"Wisconsin Right to Life sends its deepest and sincerest congratulations to Rep. Paul Ryan on being selected as Governor Romney’s running mate," stated Barbara Lyons, Executive Director of Wisconsin Right to Life.  "Ryan has been a wonderful friend to our  organization and our great cause in defense of human life throughout his brilliant tenure as a public official."
 
Rep. Ryan has been a featured speaker at Wisconsin Right to Life events and maintains a 100% pro-life voting record on scores of issues including  prohibiting the use of tax dollars for abortion, banning partial-birth abortions, and protecting older Americans and those with disabilities from rationing of medical care.
 
"We look forward to continuing our friendship and collaboration with Rep. Ryan during his service as Vice-President of the United States," continued Lyons.  "His vision, principles, integrity and sincere dedication to the value of life will serve our great country in the highest manner possible."

 

 

 

Find out who the Wisconsin Right to Life Political Action Committee (PAC)-endorsed candidates are in the races set for tomorrow's Primary Election.

Visit MY ELECTION CENTRAL.

You'll find the PAC-endorsed candidates running for the U.S. Senate seat from Wisconsin being vacated by the retiring Sen. Herb Kohl.  You'll also see the right-to-life candidates for the U.S. House of Representatives (by Congressional District) as well as those candidates endorsed in state races for Wisconsin State Senate and the Wisconsin State Assembly.

This easy-to-use resource also includes helpful links to voting information for Wisconsin Voters, including links to help you find your voting district, where to vote, how to register and how to vote with an absentee ballot.

The My Election Central webpage is great for passing along to friends and family.  Just send them this link to MY ELECTION CENTRAL:
http://wrtl.org/mec/index.html.

Want to see a comparison piece on the candidates for U.S. Senate?  You can find that here:  http://wrtl.org/legislation/comparecandidates.aspx

Visit My Election Central today!

It is terrible enough that each abortion results in the death of a precious baby.  But it is doubly tragic when the abortion takes the lives of both mother and child.  That is what happened recently at a Chicago Planned Parenthood clinic when a botched abortion claimed the lives of both Tonya Reaves and her unborn child.   Tonya underwent a second-trimester D&E abortion at 11:00 a.m. and began to bleed profusely.  Shockingly, the bleeding continued for five and one half hours at the Planned Parenthood facility before the clinic staff finally called for an ambulance that took Tonya to Northwestern Memorial Hospital at 4:30 p.m.

Why the delay? A recording and transcript obtained after the incident indicates that the Chicago Planned Parenthood ignored instructions from an emergency dispatcher to directly call 911 in order to prevent wasting precious time in the case of this woman who needed immediate medical attention.  Instead, clinic personnel waited five and one half hours to have Tonya transported by a Fire Department ambulance to Northwestern Hospital.  After hospital staff worked to save her life, Tonya died at the hospital from hemorrhage caused by a uterine perforation.

In the tragic aftermath of these events, some are calling for a criminal investigation of the Planned Parenthood facility, citing gross negligence in the way Planned Parenthood handled Tonya’s medical emergency.  The Reaves family has obtained an attorney who is looking into a possible civil lawsuit against Planned Parenthood.  And rightly so!

 

The battle for religious liberty in America is about to come into stark focus. If the administration's contraception mandate goes into effect, Catholic leaders are vowing to resist it, even to the point of civil disobedience. The fines they face in the process are staggering and could force the closure of scores of hospitals and schools.

Below are excerpts of a column by Kathryn Jean Lopes posted August 6th at National Review Online [showing what is at stake in this important public policy debate].

What does back-to-school season have to do with the "contraception rule" from the White House? The very existence of some schools is threatened, now that the Department of Health and Human Services' mandate for contraception, sterilization, and abortion-inducing drugs has gone into effect.

Hadley Heath, a senior policy analyst at the Independent Women's Forum, points to Pius X High School in Lincoln, Neb., which has sued the federal government. The school's administrators are "arguing that Pius X would be forced to choose between compliance and shutting its doors entirely," says Heath. “The [government] shouldn't be in the business of reducing choices for the 5-plus million students who are currently attending religious K–12 schools."

Why would the school ever have to shut down? Because of the punitive fines that are to be levied for non-compliance with the controversial mandate. If the government decides to collect those fines, choosing conscience over Caesar's edict would prove crippling to the likes of Pius X in dioceses across the country. …

Many of the schools Heath is concerned about are now facing a decision. As she puts it, "Do we violate the tenets of our faith and offer health insurance that covers sterilization and contraception, or do we pay a huge fine and shift resources away from our students, teachers, and educational programming? We shouldn't be asking these schools to make this choice." …

"We shouldn't celebrate government running over the rights of a group of people. We shouldn't celebrate that, to live in accordance with their faith, many schools, hospitals, and charities will have to reduce their services to the needy in our society in order to pay huge fines. It may seem like a benefit to get birth control at 'no cost,' but in fact the cost is very great. Can you imagine being rushed to your local hospital in the midst of an emergency, only to find out they can't treat you because that wing of the hospital was shut down to finance the HHS mandate penalties?"

That's a different take on the issue from the one we have mostly been hearing. Usually the Catholic Church is being accused of wanting to impose its morality on everyone, of infringing on others' freedom. …

But to paint that picture is to miss something fundamental: freedom. It is precisely the right not to have to compartmentalize faith into a worship service on the weekend that has brought together in opposition to the mandate the likes of the Catholic University of America, the evangelical Wheaton College, and even small businesses like the Seneca Hardwood Lumber Co. in Cranberry, Pa. -- which happens to be run by Catholics who believe what their Church teaches and want to live with integrity. …

The HHS mandate, Heath says, "clearly injects government into a debate about deeply personal moral convictions. We believe that debate is best had in civil society where good people with good intentions are free to come to different conclusions. In the private market, people of various religions and worldviews work together every day to exchange goods and services and create wealth. We see this as a beautiful thing."

"I'm not Catholic, and I have no moral issue with birth control," Heath tells me. "But there are plenty of women, like me, who see this as government going too far here and injecting itself into a debate that's better had among individuals and groups in society. Look at the division this has caused."

As Heath tellingly puts it, "If the government asks Catholics to violate their conscience today, who could it be tomorrow?"

---------------

The above post originally appeared in Gary Bauer's End-of-Day email.

by Steven Ertelt, LifeNews.com

Washington DC -- Before the November elections, pro-life advocates could have a result in one of the dozens of lawsuits taking on the Obama HHS mandate that forces religious employers to pay for abortion-causing drugs for their employees.

Federal District Judge Robert H. Cleland of the Eastern District of Michigan has set the date of September 26 to hear oral arguments on whether the federal government should be enjoined from enforcing the HHS Mandate. The hearing will take place at the U.S. Courthouse in Detroit, Michigan.

The Thomas More Law Center provides more details on the upcoming case:

The case before Judge Cleland was filed on May 6, 2012 by the Thomas More Law Center, a national public interest law firm based in Ann Arbor, Michigan, on behalf of Legatus, the Nation’s largest organization of top Catholic business leaders, and the Ann Arbor-based Weingartz Supply Company, and its president Daniel Weingartz.

Thomas More Law Center attorney, Erin Mersino, is the lead counsel in the lawsuit.  Joining as co-counsel is Charles LiMandri, the Law Center’s West Coast Regional Director.

Judge Cleland also ordered an expedited briefing schedule directing the Plaintiffs to file their opening brief by August 15, 2012, and the Government to file a response by August 29, 2012.  Although Plaintiffs originally filed a motion for a temporary restraining order, which would have stopped enforcement of the HHS mandate for up to 14 days, the court order requires Plaintiffs to file a separate motion for a preliminary Injunction.  The Government agreed it would not enforce the HHS regulations against Plaintiffs prior to January 1, 2013.

“Judge Cleland’s decision to expedite the briefing schedule and set a quick hearing date for oral arguments on our motion for a preliminary injunction against the Government was crucial,” Mersino said. “It best serves our goal of protecting the religious freedoms of our clients. Without the Court’s timely intervention, the HHS mandate effectively penalizes their free exercise of religion.”

The Thomas More Law Center filed its federal lawsuit against Kathleen Sebelius, Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services; Hilda Solis, Secretary of the Department of Labor; Timothy Geithner, Secretary of the Department of Treasury; and their respective departments.

The pro-life legal group hopes to permanently block the implementation of the HHS Mandate, which requires employers and individuals to obtain insurance coverage for abortions and contraception on the grounds that it imposes clear violations of conscience on Americans who morally object to abortion and contraception.

The lawsuit challenges the constitutionality of the HHS Mandate under the First Amendment rights to the Free Exercise of Religion and Free Speech and the Establishment Clause.   It also claims that the HHS Mandate violates the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993 and the Administrative Procedure Act.