Tag: right to life

Celebrate the Meaning of Roe: Vote-Special Election Feb. 15 – Elect MaryJane Shimsky!

Roe v. Wade is under attack across the United States. Women are losing their/our constitutional right to privacy and to control our own bodies.
Empowered by the 2010 elections, states are working to pass damaging legislation. (Click here to read more.)
BUT YOU CAN DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT!
Vote in the Special Election
Tuesday February 15th

You Vote – You Choose
MaryJane Shimsky—a pro-choice, progressive, budget and tax-minded candidate, running on the Working Families and Democratic lines, who has fought for the residents of Hastings-on-Hudson and the Town of Greenburgh on such projects as Ridge Hill and Stew Leonards, and worked as the Director of Community Relations for Assemblyman Richard Brodsky;
or
Astorino’s next mini-me—anti-choice Nicholas DeCicco who refused to complete Choice Matters’ questionnaire. DeCicco, like Marcotte, will walk the Right-to-Life Astorino anti-choice anti-child anti-family walk, voting as he is told.
Say “NO” to Another Astorino Puppet
In November 2009, Westchester elected a Right-to-Life (RTL) County Executive, Rob Astorinio. We have been paying the price ever since.
Astorino may want to protect the so-called unborn, but he sure has made his position about the born clear: Astorino says, Throw them under the bus to every child and family in need. Astorino’s budget is the antithesis of family. He focuses on cutting all services that support working mothers, early childhood programs and corresponding housing support.
On his coattails, Sheila Marcotte won in the 10th County Legislative District and is doing exactly as her commander has directed–voting in lockstep with him against child care scholarships, low income daycare and funding for community healthcare programs, among others–voting against a safety net and costing taxpayers millions.
Astorino’s other puppets have done the same. Believe me when I say, we do not need and cannot afford another Astorino mini-me.
Worry About Funding!
Astorino’s Right to Life beliefs have already corrupted the budget process. Laws are not the only things at stake. Budgets decide who matters.

Remember it was Astorino who took a sledge hammer to child care funding, pulverizing it by taking away 4.3 million dollars—this after the most recent census data reported that 16.7 percent of Westchester children under 5 years of age are living in poverty, which is up from 9.6 percent in 2005—and added new positions for his political cronies. When those positions were cut by the County Legislators, Astorino hired his cronies anyway using empty lines on the budget!

SPECIAL ELECTION
TUESDAY
FEB. 15TH
Choice Matters
Endorses
MaryJane Shimsky
for
Westchester County Board of Legislators

Astorino Proposes Budget using Right to Life Philosophy!

Right to Life County Executive Rob Astorino is wasting no time building his first budget on the tenets of Anti-Choice Extremism: Champion the Fetus, but once it’s born, throw it under the bus…deprive it of food, health care, shelter and education.

Astorino’s Anti-Child Anti-Family Budget
The first thing Astorino did
to draft his Anti-Child Anti-Family Budget was to go after the truly defenseless.

He took a sledge hammer to child care funding, pulverizing it by taking away 4.3 million dollars—this after the most recent census data reported that 16.7 percent of Westchester children under 5 years of age are living in poverty, which is up from 9.6 percent in 2005.

Even the business community opposes the Astorino-style anti-child budget. Why? Because they insist that we will only stem our country’s declining competitive advantage in the global economy if we invest in our children’s early years. The strongest advocates for increasing spending for quality services for young children are leading economists like Nobel winner James Heckman and Art Rolnick, and national groups like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and America’s Partnership for Economic Success.

Astorino also cut all the 4-H programs in Westchester, which rely on matching grants to survive. If Westchester does not provide any funding, there is nothing to match!

Anti-choicers like to claim the moral high ground and supposed family values, but, in reality, those like Astorino don’t care about people—or at least not about families that are financially different than their own.

Astorino’s Next Target: Families.
Astorino is planning on closing one of the most highly regarded family shelters, WestHelp, which houses 70 homeless families. The shelter is part of the HELP agency which was founded more than two decades ago to provide transitional housing to the homeless. It has 108 units and offers its residents job training and day-care services. WESTHelp’s occupancy rate has doubled since September and can be expected to continue to rise as applications for food stamps have risen in recent months.

Astorino also has Westchester’s health care system on the chopping block. Treating thousands of patients annually, the community health centers, Open Door Family Medical Center and Hudson River HealthCare have taken on the role of the Department of Health’s local clinics, providing preventive health care to the poor and uninsured. Astorino plans to savage their budgets, resulting in, among other things, kids without inoculations, women without prenatal care and seniors without necessary medical treatment.

Astorino’s pièces de résistance budget cut: He is closing all the community mental health clinics this year—50% on January 1, 2011 and the remaining 50% on July 1, 2011. Clearly Mr. Astorino is out of touch with the needs of real people and their families.  Depression which often leads to domestic abuse, murder, and suicide is a direct result of unemployment and feeling out of control.

Remember, Astorino is dong this as job loss has driven more Westchester residents into the ranks of the uninsured and underinsured.

Astorino is Playing Three-Card Monte with Your Tax Dollars!
Astorino claims that he is doing all this to lower taxes by 1%-but there really is no 1% decrease.  Astorino is raising fees and borrowing money to pay: 1. tax certiorari payments, 2. increased cost of pensions, and 3. pension buy-outs.

We will be paying for that for years to come. If anyone sees a reduction in his/her county taxes it will be approximately $20, and then only under very limited circumstances!

Call Your Westchester County Legislator and
Tell Them to Say NO
to Right to Life County Executive Astorino’s Budget

CBL 1 John Testa [-]                         (914) 995-2828                
CBL 2   Peter Harckham [+]          (914) 995-2810
CBL 3 John Nonna [+]                    (914) 995-2847                
CBL 4   Michael Kaplowitz [+]      (914) 995-2848
CBL 5 William Ryan [+]                  (914) 995-2827                 
CBL 6   Martin Rogowsky [+]        (914) 995-2834
CBL 7 Judy Myers [+]                     (914) 995-2802                
CBL 8   Alfreda Williams [+]         (914) 995-2833
CBL 9 William Burton [+]              (914) 995-2812               
CBL 10  Sheila Marcotte [-]           (914) 995-2817
CBL 11 Jim Maisano [+]                  (914) 995-2826               
CBL 12 Thomas Abinanti [+]        (914) 995-2821
CBL 13 Lyndon D. Williams [-]     (914) 995-2837               
CBL 14 Bernice Spreckman [+]    (914) 995-2815
CBL 15 Gordon Burrows [-]           (914) 995-2830                
CBL 16 Ken Jenkins [+]                   (914) 995-2829
CBL 17 Jose Alvarado [+]              (914) 995-2846

 (+) = pro-choice
 (-) = anti-choice

Right to Life Committee Endorses Dan Donovan and Rene Atayan

A True Halloween Horror
Atayan wants to make the laws banning a woman’s right to choose and Donovan wants to enforce them!
By the time their done, women will have absolutely no control over their reproductive rights and, thus, also not over their economic, social, or political lives.

Atayan is running against staunch pro-choice advocate Amy Paulin.
Donovan is opposing 100% pro-choice ally Eric Schneiderman.

We need both Paulin and Schneiderman in Albany fighting for us.

 

Myth Busters #2 Tell Joe DioGuardi Women DON’T Fake Rape and Incest

FACT: When in Congress, DioGuardi cast his vote against abortion rights every time he had a chance including voting against abortions for women pregnant from rape or incest.

He explained, to a group of pro-choice lobbyists while in office, the number of real rapes and cases of incest were minimal.

DioGuardi opined, women cry rape and incest long after the fact.*
(hmmmm) ”he really doesn’t understand sexual trauma”, (wonder what he says about victims reporting sexual assault by religious leaders that occurred years ago.)

Joe DioGuardi was a two-term anti-choice incumbent when he lost to women’s reproductive rights advocate Congresswoman Nita Lowey in 1988. When he challenged Lowey again in 1992, DioGuardi took the Right to Life line.

Today DioGuardi is again endorsed by the Right to Life Committee.
He has become more conservative over time, not less.

Now he is running against Senator Kirsten Gillibrand”and there is no stronger advocate in the Senate for women than Kirsten.

Tell DioGuardi New York women have no use for recycled Right to Life extremists!

*WCLA – Choice Matters has wonderful archives, and we have substantial files on Joseph (Joe) DioGuardi, past and present.

Growing Number Of Candidates Oppose Abortion In Cases Of Rape, Incest

A startling number of candidates up for election this year are anti-choice even to the extent that they oppose abortion in cases of rape, incest, or even to save the life of the woman. RNC for Life has endorsed 63 House candidates who are against abortion in all cases.

New York State has a horrific number running for all levels of government.

The following are NY Right to Life (RTL) endorsed anti-choice candidates:
*Senatorial and House challengers DioGuardi, Townsend, Mele and Russell and *State Senate and Assembly candidates Vernucchio, McLaughlin, Ball, Block, Ramondelli, Katz and Borkowski all want to overturn Roe v Wade; * RTL gubernatorial hopeful Carl Paladino made clear in his now infamous CNN interview that women should have no reproductive rights.

(Check out the voting guide for more, and pay special attention to the judicial candidates like Murphy who is up for reelection to the Supreme Court. Last time he took the Right to Life line and now is trying to hide that truth. He knows New York is pro-choice and his truth will hurt him!)

A few quotes from around the country:

Carl Paladino, running for Governor of New York

In a Sept. 15 interview with CNN’s Rick Sanchez, Carl Paladino said unequivocally that women should not be able to have an abortion even in cases of rape and incest. “Should a woman have a right to have an abortion if she’s — if she’s been raped?” Sanchez asked. “No,” replied Paladino. When he asked about cases of incest, Paladino said, “The baby can be adopted.”

Nevada Senate Candidate Sharron Angle

“two wrongs don’t make a right,” and said a young girl who had been raped by her father should think about making “a lemon situation into lemonade” by having her baby and either raising it or giving it up for adoption.

Delaware Senate Nominee Christine O’Donnell

On her campaign website, Christine O’Donnell states that she “[s]trongly believes in protecting the sanctity of life at ALL stages.” She has repeatedly said she opposes abortion even in cases of rape and incest. She also condemned the use of condoms, calling them “anti-human.” “And what…if the population is increasing, so what?” O’Donnell said in a 2006 interview on Fox News. “People aren’t bad. When did humans become a bad thing? Why is it that we have to, you know, stop people from getting pregnant?”

According to the news media, voters are frustrated and apathetic. We must keep our focus. We cannot allow anti-choice extremists to win elections. Think about what is at stake and VOTE.

Source: Huffington Post and RNC for Life