Ellen Kolb

Ellen is a writer, pro-life activist, and communications consultant. She blogs about life-issue politics in New Hampshire at Leaven for the Loaf.

Thoughts on a Torn Poster

I heard anecdotes about a man with a pro-life sign being assailed during the recent Boston demonstration/counterdemonstration, and then found that an Esquire writer tweeted a short video of the incident. (Language alert.) The guy was carrying a poster with photos of preborn human beings on the upper half of the poster, visible in the … Read more

Artful Dodging

Just leaving this here: food for thought, courtesy of a story in today’s Union Leader about therapeutic gene editing using human embryos. “The way they have dodged some ethical considerations is that they didn’t go on to have that embryo grow into a person.”  Perhaps that sentence doesn’t set off any alarms for you. It … Read more

As the House Considers Reps Behaving Badly

The day’s investigative festivities in a New Hampshire House committee bring to mind Part I, Article 38 of the New Hampshire Constitution. Social Virtues Inculcated. A frequent recurrence to the fundamental principles of the constitution, and a constant adherence to justice, moderation, temperance, industry, frugality, and all the social virtues, are indispensably necessary to preserve … Read more

“Women’s March” Rejects Pro-life Women

There’s going to be a “Women’s March” in Washington next Saturday, January 21, with corresponding gatherings in Concord and Portsmouth. So all women are welcome, right? Wrong. That’s why I use quotation marks around “Women’s March.” The pro-life group New Wave Feminists applied to be listed as a participating group. March organizers ignored the application … Read more

Marching for Life, or Where the Sidewalk Ends

New Hampshire Right to Life sponsored another successful March for Life in Concord on Saturday. The annual event brings hundreds of pro-life Granite Staters together to rally and march in defense of the right to life. Bold stuff, for Concord.

Gathering on State House plaza before March for Life 2017. Ellen Kolb photo.
Gathering on State House plaza before March for Life 2017. Ellen Kolb photo.

Opponents waited near the Equality Center down the street (the name “Feminist Health Center” has been retired from active duty). There were permits all around. Concord officials have adopted an every-other-year policy for use of the sidewalk in front of the Center during the march: last year, pro-lifers got to march in front of the building while abortion advocates stayed off that segment of sidewalk; this year, it was the other way around, with pro-lifers shifting off of Main Street for a block to stay within the terms of the permit issued by the city.

Participants in the March for Life are usually directed not to block the sidewalks while marching from the State House to St. John the Evangelist Church half a mile away (site of a post-march program). Permit holders of any persuasion are supposed to leave enough room to allow passage by people not involved in the demonstration du jour. Or so I thought.

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Just going to leave this here…

The man who was just elected New Hampshire Speaker of the House on the first ballot with 214 votes is fretting about a “shadow caucus.” See John DiStaso’s WMUR post.

Where’s your 10-20%?

Rep. Shawn Jasper is Speaker for a second term. He and Democrat Steve Shurtleff were the only nominees on the one and only ballot, with Jasper prevailing 214-165 before Shurtleff called for acclamation. Eight votes were scattered among other candidates. That accounts for all the reps present. Whatever divisions marked the GOP caucus last week … Read more

Repudiate him, now

This just in: Trump is a vulgar lout.  Oh, wait. We knew that. But at least he’s not Clinton. Oh, wait – we knew that, too.

Every woman inundated with campaign phone calls and palm cards and TV commercials and web ads about how one or the other is better for women ought to be throwing up right about now.

ButButBut the Supreme Court! I know the next President will set the Court’s tone for a generation. I don’t trust Trump to get it right any more than I trust Clinton. Her judgment is manifestly destructive; his is manifestly awful. I cannot kid myself that simply voting not-Hillary is going to save the Republic. After this election, hemlock is going to be the only thing on the menu for SCOTUS watchers.

Unless the Senate does its job, that is. That’s going to mean independent Senators who see both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton for who they are, and who owe neither one of them anything. The Senate is going to be a firewall against malice and stupidity and coldblooded calculation by whomever is President.

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Clinton thinks 40 years of the Hyde Amendment is enough

I posted this at DaTechGuy Blog. Let me add that Maggie Hassan is all in with Hillary Clinton in opposing the Hyde Amendment. Not long after Roe v. Wade federalized abortion policy, Members of Congress led by Henry Hyde moved to prevent federal funds from being used for abortions. The Hyde Amendment was finally added to … Read more

Books and bans and challenges

It’s Banned Books Week, according to the American Library Association. I’ll join the ALA in cheering for free expression and the right to read. Where I part ways with the ALA is where they equate banned books with challenged books. It gets my hackles up when I’m advised not to challenge things. Read more at … Read more

Jasper to seek another term as Speaker

No shock here, but Speaker Jasper will make it official tomorrow. From WMUR’s John DiStaso: @NHSpeaker of the House Shawn Jasper confirms he’ll announce a second run for Speaker at presser tomorrow 930 a.m. #nhpolitics#WMUR .@NHSpeaker of the House Shawn Jasper confirms he'll announce a second run for Speaker at presser tomorrow 930 a.m. #nhpolitics … Read more

The Speaker took sides, but…

Following up on Steve’s post about New Hampshire House Speaker Shawn Jasper taking sides in a few Republican House primaries, let’s see how that’s working out.  The Jasper for NH committee filed a September 7 report of independent expenditures in eight districts, targeting certain GOP incumbents by omission – in Merrimack, for example, the committee’s … Read more

PP contract & Hassan/Van Ostern ethics: “unofficial sources” yawn

Darlene Pawlik, New Hampshire citizen, thought there was something fishy about politicians taking campaign funds from one branch of Planned Parenthood and then supporting state contracts with another PP branch. She recently filed an ethics complaint with the Executive Branch Ethics Committee, asking that the committee look into those fishy actions by Governor Maggie Hassan … Read more

Texas DA drops charges against Daleiden, Merritt re PP body-parts videos

From the Houston Chronicle: The Harris County [Texas] District Attorney’s office on Tuesday dismissed all charges against anti-abortion activists who secretly videotaped Planned Parenthood officials in Houston. David Robert Daleiden and Sandra Merritt were charged with tampering with a governmental record, for using a fake identification to gain access to the facility. In a surprise … Read more

Cuccinelli on how to make people almost come out & vote

I  have other things to do than watch the GOP convention, so I just caught up with the day’s festivities via social media. I gather that Ken Cuccinelli of Virginia threw down his credentials at one point. (Annoyed with the GOP? What a concept!) When I read that, I recalled something Cuccinelli said in 2005, … Read more

Substandard care for women is now a Constitutional right

Remember Gosnell? (If you don’t, let Skip remind you.) Among the laws passed in some states in the wake of Kermit Gosnell’s conviction was Texas’s H.B. 2, which included requirements that abortion providers have hospital admitting privileges and that abortion facilities meet the same standards as ambulatory surgical facilities.

Five Supreme Court Justices have tossed out those two requirements, via Whole Woman’s Health v. Hellerstedt. Take a bow, Mr. Justice Breyer, along with your colleagues Justices Ginsburg, Kennedy, Sotomayor and Kagan. It’s your world – a world in which women’s health takes a back seat to abortion providers’ bottom lines – and we’re just living in it.

Kevin D. Williamson took an interesting view of the case.

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Texas judge dismisses charge against Daleiden

After undercover journalist David Daleiden of the Center for Medical Progress reported on the baby-parts business conducted by some Planned Parenthood affiliates, a Texas grand jury handed down an indictment – not against Planned Parenthood, but against Daleiden for human-organ trafficking. Today, a Texas judge threw out one of the charges. Coincidentally, the dismissal follows … Read more

Federal court revives challenge to PA buffer zone

While New Hampshire abortion providers are deciding whether to put our state’s currently-unenforced anti-First-Amendment “buffer zone” law  to work, they might want to keep an eye on the Bruni case out of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. A challenge by peaceful pro-lifers to that city’s buffer zone law had been tossed by a federal district court – but on June 1, the Third Circuit Court of Appeals ordered the lawsuit reinstated. The McCullen U.S. Supreme Court decision striking down a Massachusetts buffer zone law figured into the Third Circuit’s order: “We reverse so that the Plaintiffs’ claims may be aired and assessed by the standard that McCullen now requires.”

“The government cannot muzzle speech just because pro-abortion politicians and special interests demand it,” said Matt Bowman of Alliance Defending Freedom, attorney for the Bruni plaintiffs.

Here in the Granite State, a buffer zone challenge (Reddy v. Foster) was dismissed recently because no abortion facility has yet posted a zone. Perhaps abortion facility operators know perfectly well about the standard required by McCullen, and they want to avoid the embarrassment of seeing it applied here. 

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Conference Committee meets Tuesday on conversion therapy bill

Update on HB 1661, the “conversion therapy” bill: House and Senate conferees will attempt to work out their differences over the bill at a meeting Tuesday morning, May 24, at 11 a.m. in room 205 of the Legislative Office Building in Concord. The meeting is open to the public, and the conversation among the legislators … Read more

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