gadgetlady

Here's the latest update: A note from HSLDA regarding the case. On Monday, June 23, 2008, HSLDA founder Mike Farris argued in defense of homeschooling in the California Court of Appeal in the now-infamous Rachel L. case. In February, this same court had ruled that homeschooling is illegal in California. The court later vacated its own decision in response to a request for rehearing filed by attorney for the father, Gary Kreep of the United States Justice Foundation, with substantial assistance by Farris and other attorneys at HSLDA. Farris argued as a friend of the court on behalf of HSLDA's 15,000 member families in California, as well as Focus on the Family, and Private and Home Educators of California. Farris was joined in his defense of homeschooling by lawyers representing the Attorney General and Governor of California, the Superintendent of Public Instruction, California’s three largest homeschooling groups (California Homeschool Network, Homeschool Association of California and Christian Home Educators of California), Pacific Justice Institute on behalf of Sunland Christian School, and Alliance Defense Fund lawyer Jeff Shafer, on behalf of the family. “The weight of legal and scholarly authority presented to this court in defense of homeschooling is unprecedented,” said Farris, who has argued dozens of similar cases since founding HSLDA 25 years ago. In addition to those who presented oral argument, friend-of-the-court briefs in support of the right of parents to homeschool were submitted by Pacific Legal Foundation, National Legal Foundation, Sutherland Institute, Liberty Counsel on behalf of 13 members of Congress, Gifted Homeschoolers Forum, et al, Seventh Day Adventist Church State Council, Center for Constitutional Jurisprudence (prepared by noted law professors David Llewellyn, John Eastman, and Erwin Chemerinsky), American Center for Law and Justice and The Western Center for Law and Policy. Farris is guardedly optimistic that the three-judge panel will not repeat its earlier error, but he covets your prayers. “The homeschooling movement has been successful not because of the work of lawyers but because the Lord has blessed it,” noted Farris. “We must always remember Proverbs 21:1—‘The king’s heart is in the hand of the Lord, like the rivers of water; He turns it wherever he wishes.’ ” A decision is expected within a few weeks.

This will just take a moment of your time and it is critical – I do not say this lightly. We homeschool in California. A few days ago, a California court ruled that homeschooling is illegal. I would appreciate it if as many people as possible would sign a petition to "depublish" this decision (to restrict the decision to the one family involved, and not apply it broadly to all homeschool families). This is important even if you don't live in California. Please click on the link below to sign the petition or get more info on this case. Please consider forwarding this information to those who would also be willing to support us. To sign the petition, go to: https://www2.hslda.org/Registrations/DepublishingCaliforniaCourtDecision/

That's the day before my birthday :-) Please let us know how it goes.

LOOK OVER THE DESCRIPTIONS OF THE FOLLOWING TWO HOUSES AND SEE IF YOU CAN TELL WHICH BELONGS TO AN ENVIRONMENTALIST. HOUSE # 1: A 20-room mansion (not including 8 bathrooms) heated by natural gas. Add on a pool (and a pool house) and a separate guest house all heated by gas. In ONE MONTH ALONE this mansion consumes more energy than the average American household in an ENTIRE YEAR. The average bill for electricity and natural gas runs over $2,400.00 per month. In natural gas alone (which last time we checked was a fossil fuel), this property consumes more than 20 times the national average for an American home. This house is not in a northern or Midwestern "snow belt," either. It's in the South. HOUSE # 2: Designed by an architecture professor at a leading national university, this house incorporates every "green" feature current home construction can provide. The house contains only 4,000 square feet (4 bedrooms) and is nestled on arid high prairie in the American southwest. A central closet in the house holds geothermal heat pumps drawing ground Water through pipes sunk 300 feet into the ground. The water (usually 67 degrees F.) heats the house in winter and cools it in summer. The system uses no fossil fuels such as oil or natural gas, and it consumes 25% of the electricity required for a conventional heating/cooling system. Rainwater from the roof is collected and funneled into a 25,000 gallon underground cistern. Wastewater from showers, sinks and toilets goes into underground purifying tanks and then into the cistern. The collected water then irrigates the land surrounding the house. Flowers and shrubs native to the area blend the property into the surrounding rural landscape. ANSWERS: HOUSE # 1 (20 room energy guzzling mansion) is outside of Nashville,Tennessee. It is the abode of that renowned environmentalist (and filmmaker) Al Gore. HOUSE # 2 (model eco-friendly house) is on a ranch near Crawford, Texas. Also known as "the Texas White House," it is the private residence of the President of the United States, George W Bush. So whose house is gentler on the environment? Yet another story you WON'T hear on CNN, CBS,ABC, NBC, MSNBC or read in the New York Times or the Washington Post. Indeed for Mr. Gore is "an inconvenient truth".

I love it when I get the chance to use my favorite smiley::wink2:

How many black people are there in your office? Maybe he feels like he's the odd one out and having something to identify with or someone to link himself to eases his insecurities. Not that the forms of expression he has chosen are legitimate or acceptable -- I'm just trying to figure out why he is behaving the way he does. I would definitely either talk to him or talk to your supervisor about the "touch" thing.

The method is the same in early abortions, too. The most commonly used abortion procedures, suction aspiration and D&C, consist of dismemberment and suction. Even though the baby is small, body parts are easily identified and the abortionist and/or staff will often count what comes out into the collection bottle ("two arms, two legs, torso, head") to make sure everything has been extracted.

Oh, and one other thing. No, absolutely not. The reason people travel to another state to have late-term abortions is NOT because it's illegal in the state they live in, but because they can't find an abortionist to provide the gruesome procedure. That's a very different matter from being illegal. In fact, as I mentioned earlier, one of the most notorious late-term abortionists around, George Tiller, is located in Kansas, which you so aptly pointed out HAS a late-term abortion law! The reason he's still in business is because it's currently IMPOSSIBLE in ANY state to get around the mental health exception, and since the abortionist by definition gets to decide whether continuing the pregnancy is a threat to the woman's mental health, ergo the exception is, as I stated earlier, big enough to drive a tank through. From Tiller's website, Abortion Care - George Tiller MD - Wichita, Kansas, emphasis mine: At Women's Health Care Services, we specialize in "late" abortion care. We are able to perform elective abortions to the time in the pregnancy when the fetus is viable. Viability is not a set point in time. Viability is determined by the attending physician and is based on sonogram results, physical examination and last menstrual period date (if known). Our telephone counselors will ask you a number of medical questions to determine if you are eligible for an elective abortion. If you have visited another clinic or physician, we will ask for the results from a recent ultrasound. Kansas law allows for post-viability abortion procedures when continuing the pregnancy is detrimental to the pregnant woman's health. Each person's circumstances are reviewed on a case-by-base basis. Please call so that we can discuss admission criteria with you. I understand you disagree with me about why abortion should or shouldn't be illegal, but don't confuse opinion with facts. The facts stand; abortion is legal through 9 months of pregnancy in all 50 US states.

What the heck fact have I twisted? The law is the law is the law! You posted something trying to show that every state can outlaw abortion, which is patently untrue! Now you're trying to say that I've twisted the facts. But the facts are CLEAR AS DAY! Abortion is legal through 9 months of pregnancy in every state in the union. States TRY to limit it, but because of the Doe v. Bolton decision in 1973, they have not yet found a way to do so. The only thing they've been able to limit is the specific D&X procedure.

I don't know why you are bothered by the facts either (I know why I'm bothered by them: because abortion takes a human life). I never said mothers 8 months pregnant are "lining up", but the reality is that abortion IS legal until 9 months of pregnancy. And the reality is that the doctor = the abortionist. I did a quick search, and in 2000, the CDC reported 8,826 abortions performed in the US after 21 weeks (Abortion Surveillance --- United States, 2000). That's roughly 25 per day. The CDC numbers are known to be underreported (some believe dramatically underreported), but even if you take 25 per day as gospel truth, it's not an insignificant number. Imagine if a different type of serial killer were murdering children at the rate of 25 per day in the US -- there would be a manhunt like no other in history. However, all that being said, this shouldn't bother you if you believe that a mother is the one who gets to define when life begins for her child. Who are you to question her definition? I'm a little confused -- how do you wish the laws were different? Do you want them to be more restrictive or less restrictive? You're spot on on two out of three. It isn't up to anyone else to decide for my body or my uterus; I should have the right to do anything I want to my own body so long as another human being is not involved. But I do not own my children, and I never did. I am legally precluded from any number of things that endanger their lives; I should have been legally precluded from killing them prior to their births as well.

No, it is NOT up to the individual states' discretion. ROE IS THE LAW OF THE LAND! There is not a state in the nation that does not allow abortion up to 9 months of pregnancy. Due to Doe v. Bolton, EVERY SINGLE STATE which has laws about 3rd trimester abortions MUST have a health exception, which exception is defined to include the mental health of the mother in the determination of one physician. It's clear to me that you don't LIKE to hear this information, but it is REALITY.

I read with interest BandedMomx6's link to a webpage entitled "Feminist, Atheist, and Pro-Life" (FEMINIST, PROLIFE AND ATHEIST). In it, she recounts the following story: I had a friend who was for many years proabortion. I was able to talk about the issue calmly with her. I never expected her to agree with me and she never expected me to agree with her. However, we were friends and so why shouldn't we discuss such an important and relevant issue? One summer, a robin nested in a hanging basket on her balcony. She was constantly worried about her "babies." Would they hatch out all right, would the apartment cats get them, would they fall prematurely out of the basket? While voicing her concerns to her boyfriend, he imagined the horrified robin parents during a windstorm forecast for that evening losing egg after egg to the concrete balcony. "Splat! Tweet! Splat! Tweet!" he joked. "That's not funny," she retorted. "Why not?" he asked mildly, "They're just eggs." "No," my friend replied, "They're babies. Oh!" My friend told me the next day that that "Oh!" signified her sudden realization that she no longer agreed with abortion. Abortion too involved babies. My pro-life epiphany came much easier to me. I first heard what abortion was when I was in high school. The school paper was running a series of pro-con articles about controversial subjects. When I read the pro- argument for abortion, I thought it was the most ridiculous thing I'd ever heard. Of course what was growing in the womb was a baby, and of course killing it was killing another human being. I didn't consult a priest, rabbi, pastor, "mother earth", God, god, or gods to make the decision. It was as obvious as the nose on my face. It had nothing to do with religion and everything to do with basic human rights. Later, when I was a teacher I heard the elementary school students talking about the fetuses in jars that they had in the biology lab of the upper school students. One said to another, "Did you see the babies in those jars? Did you know that some women are allowed to take their babies out of their bellies before they're ready, and the babies die?" Kids get it. They're a heck of a lot closer in age and circumstance to those being aborted. Did you know it's illegal to destroy a fertilized eagle egg in the US? Interesting that unborn eagles have more rights than unborn human babies.

Interesting question. I don't think I've ever been asked before. I would have to say agnostic. Not that it's relevant to this discussion. There are people of all religions (and of no religion) who are pro-life.

{sigh} If I've said it once I've said it a thousand times, but I'll say it again. My choice of religion has nothing to do with my position on abortion. I was pro-life before I was a Christian, and I was strongly active in the pro-life movement before I was a Christian. Furthermore, you are free to read or not read this thread. It's your choice. I'm not badgering anyone. pearlygirl posted misleading and wholly incorrect information about states' rights, so I corrected that information. It's funny how those of you in favor of abortion pat each other on the back when anyone who agrees with you posts, but when someone who's pro-life posts (currently me), it's "badgering". Finally, I agree that there are a lot of people out there that should not be parenting children. But pre-emptively dismembering those children isn't the solution. Abortion is the ultimate child abuse.

No, it hasn't. What you've posted is actually misleading. I don't think you intended to mislead; I just think what you took it from was intentionally or unintentionally ambiguous or you just misunderstood it. Let me break it down: Roe (and Doe) are the overriding decisions, even though the restrictive laws in those states are still on the books. The laws are there, but they are ignored and not enforced because after Roe, the states know enforcing them would lead to a legal challenge. This is particularly evident by the statement In other words, in Utah the existing, "on the books" abortion law that was never repealed was taken through the courts and found unconstitutional. Please note the key word I have highlighted above: "most". According to Doe v. Bolton, the companion case to Roe v. Wade, the state does not have the right to interfere with an abortion if the health of the mother is at stake. The key here is the courts defined "health" to include mental health in the determination of one physician. Since the physician can be the abortionist, this is effectively a loophole big enough to drive a tank through. Interestingly, one of the most notorious late-term (2nd and 3rd trimester) abortionists in this country, George Tiller, is in Kansas, one of the states you listed as "banning" post-viability abortions. Banning partial-birth abortions isn't the same thing as banning late-term abortions. It is the ban against one particular barbaric abortion method, D&X, in which the viable baby is delivered feet first, stabbed in the back of the neck, the baby's brains are suctioned out, and then the head is crushed and delivered. It is a method that was developed partly because too many late-term abortions were resulting in live births; with the suctioning of the brains, this "complication" could be avoided. Other late term methods have not been successfully banned, therefore late-term (2nd and 3rd trimester) abortions are still performed by other methods. I hope the above is clear and makes sense to you. Since Roe and Doe were decided in 1973, abortion has been legal through all 9 months of pregnancy with few restrictions whatsoever.

Here's recent news on a baby born at 21 weeks 6 days. There are more stories out there and I'd be happy to find some for you if you'd like: World's Youngest 'Miracle Baby' Beats the Odds And here's an article citing a British abortionist lobbying to get the British law changed to not allow abortion after 16 weeks: Why this abortion doctor wants to see time limits reduced to 16 weeks - Telegraph Remember, in the US abortion is legal through all 9 months of pregnancy.

Actually, that's precisely why the information I posted HAS bearing. Here's the bottom line. Human life starts at some point. Logically, it can't have started at different points for different people. The point at which life begins physically and scientifically cannot be defined as when the human being's mother determines it begins. It has a definite inception, and the mother's opinion about when that inception occurs is irrelevant to the facts of the matter. The problem with abortion is that while claiming neutrality, those in favor of the practice actually are deciding for another person -- the baby -- just as those in favor of slavery claimed neutrality by saying the black person wasn't fully human.

Speaking to the issue of the scientific basis of the beginning of human life: Many internationally-known geneticists and biologists have testified that human life begins at conception. In 1981 (April 23-24) a Senate Judiciary Subcommittee held hearings on the very question: When does human life begin? Following are testimonies from two of the doctors who testified: 1. Dr. Hymie Gordon, Chairman of the Department of Genetics at the Mayo Clinic, said: "By all the criteria of modern molecular biology, life is present from the moment of conception." 2. Dr. McCarthy de Mere, a medical doctor and law professor at the University of Tennessee, testified: "The exact moment of the beginning of personhood and of the human body is at the moment of conception." Dr. Jerome Lejeune, known as "The Father of Modern Genetics," also testified that human life begins at conception before the Louisiana Legislature's House Committee on the Administration of Criminal Justice on June 7, 1990. Dr. Lejeune explained that within three to seven days after fertilization we can determine if the new human being is a boy or a girl. "At no time," Dr. Lejeune said, "is the human being a blob of protoplasm. As far as your nature is concerned, I see no difference between the early person that you were at conception and the late person which you are now. You were, and are, a human being." Dr. Lejeune also pointed out that each human being is unique -- different from the mother -- from the moment of conception. He said, "Recent discoveries by Dr. Alec Jeffreys of England demonstrate that this information [on the DNA molecule] is stored by a system of bar codes not unlike those found on products at the supermarket...it's not any longer a theory that each of us is unique." Dr. Jerome Lejeune died on April 3, 1994. Dr. Lejeune of Paris, France was a medical doctor, a Doctor of Science and a professor of Fundamental Genetics for over twenty years. Dr. Lejeune discovered the genetic cause of Down Syndrome, receiving the Kennedy Prize for the discovery and, in addition, received the Memorial Allen Award Medal, the world's highest award for work in the field of Genetics. He practiced his profession at the Hôpital des Enfants Malades (Sick Children's Hospital) in Paris. Dr. Lejeune was a member of the American Academy of the Arts and Science, a member of the Royal Society of Medicine in London, The Royal Society of Science in Stockholm, the Science Academy in Italy and Argentina, The Pontifical Academy of Science and The Academy of Medicine in France. Statement by Paul E. Rockwell, M.D. (not part of the Senate hearing): "Eleven years ago while giving an anesthetic for a ruptured ectopic pregnancy (at 8 weeks gestation), I was handed what I believe was the smallest living human ever seen. The embryonic sac was intact and transparent. Within the sac was a tiny human male swimming extremely vigorously in the amniotic Fluid, while attached to the wall by the umbilical cord. This tiny human was perfectly developed, with long, tapering fingers, feet and toes. It was almost transparent, as regards the skin, and the delicate arteries and veins were prominent to the ends of the fingers." Dr. Rockwell continues, "The baby was extremely alive and swam about the sac approximately one time per second, with a natural swimmer's stroke. This tiny human did not look at all like the photos and drawings and models of 'embryos' which I had seen, nor did it look like a few embryos I have been able to observe since then, obviously because this one was alive! When the sac was opened, the tiny human immediately lost his life and took on the appearance of what is accepted as the appearance of an embryo at this stage of life (with blunt extremities etc.)." A report from the Senate Judiciary Committee S-158, 1981 reads: "Physicians, biologists and other scientists agree that conception marks the beginning of the life of a human being--a being is alive and is a member of the human species. There is overwhelming agreement on this point in countless medical, biological, and scientific writings."

The analogy holds, and quite well. In both cases, a dominant group of people (white slaveowners / mothers) have imposed their will on a subservient group of people (black slaves / unborn babies) by defining the subservient group (black slaves / unborn babies) as less than human. The argument by those in favor of slavery was that one couldn't compare a black person to a full human being because they obviously weren't fully human, and anybody could simply see that by virture of underdeveloped brain capacity, less refined human features, less ability to perform educated tasks, etc. We clearly see this as wrong now, in 2008, but remember that the arguments were strong enough to convince the US Supreme Court in 1857. The decision defined slaves as not legal people and the property of the slaveowner -- to do with what he wished, including determining whether the slave had a right to live or not.

That is precisely my point. How legitimate is it for one human being to decide when another human being's life begins? If your mother believed your life began at 6 months and my mother believed my life began at conception, does that mean that your life really began at 6 months in utero and my life really began at conception? That our lives began at different stages of pregnancy simply because another human being had a belief that it did? Or did our lives, and the lives of all babies, begin at exactly the same time -- and some people are not only defining it differently, but carrying out a death sentence on their babies based on their definition? In most cases, the baby's heart is beating before the mother knows she is pregnant. At 8 weeks, the baby is fully formed, with all body systems present. This baby isn't a "blob of tissue" or an "unformed embryo" or "a few cells dividing". This baby has recorded brain waves, a complete skeleton, reflexes, and can be sucking his or her thumb. In the companion case to Roe v. Wade (Doe v. Bolton), the US Supreme Court guaranteed abortion through all 9 months of pregnancy for any reason whatsoever (in the determination of one physician, who can be the abortionist). There are many facilities that perform abortions after viability, which is now down closer to 19 or 20 weeks.

It seems extremely arbitrary to define the inception of one person's life (or the status of one membership in the human race) on another person's opinion. In so doing, anyone can justify all sorts of injustices towards others (for example, slave owners simply defining black people as 3/5 of a human being and therefore not entitled to any rights, or Nobel Peace Prize winners defining handicapped infants as not yet human and therefore slated for infanticide). If a pregnant mother is in a car crash with a drunk driver and her unborn baby dies, the drunk driver who caused it can be held for manslaughter. Most people agree that that's a reasonable law. But what if, in a strange twist, that mother was driving herself to an abortion clinic to have the baby aborted. You and many others would say that's her choice. But isn't the end result for the baby the same? How can we fight to save the life of a 22-week preemie in one hospital ward, and yet routinely abort babies who are more developed than 22-weeks down the hallway? Since when do we base one person's worth on another person's opinion?

Well, an infant isn't the same as an adult and there are, in fact, many differences -- but just because there are differences doesn't make an infant non-human. I asked a question earlier, in response to your statement: The question was: Do you care to answer? Basic science supports the view that the thing growing in the womb is a human being. I fully support women having control over their reproductive organs. I just believe that when another human being is involved (i.e. the baby), they are no longer just her organs she's talking about. Someone else's organs are involved. I also support full knowledge and information of what the abortion procedure is, which you love to call "hideous websites, links and graphics", but which is really just real and realistic representations (photos and descriptions) of what abortion is. I was talking to someone last night about this issue. Right off the bat he called himself "pro-choice", but then we got down to brass tacks. I asked him what he thought the procedure of abortion actually was. He said, no holds barred and without any prompting from me, "killing a baby." Now THAT's endoctrination! When we can get the general public to subscribe to the belief that something is the killing of another human being AND should be someone's choice -- it's a testament to what a great job the abortion industry has done to secure their position in the public mind.

All of the things you mention are already illegal.

Oh believe me, I'd rather these people not parent those babies if they're willing to abandon them in the hospital because of their gender. And I am 100% pro-adoption and believe it to be an unselfish and commendable act. But just to clarify here: these people didn't place their babies for adoption. They abandoned them in the hospital, just walked out on them and left them there because they didn't want girls. Are the babies better off? Yes. Absolutely.

I couldn't agree with you more.