The very name Born Alive Infants Protection Act gives one pause.
On the topic, Mona Charen writes:
Appearing on C-SPAN last weekend I mentioned that Barack Obama had opposed the Born Alive Infants Protection Act when he was an Illinois state senator — a position he has attempted to deny or obfuscate ever since. The liberal blogger who appeared on the program with me erupted with indignation. She didn’t deny that Obama had opposed the bill. She denied, hotly, that babies are ever born alive after an attempted abortion. Since I have actually met Gianna Jessen, who survived an attempted abortion, I invited viewers to contact me directly if they wanted evidence. My inbox has been bursting.
The denial goes very deep. Any number of e-mailers expressed their contemptuous certainty that “born alive” infants were an invention of pro-life activists. OK, enter “abortion survivors” into your browser and see what you get. Or, if you prefer a traditional media source, consult the Daily Mail in Britain. The Mail has reported that in just the past year 66 infants had been left to die after abortions in Great Britain.
When Congress was considering the Born Alive Infants Protection Act (BAIPA), a subcommittee of the House Judiciary Committee heard testimony from Jill Stanek and Allison Baker, two nurses at Christ Hospital in Oak Lawn, Ill. They described several instances in which babies who were moving and breathing after induced abortions were left to die. The committee report quoted Jill Stanek: “Mrs. Stanek testified about another aborted baby who was thought to have had spina bifida, but was delivered with an intact spine. On another occasion, an aborted baby was left to die on the counter of the Utility Room wrapped in a disposable towel.” The committee report also quoted Shelly Lowe, a lab technician at Bethesda North Medical Center in Cincinnati. A young woman who had undergone just the first cervix-opening phase of a partial-birth abortion gave birth in the emergency room. The doctor placed the 22-week-old baby in a specimen dish to be taken to the lab. According to the report, when Ms. Lowe “saw the baby girl in the dish she was stunned when she saw the girl gasping for air. ‘I don’t think I can do that,’ Ms. Lowe reportedly said. ‘This baby is alive.’” Lowe asked permission to hold the baby until she died. She wrapped the child she dubbed “Baby Hope” in a blanket and sang to her. Breathing room air without any other supports, Baby Hope lived for three hours….