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Friday, April 19, 2013

The Council Has Spoken! This Week's Watcher's Council Results

 

Alea iacta est...the Council has spoken, the votes have been cast, and we have the results for this week's Watcher's Council match up.

A pretty full week newswise, and the varied entries this week reflect that!



This week's winner, Joshuapundit's Unmourned, Unloved and Politically Inconvenient  was my reaction to the Gosnell Trial, the Left's reaction to it, the media's attempt to bury it by ignoring it, and what it says about our culture.I was frankly surprised at the response this got from my readers and my fellow Council members, given the difficult subject matter.Here's a slice:

Dr. Kermit Gosnell ran an abortion clinic in the city and is accused of a number of horrendous crimes, according to the Grand Jury report:


"This case is about a doctor who killed babies and endangered women. What we mean is 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."

"The medical practice by which he carried out this business was a filthy fraud in which he overdosed his patients with dangerous drugs, spread venereal disease among them with infected instruments, perforated their wombs and bowels - and, on at least two occasions, caused their deaths."

He's been charged with 7 counts of first degree murder.

The illegal part of what Dr. Gosnell did is worthy of reflecting on.

According to his former clinic staff, at least 100 living babies were murdered moments after Dr. Gosnell (or in some cases, his unlicensed assistants) ripped them out of the womb.Pennsylvania law forbids abortion in most cases after 24 weeks (the end of the second trimester). His standard method of killing the children was snipping the spinal cords, what one of his assistants described as 'a virtual beheading.' Dr. Gosnell frequently used drugs to induce labor so as to deliver the babies faster and make the killing process easier. One of his assistants in testimony described 'fetuses and blood flying around everywhere.'

Dr. Gosnell has also been charged with the murder of a 41-year-old Virginia woman who died from an overdose of anesthetic drugs, possibly administered by another unlicensed 'doctor'.

Several women patients were badly injured, according to the report. One was left simply lying there after her cervix and colon were torn in the process of trying to pull a baby out of her womb so it could be 'dealt with'. Another, only 18 years old, was not given proper care after her uterus was punctured and had to undergo a hysterectomy. Others actually contracted venereal diseases, painful infections and other complications because of the unsanitary conditions, where rusty and outdated machines, dirty, unsterilized instruments and filthy surroundings.

When the police finally got around to investigating Dr. Gosnell's clinic because of a tip he was illegally 'proscribing' drugs, they found fetal remains "stored throughout the clinic - in bags, milk jugs, orange juice cartons, and even in cat-food containers."

So what Dr. Gosnell is being charged with, actually, is performing late term abortions (illegal in Pennsylvania but not in a number of states), keeping a sloppy and unsanitary shop, allowing unauthorized and unlicensed personnel to perform procedures and administer drugs and the injuries and at least one murder that resulted from that.

Had he worked for, say, Planned Parenthood in a clean, up-to-date environment with licensed assistants in a state like California that allows abortion on demand for any reason no matter how far along the pregnancy is, he would have been doing essentially the same thing without any problems.

What Dr. Gosnell was doing to babies is not that much different than other doctors when it comes to late term abortions. They are merely more skillful and using better equipment.

A lot more at the link.

In our non-Council category, the winner by a nose was Caroline Glick  with Moral Relativism and Jihad   submitted by Joshuapundit. ( with a hat tip to my pal Terresa at The Noisy Room for the suggestion). This seems to be a week for what I call the larger issues, as Ms. Glick writes about the increasing tolerance in our culture when it comes to anti-semitism and violence associated with jihad and Islam...especially when it comes to American Jews on the Left.  Do read it.

OK, here are this week’s full results:

Council Winners

Non-Council Winners

See you next week! Don't forget to tune in on Monday AM for this week's Watcher's Forum, as the Council and their invited special guests take apart one of the provocative issues of the day with short takes and weigh in...don't you dare miss it. And don't forget to like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter.....'cause we're cool like that!
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