http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2001/09/abortion.html

synopsis is:

News: After decades of noisy protests and violence, anti-abortion activists are relying on a new 'stealth strategy' to shut down clinics.

its dated but timely, 2001, but has a very good sense of first person intimacy. possible blockquote example.

http://www.barryyeoman.com/articles/trapeditorial.html

I found this and think its good basic info. I've come to realize our posts will be largely aimed at men and I think designed to wake them up. Keep it simple. Give them something they can identify with.

bay,

you've done some amazing work on all of this. it deserves widespread dissemination! thank you!

-a

Here (registration required):

Sep. 09, 2005

Abortion ruling delayed
Clinics forced to turn patients away Friday; judge later postpones new
requirements
By Lisa A. Abraham
Beacon Journal staff writer

Women scheduled to get abortions on Friday were turned away at clinic doors, while lawyers scrambled to obtain a delay in the implementation of Ohio's stricter abortion law. By the end of the day, a judge had agreed to a two-week delay to allow clinics and courts time to change the way they do business to accommodate the new law.

The law now will take effect at 5 p.m. on Sept. 22.

"We were told by all the attorneys not to do them (on Friday),'' said Carol Westfall, executive director of the Akron Women's Medical Group on East Market Street and its sister facility in Cleveland.

Westfall didn't mince words about the decision issued late Thursday by U.S. District Judge Sandra Beckwith in Cincinnati. That decision upheld a 1998 state law that requires teenage girls to obtain parental consent before getting an abortion.

It also requires adults seeking abortions to meet in person with a doctor at least 24 hours beforehand to get a description of the procedure and information about alternatives. Under the former law, that information could be given over the phone or by videotape.

It was the 24-hour requirement that was causing problems at the local clinic.

"This ruling came out at quarter to five on a Thursday night. It was impossible to get a hold of these patients,'' Westfall said. "My opinion is, the judge should be lynched.''

Westfall said Fridays and Saturdays are the busiest days at her clinics because women schedule their procedures so that they have a few days to rest before returning to work.

"They're making this very, very hard on working women,'' she said.

Beckwith had ordered that the new law into effect immediately.

Attorneys for the American Civil Liberties Union, who filed the suit challenging the law on behalf of a Cincinnati abortion clinic, filed an emergency request with Beckwith's court on Friday, asking for a stay of 30 days.

"Thirty days seems like a reasonable time for everybody to get their ducks in a row,'' said Jennifer Branch, one of the lawyers for the clinic.

She said the state's juvenile court judges -- who rule on cases of juveniles seeking to have an abortion without telling their parents --have not even been informed by the Ohio Supreme Court about the change in law.

Under the old law, the parents of a juvenile had to be notified about their daughter's planned abortion. However, a juvenile could go to a judge to seek an order allowing her to have the procedure without telling her parents. She had to convince the judge that the abortion was in her best interest, that she would face abuse by having to tell her parents or that she was mature enough to make the decision.

The new law requires that at least one parent give his or her consent to the abortion. Girls are still free to go to court to ask a judge for an order to bypass that consent requirement, but the abuse defense can no longer be used.

In addition, Branch said abortion clinics need time to schedule counseling sessions with doctors, to find more doctors to perform the task, which will be more time-consuming, and establish new medical protocols to accommodate the new law.

Branch said she did not think 30 days was an unreasonable request.

Ohio Attorney General Jim Petro's office opposed the motion.

"We strenuously oppose any attempt to delay these important pro-life protections,'' said Kim Norris, Petro's spokeswoman.

Al Gerhardstein, the clinic's lead attorney on the case, said he would be deciding within the next few days whether to appeal the decision to the 6th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals.

He said the 14-day extension is actually 13 days because it is retroactive to Thursday. "It's not much time, but it's better than immediate,'' he said.

Meanwhile, a local pro-life group is hailing the court victory as an "incremental success'' in its fight against abortion.

Greg Frank, executive director of Right to Life of Summit County, said he was pleased with the judge's decision because it will provide better education for women considering abortion.

"What we're really trying to enforce here is education and to let people know what is going on. The other side is always talking about choice. We think it should be a well-informed choice. The better information they have, we believe the better choices they'll make,'' he said.

Frank said his group is happy with any success that helps to reduce the number of abortions that take place.

He noted how recently released statistics from the U.S. Department of Health showed a 13 percent drop in the number of abortions performed in Akron from 2003 to 2004.

"That's about 50 fewer babies a month,'' he said.

He said the number of abortions performed in Akron dropped from 4,257 in 2003 to slightly less than 3,600 in 2004.

He noticed Lauren's post on Feministe, and blogged here:

As I have reported here, here, here, and here [links in original], it is amazing how Republicans demonize "trial lawyers" when they are representing ordinary people injured by corporations or professionals, but are quick to turn to them as champions when something they actually care about is at stake.

What is sad, though, is that these kinds of laws are, apparently, getting substantial Democratic support. Lauren links to Our Word, which lists 54 House Democratic supporter of one of these laws, H.R. 748, the so-called Teen Endangerment Act or "Child Interstate Abortion Notification Act" (CIANA). Our Word is too polite to mention that all 54 of these Dems. are men (though it has pictures), but I'm not. With 43 out of 200 House Dems. being women, the odds of that happening by pure chance are (if I can trust Excel) 5.67 million to one. Just sayin'.

This is a diary at the Dk from Moiv back in March. It's an excellent resource and highly recommended, and I don't mean kinda. Read it. Follow the links.

:::warning, DailyKos link:::

The hidden TRAP behind "Safe, Legal and Rare"

note: there is a broken link in the diary that leads to a newsletter at lillith.org. evidently they renamed a directory on the server. the new link may be found here and is contained in the diary in this sentence:

The true intent of these laws is very different, of course; they are intended to prevent access to abortion care, and they do.

unanchored link:
http://www.lilithfund.org/images/lilithwinter04.pdf

by Diana Philip

No one wants to see a teenager be trapped by poverty, abuse, or neglect. Yet, laws concerning the rights of pregnant minors to access certain medical care do just that.

Since the late 1970s, state legislatures have been passing state "parental involvement" laws, which mandate that a parent or legal guardian be notified of or give consent for a pregnant minor's decision to seek an abortion. Texas has one of the most recent laws, now five years old, and as of June 5, 2005, its law changed from requiring notification to mandating consent. Congress is now in the process of creating a nationwide parental notification law through the Child Interstate Abortion Notification Act (CIANA). CIANA also would make it illegal for anyone to help a teen obtain an abortion in another state without satisfying her home state's law. Supporters of this bill generally think such a law will protect children. However, before the Senate votes on CIANA or similar legislation, lawmakers should carefully consider the damage parental involvement laws have done to pregnant youth in Texas.

Legal Child Abuse: The Harm of Parental Involvement Laws

by Jennifer Baumgardner

Twenty-three years ago, I helped my teenage sister get an abortion, without telling our parents. Today her story is still proof to me that parental consent laws don't work.

I grew up the second of three daughters in a pro-choice household in Fargo, N.D. Our family talked about politics, read Our Bodies, Ourselves and voted Democrat, but when it came to actually discussing sex, my parents' mantra was "high school is too young."

In 1985, the summer after my freshman year in high school, my 16-year-old sister told me she was pregnant. Andrea, a National Merit Scholar, knew two things: She wanted an abortion and she didn't want to tell mom and dad.

"I'll help you," I said, honored that she'd turned to me.

When Mom and Dad Don't Know Best

It s Not Just About Abortion
Reproductive Health Faces Steep Challenges
by Lois Uttley & Susan Yanow

Since the Supreme Court legalized abortion in its Roe v. Wade decision in 1973, social conservatives have organized to chip away at, weaken and ultimately reverse women s fundamental right to make our own childbearing decisions. While public attention has recently been focused on the nomination of John Roberts to the Supreme Court and the possible overturn of Roe, in fact the right to abortion was never fully achieved as a range of federal and state laws continually eroded access. In other words, the ability to access the right to an abortion has systematically been diminished by such measures as parental consent, waiting periods, restrictions on federal health care services and the like. Since the election of George Bush to the presidency, the number of restrictions on abortion has increased dramatically. In many states, the right to abortion is already a hollow promise, and young, low-income and rural women face increasingly difficult challenges to accessing abortion.

Now organizations that describe themselves as 'pro-life'? are taking their battle beyond opposition to abortion. Determined to protect all of what they call 'pre-born life,'? these groups advocate sweeping legal protections not only for the fetus, but also for the embryo and even the fertilized egg.

Leaders of these organizations'