“The Statute requires a straight forward statement that is easily understood by a lay
person, that the abortion terminates the life of a human being. The precise language was
carefully selected by the Legislature. The language used by Planned Parenthood not only fails to use the clear and proper language, but Planned Parenthood’s language is inaccurate, incomplete, misleading and very confusing.”
Planned Parenthood had won an injunction against enforcing the law, and two court rulings. But on June 27, 2008, the Eighth Circuit Court lifted the injunction. Since then, PP has been doing its best to get around the clear meaning of the law, argues South Dakota pro-life activist Allen Unruh, who has urged Attorney General Larry Long to take action.
“Laws are meaningless if they are not enforced,” Unruh says. “The attorney general’s office and health departments can’t choose which laws they want to enforce. We have spent countless hours in the South Dakota legislature to pass these laws, and millions going through the court system, and when we win, it’s not enforced. That is an outrage.”
On the national scene, the proposed Obama health care takeover is likely to include a blank check for Planned Parenthood.
In a July 17, 2007 speech to Planned Parenthood, Barack Obama said:
“In my mind, reproductive care is essential care, basic care, so it is at the center, the heart of the plan that I propose…. insurers are going to have to abide by the same rules in terms of providing comprehensive care, including reproductive care ... that's going to be absolutely vital.”
Rep. Joe Pitts (R-Pa.) observes that ObamaCare “will lead to mandated coverage of abortion, forcing employers and insurance providers to cover abortion as a health care procedure and subsidizing abortions with the tax dollars of pro-life Americans who have grave moral objections.”
The two House committees and one Senate committee that have voted on the bill rejected any attempts to exclude abortion funding. You can picture the Planned Parenthood lobby already cooling the champagne and practicing “high fives” for final passage.
Taxpayers over the past 10 years have coughed up more than $2 billion to Planned Parenthood. But the real cost should be counted in human lives, as those PP dollars eerily correspond with a rise in abortions performed at PP clinics. As Lifenews.com reports , in 1997, Planned Parenthood received about $160 million in total taxpayer funding from various levels of government and performed 160,000 abortions. By 2006, government funding had doubled to more than $300 million, and the clinics committed 305,310 abortions.
Just in South Dakota, as Unruh points out, “a kindergarten class gets killed every week.”
That’s a high price to pay for governmental complacence – and complicity.