(Thumbnail image from CNN)
Dr. Leroy Carhart. That’s the name of the man slated by anti-choice groups and the media as the replacement for Dr. George Tiller, formerly the country’s most prominent late term abortion provider. Dr. Tiller was assassinated three months ago. Now, the anti-choice group, Operation Rescue has directed their message at his predecessor. We’re reporting different perspectives on whether Dr. Carhart is in danger from MSNBC, CNN, Nebraska’s Action3 and Kansas’s KSN3.
Describing extreme anti-abortion groups as terrorists, MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow was outspoken on her opinion of Operation Rescue during her interview with Dr. Carhart.
“Operation Rescue is an operation that worries me, frankly. They’ve blockaded Dr. Tiller’s clinic, of course. They relocated their headquarters to Witchita because of Dr. Tiller. They ran Tiller Watch on their website. An ex-convict former clinic bomber on their staff admitted to having multiple conversations with Dr. Tiller’s alleged killer about Dr. Tiller before the murder. And their latest fundraising appeal is all about you, saying they want to shut you down. And I worry about you as a fellow American and I worry about anti-abortion extremism as terrorism.”
FOX News interviewed Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty with the perspective that pro-lifers are unfairly miscast as dangerous because of their beliefs.
“We get the label of extremists, you saw it in the early decades they call it the religious right, well there’s also in this country the religious left. And so if you’re going to express concerns like that, at least express them fairly, but it’s worse than that. I think that this is a stigmatizing label. It kind of implies in fact asserts that if you’re conservative your dangerous, reckless, deficient. And it’s really insulting.”
CNN sees it as an issue between two powerfully divided sides with little hope for reconciliation.
They said pointedly,
"Here in America's heartland, a battle is being waged and both sides are entrenched. There is no middle ground."
CNN also reported that Operation Rescue President Troy Newman said that any hints of possible violence are ginned up by what he calls left-wing groups and the liberal media.
On the first day of protest, Local Nebraska station, Action 3, noted that abortion rights supporters outweighed anti-abortionists at Dr. Carhart’s clinic.
“Today's protest originally expected to bring in thousands of people. But when all was said and done, roughly 100 pro-choicers showed up and about 50 anti-abortion demonstrators. That's a two-to-one ratio.”
Action 3 watched as Troy Newman’s anti-choice group kept to his promise of peace. The protest went on without violence. Nevertheless a strong police force was at the scene throughout the protest.
“One side fights to keep abortion clinics open. The other fights to close them. Police in swat gear stand near-by if things get out of hand, but they never do. The event is loud but peaceful.”
News coverage leading up to the first large protest since Dr. Tiller’s murder focused on the threat of violence posed by anti-choice groups. KSN3, an NBC affiliate in Wichita laid out the police involvement in their story on the Nebraska protest.
“Police in Belleview are gearing up for protesters on both sides by stationing patrol cars throughout the neighborhood where Dr. Carhart performs abortions.”
Are groups like Operation Rescue, which say they are involved in peaceful protests, getting a bad rap or are abortion doctors justified in worrying about their safety?
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