Update: A spokeswoman at the Mississippi Department of Health informed NewsBusters she'd "never ever" heard the term "TRAP" used inside the department to describe the state's laws and regulations governing the practice of abortion in the state.
Reporting on how pro-life advocates have been fighting state-by-state legislative and regulatory battles to curb abortion, the Washington Post's Peter Slevin today did the abortion-on-demand lobby a favor by passing along a loaded term it likes to use to discredit laws aimed at reducing abortion by placing regulatory speed bumps on the road to the procedure (emphasis mine):
"We tried every which way, and we were successful in the state way," said Terri Herring, head of Mississippi's Pro-Life America Network. She calls ever-stricter regulations a matter of common sense and creative strategy.
"All-or-nothing means nothing," Herring said. "Incremental means something."
What it means in Mississippi, one of the most restrictive states in the country and a model for antiabortion forces elsewhere, is that a woman seeking an abortion must go twice to the clinic, at least 24 hours apart. A girl younger than 18 requires the consent of both parents or a judge's signature. Public money is available for very few abortions.
Such rules are known as TRAP laws, for Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers.
Slevin then turned to a Planned Parenthood rep to denounce such laws, without noting that it is other pro-choice lobby groups -- like the National Abortion Federation, the Center for Reproductive Rights, and NARAL Pro-Choice America -- not the "restrictive" state of Mississippi which labels laws and regulations governing abortion providers by the loaded acronym TRAP.
By failing to note that it is the pro-choice lobby that renders abortion restrictions as a "TRAP", readers may believe that states themselves use the term and/or that the term is universally accepted by pro-lifers, pro-choice lobbies, and regulators alike.
—Ken Shepherd is Managing Editor of NewsBusters
Editor at Large
Comments Policy
What About the Middle Ground
June 8, 2009 - 11:24 ET by V the KParental consent, informed consent, and restriction of public funds should be part of this "broad middle ground" that the pro-abortion left and Obama claim to be seeking because they are limits broad majorities agree on. That would also include severe restrictions on 2nd and third trimester abortions as well.
But Obama and the pro-abortion left aren't interested in a real middle ground. Their idea of compromise is "We get to have all the abortions we want, anytime, any place, for any reason... but we acknowledge that you don't like it."
They won't even acknowledge
June 8, 2009 - 19:07 ET by GrannyGrump42They won't even acknowledge that we don't like it. They'll just concede that some people consider abortion "sad".
He who controls the language controls the debate
June 8, 2009 - 11:31 ET by KC MulvilleThey discredit all restrictions are mere roadblocks. That's where the debate becomes ridiculous, and the pro-abortion side always loses. It's because the restrictions on children getting an abortion without their parents' consent, and advising the husband, etc., are all common sense. The silly argument that restrictions are really just threats to abortion is where they reveal their unwillingness to be reasonable.
Abortion
June 8, 2009 - 11:37 ET by iveseenitallNo woman has a moral "right" to murder her child. That she has a legal "right" to do so in America is one of the major reasons for our nation's moral decay.
NEVER,NEVER trusta "liberal"
I think we have finally
June 8, 2009 - 11:38 ET by MrSnugglesI think we have finally found some regulations that leftists don't like.
Bingo. Libs are perfectly
June 8, 2009 - 12:38 ET by Ken ShepherdBingo. Libs are perfectly fine with a 5-day waiting period for law-abiding non-violent civilians to buy guns, but treat a mere 24-hour wait for an abortion to be some drastic hurdle.
Even with the "most
June 8, 2009 - 19:06 ET by GrannyGrump42Even with the "most restrictive" abortion laws in the country, Mississippi has abortion laws that would appall most people. And, strangely enough, no front lawns littered with coathanger-impaled women. I thought that even the teensiest weensiest "restriction" on abortion would lead women to reflexively reach for the rustiest coathanger in the closet.