A Dec. 30 CNSNews.com article by Penny Starr — who called Harry Reid a baby-killer last week — offers a sadly unsurprising one-sided view of a new Baltimore law ordering crisis pregnancy centers to post a sign stating that they do not provide or give referrals on abortion or contraceptives. Butin focusing only on anti-abortion activists’ reaction to the law, Starr ignores facts that contradict their claims.
Starr quotes one activist as saying, “These centers are among the few places that women in Baltimore can get medically accurate information to make a truly informed choice when facing a life changing and difficult decision about an unplanned pregnancy,” adding that they “present the truth about all of the options available.” But that doesn’t appear to be true.
A 2006 report by the office of Rep. Henry Waxman found that when 23 random crisis pregnancy centers were called, 20 of them wrongly tied abortion to breast cancer or infertility or mental illness. And a 2008 report by NARAL Pro-Choice Maryland found that every one of the 11 pregnancy centers it visited in Maryland offered up some piece of false information; in once center, a male counselor locked the door and acted “controlling and intimidating.”
Then again, such facts might get in the way of Starr wanting to smear someone else as a baby-killer.