Tweets may be only 140 characters, but sometimes they’re worth a thousand words. Cecile Richards recently tweeted in support of New York’s Governor Cuomo’s unabashed campaign to strengthen abortion laws in the state that already boasts the city with the highest abortion rate in the country (New York, NY).
If that wasn’t enough for Cuomo or Richards, over half of the city’s black population is wiped out by abortion every year. So why the continued fervor in New York’s crusade against life? Are New York’s shocking abortion stats not high enough for Cuomo and Richards yet? We know that for Richards, abortion is about money, and it’s lucratively funded in New York. And for Cuomo, it may have something to do with endorsements. But aside from this, it seems like New York just loves abortion.
To understand exactly what Cecile Richards was applauding when she posted the above seemingly banal tweet, here’s some context: Richards gives thanks that Cuomo is expanding access to “safe and legal abortion,” but what she really meant to say (though we all know, Planned Parenthood doesn’t believe in saying it) was “Thanks to @NYGovCuomo for working to expand women’s access to UNSAFE LATE-TERM ABORTIONS that involve inhumane procedures which have a tendency to kill women.”
Former abortionist Dr. Tony Levatino, in testimony before the U.S. House of Representatives, explains the late-term abortion procedure – the kind that Cecile Richards loves Cuomo for expanding access to:
Imagine, if you can, that you are a pro-choice obstetrician/gynecologist like I once was. Your patient today is 24 weeks pregnant (LMP). At twenty-four weeks from last menstrual period, her uterus is two finger-breadths above the umbilicus. If you could see her baby, which is quite easy on an ultrasound, she would be as long as your hand plus a half, from the top of her head to the bottom of her rump, not counting the legs. Your patient has been feeling her baby kick for the last month or more, but now she is asleep on an operating room table and you are there to help her with her problem pregnancy.
The first task is to remove the laminaria that had earlier been placed in the cervix, the opening to the uterus, to dilate it sufficiently to allow the procedure you are about to perform. With that accomplished, direct your attention to the surgical instruments arranged on a small table to your right. The first instrument you reach for is a 14-French suction catheter. It is clear plastic and about nine inches long. It has a bore through the center approximately ¾ of an inch in diameter. Picture yourself introducing this catheter through the cervix and instructing the circulating nurse to turn on the suction machine, which is connected through clear plastic tubing to the catheter. What you will see is a pale yellow fluid the looks a lot like urine coming through the catheter into a glass bottle on the suction machine. This is the amniotic fluid that surrounded the baby to protect her.
With suction complete, look for your Sopher clamp. This instrument is about thirteen inches long and made of stainless steel. At the business end are located jaws about 2 inches long and about 1/2 an inch wide with rows of sharp ridges or teeth. This instrument is for grasping and crushing tissue. When it gets hold of something, it does not let go. A second trimester D&E abortion is a blind procedure. The baby can be in any orientation or position inside the uterus. Picture yourself reaching in with the Sopher clamp and grasping anything you can. At twentyfour weeks gestation, the uterus is thin and soft so be careful not to perforate or puncture the walls. Once you have grasped something inside, squeeze on the clamp to set the jaws and pull hard – really hard. You feel something let go and out pops a fully formed leg about six inches long. Reach in again and grasp whatever you can. Set the jaw and pull really hard once again and out pops an arm about the same length. Reach in again and again with that clamp and tear out the spine, intestines, heart and lungs.
The toughest part of a D&E abortion is extracting the baby’s head. The head of a baby that age is about the size of a large plum and is now free floating inside the uterine cavity. You can be pretty sure you have hold of it if the Sopher clamp is spread about as far as your fingers will allow. You know you have it right when you crush down on the clamp and see white gelatinous material coming through the cervix. That was the baby’s brains. You can then extract the skull pieces. Many times a little face may come out and stare back at you. Congratulations! You have just successfully performed a second-trimester Suction D&E abortion.
This is a procedure that many Planned Parenthood facilities are pleased to administer (for a steep fee, of course). It is a procedure that Cecile Richards is happy that more women in New York, thanks to Andrew Cuomo, may now be subjected to. It is a procedure that always has one victim (the child), and sometimes two, when the mother doesn’t survive, or suffers a perforated uterus or other permanent bodily damage. Planned Parenthood profits from late-term abortion, but does anyone else?
