Roundup: Florida Rep Says "Stand down if you don't have ovaries!"

Roundup: Florida Rep Says “Stand down if you don’t have ovaries!”

May 3, 2010, 8:22am

Will Governor Charlie Crist veto the mandatory ultrasound bill, or is he not as Independent as he claims? Also, another flawed abortion study, and another look at what women will do when safe abortion isn't an option.

Not content to let Oklahoma have the limelight for too long in mandating offensive, ineffective ultrasound procedures, Florida has now passed their own bill declaring all women must pay out of pocket for the procedure prior to having an abortion, unless she has proof she has been raped. Of course, whether she chooses to listen to the description of the embryo or fetus is completely up to her. How’s that for freedom of choice?

After being stalled for a day by Democrats trying to take a stand against the measure, the bill then heard numerous hours of heated debate from both sides of the aisle, with some rhetoric getting so hot that it was suggested that parents who brought children should leave the chamber.

There was passionate debate Friday on both sides of the issue, including three hours on the amendment requiring the ultrasound exam.

Rep. Janet Long, a Democrat from Pinellas County, opposed the measure, saying, “This is governmental intrusion in the most personal decision. Stand down if you don’t have ovaries.”

Rep. Betty Reed, a Democrat from Hillsborough County, said the ultrasound exam is an invasive procedure that should not be imposed on women.

“It is not right. It is not fair. It is not what we should be here doing,” Reed said.

House Speaker Larry Cretul stepped in when Rep. Alan Hays, a Republican from Umatilla, likened abortion to the Holocaust.

“Everyone is aghast and embarrassed” about the Holocaust, in which at least 5 million Jews were killed, Hays said. “What are we going to say as a society about the killing of more than 50 million?” he asked before Cretul cut him short.

Rep. Keith Fitzgerald, a Democrat representing Manatee and Sarasota counties, said, “This is an unconstitutional law.”

One politician gave an impassioned plea to please consider the mother when it comes to forcing an unwanted ultrasound, trying to remind the anti-choice legislators that not everyone terminating a pregnancy is doing it because it is unwanted.

[Y]ou act like this ultrasound machine is in another room, that you walk out into and go, oh, there it is. Actually, that ultrasound machine is right next to that bed, where my wife is laying, looking at this fetus. And she’s starting to cry. And she asks that that ultrasound machine be turned in the other direction because she can’t see it anymore. But this bill right here is saying “no, we’re going to demand one more time when you go in to finally terminate that fetus — because God and nature told you ‘not this time,’ that you be forced to see that screen, or you be told what’s on that screen, and that you demand it be turned away, but you’re still going to have to listen to the description of what’s still there. Members, this is something we’re about to do to women in this state.

But we’re not alone. Statistics show that about 25 percent of pregnancies are terminated naturally by God and nature. With today’s medical care, women don’t have to wait for the mother to keep a dying fetus inside their womb until it finally terminates on its own, or it finally miscarries by nature. So my wife and my sister are not alone. There are thousands and thousands of women that will be in the same position.

…

Members, we constantly hear that this chamber is all about small government. The only thing this body has proven in the last six years is how this Legislature defines small government — six years ago this Legislature wanted government so small that it could fit down a tube into an individual woman’s throat named Terri Schiavo; this decade we have shown time and again that you want government so small that it can fit under someone’s bedroom door; and members, this year you are showing that you want government so small that it could fit between a woman’s leg and into her uterus. It’s not the small government that anyone wants.

I know that I have changed no one’s vote today because this body is controlled more by ideology than empathy. But I tell my story today because I want you to go home tonight and when you are by yourself and you have closed your eyes to sleep that your mind is filled with the personal pain you have brought to my wife, my sister and the thousands and thousands of women who want nothing more than to have the baby that is growing inside of them, but that unfortunately, God, nature and fate have chosen that it will not happen at that time. When you close your eyes every night, I want you to see their faces and their pain and the trauma you have personally brought them.

Of course, the question now remains, what will Governor Charlie Crist do with the bill? Currently in a battle with Tea Party darling Mark Rubio for an open senate seat, and recently leaving the Republican Party to run as an independent, Crist is being begged by numerous legislators and activists to veto the bill.

We hope Gov. Charlie Crist’s new-found “independence” allows him to veto the Legislature’s ultrasound mandate, a crude effort to coerce women in to not seeking an abortion.

The law, unveiled and passed in the closing days of the session just concluded, requires ultrasounds for women considering abortions during the first trimester of pregnancy, when more than 90 percent of abortions are preformed.

Doctors must perform the ultrasound, and a woman must sign a form if she wishes to avoid viewing those results.

The mandate’s backers describe it as an effort to give women more information before they make a decision on abortion.

But the gathering and discussion of information about this legal procedure should be strictly up to the doctor and patient, with no political meddling.

They should not be burdened by heavy-handed, religion-driven government mandates having to do not with health issues but with the politics of abortion.

The debate on the bill made it clear that legislators backing the bill are concerned with trying to prevent abortions, not protecting the health of women.

Until abortion foes have the votes to ban it, they should stop trying to interfere with a legal procedure they find objectionable.

Let’s hope Crist’s declaration of an independent Senate candidacy last week is also a declaration of independence from the right-wing forces that seek to sabotage women’s reproductive rights.

After all, they turned on Crist before he dumped them.

However, the Republican legislators are already laying on some heavy-handed rhetoric to persuade him to pass the bill.

Rep. Chris Dorworth a Lake Mary Republican, acknowledged the veto possibility but said, “If he vetoes this bill, he’s saying that millions of people — the millions of babies who will be terminated from this … are not people. And I know, that as a man of character, that he won’t do that.”

Mini Roundup: I suspect in three days the usual group of anti-choicers will claim this to be the be all, end all of abortion repercussion studies, despite its obvious flaws. Yet it will never occur to them that these are the lengths women will go to in order to get an abortion if it becomes illegal.

April 30, 2010

Kenyan churches oppose constitution over abortion – The Associated Press

Florida Senate Approves New Abortion Restrictions – Kaiser Health News

Chris Selley: A contrived little abortion war – National Post

Would independent Crist sign or veto new abortion laws? – Creative Loafing Tampa

Anti-gay group continues push for ‘Choose Life’ tag – Qnotes

Abortion bill veto will boost Charlie’s Senate race. – Orlando Sentinel

Palin Event Requires Media To Pay Anti-Abortion Group For Access – Huffington Post

Florida House passes bill requiring ultrasound before 1st trimester abortion – Ocala

Kenyan constitutional talks stall on abortion issue – Catholic Culture

Why Stephen Harper took a hard right on abortion – Toronto Star

Abortion’s route to rare – New Bern Sun Journal