Pro-Choice Maryland

You can say this is a sequel entry to the last entry

Texas' lieutenant governor late Tuesday suspended a senator's filibuster against wide-ranging abortion restrictions, but Democrats moved quickly to appeal the decision and set off a parliamentary fight over the rules.

Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst halted the filibuster after determining Democratic Sen. Wendy Davis had strayed off the topic when she talked about a sonogram bill passed in 2011 and how the new abortion restrictions only compounded the anti-abortion laws in Texas.

Democrats immediately appealed the decision and set off a heated debate over rules. Austin Democratic Sen. Kirk Watson appeared to be positioning himself to launch a new filibuster on Dewhurst's decision.

Wearing pink tennis shoes to prepare for nearly 13 consecutive hours of standing, Davis began the day with a one-woman filibuster to block a GOP-led effort to impose stringent new abortion restrictions across the nation's second-most populous state.

The filibuster began at 11:18 a.m. CDT Tuesday and continued until 10:03 p.m., less than two hours before the midnight deadline marking the end of the 30-day special session.

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Senator Davis is fucking awesome. Btw, the last line of the article made me facepalm myself very hard. You'll see why when you read it.

House Republicans on Tuesday make their most concerted effort of the year to change federal abortion law with legislation that would ban almost all abortions after a fetus reaches the age of 20 weeks.

The "Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act," expected to pass by a comfortable margin late Tuesday, would be a direct challenge to the 1973 Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision that legalized abortions up to the time a fetus becomes viable. Fetal viability is generally considered to be at least 24 weeks into the pregnancy.

The measure will be ignored by the Democratic-led Senate and the White House, saying the bill is "an assault on a woman's right to choose," has issued a veto threat.

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If you guys didn't see it, there's a petition to tell your representives to vote against this bill in the last entry I made. Sign it even if the senate won't pass it, Obama will veto it, and your representive is pro-choice.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- House Republican who oppose abortion promoted legislation Wednesday that would ban abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy.

These Republicans want to move ahead despite recent court decisions that have struck down similar state laws. The GOP lawmakers also are taking on their own leadership, which has shown little desire to hold votes on contentious social issues.

Arizona Rep. Trent Franks, joined by 10 other Republicans and anti-abortion advocates at a news conference, said there was a "good chance" that his bill would see action in the full House this year.

Franks and others said the legislation would gain momentum from the recent conviction of a Philadelphia abortion provider, Dr. Kermit Gosnell, for killing three babies born alive at his clinic.

In the four decades that abortion has been legal in the United States "many, until Gosnell, somehow construed abortion as victimless. That has changed," said Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J.

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Franks and others said the legislation would gain momentum from the recent conviction of a Philadelphia abortion provider, Dr. Kermit Gosnell, for killing three babies born alive at his clinic.

In the four decades that abortion has been legal in the United States "many, until Gosnell, somehow construed abortion as victimless. That has changed," said Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J
I doubt that Mr. Smith since abortion and infantside are two whole completely different things. You see, what Dr. Gosnell did was murder three born babies while abortion is terminating a pregnancy that results in the death of a fetus, which is non-viable in most abortions.

CHICAGO (AP) — One of the most liberal members of the U.S. Supreme Court, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg could be expected to give a rousing defense of Roe v. Wade in reflecting on the landmark vote 40 years after it established a nationwide right to abortion.

Instead, Ginsburg told an audience Saturday at the University of Chicago Law School that while she supports a woman's right to choose, she feels the ruling by her predecessors on the court was too sweeping and gave abortion opponents a symbol to target. Ever since, she said, the momentum has been on the other side, with anger over Roe fueling a state-by-state campaign that has placed more restrictions on abortion.

"That was my concern, that the court had given opponents of access to abortion a target to aim at relentlessly," she told a crowd of students. "... My criticism of Roe is that it seemed to have stopped the momentum that was on the side of change."

The ruling is also a disappointment to a degree, Ginsburg said, because it was not argued in weighty terms of advancing women's rights. Rather, the Roe opinion, written by Justice Harry Blackmun, centered on the right to privacy and asserted that it extended to a woman's decision on whether to end a pregnancy.

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Cross posted to we_r_the_middle

North Dakota didn't set out to become the abortion debate's new epicenter.

It happened by accident, after a legislative caucus that once vetted abortion bills languished, leaving lawmakers to propose a flurry of measures — some cribbed from Wikipedia — without roadblocks.

Long dismissed as cold and inconsequential, North Dakota is now trying to enact the toughest abortion restrictions in the nation. The newly oil-rich red state may soon find itself in a costly battle over legislation foes describe as blatantly unconstitutional.

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Lawmakers on Friday took a step toward outlawing abortion altogether in the state by passing a so-called personhood resolution that says a fertilized egg has the same right to life as a person. The House's approval sends the matter to voters, who will decide whether to add the wording to the state's constitution in November 2014.
Hopefully, history repeats itself again by voters overturning this like it did in Colorado and Mississippi.

Also, I'm happy to see that there are some republicans that aren't happy about this bill and think it goes too far. They realize that this wouldn't only hinder abortion, but it would hinder IVF and make miscarriage a crime...two things that also affect lifers as much as choicers.

With all of this said and done...it makes me happy I'm not from a state like ND. It also makes me happy that I live in Sweden because I wouldn't have to worry about this stupid shit. I was already lucky to be living here when I miscarried in 2010 because I bleed so much that a blood transfusion was required. If I had been refused a D&C, I probably would've bled to death regardless if I had the blood transfusion because I would've continued to bleed until the fetus (who was already dead) was removed (as I have O negative blood while the fetus had a positive blood type).