President Obama may be ignoring the "House of Horrors" murder trial of late-term abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, but now Congress is set to address the issue of infanticide by abortion.
A bill to end abortions after 20 weeks in the District of Columbia is getting new attention because of the gruesome details coming out of Gosnell's trial in Philadelphia. The 20-week mark was chosen because some studies reportedly showed that's the point when the unborn can begin to feel pain.
Friday, the Susan B. Anthony List, a national pro-life organization, praised Rep. Trent Franks, R-Ariz., for introducing the "D.C. Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act."
Currently in the District of Columbia, abortion is permitted for any reason until the moment of birth.
Ludwig Gaines, the African-American leadership and engagement director for Planned Parenthood Federation of America, has called Frank's bill an "attack on women."
In a Feb. 19 press conference criticizing the legislation, Gaines said pro-lifers show concern for black babies in the womb but "could care less" about them after they are born.
"Quite frankly," he told CNS News, "if you look at the records of the proponents of this bill and others who would support it, they are the very same people who will not support after-school care, or food stamps or other programs meant to elevate communities of color."
"Suddenly, they're concerned about black children, quite frankly, prior to birth, but could care less once they arrive," the Planned Parenthood representative added.
President Obama defended government funding of Planned Parenthood Friday when he became the first sitting president to address the group during its annual convention in Washington.
Obama vowed to fight legislation protecting the right to life and claimed there is "an assault on women's rights" because of bills introduced in many states to limit or ban abortion.
"The fact is, after decades of progress, there's still those who want to turn back the clock to policies more suited to the 1950s than the 21st century," he said.
He promised Planned Parenthood, "You've also got a president who's going to be right there with you, fighting every step of the way."
Obama has been fighting against the rights of the unborn – and even the born – since he was a state senator. His voting record and statements make him one of the nation's most extreme supporters of abortion, advocating positions well outside the mainstream.
While defending abortion at a 2008 town hall meeting in Johnstown, Pa., Obama told a crowd he wouldn't want his daughters "punished with a baby."
Also, WND columnist Nat Hentoff wrote, "No previous president has been so radically pro-abortion as Obama, who, when he was in the Illinois Senate, voted three times against the 'Born Alive Infant Protection Act.' The bill would have ensured that if a live baby fully emerged before an abortion was successfully completed, he or she was to be saved."
Illinois state Sen. Obama voted against versions of the "Born Alive Infant Protection Act" in 2001, 2002 and 2003. That bill was virtually identical to the federal "Born Alive Infants Protection Act" that defined legal personhood to include born-alive infants and was enacted in 2002. But Obama chaired the committee that voted 6 to 4 to kill the Illinois bill that would've would given babies born alive the guarantee of medical assistance.
As WND reported, when Obama argued against the bill on the floor of the Illinois Senate on March 30, 2001, he expressed concern for the legal liability of the abortionists but not for the lives of babies who survived abortions.
Obama said, "[T]his puts the burden on the attending physician who has determined, since they were performing this procedure, that, in fact, this is a nonviable fetus; that if that fetus, or child – however way you want to describe it – is now outside the mother's womb and the doctor continues to think that its nonviable but there's, let's say, movement or some indication that, in fact, they're not just coming out limp and dead, they would then have to call a second physician to monitor and check off and make sure that this is not a live child that could be saved."
Obama concluded that the bill was unnecessary, "Because if these children are being born alive, I, at least, have confidence that a doctor who is in that room is going to make sure that they're looked after."
However, testimony from the Gosnell trial shows that is exactly what did not happen for 17 years at the abortionist's clinic.
As WND reported, Planned Parenthood defended Gosnell's practice of killing aborted infants born alive by saying those life-or-death decisions were up to the doctor and the mother, not the law against murder.
During a Florida legislative hearing in March, Rep. Jim Boyd, R-Bradenton, asked Florida Planned Parenthood lobbyist Alisa LaPolt Snow, "If a baby is born on a table as a result of a botched abortion, what would Planned Parenthood want to have happen to that child that is struggling for life?"
She replied, "We believe that any decision that's made should be left up to the woman, her family and the physician."
Lawmakers were so stunned they asked the question again and again.
Rep. Jose Oliva, R-Miami, followed up, "You stated that a baby born alive on a table as a result of a botched abortion that that decision should be left to the doctor and the family. Is that what you're saying?"
"That decision should be between the patient and the health care provider," Snow replied.
As WND has reported, details on botched abortions and the killing of babies born alive coming out of the Gosnell trial are so morbid they have caused a national controversy.
(Warning: The following contains details of a graphic nature concerning abortions that may disturb some readers.)
A grand jury report said Gosnell's clinic went 17 years without oversight and that he "regularly and illegally delivered live, viable babies in the third trimester of pregnancy – and then murdered these newborns by severing their spinal cords with scissors."
Former employee Stephen Massof testified he snipped the spinal cords of babies, calling it "literally a beheading. It is separating the brain from the body."
He also said, when women were given medicine to hasten deliveries, "[I]t would rain fetuses. Fetuses and blood all over the place."
When authorities finally raided Gosnell's clinic in 2010, they discovered rows of jars containing the severed feet of what appeared to be late-term aborted babies and the corpses of several aborted babies with cuts on the backs of their necks.
Gosnell faces four charges of first-degree murder and one of third-degree murder after the judge, without giving a reason, threw out three murder charges earlier this week. The 72-year-old Gosnell could face the death penalty, if convicted.
Eight former workers at the Women's Medical Center have pleaded guilty, including three to third-degree murder.
Closing arguments are set to begin Monday, and the jury is expected to get the case Tuesday.
If convicted, Gosnell would seem to disprove then-state Sen. Obama's faith "that if these children are being born alive, I, at least, have confidence that a doctor who is in that room is going to make sure that they're looked after."
Yet, in his remarks to Planned Parenthood today President Obama again ignored the trial. But, as WND reported, so has the mainstream media.
The media heavyweights were shamed into covering the trial briefly after liberal commentator Kirsten Powers penned a scathing indictment of the networks and major newspapers for ignoring the hideous details emerging from testimony.
"The deafening silence of too much of the media, once a force for justice in America, is a disgrace," Powers wrote.
"Let me state the obvious. This should be front-page news. When Rush Limbaugh attacked Sandra Fluke, there was nonstop media hysteria. The venerable NBC Nightly News' Brian Williams intoned, 'A firestorm of outrage from women after a crude tirade from Rush Limbaugh,' as he teased a segment on the brouhaha. Yet, accusations of babies having their heads severed – a major human rights story if there ever was one – doesn’t make the cut," she observed.
That caused an uptick in coverage, but it was momentary.
The New York Times sent a reporter to the trial for a few days, but on April 17, the paper decided to pull its reporter and cover only "highlights" of the trial.
After some coverage following the Powers' piece, the networks have largely reverted to ignoring the Gosnell trial.
Life Site News reports CNN covered the trial April 12, and CBS mentioned it on the April 15 edition of "This Morning," but, "There endeth the coverage. ABC has never once mentioned Gosnell. CBS hasn't followed up, and NBC has yet to do any reporting on the story."
Thursday, Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minn., blasted the establishment media for ignoring the trial.
Speaking on the House floor, she said, it's hard to imagine a doctor "would sever the heads off of four babies that were born alive and potentially others, and commit one gruesome act after another and shamelessly the mainstream media has all but gone silent and failed to cover this horrific violence against women."