Father Pavone is one scary man...predicts more "mass demonstrations and abortion-clinic vigils".

[madfloridian]

Anti-choice groups are vowing to use these next years to grow their protests and demonstrations against choice by women in their private lives. They vow to intensify their efforts to cause problems for these women at abortion clinics.

Here are some words from Father Pavone found at Right Wing Watch:

Viva La Resistance!

"The election forces the pro-life movement to go back to what we do best — local grass-roots organizing," said the Rev. Patrick J. Mahoney, director of the Christian Defense Coalition. "We will not go silently into the night."

The overall outcome "brings about feelings of great disappointment, of anger," said the Rev. Frank Pavone, national director of Priests for Life. "But that disappointment and anger are forms of energy. ...I believe a lot of people on the sidelines for last eight years will now get engaged."

Pavone predicted that activists would stage more mass demonstrations and abortion-clinic vigils He also said the election results shed light on the movement's weak points, and would prompt new efforts to register anti-abortion voters and mobilize clergy to be more outspoken in future campaigns … "We will do everything to be sure fails — the damage it would do to the pro-life movement would be immeasurable," said Mahoney. "On the scale of 1 to 10, that's No. 11 of what our job is."

They don't care about anything but power. They want to exert their power over women's rights, they want to exert their power to stop gay marriage.

In fact, it looks as if the Right is almost welcoming the new Obama administration, sensing it will provide an opportunity for them to mobilize and energize their base as part of new “resistance movement”:

Wendy Wright, president of Concerned Women for America, said, "I knew, moments after the election results came in, that I was now part of the resistance movement." As part of its "movement," CWA has launched a nationwide telemarketing advertising campaign. In the ad, Wright says, "We face a president and Congress more hostile to unborn children, to marriage, to religious freedom, to free speech, to protecting our country than has ever existed in our history." According to Wright, the ad generated an immediate response of calls from religious conservatives asking "what they could do" to help, NPR reports.

Religious conservative leaders also have been scrutinizing Obama's speeches from the campaign trail for messages they can use to rally their base, NPR reports. In particular, they have publicized a speech Obama made last year to the Planned Parenthood Federation of America in which he said, "The first thing I'd do as president is sign the Freedom of Choice Act."

I doubt they will have much trouble stopping the Freedom of Choice act. One of the side effects of the handpicked more conservative Democrats is that they were picked for the very reason....they often do not support women's choice. That's a downside to winning everywhere, I guess.

But even our leaders in Congress are not much help.

In 2005 Schumer took women's rights off the table....right out loud.

"Let me tell you one other thing we did. We are no longer letting Democrats get in a circle and shoot each other. I was just in Tennessee with Harry and with (...) and we have a primary and I stood up there Harold Ford is running and he can become the first African-American elected in the south to the Senate since reconstruction which would be a great thing for America. There is this young woman whose... not so young... but a nice woman running against him but everyone says she is going to attack him."
"...(unintelligible) we are going to intervene if anyone one democrat attacks another, we're doing that in states where there are primaries. We can't afford to do it anymore. This always happens in the primaries, we would throw up the cards and see where they landed. No more, we are finding the best candidate in every one of the seats where a Republican is vulnerable."

"So I called up Governor...our number one target is Rick Santorum...let him go back to wherever he lives, Maryland, you know you heard about it, he is Pennsylvania but he tried to get exempt from the school tax there cause he lives in Maryland even though he is a registered citizen of Pennsylvania. In any case I called up the Governor of Pennsylvania, Governor Rendell, I said who is the best candidate to beat Santorum. He there is only one person who could beat him but he won't run and B you wouldn't want him to. I said why wouldn't we want him to run, he said he's pro-life. He's a deeply religious Catholic man. Bob Casey."

"I said, those days are over Ed. Yes I'm pro-choice, but we need the best candidate. We can't insist that every democrat check off 18 different issues before they get (unintelligible) we could do that, we can't anymore. And so, we persuaded, Harry using his very...Harry has amazing insights into people...and we together persuaded Bob Casey to run. A poll yesterday...national...all the polls they did...Casey 51 Santorum 40. You should see Santorum nervous and walkin on the floor."

(unintelligible)

"And we're doing this in the other states."

I guess that is what we had to do to win. But in reality we really did have to leave behind a lot of our own base to win.

The irony is that as wrong as the right may be, the left may have trouble gaining ground within the religious community, in that some have already vowed fidelity to gay marriage, and other adhere to the most stringent application of the separation of church. These positions signal loudly to many of us - including those whose religious views inform our perspectives on public life - that some on the left don’t think that we are right.

If the Democratic Party is to make inroads into the faith community, it must be willing to put all issues and options on the table that. Building an agenda around “quality of life” issues, also known as the social gospel, has proven successful.

Now in full Election ‘08 mode, with the right being wrong, and some on the left standing mute, the religious community continues to raise the question of the candidates that John asked Jesus “are you the one or should we look for another?”

Rev. Michael Whatley writes at DLC website

Inclusive is good, forgetting our own base...not so good.

The right wing is gearing up for a real fight. Will our party stand up to them?

[really annoyed]

1. Night before the election....

There was a HUGE group of anti-abortion protesters holding a prayer vigil outside of a clinic in my area that provides termination of pregnancy services. These people had been protesting for WEEKS against Obama with crazy ass signs about how he will kill babies and stuff. Incredible.

Newsflash to these people - abortions went on during the whole tenure of Bush. You did know that, right?

[davidinalameda]

46. "termination of pregnancy"?

it's called an abortion

why use euphemisms?

[BrklynLiberal]

2. At least we can know that the new administration will do whatever is necessary

to protect people going into those clinics, hopefully reinstate payment for abortions for poorer people, and will nominate judges that will ensure the right of women to make their own decisions when it comes to their bodies.

I hope that people like Pavone and his ilk get so infuriated, and so frustrated that their heads literally explode.

and, by the way, I would never vote for Schumer. I hope that when his term is up, there is a decent opponent running in the Dem primary and Schumer gets kicked out..

[nxylas]

30. Literally?

Somehow, I don't think that'll happen.

[lib_wit_it]

3. Let's not forget Leslee Unruh. According to this article, she's a real force to be

reckoned with:http://www.more.com/more-women/real-women/leslee-unruh/?page=1

Note the ten parts for the whole story. What bugged me almost as much as Unruh was the writer's wishy-washiness and creepy affection for "Leslee the anti-abortioner." I know, she's entitled to her opinion, but it still annoys me, especially the ending acceptance of the plastic fetal doll. Weak.

[bliss_eternal]

5. Crazy and creepy.

:scared:

[opihimoimoi]

4. OMG Don't those peeps realize we got too many humans on this Earth

already? almost 7 Billion....our resources are running out and they want MORE HUMANS??? ARE They NUTS?

Its INSANE.....WE are fucking ourselves into extinction


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F-QA2rkpBSY

[FKA MNChimpH8R]

8. Logic has no place in the FreeplePeeple mindset

Gawd will provide. And those of whom he doesn"t provide for are entitled to starve to death in his holy name. And be thankful for it. In Jeebus' name. Amen.

[Shallah Kali]

9. Don't you know GAWD will Provide? Global climate change is just a sign of the End Times!

and it is GAWD's wrath that is causing the wildfires in California because of teh gays!!!!! But not because of all the lobster and pork eating going on there!!!!

{/sarcasm}

I have to agree it is crazy for moder people to live by rules made to benefit people living in a rather unpopulated undeveloped region where you were lucky to have half your kids live to adulthood. Life was very hard for most and no one had handy thermometers to make sure pork was cooked properly so Mom, Dad and the passel of kiddies didn't die of trichinosis.

[madfloridian]

24. Some of the rapture groups really do welcome climate change as a sign

of the end times.

And Alaska is to be a haven. :eyes:

[Shallah Kali]

6. Talk2Action had a piece the other day about certain folks wanting throw women's rights under the bus

as a concession to anti-choice dems. I say to heck with that concept. The majority of dems are pro-choice so why throw us under the bus to lure in a few measly swing voters? But I fear this if not with Obama at the state level. I fear that too many of those who support women's rights getting complacent and taking things for granted that just because President-Elect Obama is about to take office that everything will be hunky-dory, that women won't have to right to get their birth control or emergency contraception script filled until it happens to someone in their circle.

We are up against religious fanatics (and those willing to cater to them for personal gain) who won't give up no matter what and are organized planning ways to get their people into positions of power from school boards on up. Us liberals don't have that level of organization even if we have a majority on this issue.

When Liberals Become the Religious Right
http://www.talk2action.org/story/2008/11/15/15234/457/Front_Page/When_Liberals_Become_the_Religious_Right

After posting a Short Takes item about liberal Catholic writer E.J. Dionne's call to capitulation on reproductive rights, I went on to develop it into a more detailed discussion over at Daily Kos. But that discussion also belongs here.

Various Beltway Insiders and Professional Pundits are saying that president elect Obama should not undo the various anti-abortion executive orders issued by the Bush administration. They say doing this would avoid pissing off prolifers and show that he is governing from the middle and that it will make it easier for Congress to move his anti-poverty agenda.

It is a seductive argument, but I believe it is also wrong and if Obama falls for it -- will be correctly viewed as an error of historic proportions -- not only politically, but in terms of the human costs of continuing horrific policies of the Bush administration.

More at the link:
http://www.talk2action.org/story/2008/11/15/15234/457/Front_Page/When_Liberals_Become_the_Religious_Right

[madfloridian]

21. I remember what Lieberman said...talking about the morning after pill

He said victims of rape could get a ride to another hospital for the pill. Couldn't even stand up for the rights of a rape victim.

There are many in the congress now who will not vote for choice.

[bluedawg12]

7. The rw revving up the cultural wars again, out of power and ideas

what else do they have but this? Desperate people do desperate things and the lovey to play the silent oppressed majority and then, suddenly pretend to be pushed to the limit in fake out rage.

[Shallah Kali]

11. They are oppressed because they can't make us practice their religion

I believe that many of them honestly believe that they are being oppressed and that other groups are out to get them not as in oppose their political take over but as in romans feeding Christians to the lions out to get them. I used to live near a fundamentalist family and boy was it an education! The are some of the most terrified people I have ever known. It was sad to see and there was no reasoning with them. I would talk down one of them when they were riled up about but them minute they got home with the rest it was back to panic/fear/panicpanic/fear mode.

This is not to say the higher ups aren't true belivers. I think some are and many are just users who found an easy way to get power, admiration, and $.

[FKA MNChimpH8R]

10. Logic has no place in the FreeplePeeple mindset

Gawd will provide. And those of whom he doesn"t provide for are entitled to starve to death in his holy name. And be thankful for it. In Jeebus' name. Amen.

[Seldona]

12. They don't let logic interfere with their rabid idealism.

Nevermind that under 12 years of repuke rule of the House and Senate, with eight of those years having a repuke president, nothing was done but some partial birth abortion nonsense to keep the base dazed.

It's the Democrats fault, those abortion lovers. Nevermind that historically abortion rates generally go DOWN under Democratic administrations due to the increased quality of life of mothers and better availablity of pre and post-natal care.

They are coming. There is nothing we can do about that. But we can be ready. It's certainy not a surprise attack. The law is the law. They dealt with it under 12 years of their own party's rule. NOW they freak?

Weak.

[madmadmad]

13. mass demonstrations against abortion- good. pro-gay marriage- bad.

hypocrites.

[judasdisney]

14. Torture is OK

Ghost Detainees on CIA torture barges in the Atlantic Ocean would watch the U.S. in disembodied wonderment if they saw us: Save the embryos from stem-cell research! Demand gay marriage ahead of any concern for our torture victims! Let the CEOs rape us blind because we don't want to cause Obama too much grief!

Whatta country.

[lib2DaBone]

15. Really. How come not a word from 'The Church' on torture?

'The Church'.. loves the fetus.. hates the child. Bring lots of children into a poverty stricken world then abandon them when the need medical care.

[Blue Gardener]

16. Add we will continue to support and protect

Our local family planning clinics.

[formercia]

17. I'm glad you used the term anti-choice

because we are all pro-life. No sane person wants to kill babies, but then Junior and his ilk aren't sane.

[MiniMe]

18. I walk near a planned parenthood clinic on my way to work, it is down a side street, but you can see

it. There is almost always somebody there in the morning, just standing outside with a handful of pamphlets. Usually they are quiet, and there are just 1 or 2 people there. Planned parenthood has clinic escorts who walk people inside if they wish. I heard one guy who was coming out of the clinic tell them to get a life when they tried to hand him a pamphlet.

[Le Taz Hot]

19. And we'll be right there to counter them

and ensure our right to choose remains -- much as we have been since 1973. I got real good at "shielding" back in the day. The sad thing is, most of the women we had to shield weren't even there for abortions. They were there for PRE-NATAL CARE, pap smears, treatment and detection of STD's and other gynecological issues. Then as now, the clinic works on a sliding scale so low-income women could take advantage of much-needed MEDICAL CARE. I used to get my paps and BC there.

These guys are losing power and they know it. Of course, the crazies who are left are the certifiable type -- some of whom think they hear GAWDUH telling them to kill the doctors or clinic workers or whoever else happens to be in the way.

[msanthrope]

20. Has Pavone finished feeding on Terry Schiavo's corpse yet?

What a ghoul.....

[noonwitch]

22. I wonder if he remembers what happened to Randall Terry?

Janet Reno. She applied RICO laws to Operation Rescue and essentially bankrupted him.

I can't wait to see who Obama picks as AG. I hope it's someone as tough as Reno was.

[madfloridian]

23. Looks like some on the Christian right will start organizing outsde the GOP

http://prospect.org/cs/articles?article=the_fundamentalist_111908

"Although the CNP's meetings are closed to the press, Smith filled me in on some details: Conservative direct-mail entrepreneur Richard Viguerie, a patriarch of the modern conservative movement, rallied the troops by pointing to prior comebacks, from Reagan to Gingrich to Bush. Viguerie, Smith told me, "is saying that we need to fight for conservative ideas and conservative values and not worry about who embraces them." Smith added that the group talked "about changing the culture, entertainment, media, TV" -- a longtime goal of the religious right's dominionism that it seeks to achieve by taking over social, cultural, and government institutions, much like religious-right figures are now plotting their new takeover of the Republican National Committee.

"What I'm hearing is that there is no loyalty to the Republican Party," said Smith, meaning no loyalty to the party as constituted but loyalty to one purged of insufficiently conservative members. "What Richard Viguerie talks about is not a third party but a third wave. Basically there needs to be a flowering of grass-roots conservative activism and local groups, local PACs. He's basically saying you've got a Republican county commissioner in Buzzard's Breath, Texas, and he's not a conservative? Run a conservative against him."

That is exactly what has excised moderates from the Republican Party and led to its losses in 2006 and 2008. Of course, there aren't really that many new ideas to run with if you believe that the Bible is God's literal word that should dictate policy, and that government should be starved of funding and required to do as little as possible, unless it involves using military might to combat perceived threats to Western Civilization As We Know It."

[dkofos]

25. I doubt it.

[MountainLaurel]

26. The party, no

The people, absolutely.

[madfloridian]

27. The people absolutely...I really do think so.

[davidthegnome]

28. They've certainly picked a rotten time for it

but none of them believe that that they're pushing their ideals for the sake of power. Rather, I would say, the majority of them believe they are trying to save souls and lives - as they define the fetus as a living human. That doesn't make it right, but I honestly believe they think they're doing the right thing.

In any event, it is clearly a woman's choice. No government, entity, or power, has the right to dictate to a woman that she will or will not give birth.

Of course, these same people (some) would (I have heard them say so) be very much in favor of a new eugenics movement - the forced sterilization of the "socially undesirable".

No, no matter what these crusaders believe, it is not their body and therefor they do not have the right to dictate in this matter. I'll always stand for a woman's right to choose.

[madfloridian]

29. I think the leaders of the more extreme religious right are manipulating them.

This kind of wedge issue thinking has been preached for so long that it is part of them now. I have seen it in people I know, teachers I taught with.

The leaders of the religious movements have in large part manipulated them and used them.

[defendandprotect]

31. So Chuck Schumer gave us "pro-life" Casey -- and Mukasey --!!!

What next, Chuck ...? Democrats who don't support voting rights?

[Deep13]

32. Instead of appeasing irrationality, the country needs to be more rational.

This may not be something the Democratic Party can do by itself anymore than it could end segregation without a national movement already in effect. As noted by the OP, in much of this country Democrats lose where abortion is either a real or pretended issue.

The problem is not the liberal position which is supported by evidence and ethical considerations. The problem is that people believe a zygote has a soul. If ones definition of a person is something that has a human soul--which probably doesn't exist--then the logical result of that premise is that all forms of abortion amount to homicide. Add to this the doctrinally supported cultural assumption that women have no other significant purpose in this world other than making babies. Add to THAT the idea that sex is sinful and that an unwanted pregnancy is an appropriate penalty for female promescuity. The result is neurotic attention to embryonic needs and no regard for the needs of the woman (who really is a person).

What we really need to do is stand up for rationality and point out the cruelty that anti-abortion laws visit on people. The choice is not life or death of the embryo. The choice is whether we value a potential person with no sensibilities of its own over a realized person in the form of the pregnant woman. Taken to ridiculous extremes, this thinking brings stem-cell research and contraceptives under the "anti-life" umberella. In case you are wondering where these activists are protesting the wars, they are not.

We cannot tip-toe around this. The anti-abortion movement in this country is spear-headed primarily by the Roman Catholic Church. It has accomplices, of course, but as the single largest Christian denomination in this country and the world, it is in a unique position to ram its agenda down our throats. The R.C. "authorities" have no regard for our Constitution--unless it is to protect themselves from taxation--and no respect for self-government. They wish to control the intimate details of our lives and many of us assume they are in a moral position to do so. Ultimately, they must be the only source of hope and happiness in the world or else people will know of their irrelevence. And ordinary, decent and ethical people support this subversion every week by their donations.

[pipi_k]

33. People can argue till the end of time over whether a zygote

or embryo has a "soul" or has "feelings", or that life begins at conception or whatever.

That just muddies the waters and sets people up for endless bickering back and forth, because there IS no being "rational" with that bunch



The core issue here isn't that we have to be rational with these people....I think the core issue here is that they need to be told in no uncertain terms to stay the fuck out of someone else's uterus

Period

end of discussion

If it doesn't concern them personally, then they have no business interfering, and THEIR RELIGION isn't a good enough reason for them to stick their noses in someone else's business.


same with gay marriage.

No rationalizing or arguments.


stay the fuck out of people's bedrooms!!!


stay the fuck out of women's wombs!!!!

[Deep13]

41. You missed my point.

First, telling the public to stay the fuck out of women's wombs will not make them do it. You are ignoring the reality of the situation. Religious people vote and hold high office in this country and their views count.

The problem is the irrationality of the electorate. That one cannot be reasonable is my whole point and my complaint. By diminishing the legitimate interests of women and by increasing the importance of the embryo by assuming it has a soul and defining personhood based on it, the agrument goes from being a slam-dunk in favor of women to being a case of competing interests. Framed as a choice between survival and convenience, proscribing abortion becomes the logical conclusion of that assumption. That is what he had been fighting for decades. It is only when the soul is removed from the equation and limiting gender roles are disregarded that the reality-based argument becomes viable in people's minds.

Irrational belief is the problem. If one is convinced that such-and-such is the will of god, then no counterargument is available. Anything becomes justified to enforce divine will.

[CatholicEdHead]

34. Not in the current economy they won't

Given a choice of having stable finances and putting food on the table will keep many from protesting.

[wolfgangmo]

44. the good thing about the current economy is that...

... most politicians will have bigger fish to fry and will be disinclined to monkey around with any laws that are restrictive or contentious.

We passed a contentious law in our state last year that is being challenged and the challenge is going no where.

Let us hope the same thing applies here.

[JimboBillyBubbaBob]

35. Revisiting History

There was a Women's Holocaust in medieval Europe that killed approximately 100,000 women. It was theologically driven and has been referred to as witch burning, but it was no more than an assault on women's rights. What we are witnessing among theological movements of every stripe in the current era is more of the same, a full frontal assault upon women's rights. There is no need to over complicate the matter with distractions. Everyone must be vigilant.

[47of74]

36. Republican shill

This guy is nothing more than a shill for the Republicans. I remember flipping through the channels back in 2006, and there he was encouraging parishes to violate IRS regulations and tell people to vote Republican.

[elshiva]

37. I never understood how being anti-choice tied in with being anti-gay marriage, but

yes they do go hand in hand. I picked anti-choice magazine called "Celebrate Life," which featured an awful "ex-gay" testimony called "Out of Sodom." :puke:

They are self-righteous assholes who don't know anything about women or homosexuality. :mad:

[madfloridian]

39. Yes, hand in hand.

The rights of both need to be protected.

[elshiva]

40. RAMEN!

[codjh9]

38. Those 'Concerned Women For America' make me want to puke. Nothing worse than young or women

conservatives - because I usually expect a) young to still be idealistic, and b) women vote Dem in higher percentages than men. This from a white male, but a life-long Dem one...

[old mark]

42. Mr. Pavone is a ruthless Nazi bastard who has no agenda but

self-promotion and power.
He is a disgrace, even to the Catholic Church, which has more than enough disgrace to go around.

mark

[AngryOldDem]

43. He's a hack.

He's in this for his own glory. His shameless exploitation of Terri Schiavo should have given people a clue.

[RagAss]

45. No worries...They'll be home cooking their pets on the stove in this economy !