OPINION:
Unborn and newborn babies aren’t getting much support from the White House this week. President Obama continues to refuse to weigh in on the case of alleged serial killer abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell. Instead, he agreed to give the keynote address at Planned Parenthood’s annual gala dinner on Thursday night.
The White House realized Wednesday that the public outcry was too loud and made up an excuse why Mr. Obama couldn’t give the major address, but would do a smaller speech at a Friday breakfast. It is unheard of for a president to cancel a scheduled speech or event — especially with one day notice — unless in the case of a major domestic or international crisis. Spending extra times with the families of victims of the fertilizer factory in Waco, Texas does not fit those criteria.
Meanwhile in Philadelphia, Dr. Gosnell apparently thinks his case is a slam dunk. His lawyer rested the case Wednesday without putting a single witness on the stand to rebut the five weeks of testimony from the prosecution.
On Tuesday, Judge Jeffrey P. Minehart acquitted the abortion doctor of three of the first-degree murder charges, leaving the defendant facing four counts of first-degree murder for allegedly killing babies after they were born by cutting their spinal cords with scissors. He also faces a charge of third-degree murder for giving too much medication to a woman during an abortion at his clinic, according to the prosecution.
The president followed the lead of the liberal mainstream media by ignoring the Gosnell trial, in the hopes that the public would as well. Conservative outlets — particularly Fox News, which has been covering the case since 2011 — have been the only ones bringing the horrific details of the abortion clinic to the public. On April 15, Fox News’ Ed Henry was the first of the White House press corps to ask Press Secretary Jay Carney about the Gosnell trial. The spokesman would only say that the president is “aware” of it and “does not and cannot take a position on an ongoing trial.”
Mr. Obama must have come to his position of not weighing in on open criminal cases recently. He showed none of this caution when he said Trayvan Martin looked like the son he never had, and, in doing so, likely tainted the jury that has not yet been selected to judge George Zimmerman’s guilt. Mr. Obama regular cites the details of the case against James Holmes for his alleged role in the Aurora, Colo. movie shooting, even though it is, in Mr. Carney’s words, an ongoing trial.
Mr. Henry pressed for an explanation if Mr. Obama’s position had changed since 2003 when then-Illinois state senator voted against providing medical care for a baby born after a botched abortion. Mr. Carney would only say that the president’s position on “choice” is “clear.”
Infanticide is already against the law, but Republicans in Congress are trying to strengthen federal law to stop babies from being aborted at late stages of pregnancy.
Rep. Trent Franks, Arizona Republican, will introduce a measure to make abortion illegal in the District of Columbia after the baby can feel pain, which is at 20 weeks, if not earlier. The bill was brought up in the House last year, but it failed to pass because leadership brought it up under suspension of rules and the 220 to 154 vote fell short of the two-thirds needed for passage.
Sen. Mike Lee, Utah Republican, will also reintroduce the companion bill in the Senate in May. The Democratic majority in the upper chamber never held a hearing on Mr. Lee’s bill, nor allowed a floor vote.
“The next Gosnell might happen right here in the District of Columbia, where abortion is currently completely legal for any reason until the moment of birth,” the president of the National Right to Life Committee’s president, Carol Tobias, told me. “Congress should act now to ban the dismemberment of pain-capable unborn children in the nation’s capital, by passing the Franks-Lee legislation.”
Since Congress has oversight of the free-for-all abortion policy in Washington, D.C., it should use that power to stop the killing of unborn babies. The less abortion providers in the country, the less chance that another baby will take his first breath, stretch his legs and then have his head cut off by a man in a white jacket.
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