universal truth bespeaks the universal truth that civilizations go through a repeatable cycle which transitions from slavery to freedom and back to slavery (or other form of bondage). This is perhaps true because of the very predicable nature of man himself. It follows from the duality of human nature that man is capable both of moral greatness as well as moral degeneracy. That duality is tempered by the fact that the desire for freedom is universal in all human beings, whether they live moral lives or not, and eventually then those same human beings become complacent in that freedom and allow themselves to become too degenerate to preserve that freedom.
When a segment of society can be sacrificed for the benefit of another, then we have to question our notions of freedom and equality, and moreover, we have to fear the wrath that only a universal judge can exact.
References:
Mike Church, “The Daily Republican, July 30, 2015. Referenced at: http://us4.campaign-archive2.com/?u=a7c67a0257f1fe4769a31f098&id=27e248fbf7&e=b300ce6512
Edward Morrissey, “How the Planned Parenthood Videos Expose Abortion For What It Truly Is,” The Week, July 29, 2015. Referenced at: http://theweek.com/articles/568788/how-planned-parenthood-videos-expose-abortion-what-truly
Live Action News, July 30, 2015. Referenced at: http://liveactionnews.org/planned-parenthood-baby-parts-scandal-grows-as-new-tape-released
Abby Johnson on the Mike Huckabee Show – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Rx8hL4QSEs
The Planned Parenthood videos:
The first video – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jjxwVuozMnU
The second video – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OGwV4NnJoCw
The third video – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jugZUvs0-y8
The fourth video – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GWQuZMvcFA8
The full-length video expose on Planned Parenthood – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H4UjIM9B9KQ
Forloveofgodandcountry's Blog 
I have already received a comment (not on this site) from a liberal who wrote: “I am amazed at how anti-abortion folks use repulsive stuff to pump their cause.” The reader makes excuses for women who have late-term abortions and claims that they have legitimate reasons for doing so. The reader went on to misinterpret the Roe v. Wade decision as standing for the proposition that abortions are only allowable in the first trimester. Roe v. Wade is a horrible decision that had nothing to do with what the plaintiff “Roe” (not her real name) herself really wanted. The lawsuit was a vehicle for social change endorsed and funded by Womens’ Rights groups. The right of a woman to control her fertility (ie, to abort at will) was grounded in the social goal of giving women the unfettered opportunity to compete equally with men in the workplace. A woman, after all, could never compete equally with a man, when she is “held back” by pregnancy. That this was the true motivation behind Roe is no secret. You just need to read what Sandra Day O’Connor wrote and what Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote and spoke in interviews. By the way, Ginsburg criticizes O’Connor for not going “far enough” with the decision to secure the right of an abortion under principles of Equal Protection. I don’t know how she would have done that given the language of the Texas statue at issue, but that is what Ginsburg said. As for the decision, it is not true that an abortion is only permitted in the first trimester. The decision only speaks to “trimesters” in terms of explaining the different interests at stake. As the decision discusses: In the first trimester, the baby is not “alive” and developed, so the right of a woman over her uterus and procreation is absolute. In the second trimester, there are “competing interests,” according to the Court. In the second trimester, the right of the woman over what happens with her uterus is balanced by the “state’s interest” in the baby’s life. In the third trimester, the state’s interest is supposed to control. While that breakdown seems all well and good, the decision goes on to say, in essence, that when a woman feels her health is at risk, her interests trump at all times. As if that isn’t enough, the decision says that even the mere “stress” that a pregnancy poses is enough of an “undue burden” and health risk that would rightfully warrant an abortion…. at any time. So, the decision basically stands for a woman’s unfettered right to an abortion at any time she no longer wants to carry the child inside her. While there is only a fraction of people who believe that life begins at conception at abortion should never be allowed, most people believe that a woman should be able to terminate her pregnancy if for some unfortunate reason, that pregnancy was not planned – as long as the pregnancy is terminated upfront and while the pregnancy is still in the early days of cell division. But there is something inherently evil and morally reprehensible for a woman to allow life to take hold in the organ that God and nature have given her specifically for that reason and then to have it killed. There is no difference, in my opinion, in seeing the mangled, tortured bodies of dead Jewish children in the Nazi ghettos and concentration camps and seeing the mangled, bloodied fully-formed bodies of dead babies aborted because of “undue burden.” If a woman wants an uninhabited uterus – if she wants an abortion, I don’t think it is too much for a civilized society to require that she make that decision before the baby becomes viable.
For the record, I am not categorically against abortion. I believe a woman needs the freedom and opportunity to terminate a pregnancy that was not planned. I am not naive to the fact that things happen, often out of our control, which we wish we could have prevented. And in the case of an unwanted pregnancy, the consequence has life-altering consequences. I just believe that while an opportunity should be available for women, it should not be abused. A woman should be expected to be able to make a decision about that pregnancy as soon as she learns of her condition. There is a period, as we all know, where the fertilized egg goes through a series of divisions without yet becoming a viable human being. In fact, when the egg is initially fertilized, there is a period of over 24 hours when it just sits there and doesn’t even go through its first division. That probably is because maternal and paternal DNA must go through its recombination phase to uniquely determine the genetic make-up of that “child.” I believe if we did our jobs as parents and as educators and as church members – without the dictates and mandates of government and the protests of socially promiscuous and degenerative groups – and if we walked them through the process of an abortion along with a discussion of what the long-term emotional effect it will likely have, then we might be able to cut down on the number of women and teens who needlessly put themselves in such a position. Giving life is the most precious gift that God has given to women. Only under the right circumstances can she truly appreciate that gift and that experience.