Black Community News News and Commentary for Christians
Despite its frantic efforts to counter the shock video just released and to cover its tracks that appear to be all over the harvested-baby-parts market, abortion industry leader Planned Parenthood is finding itself at the center of an exploding, and expanding, firestorm. Individual states as well as outraged lawmakers in Washington are taking immediate action to investigate the claims in that video whose contents we reported on Tuesday — evidence that appears to show a top Planned Parenthood medical official casually discussing how organs of aborted babies are routinely collected and sold for research.
Western Journalism’s post yesterday on the undercover video of Planned Parenthood’s medical services director has been widely read. The video released by an organization called the Center for Medical Progress is an edited version of a much longer piece in which undercover operatives during a “business lunch” ask a woman identified as Dr. Deborah Nucatola about the availability of hearts, lungs, livers, and other harvested organs from aborted fetuses.
And, according to LifeNews, not only does the prominent abortion doctor mix her eating with graphically descriptive talk about how she performs life-ending procedures on the unborn — how “I’m not gonna crush that part, I’m gonna basically crush below, I’m gonna crush above…” — the physician also discloses that Planned Parenthood is concerned about their legal liability for harvesting and selling the body parts of the unborn.
Since the release of that eye-opening, stomach-turning video, Planned Parenthood has tried to spin the storm away from its operations by claiming all their organization does is donate fetal “tissue” whose use in “scientific research” has been approved by the women getting abortions at their clinics. However, the Twitter account of the abortion doctor exposed in the secret taping has been deactivated. And Stem Express — a California company that had offered clinics “financial profits” in providing body parts from aborted babies — has apparently taken down its website, as Life News notes.
In addition, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, who’s running for the Republican nomination for president, has ordered a state investigation into Planned Parenthood and its reported practice of selling the organs of aborted babies.
Other GOP presidential contenders have weighed in. Politico quotes several GOP candidates: “’I am sickened by the complete disregard for innocent unborn life evident at Planned Parenthood. I’m proud that one of my first actions in the Senate was voting to defund this organization,’ Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida told POLITICO. Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas released a statement calling the video ‘sickening’ and urged Congress to begin an investigation into the Center for Medical Progress’ allegations.”
Adding his name to the list of concerned state chief executives is Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, who has also called for a state probe of the practice of abortion clinics and the harvesting of fetal organs and tissues. In a statement obtained by Breitbart News, Abbott said: “’The video of a high-level Planned Parenthood executive discussing the details of internal abortion procedures – including harvesting of baby body parts – is unnerving and appalling.’”
The outrage over the reported harvesting activities — which could be in violation of federal law — has now extended to Capitol Hill, where a number of GOP lawmakers, including House Speaker John Boehner, are moving to find out exactly what’s going on inside the nation’s biggest abortion provider, Planned Parenthood.
Politico reports that Boehner’s office refers to the evidence presented in the secretly recorded video as “gruesome.”
“When an organization monetizes an unborn child — and with the cavalier attitude portrayed in this horrific video — we must all act,” House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio said in a statement. “As a start, I have asked our relevant committees to look into this matter. I am also calling on President Obama and Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Burwell to denounce, and stop, these gruesome practices.”
And some Twitter commenters took note of an ironic tweet issued by Barack Obama as the Planned Parenthood firestorm began to rage on Tuesday. The president’s social media message was a portion of a speech he delivered to the NAACP; but when viewed in the context of the serious allegations facing the nationwide abortion organization he has so frequently praised…well, see for yourself:
CNS News reports of recent federal support for Planned Parenthood that the organization received more than $540 million in government grants in fiscal year 2013. There’s now talk in Washington that much of that funding could be in jeopardy if the investigations now getting underway show that Planned Parenthood has, in fact, engaged in the harvesting and sale of body parts from aborted babies.
BCN editor’s note: This article first appeared at Western Journalism.
