By Anita Crane

WASHINGTON – More than 500 people leaped from their chairs to give Sen. Marco Rubio a standing ovation at the 2012 Susan B. Anthony List Campaign for Life Gala on Wednesday. The freshman Republican senator from Florida was keynote speaker at the SBA List’s 20th anniversary dinner, where Sen. Kelly Ayotte, R-N.H., and Rep. Ann Marie Buerkle, R-N.Y., also congressional freshmen, gave rousing speeches.

The Susan B. Anthony List’s primary mission is to help pro-life candidates, especially women, get elected. Twenty years ago, Marjorie Dannenfelser, a wife and mother, began this work from her home while surrounded by her children. …

Applause and cheers erupted when Ayotte said, “Here’s my point: Marco Rubio is the real deal!”

Rubio said he was honored to be serving with new leaders like Ayotte. He framed his next comments “with all due respect” because he noticed that he and Ayotte were significantly younger than the median age of most senators. The crowd laughed when Rubio said one of his older colleagues had said Susan B. Anthony was a friend of his and Rubio was no Susan B. Anthony. He also apologized for coming without speech notes, but his teleprompter broke and “someone else” in Washington was ahead of him at the repair shop.

Rubio said when he first got the Senate, he looked around and asked, “How did I get here?” Six months later he looked around and asked, “How did they get here?” All of this led up to Rubio explaining he believes God and his constituents have given him the opportunity to stand up for vulnerable persons such as the unborn, and if he doesn’t he’ll have to answer to God.

Rubio said he was “blown away” by the young leaders awarded at the gala. He said he knows it’s difficult to be pro-life because some who support his fiscal policies tell him to “tone down” his right-to-life efforts.

But Rubio has no intentions of toning down. On Jan. 31, he introduced the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 2012, a bill to repeal a new Obamacare mandate that violates the religious liberties and conscience rights of faith-based institutions by forcing them to offer employees insurance coverage for contraceptives, some of which cause abortions.

Read the full story at WND: http://www.wnd.com/2012/02/rubio-life-is-not-a-political-issue/

Norma McCorvey in "Doonby." (Doonby the Movie © 2012)

MATTERS OF LIFE AND DEATH
Roe v. Wade opponents target Dallas for decision’s anniversary
Theme of rally: ‘It began in Dallas. Let’s end it in Dallas’
Published: Jan. 20, 2012

By Anita Crane

As hundreds of thousands prepare to march on Washington, Dallas, San Francisco and other American cities to protest the Supreme Court’s infamous Roe v. Wade decision, Norma McCorvey, the “Jane Roe” of that case, spoke to WND about her role in history and the movie “Doonby.”

Mike Mackenzie, a producer of “Doonby” and son of the movie’s writer/director/producer Peter Mackenzie, joined the conversation. The mystical thriller stars John Schneider as American drifter Sam Doonby in a daring adventure.

“Doonby” Writer/Director/Producer Peter Mackenzie with his sons at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival. Dan Mackenzie (left) was a cameraman for the film and Mike Mackenzie (right) is one of the producers. (Courtesy of Doonby the Movie © 2011)

McCorvey will speak Saturday at the Dallas March for Life rally, where the theme is: “It began in Dallas. Let’s end it in Dallas.” This means marchers conclude their annual protest at the Earle Cabell Federal Courthouse, which houses the district court where ambitious pro-abortion attorneys first filed the Roe case in 1970, while McCorvey was homeless, unwed, drug-addicted and pregnant with her third child.

“By casting Norma in the film, we hope to highlight the ambivalence Americans have had towards the subject of abortion,” Mike Mackenzie said. “Norma spent half her life being pro-choice, found Christ and became pro-life, and now she’s a fervent activist.”

Starting February 17, “Doonby” launches with a limited release in four Mississippi towns, then opens in Dallas movie theaters on February 24. In the spring, theater distribution will expand and WND readers will be able to find theater locations at Doonby.com.

“I just hope everybody comes out and sees ‘Doonby,’” said McCorvey. “I don’t say that because I’m in it, I say it because it’s a great flick – a great psychological thriller.”

“We hope this film highlights the social issue and really affirms the significance of every [human] life,” said Mackenzie. “What we want to do is raise awareness of the issue without trying to side one way or the other – really just trying to focus on this life issue and protecting the most sacred gift we have.”

Schneider and several of his “Doonby” co-stars, including Joe Estevez, Jennifer O’Neill, Robert Davi, Jenn Gotzon, Erin Way and Will Wallace, spoke to WND about what compelled them to do the film and why they think it deserves an audience. While the movie release date has changed, you can read interviews with Schneider, Estevez and Way and with Wallace, Davi, O’Neill and Gotzon.

Read the in-depth story on Norma and see her in “Doonby” at http://www.wnd.com/2012/01/roe-v-wade-opponents-target-dallas-for-decisions-anniversary/. Also be sure to read her gutsy congressional testimony by clicking on the word “testified” in the above article.

by Ben Johnson
Sat Jan 14, 2012 14:04 EST

BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS, January 13, 2012 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Republican frontrunner Mitt Romney has been dogged by allegations that his shifting positions on abortion have been politically opportunistic. That perception will be bolstered by a new book that reveals Romney consulted polling data before deciding to campaign as “pro-choice” during his 1994 Senate race.

In the book Mitt Romney: An Inside Look at the Man and His Politics, Ronald Scott wrote that Romney commissioned former Reagan pollster Richard Wirthlin to survey Massachusetts voters on key issues. Wirthlin showed Romney a poll indicating any candidate describing himself as “pro-life” was unelectable in the state.

Before initiating his campaign against then-incumbent Senator Ted Kennedy, Romney informed the elders of his church about his decision to run as a supporter of abortion rights. In November 1993, Romney, Wirthlin, and Scott (all Mormons) presented their case to the leadership of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints as a courtesy. Romney, then a Mormon leader in his state, explained his would label himself personally opposed to abortion but would take no action to outlaw it, a view he later described as “effectively pro-choice.”

The meeting proved a contentious one. “I may not have burned bridges, but a few of them were singed and smoking,” Romney said of the exchange.

The Romney campaign has declined to comment on the book’s allegations.

Meanwhile, new information has come to light about the relative whose death from an illegal abortion Romney credited with making him pro-choice in that race. Ann Keenan’s brother, Loren, married Lynn Romney, Mitt’s sister, in the 1950s. Lynn Keenan died at Wyandotte General Hospital on October 7, 1963, when Mitt was just 16-years-old. Her death certificate listed the cause of death as a “criminal recent abortion.”

Sandra Nye, Keenan’s friend from Michigan State University, said, “It was all very hush-hush, because [Mitt’s father George] Romney was governor, and they really wanted this very quiet and to go away.”

The girl’s parents wrote in her obituary that, “Memorial tributes may be sent to the Planned Parenthood Association.”

In a 1994 debate against Kennedy, Romney alluded to Keenan as the inspiration for his first conversion, from pro-life to pro-abortion: “Many, many years ago, I had a dear, close family relative that was very close to me who passed away from an illegal abortion. It is since that time that my mother and my family have been committed to the belief that we can believe as we want, but we will not force our beliefs on others on that matter. And you will not see me wavering on that.”

He later elaborated her case “obviously makes one see that regardless of one’s beliefs about choice, that you would hope it would be safe and legal.”

It would be the first of many twists-and-turns in the governor’s abortion record. The same year, his wife, Ann Romney, made a donation to Planned Parenthood. Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards would later say Mitt Romney “used to come to Planned Parenthood events. He asked for our endorsement.”

Kennedy would go on to defeat Romney by 17 percent of the vote in the election that saw Republicans regain control of Congress for the first time in decades.

In 2002, Romney chose to run again, this time for governor. During the campaign, he said, “On a personal basis, I don’t favor abortion. However, as governor of the commonwealth, I will protect a woman’s right to choose under the laws of the country and the commonwealth. That’s the same position I’ve had for many years.”

After his election, however, he began to change his views again, telling reporters he had been influenced by the state’s debate over creating embryos for scientific research. He stated, “When we were studying cloning in our state, I said, ‘Look, we have gone too far.’ It’s a brave new world mentality that Roe v. Wade has given us, and I changed my mind.”

Not everyone was convinced, believing Romney told Massachusetts voters what they wanted to hear in order to get elected. His adviser, Mike Murphy, would tell National Review during the 2008 Republican primary race, “He’s been a pro-life Mormon faking it as a pro-choice friendly.”

After his most recent pro-life turn, Romney said Ann’s contributions to Planned Parenthood speak “for her and not for me…Her positions are not terribly relevant for my campaign.” His wife later made substantial donations to Massachusetts Citizens for Life, becoming its co-chair.

Romney says he now favors overturning Roe v. Wade. When asked during a 2007 debate if he would sign a bill banning all abortions, he replied, “I’d be delighted to sign that bill.” He has said at various times he believes “abortion should be limited to only instances of rape, incest, or to save the life of the mother.”

His relationship with the pro-life movement in 2012 has at times been strained. In June he declined to sign the Susan B. Anthony List’s pro-life pledge. In October, Romney told Mike Huckabee, “I’d make sure that the progress that has been made to provide for life and to protect human life is not progress that would be reversed.” Some liken that to his pro-choice position in earlier campaigns, when he said he “was personally pro-life but that I would protect a woman’s right to choose as the law existed. ”

This has led critics in both parties to question his core convictions on the issue. Republican strategist Keith Appell stated in 2007, “It’s part of Romney’s challenge: How many epiphanies have you had?”

What’s so awful about the 1%?
Occupy Wall Street has said it’s the 99% of ‘us’ against the 1% of ‘them.’ But many of ‘them’ started out like ‘us’ and have brought us great innovations that we embrace.

By Bradley Schiller

The class war is on. It’s the 99% of “us” versus the 1% of “them.”

In the rhetoric of this war, we are fighting the 1% because they possess most of the nation’s wealth, bankroll their handpicked political candidates, control the banks and get million-dollar paychecks and billion-dollar bailouts; yet they don’t pay enough taxes or invest their wealth in creating American jobs. They’re the “millionaires and billionaires” President Obama has called out as needing to pony up more for progressive reforms of our healthcare, banking, tax and political systems. They are the enemy of “us” — the 99% who toil at low-wage jobs, hold underwater mortgages, face foreclosures, suffer recurrent and protracted job layoffs and plant closings, and yet pay our fair share of taxes.

But there’s a flaw in this strategy. The Occupy Wall Street movement envisions the 1% as a monolithic cadre of entrenched billionaires who have a firm and self-serving grip on all the levers of the economy. But a closer look at that elite group reveals how untrue that perspective is.

Forbes magazine compiles a list of the richest 400 Americans every year. To get on that list, you must have at least $1 billion of wealth. They are the creme de la creme of the 1% — indeed, the top 0.0000013% (!) of Americans. So who are these dastardly people?

Continue reading this op-ed in the LA Times: http://articles.latimes.com/2011/dec/04/opinion/la-oe-schiller-who-is-the-one-percent-20111204

MATTERS OF LIFE AND DEATH

Salvation Army marching toward abortion support?

Exceptions already approved in international position statement

Posted: December 17, 2011
10:00 pm Eastern

By Anita Crane
© 2011 WND

The story, co-authored by Bob Unruh, a WND editor, is here: Hope? Vets say not until Obama leaves http://www.wnd.com/?pageId=366957#ixzz1dYkK2KOz. Few pictures were used, so I’ve made a little photo essay on this page. I humbly thank U.S. veterans and active-duty Armed Forces for serving our country at the risk of their own lives.

Col. Harry Riley, JB Williams and Rev. Edward Anthony. (Anita Crane © 2011. All rights reserved.)

Three patriots bow their heads in prayer. Willie Squires is a Vietnam veteran who served in the Air Force, Jeff Scyers served in the Army, and Mark Welsh also served in the Air Force. (Anita Crane © 2011. All rights reserved.)

Old Glory saluting the veterans. (Anita Crane © 2011. All rights reserved.)

Richard Brooks, a Navy veteran who served 1960-64, traveled from Kennett Square, Pa. wearing a Civil War Union uniform and flying the Pennsylvania flag of that era. “This is Veterans Day. I came to represent all the veterans from 1960 to 1964. I also came to represent my great grandfather, who fought for the Union, 1861 to 1865.” Carol Matthews, a petite woman sporting a National Rifle Association cap, came from Ocala, Fla. with husband Robert, a retired U.S. Marine. (Anita Crane © 2011. All rights reserved.)

Young Americans drawn to the rally by Harry McKay reciting Patrick Henry's speech stand beside two veterans. (Anita Crane © 2011. All rights reserved.)

Harry McKay as Patrick Henry. (Anita Crane © 2011. All rights reserved.)

Eric Stricchiola and Martin Reilly, Army and Marine veterans respectively, holding their hats over their hearts as the National Anthem played. (Anita Crane © 2011. All rights reserved.)

(Anita Crane © 2011. All rights reserved.)

The rally organizers, Barbara Ketay and JB Williams. (Anita Crane © 2011. All rights reserved.)

Abortion clinic staff gives children condoms for Halloween

Posted: November 01, 2011
8:45 pm Eastern

By Anita Crane
© 2011 WND

Contents of “trick” bag handed to children by abortion clinic workers

GERMANTOWN, Md. – It was Halloween, and pro-life singles and families were praying outside the Germantown, Md., abortion business of LeRoy Carhart when two of his staffers handed little children bags of “treats.”

But inside were not the typical chocolate or bubble gum enticements. There were condoms.

Before opening his own late-term abortion shop of horror, Carhart worked for the late partial-birth abortionist George Tiller in Wichita, Kan.

Later, when he was trying to protect his lucrative abortion business in Nebraska, Carhart filed lawsuits against the state’s partial-birth abortion ban, then the federal Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003.

In 2007, the Supreme Court upheld the federal ban in a case called Gonzales v. Carhart – but Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote the court’s opinion and instructed abortionists how to get around the ban using Carhart’s method of injecting poison into the hearts of late-term unborn babies.

His abortion business in Nebraska ultimately faltered because of a new state law that banned abortion beyond 20 weeks because of the pain inflicted on the unborn child, and he decided to move to Maryland.

Yesterday, Carhart’s staffers from Germantown Reproductive Health Services, located on 13233 Executive Park Drive, in Germantown, Md., mocked the Germantown “40 Days for Life” campaign by giving children bags labeled “40 DAYS for CHOICE.”

The bags contained condoms and sexually or gruesomely suggestive candies.

Read more of ‘Mommy, this is strange candy’: http://www.wnd.com/?pageId=362993#ixzz1cVqPPPZ7

By Anita Crane
© 2011 WND

In “The Mighty Macs,” which opens this weekend, Carla Gugino, David Boreanaz, Marley Shelton and Ellen Burstyn take us back to the days when G-rated movies were the norm, not the exception.

Gugino stars in this feel-good movie based on the true story of Coach Cathy Rush, who worked for the Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, the IHM, and led Immaculata College’s humble team to the first national championship in women’s basketball.

In 1971, Cathy was the 23-year-old bride of NBA referee Ed Rush (Boreanaz) when she chased a challenging job and met the equally challenging Reverend Mother (Burstyn) of the all-girls school in suburban Philadelphia.

When Rush arrived at Immaculata College, there was no gymnasium on campus, the school was in dire financial straits and she had never coached. Yet as the movie motto goes, she dared to dream, and the religious sisters dared to believe.

After writer/director Tim Chambers welcomed Catholic Archbishop Charles Chaput of Philadelphia to a red-carpet screening, the archbishop said, “This story of faith and determination is inspirational. The family friendly film reminds us of the power of believing that we can achieve against seemingly insurmountable odds.”

Of course there is much more to the real story behind the movie. Read more here: http://www.wnd.com/?pageId=358585

WND Exclusive MEDIA MATTERS
‘The Way’ project tells story about ‘transcendent experience’
Family project involves Estevez, Sheen and message of family
Posted: October 07, 2011
8:58 pm Eastern

By Anita Crane
© 2011 WND

Filmmaker Emilio Estevez is on a media blitz with his father and fellow actor, Martin Sheen, to promote “The Way,” a heart-wrenching, funny and soul-searching film opening in U.S. theaters today.

Estevez wrote, directed and produced this film for his family, especially for his dad, also known as quite the political activist.

David Alexanian, Emilio Estevez and Martin Sheen (Anita Crane © 2011)

During the Washington, D.C., leg of their tour, I was granted an interview with them for WND, along with co-producer David Alexanian of Elixir Films. The filmmakers had a lot to say, one thing led to another and here are some of the highlights.

If you think you know Sheen as star of the NBC series “The West Wing,” Francis Ford Coppola’s “Apocalypse Now” or Terrence Malick’s “Badlands,” think again.

In “The Way,” Sheen plays Dr. Tom Avery, an uptight California ophthalmologist and widower who has lost faith and dropped his Catholic religion. In real life, however, Sheen said he “loves the faith.”

Estevez plays Tom’s son Daniel, a young man who went to Berkeley, dove into cultural anthropology, and got lost somewhere along the line of pondering his doctorate. According to Estevez, Daniel suddenly decides he’s had enough of learning about the world from books, enough of working as a teacher’s assistant and off he goes to actually see the world for himself.

After five years as a traveling “seeker,” Daniel invites his dad to join him on the Camino de Santiago, otherwise known as the Way of St. James, hence the movie title. It is the 500-mile Christian pilgrimage to the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela, containing the relics of St. James the Apostle in Spain. And according to the filmmakers, it has become a journey traveled by people of many religions – even people of no religion.

Therefore, Sheen sees “The Way” as his family’s overture to the entire human family.

“‘The Way’ is about healing, transcendence and extended family, which is community. The film was a deeply personal project for me,” he said. “At my age, a part like this does not come along very often. It’s the best role I have had in many, many years, and the fact that I am able to be part of a film that includes my family, my son and my grandson, makes it very special.

“The film is also about family. It takes the death of my character’s only son for him to reconnect with the world and truly see what is important in life. I think this will be a message that many families will connect with.”

Following in his father’s footsteps, Estevez began his career as an actor, then graduated to filmmaker in hopes of rising above the standard Hollywood fare. His top three favorite accomplishments are “The War at Home,” “Bobby” and now “The Way” – all featuring both him and his father as actors.

Thus, I asked Estevez a series of questions about his experience of working on other people’s films and why he made “The Way.”

“I mean nobody starts out to make a piece of crap,” he said. “But it happens more often than not. And oftentimes you agree to do movies and everyone has great intentions – and I’ve directed some of those movies that had great intentions and were ultimately not good films. I’ve appeared in them. So has he (Sheen).”

Estevez was talking both production and moral quality of films.

He continued, “If you go out – the studios – they don’t know how to do it any other way. But they’ll green-light a $200 million [production] and that in itself, I think, is vulgar. Now when you think about all the stories that could be told for a lot less, without the CGI [computer generated imagery], without the vulgarity, without the gratuitous killing or sex or [foul] language, I just find that there are so few movies that I’m not embarrassed or ashamed of. I’m seeing actors that I admire in crap belittling themselves and it’s embarrassing.”

Considering the studio system, Alexanian said, “Well, it’s hard to make independent films; films that are independently spirited that get a chance to become mainstream. And I think the studios have the burden of decision by committee, which I think is the death of art.”

Nevertheless, Estevez and Alexanian weren’t completely slamming the studio system of decision by committee, but adapted that into the now-popular indie method of multiple screenings and listening to one audience after another until a movie is ready for world release.

Some feedback or criticism involved Tom sprinkling his son’s ashes along the Camino because this isn’t proper Catholic tradition.

Yorick van Wageningen, Deborah Kara Unger, James Nesbitt, and Martin Sheen as fellow pilgrims in “The Way,” a film by Emilio Estevez. (Elixir Films, 2011)

But other parts of the film make up for that oversight. Along the way, Tom adopts three faulty but earnest characters including Joost the Dutchman (Yorick Van Wageningen), who is trying to lose weight for his wife, but wining and dining on cheese; Jack the Irish travel writer (James Nesbitt), who suffers writer’s block but no loss for words; and Sarah (Deborah Kara Unger), the Canadian chain smoker who’s on a mission to quit.

In one of the most poignant scenes, Sarah finds out that Tom is grieving the death of his only son. Given Tom’s loss, she regrets all her harsh presumptions about him, bursts into tears and confesses the real reason for her pilgrimage.

“I had to give her a device for being out there and being so completely broken,” Estevez said. “And what better way than to have this examined in the form of a terminated pregnancy that has left a hole in her heart? And the level of regret and the seemingly hopeless place that she is in and she’s looking to trust men again. She’s looking for the brothers that she grew up with. She’s looking for – to fill that hole in her heart again – and she’s looking for forgiveness. And ultimately she finds it through these other three gentlemen – who are, in fact, gentlemen – and they’re all chivalrous. They all have grace.”

Indeed. As Estevez so humorously demonstrates, Tom, Joost and Jack are gentlemen.

When nature calls Sarah, they guard her modesty with backs turned.

Nodding towards his father, Estevez said, “And he objected to that moment, but I said, ‘This is a galvanizing moment. Yes, it’s somewhat juvenile but it works in the piece and it basically says these three brothers or the father figure will do anything including stand guard while she must relieve herself.’ Right?

“But also to that point, we also wanted to give voice to the unborn and when she says ‘I’m hearing my unborn daughter,’ [Tom's] saying ‘That’s not so crazy, ’cause I’m seeing my deceased son.’ And so the distance between them all of a sudden shrinks about a thousand percent and they are kindred spirits in their loss.”

So if Emilio Estevez and his father want “The Way” to be a voice for the unborn, and if Martin Sheen loves the faith, does this raise other questions? Yes, it certainly does. I asked those questions and much was said. In brief, Mr. Sheen promised me another interview in 2012 to discuss his politics.

Meanwhile, I believe a lot of love was poured into “The Way.”

“The film celebrates faith, family and the very best of humanity,” said Sheen. “I hope people will recognize that they don’t have to go to Santiago, Mecca or Rome or Jerusalem to be on pilgrimage. We all are on pilgrimage, whether we realize it or not. I want people to see themselves in this film and to get in touch with the part of them that seeks to unite the will of the spirit to the work of the flesh. I think we are all seeking a transcendent experience to come to know ourselves and to lead an honest and free life.”

“The Way” is rated PG-13.

‘The Way’ project tells story about ‘transcendent experience’ previously found at  http://www.wnd.com/?pageId=353141#ixzz1a983Yn8C