Continuation of Reports on Montgomery Council Hearing Regarding CPC Sabatogue Attempt

I hope that everyone has had a happy new year celebration.  With that, it's time to turn our attention to pro-life battles that face us, particularly in Montgomery County.  I've written before on the open County Council hearing that occurred on December 1st.  By no means did I have time to report and comment on all the proceedings.  However, the votes on the Obama Hell Bill occupied our attention. 

Now we must refocus on the protection of Maryland pregnancy centers.  The Health and Human Services Committee, chaired by George Leventhal (D-at large) is scheduled to revisit the matter on January 25th.  We need to make the council aware of our displeasure at this bill, and remind them all that their jobs are vulnerable in the upcoming 2010 elections this autumn.

The Dec 1st hearing was quite lengthy, so much so that my camcorder could not hold all of it.  When the disk filled up, I resorted to my digital voice recorder and my cell phone camera.  From these I'll be presenting clips, and not necessarily in chronological order.  In fact, what I present now is the very last testimony, and some rather troubling behavior by the chair of the HHS committee, George Leventhal.  The lady whom you'll hear first is Ms Linn (not sure of the spelling), a peer counselor at the Rockville Pregnancy Center.  She relates how her clients told her of being exploited at Planned Parenthood.  One woman told Ms Linn that PP staff held her down and forced her to abort.  Leventhal questioned her - no, not questioned her.  He tried to twist the counselor's words around to make it seem that Ms Linn was telling the client that Planned Parenthood would abuse her.  As you listen to the testimony (and I'd advise you to play it as many times as you need), you'll hear that Ms Linn is simply relating what she heard from her client, not what she told her client.  Leventhal tries to twist it to make it appear that Ms Linn told this to the client.  (Does a member of the Montgomery County Council not know the difference between "heard" and "told"?)  Also notice that Leventhal doesn't direct this challenge directly to Ms Linn; he directs his question to the pro-life attorney (Ann O'Connor) who testified immediately before Ms Linn; he wouldn't even let Ms Linn speak for herself.  I regret that when they both did eventually reply, that their replies were way too reticent and demure.  (Also Ms O'Connor was barely audible)  They should have directly challenged Leventhal on what could charitably be called his "selective listening" problem.

And now, please click on THIS to hear the exchange.

Do you notice how Leventhal kept repeating that he was "sincerely trying to get an answer"?   I've learned over the years to assume that when someone protests how "sincere" they are, that I should take such assertions with copious grains of salt.  By the way - I've pointed out in earlier postings that most of the Montgomery County Council members were listed as sponsors on NARAL's "Evening of Chocolate" fundraiser program.  Notice that Leventhal is a "Partner of Choice".  That brings up another point.  Did you notice how in the beginning of his tirade, Leventhal said he wouldn't bother to visit a crisis pregnancy center because he didn't trust that he would get a truthful sense of their actual operations?  With all that's been revealed, I think we can most likely say that even if Leventhal did visit a pregnancy center, that perhaps his report would be negatively biased, since he clearly demonstrated his refusal to even echo back properly and truthfully what all plainly heard.  Perhaps Mr Leventhal is too much a "Partner of Choice".