The theme of this years blogburst is: What is your top pro-choice hope for President Obama and/or the new Congress?

American women’s rights to reproductive liberty and recognition of women as persons, has taken some sharp hits. Some states have already instituted requirements for forced tests and waiting periods and domestic terrorists in the guise of foetus fetishers have bullied, threatened and accosted doctors, clinic personnel and patients. Some patients not even there for abortion services. This harassment has caused the closure of some clinics, resulting in a loss of services to provide women not only with abortion but also with exams, counselling, contraception and other health care needs.

As reported here the next big thing for the foetus fancier is to have foetuses, well fertilized eggs anyway, declared persons. Effectively declaring women non-persons. Making potential criminals out of women who miscarry, or who indulge in any activity short of sitting on the nest.

The rhetoric of the anti-choicers was ratcheted up to a new high –or perhaps low–with this bit of nonsense from ALL

“Krispy Kreme Doughnuts, Inc. (NYSE: KKD) is honoring American’s sense of pride and freedom of choice on Inauguration Day, by offering a free doughnut of choice to every customer on this historic day, Jan. 20. By doing so, participating Krispy Kreme stores nationwide are making an oath to tasty goodies — just another reminder of how oh-so-sweet “free” can be.”

Just an unfortunate choice of words? For the sake of our Wednesday morning doughnut runs, we hope so. The unfortunate reality of a post Roe v. Wade America is that “choice” is synonymous with abortion access and celebration of ‘freedom of choice’ is a tacit endorsement of abortion rights on demand.

President-elect Barack Obama promises to be the most virulently pro-abortion president in history. Millions more children will be endangered by his radical abortion agenda.

Radical? Of course anyone is radical to these people. These are people who believe that abortion is wrong even to save a woman’s life. Even when not doing so will result in the death of both. Hence the refusal of a catholic hospital to preform a lifesaving operation on a woman with a rupturing ectopic pregnancy.

My hope for the Obama presidency is that he will not let the radical religious extremists dictate the agenda and the laws and rights of the American people. That eggs will keep their natural place as potential foetuses and foetuses their place as potential babies.

So many children in America are living in poverty, facing homelessness, and countless other problems.

What are some of the economic hardships faced by children in America?
Food insecurity, lack of affordable housing, and other economic hardships affect millions of American children—not just those who are officially poor.

* 16% of households with children experience food insecurity. 2
* 41% of families who rent their homes spend more than a third of their income on rent.
* Compared to white families with children, black and Latino families with children are more than twice as likely to experience economic hardships. 3

Many poor children lack health insurance.

* 19% of poor children lack health insurance—this is nearly double the percent of all children who lack coverage (10%).
* In the 10 most populated states, the percent of poor children who lack health insurance ranges from 12% in Michigan to 28% in Florida and Texas.
* The percent of all children who lack health insurance increased for the first time in nearly a decade in 2005—from 10.8% in 2004 to 11.2% in 2005. 4

If these people truly cared about children they would be spending their time lobbying for better health care for children, maternity benefits, help for families and other programs that would support and strengthen families. Instead their focus is on lies, deceit and over the top rhetoric in an effort to have a final fundamentalist fantasy world that looks something like this – noted by Antonia at Broadsides;

The “countercultural” attitudes that signers support include the idea that women are called to affirm and encourage godly masculinity, and honor the God-ordained male headship of their husbands and pastors; that wifely submission to male leadership in the home and church reflects Christ’s submission to God, His Father; that “selfish insistence on personal rights is contrary to the spirit of Christ”; and, in a pronatalist turn of phrase that recalls the rhetoric of the Quiverfull conviction, their willingness to “receive children as a blessing from the Lord.”

Mr. President many wept as you took the oath of office. Recognizing the importance of the day. Where once a black man in America was not a person, not free, not endowed with personal autonomy, now stands a black man called the President of the United States of America.

So too women were once considered non-persons, had no personal autonomy, no ability to control their own destinies. Reproductive choice in the form of contraception and abortion has given women freedom to control family size, protect their health and pursue education and careers. Perhaps one day women across America will weep. Let us hope that it is because one of their own has attained the highest office in the land and not because they have been reverted to status as non-persons.