October 11, 2010

Election Day and Abortion – Vote!

Posted by Pat Richards under Aborticentrism, Abortion, Abortion & Religion, Abortion Advocates, Abortion Candidates, Abortion Centers, Abortion Discussion, Abortion Doctor, Abortion Heroes, Abortion Information, Abortion Law, Abortion lies, Abortion Medical, Abortion Rights, Supreme Court, Vote | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , |
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Abortion Issue

 

Besides being the day before my birthday, November 2 is Election Day.  If you are concerned about the abortion issue, this is a rather important election.

At this moment, both the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House of Representatives are controlled by the Democratic Party and, for the most part, the Democrats support abortion rights.  Still, the votes in the House and the Senate are often very close because there are a number of Democrats who are pro-life.  We saw the impact of that situation when the Congress considered health care reform and a number of pro-life Democrats who supported the bill forced President Obama to assure them that the new law would not fund abortions.  Desperate for votes, Obama took the extraordinary step of signing an Executive Order confirming that the new law would not pay for abortions.  That satisfied those Democrats, so they voted for the bill.

Since the Democrats are the majority party in both houses, it means that every chairman of every committee is a Democrat.  And it is in the committees where all the action is.

Every year, pro-life Members of Congress introduced legislation that would in one way or another outlaw abortion.  These bills can take different approaches but the bottom line is they want to make abortion illegal again.  When those bills are introduced, they are usually referred to the Judiciary Committees.  The Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee is John Conyers, who is pro-choicer.  When he sees these anti-abortion bills, he says thank you very much and proceeds to stuff them in a drawer, basically killing any chance of their being considered.  They are DOA.  The same thing happens in the Senate Judiciary Committee.

 

Abortion

 

But this November, it is very possible that Democrats in the House will lose a number of seats and the Republicans could actually be in the majority.  If that occurs, come next January, when the new Congress is sworn in, a bill that is introduced to outlaw abortion could very well go to a new Chairman of that committee who would probably be pro-life.  In that case, it is very possible that that chairman could then take steps to move that bill for consideration.  Then the battle will be on.  Yes, President Obama will be there for us to veto any bad bill but the pro-choice forces will have to mobilize, raise money, etc. to fight the bill.

Then there is the U.S. Senate.  When President Obama has to nominate someone for the Supreme Court, the nomination goes to the Senate Judiciary Committee, which is run by pro-choicer Pat Leahy.  The current chairman will do everything he can to assure that Obama’s nomination is granted smooth sailing in the committee and on the floor of the Senate.

But should the Senate fall into the hands of the Republican Party, then you will have probably Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah as chairman and he is very pro-life.  So, a nomination that is sent to his committee will have a much tougher time of it.  Indeed, if the Republicans take over the Senate, there is a good chance that Obama’s pro-choice nominations will be defeated and he’ll have to nominate someone who is “neutral” on the issue of abortion.

So, the bottom line is you need to vote.

You need to do your research, find out who is running and vote for the one who is pro-choice.

You’ve got the power – use it.

 

October 5, 2010

Go Get ‘Em, Bill

Posted by Pat Richards under Abortion, Abortion & Religion, Abortion Advocates, Abortion Blog, Abortion Candidates, Abortion Centers, Abortion Discussion, Abortion Doctor, Abortion Heroes, Abortion Information, Abortion Law, Abortion lies, Abortion Medical, Abortion Pill, Abortion Pregnancy Centers, Abortion Rights, Abortion Violence | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , |
[25] Comments 

Abortion

Bill Baird.

The self-proclaimed “Father of the Abortion Rights Movement.”

On April 6, 1967, before an overflow audience in excess of 2,000 people, he spoke at Boston University about the public’s right to privacy in matters of sexuality, including the right to birth control and abortion. At the end of the lecture he was promptly arrested by members of the Boston police department’s vice squad and charged with publicly exhibiting birth control and abortion devices and giving away a single condom and package of contraceptive foam to a nineteen-year-old, unmarried female student. The event made headlines nationwide.  He spent months in jail.  As far as I know, he is the only private person to have two Supreme Court cases in his name, both dealing with the right to privacy.

Now, Bill Baird is close to 80 years old and is barely making it on his social security payments.  In addition, he has been a pariah within the pro-choice community for decades.

Things started going downhill for Bill years ago when charges of womanizing started spreading throughout the feminist community.  Who knows if the allegations were true or not?   All I know is that Bill would tell me stories about how women practically attacked him, but it didn’t matter.  The stories were already out there and could not be roped in.  Contributing to his fall from grace was his constant self-promotion.  Whenever he went to a pro-choice convention or if he just had the ear of one person, the conversation was all about him, all about his Supreme Court cases, all about his press releases (which he literally carried around with him).  He was clearly yearning for attention.  It was both obnoxious and pathetic at the same time.

When I joined the National Coalition of Abortion Providers, I ran into

Abortion

him at some event and he told me he needed money to attend the annual “Right to Life” convention.  I asked him why he would even go to their meeting and he said he thought it was important to protest outside their hotel.  He bragged about how his protests would get “lots of media attention.”  At one point, he even told me that the anti-abortion folks were very interested in paying him money if he came over to their side.  I always suspected that was a bunch of crap and that he was telling me this in the hopes that our side would give him money instead.  It was just an exhausting and very sad occasion whenever I saw him.

Then, in 1993 NCAP decided to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Roe

vWade with a formal, black-tie dinner dance at the elegant Mayflower Hotel in Washington, D.C.  It was the first of its kind and we invited a number of pro-choice “celebrities” to join us.  As much as I knew how Bill rubbed folks the wrong way, I felt he should be invited to the event because of how much he had done for our cause.

So, I called him and told him we’d like him to join us as one of our “dignitaries.”  He started crying.  He said through his tears that he hadn’t been invited to a pro-choice function in decades and he thanked me profusely.  Then he added “but, Pat, I can’t afford to rent a tuxedo.”

“Okay, let me work on that Bill.”

Within hours, I was talking to Susan Hill, one of the original founders of NCAP and not one of Bill’s fans, but she still offered to pay for his tuxedo.  I called him back and told him to make plans to come to Washington.  We paid for his hotel room as well.  For the first time, Bill Baird was speechless.

The day of the dinner dance, I gave Bill the opportunity to talk to our

membership to give them a historical perspective of his work.  He was getting a great reaction until he said at one point that he felt the pro-choice community had an “obligation” to pay him money for all the work he had done for them over the years.  In the audience were other leaders of the movement who had sacrificed just as much.  His comments were incredibly obnoxious – and it was textbook Bill Baird.  Always making trouble.  Always approaching things with a sense of entitlement.

Of course, he was oblivious to the fact that he had once again pissed everyone off.  So, that night he came to the dinner party, all dressed up in his rented tuxedo.  He took the opportunity to catch up with some old friends, if they could actually be called “friends.”  I even saw him dancing later on in the evening with Susan.  He was beaming all night.  As he was leaving, he came up and gave me a big hug and said “I’ll never forget what you did for me.”

Abortion

The next day, on the front page of the “Style” section of the Washington Post, there was a big photograph of Bill Baird, surrounded by the press, holding court.  He was in his element.  He had yet another press article for his collection.

After that night, Bill went back to New York.  When Susan Hill died, I called him and I could hear him sobbing.  When he got composed, he told me how he needed money to go to the next Right to Life convention.  “There’s still a lot of work to be done, Pat” he said before he hung up.

Go get ‘em, Bill.

 

October 1, 2010

My Friend, Doctor Dendres

Posted by Pat Richards under Abortion, Abortion Advocates, Abortion Blog, Abortion Candidates, Abortion Centers, Abortion Discussion, Abortion Doctor, Abortion Heroes, Abortion Information, Abortion Law, Abortion Medical, Abortion Rights, Vote | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , |
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Abortion

When I joined the National Coalition of Abortion Providers in the early 1990’s, I was excited at the prospect of representing these courageous doctors and clinic staff who put their lives on the line for hundreds of thousands of women.   I was overwhelmed at the thought of representing them on the national scene.

One of my first tasks was to raise money.  After all, you can’t have an organization without money so I started communicating with as many abortion doctors or clinic owners as possible to try to convince them to join our fledgling organization.  I was a little anxious but confident that I could persuade them that they needed someone combing the halls of Congress to protect their unique interests.

To compile a list of potential members, I asked the founders of NCAP who I should contact and the name of one doctor came up several times – Doctor Gary Dendres.  I was told he was important because he was the owner of a large chain of clinics in Florida and New York.  He was a player, a powerful one and we needed him on our team.  I was also told that he never joined anything and preferred to stay under the radar.  He was very much the “mystery man” in the world of abortion clinics.

After weeks of persistent calling, I was finally told that Doctor Dendres would meet with me.  I gulped and jumped on a plane to Tampa.  From the airport I took a taxi to his small corporate office a few miles away.  I was very nervous, didn’t know what to expect and I sat in the waiting room for 45 minutes.   Then, suddenly, there he was, standing right in front of me.

“Hey, are you Pat Richards?” he asked.  Before I could get a word in, he interrupted.  “Well, c’mon in, I don’t have much time.  I have a tennis lesson.”

Abortion

He was nothing like I had imagined. He was about 50 years old, 5 feet 9 inches, a little on the rotund side, a very expressive face and, by the way, a long pony tail.  In true Florida style, he was wearing a bright orange flowered shirt, shorts and sandals.  It was clear he had no use for me and I started thinking about catching an earlier flight out of Tampa.

“So, tell me why you are here again,” escorting me into a very small room.

I was ready with my pitch.  I told him how abortion providers needed a presence on Capitol Hill and before I could detail what I would be doing for the organization, he stopped me.

“Okay, let me tell you something” he said.   “I don’t give a crap if Roe versus Wade is overturned so don’t even go there.”

With a puzzled look on my face I asked “what do you mean?”

“Okay, so if Roe is overturned then the issue is left up to the states, right?  Well, I’ve got clinics in Florida and New York and they’re pretty liberal states.  So, if all of those other backward states outlaw abortions and my two states keep it legal, then all of those women are going to have to come to me.”

It was my first lesson in the business of abortion.  I suddenly needed a new approach to woo him.

From the beginning, I recognized a New York accent.  I inquired where he was from and he said Long Beach.  Since I was from Brooklyn, I thought I’d try to make him more comfortable by talking about my love for the New York Yankees.  At one point, I mentioned that I had been a pretty good ballplayer in my day but I know he didn’t believe me.   Suddenly, he jumped from his seat and said “Crap, I forgot about my tennis lesson!”

He ordered me into his car and we drove out to his club.  He introduced me to Bob, his tennis pro.  It was a typical muggy Florida day, very breezy.  I took a seat and watched the good doctor volleying with his pro.  I was impressed at how light he was on his feet.  I could tell he was an athlete in his day.

“Okay,” he yells at me.  “You say you were a ballplayer, huh?   Well, I’ll make you a deal.  I’m gonna have Bob hit three balls as high in the air as possible.  If you catch all three, I’ll join your organization.”

I was puzzled but, heck, I really had nothing to lose except my pride.  I was very concerned about the wind but I said “okay, you’re on.”

Bob hit the first ball a mile up into the wind and I had to run all over the court, but I caught it.  I then caught the next two balls as well.  Piece of cake.  I think Doctor Dendres was impressed but he didn’t say a word.   He then asked how much it cost to join the organization.  At that point, NCAP had no set fees, we were just trying to collect as much money as possible.  I also had no idea what was a lot of money to these folks.

I gulped and said “$3,000.”  He didn’t say a word.

Abortion

We spent more time together that day.  He entertained me with stories about the “old days” of abortion.  He performed them for years but had stopped to focus on running his clinics.  Like any businessman, he wanted to make money but I learned also that his prices for abortions were not that high and, indeed, his clinics often performed them for free for women in need.

Over the years, we have become very good friends.  Our families know each other, he constantly asks about my kids (he offered them both their first cigar).  He is also one of the few people that I can go to to get a straight answer.  The staff at his clinics love him and most of the directors have been with him for twenty years or more.

Oh, and by the way, a week after catching those three tennis balls we got a check from the good doctor for $3,000.  And over the years, he became a player in our organization.

Here’s looking at you, Gary.

 

September 16, 2010

For Late Term Abortions: 1-800-595-3155

Posted by Pat Richards under Abortion, Abortion Centers, Abortion Doctor, Abortion Heroes, Abortion Information, Abortion Late, Abortion Pill, Late Term Abortions | Tags: , , , , , , , , , |
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Late Term Abortions

Late Term Abortions

The website, www.Abortion.com, has been providing a useful service to women seeking abortions for many years.  The site is a simple directory of abortion clinics throughout the country and hundreds of thousands of women have used it to procure abortion procedures.  Recently, the owners of the website added a new feature that should be applauded.

The vast majority of abortions are performed in the first trimester.  Sure, the anti-abortion movement likes to make it look like every abortion is performed hours before birth but that is simply not the case.  However, the Roe v Wade case did allow abortions to be performed in the third trimester for extenuating circumstances.  Generally, those abortions are performed when the pregnancy has gone terribly awry.

In this country, one in every thirty-three children is born with a birth defect.  Most of those defects are mild and can be managed surgically.  However, for some, the outlook is not so good.  Some babies will be severely challenged for life and some will simply not survive after the birth.  In some of those cases, a woman will reluctantly elect to abort that child.   As you can imagine, it is an incredibly difficult situation for everyone involved.  And before any anti-abortion folks suggest that these “defects” are very minor, I can tell you personally that I have seen what can happen to a baby in utero.  I have seen babies with two heads.  I have seen babies with their heart growing outside of their body.  It is absolutely horrible stuff.

When faced with this situation, it is very difficult to find a doctor in this country who will perform these physically and emotionally difficult abortions.  Perhaps the most well-known late term abortion doctor was Doctor George Tiller, who was murdered over a year ago by a crazed anti-abortion zealot.  In response to Doctor Tiller’s death, however, an unassuming physician from Nebraska stepped up publicly and announced that he would fill that void and perform those difficult abortions.  His name is Doctor Lee Carhart.

Therapeutic Abortion and Late Abortion

Therapeutic Abortion and Late Abortion

Doctor Carhart got his training in Pittsburgh and since 1998 he worked with Doctor Tiller at his clinic in Wichita, Kansas.  After Tiller’s death, many members of his staff moved to Nebraska to carry on the Tiller’s work.  As you can imagine, Doctor Carhart has now become a target for the anti-abortion movement and he has had to spend a considerable amount of money on personal security for him, his family and his staff.

The women who go to Doctor Carhart – women from all over the world – do not want to be there.  These are wanted pregnancies that have gone terribly awry.  They have elected to abort their child, an action that most of us (fortunately) could never comprehend.  In response, Doctor Carhart offers some very unique services for these women.  They include the availability of a chaplain, they will take hand and foot prints of the baby, they can arrange a cremation by a licensed Funeral Director and will return the ashes if so desired.  They will take pictures of the baby.  Yes, I know this is heart wrenching and it is hard to believe that these services are out there but Doctor Carhart is responding to the hundreds of women who are, in their mind, forced to undertake this very difficult step.

I want to applaud www.abortion.com because they have now put on their homepage a toll free number for women who are seeking abortions after 24 weeks.  Those phone calls will be routed directly to Doctor Carhart’s office in Nebraska.  It is easily viewed on that page but to give this number as much visibility as possible for those women in need, I’ll repeat it here:  1-800-595-3155

Therapeutic Abortion Late Abortion

Therapeutic Abortion Late Abortion

Related Articles
 

August 18, 2010

The Donohue Show

Posted by Pat Richards under Abortion Blog, Abortion Discussion, Abortion Doctor, Abortion Information, Abortion Late, Abortion Medical, Abortion Pill, Late Term Abortion | Tags: , , , , , |
[27] Comments 
Abortion Pill

Abortion Pill

I follow the discussion on the Abortion.com Facebook page very closely and I appreciate the moderator posting some of my pieces.  From what I can see, a number of people are interested in some of the more unique stories about the days when I was at the National Coalition of Abortion Providers.   I’m not sure if this will be to your liking, but…..

At about 2:00 p.m. on March 10, 1993 I learned that Doctor David Gunn had been murdered as he approached his clinic in Pensacola, Florida.  For months, those of us in the abortion provider world knew something was going to happen.  Anti-abortion terrorism was spreading everywhere, folks were on edge.  I have to say that when I got the call, I was not in total shock.

The murder was front page news for several days.  A short time later, I got a call from a producer from “The Donohue Show.”  For you youngsters out there (or you oldsters who can’t remember where your bathroom is anymore), Phil Donohue was basically the first “Oprah.”  The producer said they wanted me to join Susan Hill, Doctor Tom Tucker, David Gunn, Jr. and a Mr. Paul Hill on the show a few days later.  I readily accepted the invitation.  Unfortunately, Doctor Tucker got stuck in a snow storm but Doctor Takey Crist, an abortion provider from North Carolina, chartered a private jet at the last minute to fill in for Tucker.  Susan Hill owned 8 clinics at the time and employed Doctor Gunn.  David Gunn, Jr., the son of the murdered doctor, had already become a celebrity of sorts by that time.  None of us knew who Paul Hill was.

When we got to the television station, we were escorted to the “Green Room” which is where we all met Paul Hill.  By that time, we had learned that he would represent the anti-abortion side on the show.  I shook his hand, he was very cordial.  When we went up to the stage, I was seated next to him.  Then, once the show started, Paul quickly told the world that it was “justifiable homicide” to kill an abortion doctor.  The crowd, a liberal New York crowd, collectively gasped.  They had never heard such a thing (neither had I).  I thought the audience was going to lynch him.  His remarks were especially outrageous in that the son of the murdered doctor was sitting three chairs from him on the stage.

I answered a few easy questions, although later on my friends said I had the “deer in the headlight” look about me.  At one point, I was talking about how some police were letting protestors block the clinics and I said that “we HAD a sheriff in Corpus Christi, Texas, who testified that he would never arrest the protestors because he was pro-life.”  Unfortunately, millions and millions of people across the country thought I said we “HAVE” a sheriff down there.  The next day I got a call from the sheriff of Corpus Christi who, screaming in my ear, told me that his office was being barraged with phone calls from angry pro-choicers.  I felt terrible when he told me he was actually pro-choice – but the damage had already been done.

During one commercial, Phil Donohue himself came over to me and said “Okay, someone is going to call in and ask you about that abortion pill.  What is it called, RU-483 or something?”    I told him it was RU-486.  Minutes later, “Marianne from Brooklyn” called to ask about the abortion pill.  I found out later that “Marianne” was actually one of the co-producers of the show calling from backstage.

Then there was Doctor Crist.  He was a large, dashing bearded doctor of Greek descent who on that day was not going to take any crap from Paul Hill.  He massacred him verbally, got more applause from the audience than anyone.  After the show, over the course of the next few weeks, his clinic received hundreds of calls from women who wanted to meet Doctor Crist personally.  He told me later that he received at least 50 proposals of marriage in the mail after his appearance.  Ah, the power of television.

During the commercials, I talked to Paul Hill and over the next year I saw him at a number of anti-abortion protests.  He became the national spokesman for the “justifiable homicide” doctrine.  Then, about 15 months later I got another call that Doctor Baird Britton and his bodyguard had been assassinated in Pensacola.  They were both shot by Paul Hill.

 

August 16, 2010

Pendergraft Abortion

Posted by Elena Carvin under Abortion Blog, Abortion Discussion, Abortion Doctor, Pendergraft Abortion | Tags: , , , , |
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Pendergraft Abortion

Pendergraft Abortion

A Florida abortionist’s medical license has been suspended a fourth time — and a prominent pro-life group is outraged the man hasn’t been drummed from the practice altogether.

Operation Rescue president Troy Newman has tracked abortionist James Pendergraft — a “proven quack,” as Newman describes him — for years and tells OneNewsNow that a fourth suspension is not enough. The medical board, says the pro-life spokesman, is apparently missing the point: the impact on people.  “[He has] endangered women [and] killed women,” Newman states. “And so Operation Rescue is calling for not just a suspension of his medical license, but finally and completely an absolute revocation of his license before more women and children die.”

The pro-life leader describes Pendergraft’s five abortion clinics in Florida as “a menace to the public” that should be shut down. “The Florida Board of Medicine seriously dropped the ball by not revoking Pendergraft and forcing the closure of his clinics,” he says in a press release.

While outraged that Pendergraft’s license was not permanently revoked, Newman says people can have the last word on the subject.

Operation Rescue’s website contains contact information for Florida officials, and Newman is urging people nationwide to use that information to deliver a clear message to the Florida Board of Medicine that Pendergraft should be pushed out of the profession for good.  According to Operation Rescue, Pendergraft’s clinics — manned by other abortionists — continue to operate while he is on suspension.

 

July 12, 2010

Abortion and Normal Rockwell

Posted by Pat Richards under Abortion Discussion, Abortion Doctor, Abortion Doctor Murder, Abortion Heroes, Abortion Information, Abortion Late, Abortion Law, Abortion Medical, Abortion Mifeprex, Abortion Pill, Abortion Rights, Abortion RU486 | Tags: , , , , , , |
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Abortion

Abortion

Yesterday, to escape this blasted heat, I went into Washington, D.C. to catch an exhibit of Norman Rockwell paintings that had been donated by Stephen Speilberg and George Lucas.  It was nice just taking my time walking around, examining every amazing detail in Rockwell’s works.

At one point I came across a piece entitled “Free Speech.”  The piece focuses on one man, standing in the middle of a crowd.  The caption next to the painting said this was a man who disagreed with the crowd on some issue, but his opponents were listening to him intently, respecting his right to say what was on his mind even though they ultimately would not support him.   I was almost brought to tears.

Today, of course, that person would have been shouted down, totally discounted as some nut ball by his opponents.  That’s just where we are as a society these days.  We just don’t listen anymore.  Worse, when someone tries to suggest something contrary to our beliefs, we try to silence him with harsh words, with guffaws, with rolling eyes, as if this person could never say anything that was remotely of some benefit.

Of course, we see this kind of behavior all the time in the abortion debate.  Indeed, the harsh back and forth is probably more pronounced when discussing the abortion issue than any other issue.  We are so locked into our beliefs, the battle lines are drawn oh-so-clearly and you cannot cross them lest you be accused of ceding some valuable territory to the opposition.  Just watch an abortion debate on television.  You know exactly what I mean.  It’s a constant screaming match.    “Abortion is murder!”   “A woman has the right to control her body!”   And on and on and on.

No one is communicating.  They’re just yelling over each other.  Actually, years ago I stopped watching these “debates.”

I’m pro-choice, I’ve worked for pro-choice organizations for years.  But, much to the chagrin of many of my colleagues, years ago I started reaching out to pro-life people in an attempt to try to get inside their head, to learn more about them and, hopefully, to allow them to learn more about me .  I actually started engaging the other side after I learned that a number of the abortion clinics that I represented engaged in the same discussions with their local anti-abortion activists.

At the same time, I challenged my pro-choice colleagues to address the tougher questions about abortion.  When I visited the clinics, I talked to the women and it became clear to me that they were not there to make a statement about their constitutional rights or to promote some feminist ideology.  They were there because they were in a difficult situation and they needed help.  They also had to deal with something that pro-choice organizations would rather not address – they were carrying a baby that they didn’t want.   I soon discovered that the bottom line was that abortion is all so complicated.

So, amidst the screaming and yelling, the women continue to seek abortion services.  I think that anti-abortion folks owe these women more respect and the pro-choice activists should not try to reduce this issue to a simple bumper sticker.  Both sides should listen more to the other side with the goal of having a civil debate about abortion – kinda like that group in the Normal Rockwell painting.

 

June 16, 2010

Common Ground on Abortion

Posted by Pat Richards under Abortion & Religion, Abortion Advocates, Abortion Candidates, Abortion Discussion, Abortion Doctor, Abortion Doctor Murder, Abortion Heroes, Abortion Information, Abortion Late, Abortion Law, Abortion Medical, Abortion Mifeprex, Abortion Pill, Abortion Rates, Abortion Rights, Abortion RU486, Abortion Violence | Tags: , , , , , |
[47] Comments 

In my last blog, I wrote about my relationship with Mr. Guy Condon, an anti-abortion activist who ran a number of crisis pregnancy centers across the country.  I noted that we had been brought together by an organization called “Common Ground,” which has since closed its doors.

The folks at Common Ground had a very ambitious and, yes, “sexy” agenda.  Their goal was to bring together parties on both sides of controversial issues in an effort to find areas of possible agreement.  So, for example, with the abortion issue, they tried to craft an agreement on how to reduce the number of abortions.   I don’t think they ever succeeded in that particular quest but for a while, this group was much in vogue, they got tons of publicity and lots of money from certain foundations.  Ultimately, however, they were forced to shut their doors.  Honestly, I don’t know what happened and I don’t have the energy to try to research the rise and fall of Common Ground.  Suffice it to say that they are gone.

What many people never realized, however, was that every day there were similar efforts taking place on a smaller scale at the abortion clinics.  No, anti-abortion and pro-choice folks were not sitting down and hashing out peace agreements or crafting joint legislation.   But activists on both sides of the abortion issue were talking and have been talking for years.

The dynamic at an abortion clinic is fascinating.   Generally speaking, the clinic staff people will arrive at the same time and they always know when their local protestors will be out there.  Saturday is usually the biggest day as more women are able to get away from work to have an abortion.  Normally, you would think that the staffers would just walk in and exchange harsh glances or even harsh words with the protestors.   And, yes, in some cases the two sides just didn’t talk and, indeed, there was great animosity.  But there were so many other instances where the clinic staff developed some kind of relationship with their protestors.

Over the years, clinic staffers would tell me how they would bring coffee out to their protestors on cold, winter days or ice tea in the middle of the summer.  Others would actually invite their protestors into the clinic for a tour of the facility.  Several clinic administrators told me that on occasion they would have lunch with the lead protestor in an effort to develop a mutual understanding of their work.  Some clinic staff told me that they would have conversations with the director of the local anti-abortion crisis pregnancy center and even refer women to them if they felt it would be helpful.   It was as if there was a general truce at these clinics and even a curiosity about that person on the other side of the fence.

I’ve already talked about how my relationship with Paul Hill might have saved the lives of a number of abortion providers in Pensacola in 1994.   Of course, no one can prove that talking to the other side might prevented some kind of tragedy but many of the clinic administrators (or doctors) who regularly engaged with “the enemy” told me that the conversations resulted in a less tense environment outside the clinic.  They said that after the protestors got to understand a little more about what motivated the clinic workers and the mindset of the women, the protestors were inclined to be less “angry.”

The fact is that activists on this controversial issue, and that includes abortion clinic staff, are usually pretty myopic when it comes to listening to arguments from the other side.   They usually just listen to their leaders of their own movements, cite their studies, and regurgitate their talking points.  They think that the other side could not possibly have anything meaningful to say, that they are all just out to lunch.  So, both sides stick their heads in the sand, become intractable and, as a consequence, the tensions increase.

But because of the bravery of some people on both sides of the issue, peace broke out years ago at some of the clinics that slowed abortion providers and protestors to continue their work in a less-than-hostile environment.

In that regard, I think “Common Ground” worked.

 

June 2, 2010

Paul Hill and Me

Posted by Pat Richards under Abortion, Abortion & Religion, Abortion Discussion, Abortion Doctor, Abortion Medical, Abortion Rights, Abortion Violence | Tags: , , , , , |
[31] Comments 

I met Paul Hill about a week after Doctor David Gunn was killed in Pensacola, Florida.  We were about to take the stage of The Donohue Show and we were munching vegetables in the “green room.”  I introduced myself, not knowing who he was, but we didn’t have time to talk.  Minutes later, he was telling a national television audience that it was “justifiable homicide” to kill a doctor who performed abortions.  Three other pro-choice spokespeople were on the stage with us and I sat next to Paul.

When he started talking, I thought the audience was going to lynch him.  No one had ever heard this kind of talk.  More interestingly, it was coming from a pleasant looking man with a sheepish grin, not your typical rabble-rousing, screaming zealot.  He seemed like an Iowa farm boy who had gotten lost in the Big Apple.  During the commercial breaks, I chatted with him a bit as I was always interested in knowing how “the other side” thinks.

Over the next few months, I would see Paul at various pro-life demonstrations.  As a staff person for the National Coalition of Abortion Providers, I would go to the events to lend support to the clinics that we represented.  If I saw Paul outside, I would simply walk through the hundreds of protestors and go up to him, shake his hand, ask how the kids were.  If we had time, we would sit and chat about his views.  He would ask me lots of questions about how abortions were performed and the women who sought them.

At one point, at a demonstration in Birmingham, Alabama, I asked him if he thought it was okay to kill a doctor, then why hadn’t he done it himself?   “You know, Pat, that’s a good question and a lot of people ask me the same thing,” he said.  “But I feel I can do more as a leader of this movement than a doer.”   He then told me how many of his colleagues in the pro-life movement had been harassing him about his theory, almost calling his bluff.  Indeed, during the same rally, a leader of the anti-abortion group, Operation Rescue, asked me if I would give him any “intelligence” on Hill because they were concerned that he might kill a doctor.  Talk about a bizarre situation.

In March, 1994, NCAP held an open air rally at the site of Doctor Gunn’s murder to commemorate the one year anniversary of that horrible event.  About 100 abortion doctors and staff attended the ceremony.  Paul Hill was the only protestor there.  There were a few security guards circulating around, but they really didn’t offer much protection to us.   Throughout the ceremony, Hill just walked around the edge of the group with a large sign, but he was very quiet.

Later that year, Paul Hill killed Doctor Britton in Pensacola.  I never thought he could pull the trigger, but I was wrong.  He was quickly convicted and sentenced to die.

A few months later, filled with some liquid courage, I called Paul at his jail.  It was just a spur of the moment thing.  The receptionist told me he couldn’t accept calls, so I left a message.   The next morning, I was at my desk in the office when the phone rang and our receptionist buzzed me.  “Pat, it’s Paul Hill.”  I almost lost my lunch.

“Hello, Paul.”

“Hello, Pat, how are you?”

“Well, I guess I’m better than you, Paul.”   I hesitated, then decided to just jump in.  “Paul, why the hell did you kill Doctor Britton?   What did you think you would accomplish?”

“Well, Pat, I thought it was time to send a signal to others to take up the cause.”  I felt like I was having an out of body experience, talking to a guy on death row.

“Okay, Paul, but here’s what I don’t understand.  When we had our open air event in Pensacola and you were walking around, there were about 100 abortion providers there with no protection, we were all sitting ducks.   Why didn’t you just wipe us all out at that point?”

“Well, Pat, don’t think I didn’t think about it but, honestly, I ultimately decided that I didn’t want to disrupt your event.  You always were respectful of my opinions, so….”

I didn’t hear the rest of what he said.  My mind just could not register his words.   Then, I ultimately heard him invite me to his execution.  My head started spinning again, but through my haze I told him that I didn’t support capital punishment so I had to decline his invitation.  A few months later, Paul Hill left this world, leaving his wife and two children behind.

 

May 26, 2010

Shut up, Doctor Carhart!

Posted by Pat Richards under Abortion, Abortion Advocates, Abortion Candidates, Abortion Discussion, Abortion Doctor, Abortion Doctor Murder, Abortion Heroes, Abortion Information, Abortion Late, Abortion Law, Abortion Medical, Abortion Mifeprex, Abortion Pill, Abortion Rates, Abortion Rights, Abortion RU486, Abortion Violence | Tags: , , , |
[15] Comments 

One of my dearest friends in the world is Doctor Leroy Carhart.  Doctor Carhart is a physician who performs abortions in the tiny hamlet of Bellevue, Nebraska.   He has been doing abortions for decades – and, I should add, he has been doing late term abortions over those years.  In the last ten years or so, he became an outspoken advocate for abortion rights and, in fact, years ago he challenged the “Partial Birth Abortion Act,” a case that ultimately made it all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.

In addition to working in Nebraska, for years Doctor Carhart had been traveling to Wichita, Kansas where he helped out Doctor George Tiller, a specialist in very late term abortions.  As we all know by now, Doctor Tiller was murdered almost one year ago and soon thereafter, his clinic – his beautiful clinic – was shut down.

But Lee Carhart came to the rescue.   Within hours of the murder, he was proudly announcing to the media that he would take over the late term abortion doctor mantle in order to help all of those women who normally would have gone to Doctor Tiller.  He was all over the media, he started giving more speeches, and he pumped up his website.  For good reason, he was applauded for his courage and his loyalty to his dear, departed friend.

A few weeks after Doctor Tiller’s murder, I caught up with Lee at a memorial service in Washington, D.C.  He shared some wonderful thoughts with the crowd and afterwards I was escorted to a private room to see him.  It had been years, so we had a good hug, a few tears were shed and then I looked him directly in the eye and said “Lee, shut the hell up.”

He was incredulous.  For years, working through the National Coalition of Abortion Providers, I encouraged him (and his colleagues) to speak openly about what he did, to no longer hide in the shadows anymore.   My argument was that if abortion doctors were open about what they did and talked honestly about their work, then it would prevent the anti-abortion movement from filling in the information gap with their own distorted interpretation of things.  So, Lee started talking – and talking and talking.  Ultimately, he became one of our leading spokesmen.

But now I was telling him to shut up.

“Lee,” I said as I put my hands on his shoulders, “you now have a lot of patients that are relying on you.  You need to be here for them.  But when you go on television, you’re making yourself a target for some nut ball out there who might get the notion of taking out the next George Tiller.”

He was a little stunned at first and, as he often does, he started mumbling about how he understood what I was saying but….

“But what?” I screamed.  “You’ve got an obligation to thousands of women and to George Tiller.  You need to be there every day for your patients.   You cannot go around making speeches everywhere, walking through crowds.  You’re gonna get yourself shot, Lee, and I don’t want to have to come to another memorial service.”

He listened but I don’t think he heard me.

And yesterday I saw an announcement that he will be speaking at the national conference for the National Organization for Women in Boston in a few weeks.

Oh well…..Go get ’em, Lee.

 

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