Another Abortion Record at Planned Parenthood.

The colors are bright, the layout bold and contemporary. A picture of a mother and baby graces the inside cover of "Taking Charge of Today, Choosing Our Tomorrow." Yet this is hardly some vibrant celebration of life. This is Planned Parenthood Federation of America's 2000-2001 Annual Report.

Another year has gone by, and another nearly 200,000 babies have lost their lives at Planned Parenthood clinics. It's a new record, but the same old song.

While national abortion trends over the last several years have been down, abortions at Planned Parenthood have climbed steadily. According to the report, 197,070 abortions were performed at Planned Parenthood clinics in 2000, a 7.8% increase over the total in 1999 (*1) - - with this latest figure representing the highest total Planned Parenthood has ever recorded.

The theme of the report is "Taking Charge of Today, Choosing Our Tomorrow," and one of Planned Parenthood's explicit goals is to "preserve - - and expand - - access to abortion services." A quick glance at the report shows that Planned Parenthood means it.

Under "Ensuring Access to Abortion," Planned Parenthood highlights its efforts to defeat, in courts or in legislatures, "anti-choice" laws or bills, such as those that would have required the involvement of parents in the abortion decisions of minors or would have prohibited the use of state tax dollars for abortions.

One of the most prominently featured activities in this section of the report was Planned Parenthood's creation of the "ROEvBUSH.com" web site, which sought to block the confirmation of President Bush's pro-life nominee for Attorney General, John Ashcroft. While he was ultimately confirmed, Planned Parenthood says the 42 votes marshaled against Ashcroft served to put the new administration "on notice about the strength of our movement and our determination to fight any anti-choice Supreme Court nomination to the end."

Another "achievement" touted in the report was the delivery of grant money which helped 88 Planned Parenthood clinics offer RU486, the chemical abortifacient approved by the Food and Drug Administration in 2000, to clients seeking an alternative to surgical abortion. The report does not indicate how many of the nearly 200,000 abortions it performed were chemically-induced or how many were surgical. Planned Parenthood's national office held three "audio conferences" for its affiliates. Two were devoted to chemical abortion.

One chilling item, mentioned last in the list of several new medical services approved at Planned Parenthood's 2000 National Medical Committee meeting, was "fetal tissue donation." While federal law prohibits the sale of fetal tissue, abortion clinics can make additional profits by renting out space in their offices to private fetal tissue collectors, who make their money by charging researchers fees for procuring and shipping the tissue.

Planned Parenthood took in $672.6 million in the 2000-2001 fiscal year, with $202.7 million, or approximately 30%, of that coming from "Government Grants and Contracts" -- in other words, out of the taxpayer's pocket. Planned Parenthood releases no figures on its abortion income. But a very conservative estimate, using the $316 the Alan Guttmacher Institute says clinics charge for standard first-trimester surgical abortions (chemical abortions cost more, as do the second-trimester abortions many Planned Parenthood clinics advertise and perform), suggests that Planned Parenthood, at a minimum, receives at least $62 million a year for the abortions it performs.

Given its role as America's leading abortion chain, the rhetoric Planned Parenthood employs to describe its mission and vision is nearly as sardonic as it is ludicrous. In her opening statement, Planned Parenthood president Gloria Feldt says without any sense of irony that the "world we envision is one in which all people possess and can pursue their own dreams." She then goes on to speak glowingly of the "hope for humanity" that is Planned Parenthood's vision. Hopes and dreams for all except those who lose their lives at Planned Parenthood's clinics, one supposes.

In the section of the report dedicated to "Ensuring Access to Abortion," Planned Parenthood declares, "We believe in acting courageously, especially as allies with those who have little or no voice and little or no power." Never once is there a consideration that none in this society are more voiceless or powerless than the unborn children Planned Parenthood casually and callously destroys.

Later, on a page studded with portraits of actors and entertainers who serve on Planned Parenthood's "Board of Advocates," the report proclaims, "We believe in passion -- for change, for justice, for easing the plight of others, for caring, for living our convictions, and for confronting inhumane acts." The obvious question is never asked: What act is more inhumane, more uncaring, more unjust than the slaughter of innocent little children?

The report speaks blithely of Planned Parenthood's outreach to college campuses and Planned Parenthood's special "diversity" initiative, never acknowledging the way abortion has especially decimated minority communities (identified in the report as one "of the very communities on which we depend") or the way abortion has destroyed as much as a quarter of every incoming college class for the next 18 years.

Offering a rationale for Planned Parenthood's "Vision for 2025," Gloria Feldt talks of the need to "keep the lifeline of our movement alive for the future." She adds, "we must continue to grow and thrive, we must create the future of our choice." While Planned Parenthood has been remarkably adept at capturing an increasing share of the abortion market, now performing more than one out of every seven abortions in the U.S., it fails to explain how it plans to stay in business in the long term by killing so many of its future customers.

Parenthood hardly seems part of Planned Parenthood's plans at all. While it was performing 197,070 abortions, Planned Parenthood saw only 17,700 prenatal clients, an 11 to 1 ratio. Only 2,486 clients were referred to adoption agencies, and just 204 patients were counseled or treated for infertility.

In the introduction to the report, Planned Parenthood says it believes "every child should be wanted and loved." The obvious implication, given Planned Parenthood's record, is that those deemed unwanted may be disposed of. Planned Parenthood never explains why it doesn't apply this horrible equation to children already born, but logically, if one has accepted Planned Parenthood's premise, there's no reason not to.

When killing becomes "compassion"; when justice is said to sanction the slaughter of the innocents; when the promotion of death becomes part of one's vision of the future, nonsense reigns, as it does here in Planned Parenthood's latest annual report.

Those looking for true compassion, for true justice, for a cause with a real future, for basic common sense, will find it not among the abortion profiteers, but in the pro-life movement.

It is pro-lifers who truly do have women's interests and the interests of their children at heart, and which has, for over 30 years, sincerely and selflessly defended the lives of the voiceless and powerless.

NOTE:

(*1) Planned Parenthood also indicates that its overseas programs accounted for 4,577 abortions in Africa and 2,144 abortions in Latin America and the Caribbean, but these do not appear to be part of the total.>EN