Not Since Canaanites Gathered Around the Altars of Baal 3,000 Years Ago

In just one sentence, Calgary Herald columnist Nigel Hannaford has put abortion into historical perspective: "Abortion has been around forever of course, but not since the Canaanites gathered around the altars of Baal 3,000 years ago has anybody actually defended child sacrifice as an intrinsically good thing."

The current abortion regime really is something extraordinary, unprecedented in Western Civilization. Like it or deplore it, abortion-as-we-know-it is not just an incremental adaptation of previous practices.

Calgary Herald
Social conservative face shown at last
By Nigel Hannaford

Talk about stirring things up. After Finance Minister Iris Evans delivered off-the-cuff comments about family life, much combustible gas erupted from the bottom of the pond as the left jumped all over her. Yet, all she said was that going to work and letting somebody else raise your children wasn't ideal. Wow. There's subversive.

Come on. She didn't say working couples were wicked, and until quite recently a parent at home for the kids was what just about everybody did. More would do it today if they could afford it. But, the left piled on. Liberal Leader David Swann called it "outrageous," a "black eye for Alberta." The NDP said she was out of touch with reality, and much else besides. It was an Alberta example of what the left everywhere loves to do: Use walls of sound to try to shut down opinions it doesn't like. Often, these are positions that have been mainstream for centuries, if not eons. In the case of Evans, it's state-run day care that's the left's real issue with her. Socialists everywhere dream of when all little kid-dies are dropped off at the government mind-meld facility, where people who really know how to make children into good, compliant citizens, will have their way with them. (Not a new idea, by the way: Prussian academics were promoting it 130 years ago.) So, how dare Evans encourage parents who want to do the job themselves? What next? Kind words for home schoolers?

The left has made effective use of the co-ordinated yell to topple one motherhood issue after another as those of us who have lived long enough can attest. Oddly, the first to go was the one that should have been impregnable: The bond between mother and unborn child. But, somehow enough women became persuaded that it wasn't a baby they were carrying, just fetal tissue, and that their choice of convenience superseded its right to be born. Abortion has been around forever of course, but not since the Canaanites gathered around the altars of Baal 3,000 years ago has anybody actually defended child sacrifice as an intrinsically good thing.

Bizarre, but now a politician who so much as proposes limits on abortion, makes him- or herself a magnet for vile personal attacks. So did those who argued without success that thousands of years of past practice and the consensus of the world's religions suggest the institution of marriage was and should remain exclusively heterosexual. And for environmental conservatives, there's the ultimate slander - to be called Nazis. Ellen Goodman for instance, a liberal columnist who has many imitators, wrote in 2007: "I would like to say we're at a point where global warming is impossible to deny. Let's just say that global warming deniers are now on a par with Holocaust deniers." Let's see. Tim Ball is like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad? Of course not. However, no less a Kyoto skeptic than Stephen Harper (who in 2002 wrote in this paper that as environmental policy, Kyoto was "a fraud") has, since becoming prime minister, been obliged to prescribe policies he once scorned. Such is the power of the left's green scream.

Conservatives need to sort through their issues. The right has a long history of blending authentic truth with some mean-spirited attitudes: Liberty for some, but not for all; condemning people instead of behaviour, drive-by misogyny and so forth. The attitudes, they need to lose. However, they should have more confidence in their truths. Evans's family ideal is well-founded and requires defence, not excuse. Within its abilities, it should be her government's objective to use tax and benefit policies so Albertan families that want to keep one parent at home for the kids, have that choice. As for Alberta's left, Evans should remember a party that hasn't formed a government for 90 years could hardly claim to understand today's realities itself: Nor could one that not one Albertan in 10 will vote for. The noise is not coming from the moral high ground. The government shows its social conservative face? About time.

Quebecois Abortionists Bristle at Proposed Canadian Health Insurance Rules

If U.S. Democrats want to make abortion "safe, legal and rare," as former President Clinton claimed, and as Democrats from Tipper Gore to Barack Obama have since confirmed, or even if they just want to publicly fund abortions under the proposed new health care systems, they might want to take note of the controversy brewing up north in Quebec.

The article Le Droit article reproduced below, to summarize for the monolingual Americans whom President Obama denounced during his Europe tour, says that Bill 34, under consideration by a Quebec parliamentary committee, would require private clinics that perform about 50 surgical procedures - including abortion - obtain permits as "specialized medical centers."

This would subject the clinics to rules regarding facilities, staff, procedures, even dress code. Without this permit, clinics will have to shut down or lose eligibility for Quebec's $350 health insurance payments.

More than a quarter of Quebec abortions are performed privately, outside hospitals. Some Canadian hospitals decline late-term abortions Some have long waiting lists and cannot schedule elective abortions promptly. Current health insurance rules permit hospitals to refer to private abortionists, including general practitioners, who threaten to stop offering abortions if Bill 34 passes.

Le Droit
L'avortement menacé dans le secteur privé
By Pascale Breton, La Presse

Exaspérés par les contraintes administratives que veut leur imposer Québec, les médecins menacent de ne plus pratiquer de nombreuses interventions dans les cliniques privées, notamment les avortements. Une décision qui aurait un impact important sur les listes d'attente.

Des ententes existent entre des hôpitaux et des cliniques privées pour y référer des femmes qui veulent subir une interruption volontaire de grossesse. Plusieurs hôpitaux sont en effet incapables de faire les avortements dans les délais requis en raison des listes d'attente élevées. D'autres ne pratiquent pas ce genre d'interventions au−delà d'un certain nombre de semaines de grossesse.

Tout risque de changer, affirme le président de la Fédération des médecins spécialistes du Québec, le Dr. Gaétan Barrette. "C'est certain que les gynécologues−obstétriciens vont arrêter de faire ces interventions parce que ce qu'on leur impose comme lourdeur est trop grand. On impose aux cabinets privés des normes hospitalières."

Le son de cloche est similaire du côté des médecins omnipraticiens du Québec qui pratiquent le plus grand volume des avortements.

"On se retrouve avec un carcan administratif, déplore le président de la Fédération des médecins omnipraticiens du Québec, le DrLouis Godin. Nous pensons qu'il y a un risque important que ça ne mette un frein à l'accessibilité, parce qu'il y a probablement des médecins qui vont arrêter d'en faire."

Le problème réside dans la teneur du projet de loi 34, à l'étude en commission parlementaire à Québec cette semaine. Dans un souci d'accessibilité aux soins et dans la foulée du jugement Chaoulli, le gouvernement veut encadrer une cinquantaine de procédures chirurgicales faites dans le privé.

A compter de l'automne, les cliniques devront être reconnues comme des cliniques médicales spécialisées. Elles devront obtenir un permis délivré par le ministre. Elles devront aussi se conformer à une série de règlements, autant en ce qui a trait aux installations, au personnel, aux procédures, jusqu'au code vestimentaire.

Si la clinique n'obtient pas de permis, elle devra cesser ses opérations ou devenir privée au sens où les médecins devront devenir non participants au Régime de l'assurance−maladie du Québec.

Mais les médecins estiment que les règles administratives sont trop nombreuses. "Les gens vont simplement arrêter de faire ces procédures parce qu'ils n'ont pas besoin de ça pour vivre", lance le Dr. Gaétan Barrette.

L'impact sur les avortements est important. En 2007, près de 5000 interruptions volontaires de grossesse ont été réalisées dans les cliniques privées et quelque 2800 dans les centres de santé des femmes. Environ 19900 interventions ont été pratiquées dans les hôpitaux et les CLSC.

A la suite d'un jugement de la Cour supérieure du Québec, le ministère de la Santé et des Services sociaux rembourse par ailleurs 350$ pour chaque avortement pratiqué au privé, en plus des honoraires médicaux payés par la RAMQ.

Bien d'autres procédures faites au privé risquent d'être aussi abandonnées. Une décision qui aurait même un impact sur le projet de loi sur la procréation assistée. En campagne électorale, les libéraux s'étaient engagés à payer des frais de traitements de fertilité aux couples qui veulent avoir un enfant.

"Il est strictement impossible de faire de la fécondation in vitro dans le public au Québec. Il n'existe aucune ressource", souligne le DrBarrette.

En commission parlementaire, le ministre de la Santé, Yves Bolduc, a expliqué qu'il voulait s'assurer de la sécurité entourant chacune des procédures.
"Dans les cliniques médicales spécialisées, ce sont des actes chirurgicaux qui sont pratiqués. C'est le pendant d'un bloc opératoire à l'hôpital. [...] Le fait d'avoir un agrément, un permis spécial est tout à fait indiqué."

En fin de journée hier, le ministre Bolduc a par ailleurs indiqué que les centres de santé des femmes, des organismes à but non lucratifs où se pratiquent notamment des interruptions volontaires de grossesse, ne seront pas soumis aux règles les contraignant à devenir des cliniques médicales spécialisées.

Canada Wrestles With Human Dignity of Child: Does It Depend on Context?

Canadians are wrestling with the ambiguous situational ethics of abortion and infanticide, but have not achieved any clarity as yet.

Mom asks charge of hiding baby's body be dropped
Teens found human remains in March 2007
The Sault Star
by Maria Calabrese

Canada has never come up with a definition of "fetus" or "child," and that is exposing a North Bay mother to a public trial based on evidence that doesn't exist, her lawyer argued Tuesday.

Even the highly charged Henry Morgentaler case that brought abortion rights to the Supreme Court of Canada more than 20 years ago failed to define when the rights of a pregnant woman stop and the rights of the fetus begin, said defence counsel Erin Lainevool.

"We do not put people on trial for doing things we cannot understand, that we frown upon, or that upset us, simply because we want answers," Lainevool told court.

"Public outcry, shock, sadness or the need for answers are not the purview of the criminal justice system unless there is also evidence."

She is representing Tabatha Etches, a 27-year-old North Bay woman linked by DNA to the decomposing remains of an eight-pound, four-ounce baby boy. Two teens found the remains wrapped in a towel in a garbage bag near a walking trail in a wooded area near Laurentian public school March 30, 2007.

A judge acquitted her of infanticide and showing indignity to a human being or human remains, mainly because there is no cause of death or proof the child was born alive.

In Canada, a fetus has no rights and is not legally considered a human being.

That same judge ordered Etches to stand trial for failing to get help with childbirth -- which carries a maximum jail sentence of five years -- and concealing the body of a child -- with a sentence of up to two years imprisonment.

Lainevool asked a higher court to review that ruling, saying the judge overstepped his role by allowing a weak case to go to trial.

Superior Court Justice Paul Rivard will give his decision at a later date whether to acquit Etches on the remaining charges.

While the defence argues the charge of concealing a child's body exposes women to prosecution if they miscarry at home without medical intervention, the Crown says there is other evidence in this case that merits the charges going to trial.

That evidence is currently protected by a publication ban.

Crown attorney Paul Condon refers to the Canadian Labour Code that uses the terms "child" and "fetus" interchangeably, although the defence said that's a different context involving the protection of pregnant women and nursing mothers exposed to hazardous workplaces.

The Crown also refers to the federal Assisted Human Reproduction Act which defines a fetus as a human organism beginning on its 57th day after creation and ending at birth. It does not define "child."

Court heard Ontario's Vital Statistics Act only offers a definition of birth as a live fetus from the mother.

The problem is Canada's Criminal Code is based on English law drawn up centuries before Canada was even a country, Lainevool said.

"We've adopted legislation and simply incorporated it into our system. But the society that existed at that time is very different than the society that exists today in terms of women's rights, in terms of health, in terms of technology, in terms of abortion," she said.

Self-Congratulation Abounds in Canadian Pro-Life Group's Launch of Brand

It remains to be seen whether Signal Hill will ever bear a resemblance to William Wilberforce's dogged antislavery campaign. For now, it certainly doesn't lack self-esteem, to judge by Terry O'Neill's fawning panegyric in the National Post.

It's not off to a good start mining lessons from Wilberforce, who was a 50-year finger nail across the blackboard of amoral British Mercantilism. If Manning and O'Neill think Wilberforce won abolition of British slavery by putting "service before sermons," they are quite mistaken. Wilberforce was confrontational, and he fought on even when his cause was utterly forsaken by his peers.

National Post
A wise new strategy for pro-lifers
By Terry O'Neill

A long-standing legal and moral issue - the mere mention of which causes newscasters both here and in the U.S. to lower their voices an octave - suddenly squeezed its way into the news earlier this month, thanks to some interesting developments on both sides of the border. But perhaps the most significant Canadian event of all involving the issue - abortion - passed with not a single word of notice in the mainstream media. That's a pity, because it involved a prominent former national political leader emerging from his Calgary redoubt to embrace and endorse a new strategy to reinvigorate the pro-life movement.

Ladies and gentlemen, meet Preston Manning, the newly emerged champion of a B.C.-based group called Signal Hill. The fast-growing organization intends to help Canada reconsider its acceptance of abortion. Signal Hill's strategy is to put aside impassioned political and moral arguments in favour of service, education and compassion. You might say the group is aiming, not for Canadians' minds, but for their hearts. And Manning couldn't be more pleased.

This past month has seen some fairly significant abortion-related events. A Gallup poll in the U.S. found that, for the first time since the company started asking the question, the majority of Americans considered themselves pro-life.

The news came at the same time as controversy was building over Notre Dame's awarding of an honorary degree to President Barack Obama; protesters said a Catholic university should not be honouring a pro-abortion President. Subsequently, anti-abortion hecklers interrupted Obama's keynote address at the Catholic institution.

Naturally enough, things weren't quite so dramatic in Canada. There was a smattering of stories about the 40th anniversary of the legalization of abortion in Canada, and also some coverage of the national March for Life in Ottawa on May 14. Some of the smaller provincial marches received coverage as well.

If anything, the fact that abortion is still in the news is a repudiation of Jean Chretien's remark of nine years ago: "We have social peace with that [abortion] at this moment."

The dismissive declaration helped slam the door shut on mainstream public discussion about the issue in the years that followed - except, of course, for the odd headhunting journalist trying to trip up a conservative candidate. Nevertheless, anti-abortion diehards have been determined to show there actually is no social peace over the country's lack of a law regulating abortion.

To prove their point, they've staged the aforementioned marches, and Life Canada, for example, has released annual polls showing that most Canadians actually want some restrictions on abortion. More confrontationally, the Canadian Centre for Bio-Ethical Reform has helped set up graphic displays at universities, likening abortion to genocide.

Pro-lifers in B.C., on the other hand, decided to adopt a different approach. Building on the success of their compassionate Focus on Life television campaign, they made some creative changes last June. They adopted a new name, Signal Hill, and featured a woman-and family-friendly look to their Web site and printed material.

It all goes along with a new educational and service-oriented approach to help women make informed choices when they are in a crisis pregnancy. The Signal Hill moniker was chosen as a way of telling Canadians that the group intended to take the high ground in the abortion debate and that it aimed to separate truth from falsehood. (Full disclosure: I sit on the board of Signal Hill.) Response in the Canadian pro-life community (yes, there is a widespread and active - although somewhat aged - one) has been largely positive. Indeed, some groups in other provinces have requested permission to adopt the Signal Hill brand.

Enter Manning. Back when he led the Reform Party of Canada, Manning always worked hard to keep the hot potato of abortion (opposition to which is closely linked with Christian groups) from landing in his party's hands.

Today, with his Manning Centre for Building Democracy sponsoring such offerings as a "faith-politics interface program," Manning is freer to speak his mind on such big questions. But it doesn't mean that he's in favour of using religious or moral arguments in the public square.

Rather, in a speech on May 11 to more than 600 Signal Hill supporters, Manning repeatedly stressed that pro-life advocates had to be "wise like serpents, gracious as doves." And he drew a direct parallel between the struggle to end abortion and the fight to end slavery in the British Empire.

That latter engagement lasted more than half a century, he pointed out. At first, it was led by Quakers, who advanced well-meaning, high-minded and morally indignant arguments against slavery. They got nowhere. And it was only when a new group, led by the likes of William Wilberforce, adopted a new strategy of drawing attention to the suffering associated with slavery that progress was eventually made.

The lessons are clear, Manning said. Put service before sermons. Broaden one's base. Ensure that your tactics are wise and gracious. And do not let zeal for the cause override your long-term plan. In all respects, he said, Signal Hill appears to be following this path.

Naturally enough, Signal Hill's leadership and supporters are encouraged by Manning's imprimatur. They can only hope their own wise and gracious approach to one of this nation's most vexing issues will prove to be as successful as Wilberforce's.

- Terry O'Neill is a Vancouver writer and editor, and co-host of RoadkillRadio.com.

(c) 2009 The National Post Company.