Wednesday August 15, 2001

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MANNING RELEGATES SOCIAL CONSERVATIVES TO THE BACK OF THE BUS - AGAIN

OTTAWA, Aug 15, 2001 (LSN.ca) - Former Reform Party Leader and founder and current Canadian Alliance MP Preston Manning released his "blueprint for uniting the right" in today's National Post. Manning also announced that he will be resigning his seat at the end of the year "to pursue his political ideals and other interests from a less partisan base."

Most significant in the 'blueprint' are Manning's comments related to the core issue of social conservatism. "In my judgment, the 'principled ground' on which there is the best prospects for agreement and co-operation between Alliance and Conservative MPs at the present time is that defined by the principles of fiscal and democratic conservatism," writes Manning. "Only after effective co-operation has been achieved on this ground should exploratory efforts be made to find common ground respecting certain principles of social and constitutional policy."

Historically Mr. Manning has tended to place contentious social conservative issues on the back burner. While he has professed a personal pro-life belief, he has never been able to confirm the courage of his convictions. In the Reform Party, social conservative issues such as legal protection for the unborn were left to referenda to decide while constitutional initiatives such as the triple E Senate and recall were clear party policy.

Social conservative leaders across the country expressed great disappointment with Manning's comments in the National Post. Campaign Life Coalition spokesman and LifeSite Director Steve Jalsevac responded, "This is even further confirmation of our worst fears about Mr. Manning's strategy. It appears that political power and money into the party coffers are Preston's main priorities. The large number of Canadians who cherish life and family will be left without representation by a major party if Manning gets his way."

The Catholic Civil Rights League (CCRL), compared the 'unite the right' movement in Canada to the movement in the United States. "It is a shame that conservative leaders in Canada ignore the ascendancy of the US Republican Party. That strength in the polls has been in part been driven by its willingness to accommodate social conservatives and fiscal conservatives in its tent," CCRL National Vice President Philip Horgan told LifeSite. "The big bus of Canadian conservatism should not relegate social conservatives to the back seats." Mr. Horgan commented that the timing of Manning's blueprint - being less than 48 hours after Stephen Harper signaled he would run for the Alliance leadership - was "perhaps an expression of his own interest in running." However, given Manning's views, says Horgan, "perhaps social conservatives will have to look elsewhere to find their leader."

Manning's desire for unity on fiscal issues may well prove illusory since many religiously-motivated groups, while officially neutral on matters of fiscal policy, are conservative on social issues such as those affecting life and family.

Gary Walsh, President of the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada told LifeSite that while Evangelicals in Canada include both fiscal conservatives and fiscal liberals, they are conservative on these social issues. "If MPs are persuaded to put aside social policy for whatever reason we regret that important national policy will be overlooked," he said. "We would be disappointed that there wouldn't be an organized presence in the House voicing conservative responses to social issues."

Gwendolyn Landolt National Vice President REAL Women of Canada, told LifeSite that "In his anxiety to co-operate with the Tories, Preston Manning has exposed himself as an individual devoid of personal principles himself, since he is prepared to exclude social conservative policies from his co-operation plan." Landolt criticized Manning's plan of "cooperation with the Tories at any price", adding that "He and his followers should move over to the Tory party, and leave the genuine members of the Reform/Alliance to get on with the important business of repairing their party so that it represents, once again, a distinct and independent party upholding firm moral values." Landolt said, "Mr. Manning knows or should know that the strength and success of the Reform/Alliance Party has always been the grassroots people who have retained their values and who wish these values included in the party platform."

A common complaint about Mr. Manning's handling of the Reform Party was his exclusion of many social conservative individuals and groups from any significant influence on the party's inner circle. Manning allowed his staff and advisors to regularly obstruct meaningful access to him by pro-life leaders while at the same time professing pro-life ideals. Moreover, Manning's backroom crew which included Rick Anderson and Cliff Fryers, excluded even grass-roots members from having any meaningful say.

Brian Rushfeldt, President of the Canadian Family Action Coalition called Manning's blueprint "a sell-out" and a "betrayal of the social conservatives that helped him build the party." Rushfeldt told LifeSite: "I cannot support any party which is not going to consider social conservatives or social conservative issues. If we don't have social conservative principles and policies this nation is destined to go down the tubes."

Manning's determination to continue to push social issues onto the back burner of any new 'conservative ' political unity movement and his by-passing of Alliance constitutional principles will come as a shock to the many Alliance members for whom these issues are of great importance. Finally, his current support for exclusive top-down, backroom process at uniting the right betrays his often touted populist stance.

Family Coalition Party Leader Giuseppe Gori told LifeSite: "The abandonment of conservative social policies and constitutional dialogue necessarily directs a government towards socialism, centralization of services and tyranny. We have tried such an administration in Ontario and British Columbia. It was labelled 'NDP'." Gori warned that "By shelving these principles and going after popularity such a party might do well in Ontario and Quebec, but will frustrate the West. We already have such a party. It's labelled 'Liberal'."

See Manning's blueprint for uniting the right in the National Post at:
http://www.nationalpost.com/commentary/story.html?f=/stories/20010815/646297.html

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MS. MAGAZINE CALLS POST-ABORTION HEALING EFFORTS EXPLOITATION

NEW YORK, Aug 15, 2001 (LSN.ca) - In Ms. Magazine's August issue, author Cynthia L. Cooper accuses Christian based post-abortion counseling groups, and specifically Elliot Institute director Dr. David C. Reardon, of "exploiting" women who have had abortions.

She contends that "anti-choice" efforts to educate women about post-abortion emotional problems are premised on a "bogus affliction invented by the religious right" to make women feel guilty. Post-abortion outreach and healing programs are similarly ridiculed as nothing more than cynical attempts to "use" women (through guilt-tripping techniques, or perhaps even brainwashing?) into working for the overthrow "abortion rights."

Although Cooper interviewed a number of pro-choice activists for her article, she never bothered to call the central target of her attack, Dr. Reardon, to ask his response to her accusations about the motivations behind his pro-woman/pro-life strategy. Instead, she simply took a sprinkling of quotes from Reardon's published material and blended them with a generous dose of her own insinuations of misogyny to construct the charge that Reardon's efforts on behalf of women are "merely a cynical ploy aimed at bringing down the walls of choice."

The first half of Cooper's article is an attack against the "lie" that abortion hurts women. The thrust of her argument is summed up in her claim that "the overwhelming scientific evidence shows that abortion does not hurt women-physically or mentally" but she finds it hard to completely support to that claim. By the middle of the article she admits that while some few women may have problems, it is only "pro-choice" groups that have their real interests at heart and can offer them effective help.

Even then, however, she attacked "anti-choice" groups as the root of the problem. "If women do feel negative emotions, they are probably a result of the anti-abortion movement itself," she wrote. "After all, the picketers who scream 'murderer' at women entering clinics are significant stress-inducers, too."

A copy of the article is available on line at www.msmagazine.com Letters of response can be sent to the magazine by email to

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REVEALING OF ABORTION-BREAST CANCER LINK IS AIM OF SUIT AGAINST PLANNED PARENTHOOD

SAN DIEGO, Aug 15, 2001 (LSN.ca) - Three California women are suing Planned Parenthood to force the nation's largest provider of abortions to reveal scientific evidence of a substantial link between induced abortion and increased risk of breast cancer, it was announced today by the Thomas More Law Center, a national, not-for-profit public-interest law firm.

The women, Agnes Bernardo of Chula Vista, Pamela Colip of Loma Linda, and Sandra Duffy-Hawkins of Sacramento, filed suit this morning in the San Diego branch of the state superior court against Planned Parenthood of San Diego and Riverside Counties, which operates an abortion clinic in San Diego, as well as Planned Parenthood Federation of America (P.P.F.A.), headquartered in New York City.

Patrick Gillen, the Thomas More Law Center's lead attorney in the case, explained that the complaint alleges that both P.P.F.A. and its San Diego affiliate consistently mislead women about the safety of abortion by obscuring evidence that induced abortion causes breast cancer. The plaintiffs are seeking no monetary damages. Rather, they want the court to compel Planned Parenthood to inform women that abortion poses a significant health risk in the form of increased vulnerability to breast cancer, the leading cause of death among middle-age women in America.

Dr. Joel Brind, an endocrinologist at Baruch College of the City University of New York, who has analyzed the research concerning an abortion- breast cancer link, noted that a correlation between breast cancer and induced abortion was observed as long ago as a 1957 study conducted in Japan. In the years since, a body of evidence has accumulated from around the world, lending credence to the abortion-breast cancer connection. "Out of 37 independently published studies, 28 show a causal connection," Brind said. "And of those, 17 provide positive associations that reach statistical significance suggesting a 95-percent certainty that this association is not due to chance. That is scientific evidence which simply cannot be ignored."

For more see the full press release from the Thomas More Law Center:
http://library.northernlight.com/FB20010815190000067.html?cb=0&dx=1006&sc=0#doc

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KNIGHTS PASS PRO-LIFE RESOLUTIONS INCLUDING ON STEM CELL RESEARCH

TORONTO, Aug 15, 2001 (LSN.ca) - At their annual international meeting over the weekend, the Knights of Columbus passed several pro-life resolutions, including a resolution on the contentious issue of embryonic stem cell research, urging "researchers and physicians to reject experiments and treatments that destroy human embryos," and the U.S. government to "terminate all federal funding for such research."

Embryonic stem cell research remains controversial because despite the purely conjectural and often exaggerated claims of its therapeutic potential, it requires the deliberate destruction of human beings in their earliest, embryonic stage of life. "Destroying human life at any stage of development in order to improve the quality of human life is intrinsically evil," the resolution declares.

Among other resolutions adopted, the Order strongly reaffirmed its "Crusade for Life," declaring that "abortion, infanticide, euthanasia and assisted suicide are contrary to God's law and the common good of every nation." In reaffirming its historic commitment to be "unconditionally pro-life," the Order declared it would "oppose vigorously any governmental actions that in any way promote, legalize or finance the performance of abortion, infanticide, euthanasia or assisted suicide." The resolution further condemns abortifacients such as RU-486 and Preven, the use of aborted babies in research, and efforts by the United Nations' population fund to promote abortion internationally.

The pro-life resolution also reaffirms the Order's policy against providing a public forum, or bestowing honors and privileges of the Knights, on anyone - especially public officials and candidates for public office - who does not support legal protection of unborn children, or who advocates for euthanasia, assisted suicide and partial-birth abortion.

The Knights will also begin to declare March 25, (for Catholics the feast of the Annunciation), as "Knights of Columbus Day of the Unborn Child," adopting a practice begun by the Mexican Conference of Catholic Bishops. Moreover, a sculpted silver rose, symbol of the right to life, will travel from Toronto to Monterey, Mexico, over the next several months, carried by members of the Knights of Columbus, their families and Columbian Squires.

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