Fetuses all across the Virginia are smiling on their sonograms this week in the wake of Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli’s opinion that concludes the Commonwealth can legally resume oversight over “clinics” that abort the unborn.
Now Missy — on the way to abort her child — will be comforted by the knowledge that she will soon enjoy service and thoughtful attention from the same type of competent, licensed professionals she encounters at the veterinary hospital when she takes Fifi in to be spayed.
Curiously enough, the thought of a safer abortion outrages the unborn death lobby. They are so angry it makes you thankful they are opposed to personal ownership of handguns.
Tarina Keene, executive director of NARAL Pro–Choice Virginia, complains that meeting the as yet unwritten, potential regulations would be “financially prohibitive” for abortion mills.
This puts me at a loss. I thought when the “choose death” activists’ assured us their only goal was to save women from “dangerous back alley abortions” they were worried about safety. Evidently the objection was to geography and market share. There appears to be no problem if dangerous abortions take place in a strip shopping center facility operated by Planned “Parenthood.”
Ms. Keene would have you believe Cuccinelli has authorized jack–booted Baptist deacons to storm abortion factories, flinging their tracts into the face of would–be ex–mothers and Molotov cocktails into the offices.
Reality is somewhat less dramatic.
Brian Gottstein, a spokesman for the Attorney General’s office explains, “The state has long regulated outpatient surgical facilities and personnel to ensure a certain level of protection for patients. There is no reason to hold facilities providing abortion services to any lesser standard for their patients."
Today we have “medical facilities” where the survival rate is zero and the enterprise is viewed as hands off when it comes to regulation? Maybe NARAL would prefer abortion factories be treated like a funeral home. Nobody gets out of there alive either. But wait, funeral homes ARE regulated in Virginia.
Hmmm. What about classifying abortion “clinics” as slaughterhouses? Nope, the state has inspectors and regulations there, too. Possibly butcher shops? Or death row?
Democrats routinely saddle pro–life pregnancy centers with laws and regulations expressly designed to force them to close, yet it is somehow unfair for Planned “Parenthood” to measure up to the regulatory standards of the Bark & Purr Animal Hospital.
The reality is Cuccinelli’s opinion concludes the state Board of Health has the authority to require “doctors” who perform abortions to use proper care in diagnosing the age of a fetus, hold hospital privileges and follow requirements for the use of general anesthesia in non–hospital settings. Abortion “counselors” are to receive professional training and the buildings may have to undergo structural changes that would allow women to be quickly transported to a hospital in the event of life–threatening complications.
Hardly a draconian regulatory regime — although it is possible that when a woman is informed that her “doctor” is not considered competent enough to perform surgery in a hospital and today’s anesthetic will be a shot of whiskey, it could reduce her enthusiasm for an abortion.
Cuccincelli is also very clear that any new regulations and oversight must conform to the Penumbra of Death established by the Supreme Court’s decision in Roe Vs Wade.
Del. Adam Ebbin (D–People’s Republic of Alexandria), a man who is easily startled, whined, “"It is frightening to think of what Cuccinelli will do next… He is not working on what is important to Virginia consumers.”
Setting aside Ebbin’s fundamental misunderstanding of the role of the attorney general (Cuccinelli is not manager of the Customer Service Department at MEGLOMART), just what is the AG about these days?
Let’s see, Cuccinelli is fighting Obamacare and its unconstitutional mandates; illegal immigration’s costs to taxpayers and crime victims; and he is working to expose the “global warming” scam that threatens to impose ruinous taxes on consumers and business.
Alexandria residents could well be more concerned with unlicensed arugula farmers, but a majority of Virginia residents care strongly about all those issues.
Meanwhile, back at the controversy, the AG’s opinion does not break new legal ground, from 1981 to 1984 abortion “clinics” were regulated and I don’t recall a crippling shortage of dead babies.
It wasn’t until the election of Gov. Charles Robb (D–Hot Tub) that abortion “clinics” were allowed to run as wild as mortgage bankers.
Finally, this week’s controversy has revealed something I thought I would never see. After a decades–long search we’ve at last found a business Democrats believe should be spared “burdensome regulations!”
It just happens to be a multi–million dollar enterprise that kill babies.
