Douthat on Planned Parenthood and Fiorina
Ross Douthat has a fair, detailed, accurate, well-written piece about the controversy regarding Carly Fiorina and the Planned Parenthood videos. Here’s the meat of what he says:
Then if you watch the full film, you’ll see that the situation the technician is describing involves the worker showing her how she can tap the heart of the just-aborted fetus they’re looking at and make it start beating again, just before they jointly cut open the fetus’s face in order to actually acquire the brains. Again, we don’t see the tapping or cutting happen; the footage of the fetus that we see is from a different case, an undercover video obtained by a different pro-life group. And then the film as a whole is using the technician’s anecdote and the footage as part of an argument — buttressed by footage of interviews with Planned Parenthood higher-ups and others — that because fetal tissue harvesting is much easier when the fetus comes out intact, abortionists have incentives to perform later-term abortions in ways that sometimes/often end with fetuses alive in the air before they die.
So that’s a (no doubt partial) attempt at a summary of the film and footage that’s at issue. And having completed it, I’m a little bit confused about what’s being debated here. On the one hand, I think Fiorina’s critics are correct that she misdescribed the video, in two ways: She implied that the footage of the fetus was part of the scene being described (maybe because she thought it was; the documentary doesn’t make it clear that it’s a different fetus), and she has the Planned Parenthood worker saying “we have to keep it alive to harvest its brain,” as opposed to “look at this, I can make its heart beat; okay now let’s harvest its brain.” Neither of these misdescriptions strike me as lies, per se, in their original form: If you watch the film as a whole it’s easy to see how you could misremember the scene the way Fiorina describes it rather than the way it actually plays out. (Just as lots of people think they remember the line “play it again, Sam,” which is never actually uttered in “Casablanca.”) But I agree with Lithwick that it would have been, and still would be, appropriate for Fiorina to correct herself, to say that she misremembered some of the details, instead of standing by her original words in their entirety.
But for her words to rise to the level of an extraordinary “big lie,” a vicious slander of abortion providers everywhere, it seems to me that something more than this kind of misdescription would need to be in play. If the scene in question literally did not exist, which is what the language of her critics consistently suggests — if Fiorina had conjured up a vision of an intact fetus with a working heart and twitching limbs having its brains harvested out of her hyperactive pro-life imagination — well, that would merit liberal shock and outrage. But she didn’t conjure or invent it: It’s very easy to figure out what scene she’s talking about, and the discrepancies between what’s in the documentary and her description aren’t wild or incredible or weird. There’s no outright fabrication here, in other words, and what Lithwick calls “the big lie about the kicking fetus and the brain harvesting” is a roughly-accurate summary of what the film actually shows. (A twitching, dying fetus? Check. A firsthand description of harvesting a brain from an intact fetus? Check again.)
I agree with every word. Well done.
On Dahlia’s Facebook page, where she linked Douthat’s piece, I asked Dahlia whether her outrage about uncorrected factual inaccuracies extended to Amanda Marcotte’s incorrect statement regarding footage of a kicking, twitching baby:
The provenance of the video is unknown, there is no audio on the video, and there is no indication that the fetus was aborted.
As I discussed in this post, the folks at the Federalist asked the people who provided the footage. (Journalism! Imagine that!) The providers of the footage responded that the footage was of an intact delivery abortion done at an abortion clinic. Marcotte’s claim was wrong. I wrote Slate about this, and in their corrections page for that week, I saw this . . .
In a Sept. 18 Behold, David Rosenberg misspelled Hartford Art School.
. . . .
In a Sept. 14 Future Tense, Mike Godwin misspelled Sen. Orrin Hatch’s first name.
. . . .
In a Sept. 14 Slatest, Ben Mathis-Lilley misspelled the city Gautier, Mississippi.
. . . but nothing about Marcotte’s error.
What a surprise, huh?
The folks at Dahlia’s Facebook page are doing a lot of handwaving, citing to articles about a different issue, remonstrating me for being insufficiently upset about Fiorina’s inaccuracies, and wholly refusing to acknowledge even that Marcotte got it wrong.
I guess some uncorrected factual inaccuracies are privileged over others . . .
this is not even remotely accurate I am disappointed in the Douthat character
i give him 4 bruschettas!
carlycakes says there’s someone on the video what is actually saying all that blah blah blah about the brain – but this is not true it is in fact a scurrilous (sp?) lie – the blah blah blah about the brain is just something a disgruntled ex-employee of stem express alleges was said
i personally do not think this employee is very honest I think she’s actually very biased
happyfeet (a037ad) — 9/29/2015 @ 8:01 amThanks for reading what left wing nuts are writing so we don’t have to.
If Carly were to acknowledge any of this criticism as correct would discredit the whole thing. She is right to keep demanding they look at the videos.
I don’t reqd happy feet comments, by the way.
Mike K (90dfdc) — 9/29/2015 @ 8:08 amHow biased would you have to be to object when the case is baby murder?
If a person saw a toddler fall into a lake, and they jump in after to fish em out, is that bias or just human decency?
Let’s say a planned parenthood true believer, who buys the whole premise that the world is over run and infested with humans, and needs population control, is in the same scenario. Instead of jumping in they watch from the sideline. The law might hold that person as criminally negligent.
papertiger (c2d6da) — 9/29/2015 @ 8:17 amPatterico, this is not about facts at all, but narrative.
I appreciate the way you described it, and treated the situation as a serious one.
Simon Jester (a0e1d9) — 9/29/2015 @ 8:45 amFor normal people, the issue is premeditated abortion of captive, wholly innocent human lives while subject to a superior force (a la rape). Presumably, the revelation of torture, dismemberment, abortion, harvesting, and trafficking is directed to followers of the pro-choice cult, and to topple fence-sitters.
The casual response by the government, press, and human rights organizations to an unprecedented violation of human rights is remarkable. Do we really lack a consensus that human evolution (i.e. chaotic process) begins at conception (i.e. source)?
Some, many, people seem to think that destroying intrinsic or exceptional value of human life does not matter. That denying the scientific evidence and self-evident knowledge of human evolution from conception does not normalize or promote progressive corruption.
n.n (e651b0) — 9/29/2015 @ 8:54 amThe facts don’t fit the narrative, therefore they are not facts.
Dan S (94f399) — 9/29/2015 @ 9:49 amWhen you’re murdering human beings for the sake of restrained sexual glee, “truth” becomes a relative term.
CrustyB (69f730) — 9/29/2015 @ 9:59 amGood call, Mike. Both regarding happyfeet and what Carly should do going forward.
At Power Line John Hinderaker agrees with Ann Althouse. This may not have been Fiorina’s strategy in the beginning, she may have gotten a few details wrong, but by having people watch the videos it makes the people calling her a liar now look vile.
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2015/09/todd-vs-fiorina-on-meet-the-press.php
That was precisely my reaction to Chuck Todd’s continued emphasis on the fact the video of the baby moving its arms and legs while it was dying in a specimen tray was “only” stock footage. As if that makes what we’re watching in the video OK since it wasn’t actually the baby getting its face cut open to rip out its brain.
By the way, the CMP does acknowledge in its video the source of that footage. When it shows that dying infant it superimposes the text “Courtesy of Grantham Collection & Center for Bio-Ethical Reform.” I’m working from memory and not sure if I have the correct spelling of the collection.
It never bothered me as I don’t recall Carly ever saying or implying it was the exact baby being discussed in video. Actually when the pro-PP crowd raised that as an objection I thought they had to be idiots as it would beggar belief to imagine it would be the same infant. The important thing is that when an infant survives an abortion, when it is making voluntary movements with its limbs or when it has a detectable heart beat, both federal and most states (including Kali, where StemExpress employee Holly O’Donnell removed a little boy’s brain through its face) provide that you must provide medical care. The same as if the infant was born anywhere else other than an abortion clinic.
I would have gone off on Chuck Todd and his lack of moral compass, though. He’s not bothered by what he sees in that video, but he’s outraged Carly Fiorina didn’t identify it as stock footage? Shouldn’t he be more outraged that this happens so often we have stock footage of the atrocity?
And I’m not exaggerating. Earlier in the video, before we get to the stock footage, there is audio of a Dr. Van Handel of Novogenix Labs admits that it’s not uncommon after “the procedure” the infant’s heart is still beating.
Which brings us to another level of PP’s barbarity. As I understand it, some critics of PP have long suspected that the abortion mill/baby chop shop may be keeping these infants alive and its heart beating as long as possible to get it through what these ghouls call the “tissue harvest.” On an earlier CMP video PP officials were bragging about the freshness of their product. What they meant was, “excised” while still alive. For instance, according to the peer reviewed literature PP’s partner StemExpress is a major supplier of fetal hearts suitable for Langendorff perfusion.
http://www.hindawi.com/journals/omcl/2015/730683/
My understanding of this is pretty rudimentary. Langendorff perfusion is a method used to experiment on a heart by keeping it beating outside the body. Tyrode solution is one sort of perfusate, an oxygen-enriched nutrient solution that can keep the heart tissue alive for several hours outside the body. And the collagenase digests the heart tissue so that these people can harvest individual cells.
The emphasis is on living heart tissue. As I understand it to be a good candidate the fetal heart must beating until it’s cut from the baby’s chest and then the “procurement technician” has at most five minutes to prepare the heart (remove connective tissue, whatever) and get it in some kind of nutrient solution.
I also am informed that other sorts of tissue, such as nerve tissue, has to be “harvested” under similar conditions. So, PP keeps the heart beating until they get everything they want, then they take the heart.
You can not use a dead heart for Lanendorff perfusion.
Perhaps Mike K. or another physician can weigh in. But if I have this roughly correct then PP are a worse set of monsters than even these videos show. Not like that isn’t bad enough already.
Steve57 (ca1277) — 9/29/2015 @ 10:00 amMike K, Tanny provided a javascript routine that can be used to eliminate text that is offensive. The routine is stored in shortcut file, like those in your “Favorites” folder, but when you open the shortcut, it attaches itself to the current page and performs its magic and does not close the current page. To restore the page to its initial condition, just use the “refresh” hotspot.
Tanny’s contribution to my mental health begins here. Remarkably, HF contributed to the discussion and helped me install my copy. You will also find a link to Tanny’s website where the code is presented. I’ve named my copy of the URL Enema, and it is part of my “favorites bar”. When I click on it, HF and Jmann disappear. And these names can be edited in the “properties” view of the shortcut.
This was an interesting little program, and it makes me shudder to think what other “little” things might exist in our browser’s design. The “javascript” header is what tells the browser to give this little “bookmarklet” special treatment (as compared to http:// … for example.)
I’m also puzzled by HF. Perhaps partially unhinged is the best way to think of him. Sometimes he swings into sanity, and other times he’s disconnected from the reality I’ve experienced.
BobStewartathome (a52abe) — 9/29/2015 @ 10:36 amI don’t much like Fiorina. And frankly I don’t much care about abortion spare later term abortions are an abomination and at a loss why the rest of us have to pay for anyone to exercise this “right” found in an emanation of a penumbra. Yet this hammer and chain attack on Fiorina by the MFM seems way out of proportion to her alleged statements, which are an accurate reflection of the procedures.
But Bigger Picture-vast majority of American mind their own business. They don’t like this story. They don’t like abortion, but they accept it’s legality. GOP candidates generally lose on this issue when they move off the funding and late term aspects. Ultimately as repulsive as this all is to many of us, not sure politically what Fiorina gains. She is not Santorum nor Huckabee. Personally think per candidacy is a disaster based on her career. But at a loss why she now feels compelled to push this issue that I suspect she doesn’t really care about.
Bugg (db3a97) — 9/29/2015 @ 11:26 amBugg, I think Carly demonstrated that she has a set of core values, and she’s willing to act on them. One of the things that turned me off on Walker, whom I supported in his campaigns in Wisconsin, was his failure to discipline anybody in his Department of Natural Resources for the 13 man raid on the St. Francis no-kill Animal Shelter in Kenosha. The raid was on the scale of the OBL operation, and the staff at the shelter were badly treated … cameras and cell phones taken away and they were threatened with arrest for taking pictures of the event, they were herded into a corral under gun point while the DNR agents seized the 20 pound baby deer that was the target of the raid. Three months after the raid, no one who participated in the raid had been publicly identified, but their emails had been turned over, and they showed the thugs who did the raid to be just that … thugs. But they get to hide behind their state agency and I have no reason to think that they won’t repeat the process when it strikes their fancy. Walker should have been outraged that his administration was the face of this operation. But he just ducked the whole thing.
I think Carly shows some signs of the kind of fortitude it takes to discipline this sort of rogue agency. Walker looked more and more like an accountant or a community organizer.
BobStewartathome (a52abe) — 9/29/2015 @ 12:39 pmHe’s not bothered by what he sees in that video,
I doubt he has watched it. I have not seen him say that he watched it. None of them say that.
GOP candidates generally lose on this issue when they move off the funding and late term aspects. Ultimately as repulsive as this all is to many of us, not sure politically what Fiorina gains.
I think she is making the case that this is beyond the Pale, even for a pro-choice person, which I think she is.
I’m pro-choice and have no problem with PP as long as they stay within the 20 week window and do not sell parts. I have seen young men who were treated for Chlamydia at PP and am willing to concede they do some medical treatment for low income people.
The public is slowing changing its mind about abortion because of the abuses and the gradual coarsening of the culture. This is one reason why the left, especially the feminist left, is panicking.
Mike K (90dfdc) — 9/29/2015 @ 12:50 pmThe provenance of the video is unknown, there is no audio on the video, and there is no indication that the fetus was aborted.
how is this at all inaccurate?
the provenance is indeed not known
if Taylor Swift sent you a private email message using the internet and asked you to meet her for to enjoy some pumpkin scones at that place where the spliced-in video was made you would have NO idea where to go whatsoever – the one place you know for sure NOT to meet Taylor for to enjoy her tasty scones is… at a Planned Parenthood
is it true that there is no audio? yes. this is very truthful to say.
Is there any indication in the video that the spliced-in fetus was aborted? No. No there is not.
Therefore ergo the truthfulness of the statement above is demonstrandumed.
happyfeet (a037ad) — 9/29/2015 @ 12:55 pmProvenance (from the French provenir, “to come from”), is the chronology of the ownership, custody or location of a historical object.[1] The term was originally mostly used in relation to works of art, but is now used in similar senses in a wide range of fields, including archaeology, paleontology, archives, manuscripts, printed books, and science and computing. The primary purpose of tracing the provenance of an object or entity is normally to provide contextual and circumstantial evidence for its original production or discovery, by establishing, as far as practicable, its later history, especially the sequences of its formal ownership, custody, and places of storage. The practice has a particular value in helping authenticate objects. Comparative techniques, expert opinions, and the results of scientific tests may also be used to these ends, but establishing provenance is essentially a matter of documentation.
happyfeet (a037ad) — 9/29/2015 @ 12:56 pmif one cut Douthat, would he leak blue fluid like bishop, what kind of a soul less strigoi would try to rationalize this horror?
narciso (ee1f88) — 9/29/2015 @ 1:00 pmwas that too strong, I don’t think so, then again Douthat excused the mass atrocity that was Rotherdam some months back,
narciso (ee1f88) — 9/29/2015 @ 1:14 pmjust a reminder,
http://www.unz.com/isteve/ross-rape-rotherham/
narciso (ee1f88) — 9/29/2015 @ 1:17 pmWhat hospital puts newborn babies in metal pans and leaves them there, uncovered and uncared for? I’d like to know. I think all parents would want to know which hospitals do that.
DRJ (521990) — 9/29/2015 @ 1:43 pmSigh. I feel your pain on this, DRJ. This is like any other number of things: repeat the nonsense over and over again.
The part that always gets me is how folks will criticize what they call propagandizing people, while calling folks names and lying are indeed propaganda.
I think it would be better for PP to just lay the facts out. But they don’t dare do that. Because even if they aren’t “making money” for the selling of fetal parts, they are still doing it for money.
And if it is wholly up to the mother, why isn’t the father included?
After that, it all devolves into Left of center narrative and slogans.
Simon Jester (a0e1d9) — 9/29/2015 @ 1:49 pmno simon it’s about good and evil, ‘powers and principalities’ I know that is such quaint language, not like ‘binders full of women’
narciso (ee1f88) — 9/29/2015 @ 1:51 pmWhat hospital puts newborn babies in metal pans and leaves them there, uncovered and uncared for? I’d like to know. I think all parents would want to know which hospitals do that.
be that as it may there’s no way to look at that footage and say yesiree that there’s an aborted baby
not with any confidence
you’d just be guessing
happyfeet (a037ad) — 9/29/2015 @ 2:00 pmExcept for this happyfascist,
Gazzer (124d91) — 9/29/2015 @ 2:17 pmAs I discussed in this post, the folks at the Federalist asked the people who provided the footage. (Journalism! Imagine that!) The providers of the footage responded that the footage was of an intact delivery abortion done at an abortion clinic. Marcotte’s claim was wrong. I wrote Slate about this, and in their corrections page for that week, I saw this . . .
happyfeet,
Guessing is what you do when you don’t have any evidence to guide your decision, but we have the report from the people who got the film that it showed an aborted baby. Obviously you don’t believe them, so I bet you won’t believe this 1999 Congressional testimony either:
You have every reason to be optimistic, hf. This inhumanity has been going on for a long time so it will probably continue. If killing babies doesn’t bother you, nothing will.
DRJ (521990) — 9/29/2015 @ 2:25 pmto say it came from “an abortion clinic” is not the same as knowing the provenance of the video Mr. gazzer
all you have is an assertion from a decidedly not disinterested party; you’re still left with no evidence whatsoever that you can point to and say here this shows where that video came from
to know the provenance of that video would mean you knew where and when that video was made, and we still don’t know that – not that it matters – the video has nothing to do with what happened at Planned Parenthood
it’s just a sick disgusting video clip, the kind that people like the CMP love to shove in people’s faces in lieu of facts and reasoned argument
at the end of the day – whatever baby was or was not aborted at PP or elsewhere, there were two things that could’ve happened
the dead fetus could’ve been treated like medical waste (let’s call this the Fiorina Option)
or the dead fetus could’ve been, with the permission of the mother, donated for research (let’s call this the Donated For Research Option)
and you know what? There’s absolutely nothing wrong unethical or inhumane about the Donated For Research Option. It’s no different than when you donate your own body to science after you die, a practice what has helped advance science immeasurably and in countless ways.
here is a nifty article about how embryonic stem cells are helping blind people see
happyfeet (a037ad) — 9/29/2015 @ 2:35 pmfe·tus
ˈfēdəs/
noun
noun: fetus; plural noun: fetuses; noun: foetus; plural noun: foetuses
an unborn offspring of a mammal, in particular an unborn human baby more than eight weeks after conception.
They were babies!
Gazzer (124d91) — 9/29/2015 @ 2:37 pmI fear for your soul, happyfascist. Or, I would if I thought you had one. No wonder you take sleeping pills every night.
Gazzer (124d91) — 9/29/2015 @ 2:39 pmDRJ whatever happened in 1999 doesn’t change the fact that carlycakes is a liar in 2015
these are wholly independent variables
happyfeet (a037ad) — 9/29/2015 @ 2:42 pmI once saw a documentary talking of Auschwitz but it used pictures from Dachau. LIARS!
I guess the Holocaust never occurred by Leftist standards.
Rodney King's Spirit (ab8c0d) — 9/29/2015 @ 2:44 pmHappyfeet thinks it OK to butcher babies for profit because mommy does not want the baby?
Wow, new low.
Guess that explains the Baby in NYC tossed from a window with an umbilical cord.
Makes me wishes for legal very late term abortions on post birthed adults. I would happily volunteer to pull the brains out from their face every day and all day. My father was a butcher so I learned well — at least on cows, pigs and chickens.
Rodney King's Spirit (ab8c0d) — 9/29/2015 @ 2:50 pmThe providers of the footage responded that the footage was of an intact delivery abortion done at an abortion clinic.
Was it a PP clinic? You don’t know, and unless it was, it is actually irrelevant to what is happening at PP. And we should be able to know, since the clip does seem to show a crime being committed, which means the criminals should be prosecuted. Even CMP doesn’t know, since the clip came from another party, whose veracity and integrity remain unknown.
The only reason that clip was inserted was to short circuit your thinking, to make you respond emotionally and not notice what the ex-technician was actually saying. Which is already damning of PP with the visual effects. Ms. Fiorina exemplifies the almost Pavlovian predictability.
Remember: Agitprop for truth is still agitprop. And morally good causes do not justify immoral means. They merely become corrupted by those means.
kishnevi (28fa9f) — 9/29/2015 @ 3:10 pmwithout the visual effects
kishnevi (9cb6b5) — 9/29/2015 @ 3:11 pmdenial seems to run in more places then egypt,
http://biblehub.com/jeremiah/5-21.htm
narciso (ee1f88) — 9/29/2015 @ 3:15 pmNote
http://a.disquscdn.com/uploads/mediaembed/images/2594/3188/original.jpg?w=800&h
Hoagie (f4eb27) — 9/29/2015 @ 3:31 pmkixhnevi,
To me, the video is similar to what was described as happening at Planned Parenthood. It is a visual demonstration of what the words described. Further, it suggests this wasn’t a one-time event — that it happens at other abortion places, too.
I think this would be unfair if there were no evidence that this happens at Planned Parenthood but there is a witness who said it happened at a PP clinic. Do you honestly believe that this has no relevance to a discussion about live birth abortions?
DRJ (521990) — 9/29/2015 @ 3:55 pmOr are you saying it’s prejudicial because it’s too inflammatory?
DRJ (521990) — 9/29/2015 @ 3:56 pmFiorina’s coyness about the degree of correspondence between her debate answer and what the video depicts is a very deliberate departure from her usual style and manner. I believe that as a strategic choice, she’s simply refusing to engage in discussion — protracted or brief — on those particular details (which are relevant only as a “gotcha” of a candidate). Instead, she’s stubbornly returning the focus instead to what’s going on at Planned Parenthood.
Beldar (fa637a) — 9/29/2015 @ 4:09 pmthere are now eleven different tapes, they weren’t edited unlike the claptrap the Journal and the Times bought, it covers many aspects of the abbatoir, that moloch has informed,
narciso (ee1f88) — 9/29/2015 @ 4:10 pmFor purposes of appreciating — engaging morally and intellectually — on the subject of what’s going on at Planned Parenthood, viewing video exactly like this footage is essential. Her coyness drives more people to actually view the video.
Even if they conclude afterwards, “Well, she could have spoken more clearly” — or whatever other similar critique they might think justified — nevertheless, forcing someone to actually view the video is the most compelling way to persuade them that Carly’s not giving Planned Parenthood a bum rap, which then leaves the issue: Wow, this is actually going on at Planned Parenthood, however accurate and precise a film reviewer/chronicler Carly Fiorina was at the GOP debate.
Beldar (fa637a) — 9/29/2015 @ 4:15 pmWell said, Beldar.
Gazzer (124d91) — 9/29/2015 @ 4:16 pm^^^ All of which is to say: Fiorina is manipulating the media deliberately and successfully.
It would be nice to have more GOP candidates who could show that sort of subtlety and deliberation.
Beldar (fa637a) — 9/29/2015 @ 4:19 pmHer coyness drives more people to actually view the video.
there’s no proof of this at all
and if people are watching the videos just to see how big a liar she is
that’s not necessarily gonna move the dial against fetal tissue research
it might just make people go yup
she lies, and so so easily
i wonder what else she’s lying about
happyfeet (a037ad) — 9/29/2015 @ 4:20 pmWith $500M at stake, of course PP’s storm troopers are going to lie, cheat, slander and abuse the truth-tellers. They do it with nothing at stake, it is who they are.
Colonel Haiku (3bcea0) — 9/29/2015 @ 4:25 pmIt turns out the fetus in planned parenthood film was a still born birth not an aborted fetus according to the mother and she shows other pictures to show film was doctored!
adam smith (313248) — 9/29/2015 @ 4:29 pmYup. Nothing is worse than lying about things to improve your “moral position” in the eyes of others.
People who do that are really jerks.
Beldar, thank you for you thoughtful and temperate comments on this situation. It’s very interesting to see how Teh Narrative is being drummed up. Low information types are outraged—and only listening to NPR for their information.
Simon Jester (a0e1d9) — 9/29/2015 @ 4:30 pmlike I say, simon, it may have started about politics, but it’s really about something darker,
narciso (ee1f88) — 9/29/2015 @ 4:34 pmNarciso, there is something truly awful about this. Even if you like fetal stem cell research. It’s the way that these workers talk. I think that they have worked so hard to dehumanize fetuses that they sound like lab assistants to Mengele.
Hey, that research could be seen as very important, too. Save lives (like the cold water exposure work), or the Unit 731 experiments with typhus on humans.
It’s good to ask, from time to time, about one’s center.
The part that really gets me is that I can promise that these same people are up in arms about the Tuskegee Experiments. Brrr.
Simon Jester (a0e1d9) — 9/29/2015 @ 4:42 pmAnd against the Death Penalty. It should be called fatal stem research.
Gazzer (124d91) — 9/29/2015 @ 4:47 pmyes, Herr Strughold, certainly helped in the former case, I forget the major player in the 731
narciso (ee1f88) — 9/29/2015 @ 4:47 pmcase. Tuskegee was a case of extreme malpractice, with no research impact,
Fortunately, there is increasing evidence that stem cells can do a lot of what fetal cell research was about.
That doesn’t mean that the ghouls who buy these body parts will not keep at it. It just means that their justification is going away. The California ballot initiative that was passed using some rich guy’s money and which created a feeding frenzy at medical schools like mine, has resulted in very little useful research but has padded some department budgets, sort of like Climate research,
Mike K (90dfdc) — 9/29/2015 @ 4:48 pmit’s almost as if that concern, about ‘putting science in it’s proper place’ was folderall.
http://babalublog.com/2015/09/29/reports-from-cuba-repression-of-science/
narciso (ee1f88) — 9/29/2015 @ 4:53 pmThank you Tanney! I am using your code; it has made a wonderful difference for me.
felipe (56556d) — 9/29/2015 @ 4:54 pmI think there are two babies shown in this CMP video with Holly O’Donnell. The first occurs at approximately 5:58 and is a baby in a metal pan who moves his leg. The attribution on the video is to the Grantham Collection, a collection of “visual evidence of history’s injustice to the pre-born.” The second baby, which looks like a different baby to me, begins at 8:59 and shows people holding a baby. The photos are of Walter Joshua Fretz, the stillborn baby of loving pro-life parents.
DRJ (521990) — 9/29/2015 @ 5:11 pmpathological
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 9/29/2015 @ 5:39 pmliars club comes to order
chairman happyfeet
I think this would be unfair if there were no evidence that this happens at Planned Parenthood but there is a witness who said it happened at a PP clinic. Do you honestly believe that this has no relevance to a discussion about live birth abortions?
1) Notice CMP used an outside source for that clip. It apparently could not obtain a similar clip using its undercover video methods, despite having hundreds of hours of videos filmed that way. Which implies it couldn’t catch such an event at PP. Could simply be lack of access. Or could be that doesn’t happen at PP.
2) Visual memory is the strongest type of memory. CMP arranged the film that way so people would remember the visual image more than the actual witness’s words. You quite correctly point out the witness and the fact that her testimony is evidence of a crime. So it seems strange that CMP wanted to minimize her testimony. If anything CMP ought to have highlighted it.
Or are you saying it’s prejudicial because it’s too inflammatory
Certainly inflammatory. And that leads people to miss some things. For instance, you noticed this but apparently not many others, who are fixated on PP.
Further, it suggests this wasn’t a one-time event — that it happens at other abortion places, too.
kishnevi (31ba4e) — 9/29/2015 @ 5:49 pmDefunding PP won’t have any impact on those other places. May simply give them more business.
You may remember near the start of this I suggested reviving Reagan’s regulation that prohibited using the remains of aborted fetuses for research purposes. That would cut off those other places.
Walter Joshua Fretz was a premature baby
Photos at link may be too graphic for some people.
kishnevi (9cb6b5) — 9/29/2015 @ 5:53 pmkishnevi, PP is in the same business, they do abort intact fetuses at the same gestational age, when abortionists intend to harvest fetal tissue (or intact fetuses) for sale to corporations such as StemExpress the abortionists do not use feticides like digoxin, and consequently fetuses (which are infants when they leave the birth canal) are sometimes born alive at that age, as Dr. Van Handel of Novogenix Labs admits on the CMP video.
That’s what makes that video relevant, kishnevi. That’s what an infant at 20+ weeks of development born alive following an abortion looks like. Whatever abortion clinic that video was acquired at, they’re in the same business, and they deliver the same product. That’s what the product looks like.
I mention the 20+ weeks of gestation because that’s what researchers want for fetal heart research.
Do you imagine for some reason that infants born alive after being aborted intact at PP clinics look or act differently than infants born alive after being aborted intact at some other abortion facility?
You can either face facts or turn away from them. But to say the video isn’t relevant if it wasn’t acquired at a PP abortion site is to simply deny the facts.
Steve57 (ca1277) — 9/29/2015 @ 5:55 pmThanks for that info, Steve 57. I am going to forward it to a couple of academic MD bioethicists that I know to look into.
This started long ago. In 1st year med school in 1980 I saw a movie about a newborn infant that was left to die from pyoric stenosis instead of corrected with surgery. The details are hazy and I can’t find it with a brief Google search. I am thinking the baby had Down’s syndrome and that there were no legal charges brought. As I recall, it was bizarre and kafkaesque, couldn’t believe people would do that and think it OK.
Mike K, do you remember about this, can you add anything or correct my recollection?
MD in Philly (f9371b) — 9/29/2015 @ 6:04 pmkishnevi, they didn’t have any videos filmed “that way.” Their undercover operators were posing as executives for a fetal tissue wholesaler. They had access to PP executives and doctors. Occasionally they had access to the labs to see the tissue after the infants had already been dissected. But they had no one undercover in the rooms where the abortions were being performed, and no one undercover working as a procurement technician. If they had, they wouldn’t have needed Holly O’Donnell, a former procurement technician for StemExpress who had quit in disgust, to describe what it was like to see infants with beating hearts, and what it was like to cut the face open and extract the brain.
You’re going further afield from the facts than Carly Fiorina. I’ve watched all the videos and the CMP did not have one person undercover in a position to get that video of the living infant in the specimen tray. Apparently the Center for Bio-Ethical reform did have someone in such a position, which is why they used it with attribution. To show an infant at the gestational age Holly O’Donnell was describing.
Steve57 (ca1277) — 9/29/2015 @ 6:06 pmI think most people here agree that the protests are a means of trying to deflect the main point,and the main point stands.
But I am still not sure whether i am interested in supporting her.
MD in Philly (f9371b) — 9/29/2015 @ 6:08 pmi tend not to care what people say in the here and now, but look at what they have been doing over time, especially when no one was especially looking.
I know i am on the east coast and not an insider in the tech business, so it seems to me that she has come out of nowhere.
of course it’s also possible Holly O’Donnell is a liar just like carly
happyfeet (831175) — 9/29/2015 @ 6:09 pmThe legal term for “a fetus alive in the air” is “infant.” I believe that every state makes it a felony for a parent or other person in custody of an infant (such as a medical provider at delivery) to neglect an infant in such a manner as to put such infant in danger of death or serious injury. Moreover, it is a felony in every state for a licensed medical provider who has cause to suspect that such neglect has occurred to fail to report such neglect to the state’s child protective services agency.
It’s time for these cases to be prosecuted as child abuse, manslaughter and murder.
Barry Jacobs (2b1ba8) — 9/29/2015 @ 6:10 pmSteve, it is not evidence of what happens at PP if it was not filmed at a PP facility.
You are thinking it as illustration of what goes on at abortion centers.
kishnevi (28fa9f) — 9/29/2015 @ 6:11 pmI am thinking of hard evidence that could convict PP in a court of law. (It is the lawyer in me.) From that angle, not only is it not relevant, but it detracts attention from the actual evidence (in this case, Holly O’Donnell’s testimony).
But they had no one undercover in the rooms where the abortions were being performed, and no one undercover working as a procurement technician.
kishnevi (9cb6b5) — 9/29/2015 @ 6:15 pmI did say it might be lack of access. But you don’t actually know that they had no one undercover in the abortion rooms. Unless you have seen the rest of those hundreds of hours of videos they say they filmed in doing this project.
of course it’s also possible Holly O’Donnell is a liar just like carly
It is also possible that Patterico is actually a Mexican drug lord operating out of Cabo San Lucas.
kishnevi (9cb6b5) — 9/29/2015 @ 6:19 pmi’m dubious
happyfeet (831175) — 9/29/2015 @ 6:19 pmThe argument now is about one thing and one thing only: public funding for abortion clinics. I’ve heard it said that’s not legal. Obviously another leftist lie. If PP performs abortions and if PP gets public funding the government is breaking the law and lying to us. There is no way to separate funds within one organization since money is fungible. If the funding goes to pay the rent then the rent money goes to pay for abortions so it’s all the same and it’s all a lie. Secondly, if only 3% of what PP does is abortion how is it that 89% of their income comes from it? Thirdly, if they need public funding how can they turn a multimillion dollar profit? Finally, under Obamacare all women’s heath issues are covered so why does any clinic or other facility need public funding?
One other thing of note. I’ve heard leftist women moan it’s about contraception for women and that they need prescriptions. The Republicans have been for eliminating the need for prescriptions for contraception for a long time.
But the important thing is to win one issue. No public funds. Then we do like the left does and move to the next issue.
Hoagie (f4eb27) — 9/29/2015 @ 6:21 pmWhen the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, there were no strategically placed Technicolor cameras available to record the event. For forty years, movies and news videos used models and footage from unrelated events to dramatize the attack. Victory at Sea was one of the productions that did this. And yet, in our country, before the rot of liberal progressive thought-code throttled the souls of those who bought into the promises of utopia, we looked at those obvious recreations and listened to the narration that was woven into the magnificent music, and we appreciated the efforts of those who wanted to give us some idea of what it might have been like.
Now we are supposed to let the left pretend that something didn’t happen if the only evidence of the event is one of the participants discussing the details of the vivisection. And worse yet, if those showing us the conversation attempt to illustrate the horrific things being discussed over a lunchtime cocktail by splicing in some video that accurately demonstrates the carnage, we let the left accuse us of propaganda.
Enough! Dialogue is useless. Worse, it gives some semblance of respectability to those who slaughter living children for body parts. The left doesn’t like images of their crimes because these images will reach a lot of people who otherwise wouldn’t understand what was being done in their name … ostensibly creating a brighter future for “the children” of all the little people … while actually enslaving them through massive indebtedness and a dysfunctional education.
BobStewartathome (a52abe) — 9/29/2015 @ 6:27 pmThe casual conversations over wine and brie was the evidence or rather the admission of guilt. One can’t sell baby parts without parting out babies and PP is an abortion clinic or has connecting the dots become too much for the law? The dead baby video was as kishnevi said, illustrating the crime the ladies lunching and sipping wine conspired to do. It also shows the callousness of these people and the reason they fight so hard to keep PP clinics from being inspected and fought so hard for Gosnell The Butcher.
Hoagie (f4eb27) — 9/29/2015 @ 6:32 pmI see hf is still unsuccessfully trying to infect people with his disease. He really should be moderated. His nastiness, lies, and hatefulness abounds and the Truth is not in him.
John Hitchcock (0bf82e) — 9/29/2015 @ 6:37 pmkishnevi:
1) Do you ever see anyone posing as anything except as executives for a biomedical research company (i.e. a fetal tissue wholesaler).
2) David Daleiden, the founder of the CMP, is pro-life. He worked at Live Action, a pro-life organization, for five years before founding the CMP. Apparently the others working at the CMP are pro-life. So you are overlooking a practical difficulty. No one who is morally opposed to abortion is going to assist with abortions or dissect fetuses (and infants, when they are born alive) for any reason. Not even to get video. That’s why they need someone like Holly O’Donnell. O’Donnell is not a traditional pro-lifer, and for all I know she may not be any kind of pro-lifer at all now. But she grew to oppose the disgusting fetal tissue harvesting that PP and their corporate partners profit from.
You are thinking it as illustration of what goes on at abortion centers.
3. No. Holly O’Donnell is describing the baby from which she will eventually remove the brain through the face. That infant (not fetus) that O’Donnell is describing was alive as the other technician started the heart by tapping it, thus it met the Born Alive Act standards; it required medical care. It clearly got quite the opposite. The infant was 20+ weeks old. Unless you have some secret information that infants at 20+ weeks gestational age look different at PP than they do elsewhere, the video is relevant as it shows what such an infant (or fetus) looks like.
I am thinking of hard evidence that could convict PP in a court of law. (It is the lawyer in me.) From that angle, not only is it not relevant…
4. The CMP wasn’t making the video for that purpose. Which is why your argument that the borrowed footage is not relevant is, well, irrelevant. They simply hoped their videos would create a public demand for investigations, and those investigations would gather the hard evidence that could convict PP in a court of law.
Steve57 (ca1277) — 9/29/2015 @ 6:38 pmThe casual conversations over wine and brie was the evidence or rather the admission of guilt.
it was a sting video sillyhead
the lifeydoodles thought it would be fun to take the planned parenthood people out to lunch
but there’s no evidence at all that any of the planned parenthood people eat out on any kind of regular or even semi-regular basis
and the CMP douchebags were swilling wine and yucking it up about dead fetuses with the best of em
the whole “over lunch” thing was a contrivance, you see
like today for lunch i went to ho fooz and i got a huge pre-packaged salad for $10 what said RAW on it and had these tasty-looking chunky avocados
and it had two lil cuppy things
one had some kind of crunchy crunch so i poured that over the salad
the other one had dressing so i poured that too
they trickered me!
it wasn’t even dressing it was just a cuppy cup of lemon juice
DISGUSTING
i tried to rescue it with this greek yogurt dressing i had in the fridge but nope it was ruined
happyfeet (831175) — 9/29/2015 @ 6:40 pmNow we are supposed to let the left pretend that something didn’t happen if the only evidence of the event is one of the participants discussing the details of the vivisection.
kishnevi (31ba4e) — 9/29/2015 @ 6:40 pmThat is the only evidence needed. Hoagie calls it admission of guilt, and I think that is an accurate description.
Well, kishnevi, you kind of explained the difference between evidence and the admission of guilt and how the vids, wherever they came from just illustrated the barbarity. I’m not a lawyer by any means but you made it clear for me.
Hoagie (f4eb27) — 9/29/2015 @ 6:56 pm” I saw a movie about a newborn infant that was left to die from pyoric stenosis instead of corrected with surgery. The details are hazy and I can’t find it with a brief Google search. ”
I had a medical school classmate who did not have their baby operated on for pyloric stenosis. This was the late 60s when the counterculture was big and they were examples. There is a theoretical way to treat it with out surgery and they did it. The kid was a failure to thrive when I graduated. Potential Darwin award.
I did see Down’s kids with major congenital heart lesions (especially osmium primum ASDs) that were not operated on. They were in a home for retarded children.
Mike K (90dfdc) — 9/29/2015 @ 6:57 pmhf, you are pretty much in your own corner by yourself, trying to put your hands over your eyes and ears at the same time to neither see nor hear evil,
though you don’t mind talking to justify it.
You do need help, if you would only accept it.
MD in Philly (f9371b) — 9/29/2015 @ 7:23 pmI believe his mind’s made up, MD. At this point, as is true with so many liberals especially about abortion, AGW and taxes no amount of facts will change his mind. Opinions have won over facts.
Hoagie™ (f4eb27) — 9/29/2015 @ 7:54 pmoh please just cause i don’t fall into lockstep doesn’t make me a bad person i still think PP should have their funding cut (but the money should be seriously cut not transferred to weirdo lifeydoodle clinics)
i still think cecile is a remarkably creepy choice to head planned parenthood
i still think that the little sisters of the caramel corn shouldn’t have to hold the forceps during abortions or whatever
but no it’s just never enough for you people
happyfeet (831175) — 9/30/2015 @ 3:21 amActually happyfeet, that is enough for me. At least it is a good start. Especially the part about “the little sisters of the caramel corn”. At least you recognize that Christians should not be forced to finance, subsidize or participate in any actions which compromise their Freedom of Religion and/or religious beliefs. That’s progress as far as I’m concerned. Shalom.
Hoagie™ (f4eb27) — 9/30/2015 @ 5:53 amshalom Mr. Hoagie it’s hump day and it’s a gloomy one looks like
happyfeet (831175) — 9/30/2015 @ 5:55 amIt’s gloomy in Willow Grove, PA. Philly and suburbs is all downpours all day. I’m waiting for Home Depot to deliver and install a new dishwasher.
Hoagie™ (f4eb27) — 9/30/2015 @ 7:09 am