by Steven Ertelt | Washington, DC | LifeNews.com | 4/25/14 11:20 AM

A former plant worker at the facility found to be burning aborted babies for energy says the practice had been going on for years and he believes plant officials and perhaps even county government officials should have known.

Local officials in Oregon are upset that an energy plant is reportedly burning aborted babies from Canada to generate electricity. As LifeNews reported on Thursday, they launched an investigation into how and why aborted babies were included along with medical waste shipped from Canada to Oregon to be incinerated for energy at a recycling plant.

The Marion County Commissioners heard about it for the first time yesterday, April 23, at 4 p.m. They immediately called Oregon Right to Life to express their horror and avow their lack of knowledge of the practice.

Commissioner Sam Brentano said the “waste-to-energy” plant was intended to efficiently destroy waste and, in the process, generate electricity, but the plant was “never intended to be a destruction of human fetal tissue.”

But plant worker KOIN interviewed Bud Waterman, a former temp worker at Covanta Marion, Inc., who told the television station that he saw 53-foot tractor trailers carrying biohazardous material dropping off loads at the facility at least two to three times a week. He said plant officials had to know that aborted babies were part of the medical waste and had been for years.

From the report:

On more than one occasion, Waterman said the contents of the truck spilled out of their containers.

“It would make you sick, especially if you had to clean it up or have to pull a box off the trailer,” said Waterman.

Covanta responded to the claims early Thursday morning by placing blame on Marion County and said the company is halting the program until answers are given.

“The medical waste program at the Marion County Resource Recovery Facility is County run and managed,” Covanta said in a statement. “Marion County contracts for and delivers medical waste to the facility and Covanta has no responsibility for the program. Covanta is shocked by these allegations and is discontinuing the receipt of this waste stream until we have been assured by the County that this alleged material is not being delivered to the facility.”

Waterman said he believes certified contractors have been carrying fetuses from British Columbia to Oregon, where state statutes allow fetuses to be disposed.

“I don’t know that you can know just like I should have known, but I didn’t,” said Brentano. “I’m sorry I didn’t know that this included fetal tissue, but now that I do know, believe me things change.”

Waterman said he believes fetuses have been incinerated at the Marion County facility for years and used for energy, a practice that the Canadian government will not do.

“They knew it, they had to. I don’t see how they could not know it,” said Waterman.

After reports a few weeks ago that aborted babies are burned to heat hospitals in the UK, today we get this:

The remains of aborted humans are being shipped to a US power facility, in order to provide electricity to Oregon residents.

The British Colombia Health Ministry has confirmed that ‘medical waste’ is sent to our country to be converted to electricity in waste-to-power plants. ‘Medical waste,’ in this brave new world of ours, includes amputated limbs, cancerous tissue, and the bodies of murdered children.

I don’t have any long tirade for you. I just need you to understand what’s happening here in your one nation under God. We are incinerating slaughtered babies so that we can charge our iPhones and power our televisions.

If we displace a few caribou to build a pipeline, or disadvantage a couple of dolphins to drill for oil, the public outrage cannot be contained. The cries of injustice and eco-treason can be heard across the land. But using the corpses of dead kids like firewood? Well, that’s just a practical cost-saving measure, now isn’t it?

God help us. And God help the sick, perverted, psychopaths who can’t recognize this for the atrocity that it is. We kill these human beings, can’t we at least treat their bodies with dignity?

I read these stories and I remember the accounts of ancient pagans burning their children alive as a sacrifice to the god Moloch.

These are terrifying times. Don’t let yourself be too buried in piles of Tweets and selfies and Netflix binges to notice that the ship is sinking straight to hell.

In our comfort and our apathy, we scoff and say, ‘ah, it can’t be that bad.’

But it is that bad.

And it will only get worse from here if we don’t wake up.

*****

Update: LifeSiteNews reports that the Marion County Board of Commissioners have announced that the practice of burning aborted babies for power will be stopped immediately. They claim that they were unaware of the practice, but will now put it to an end.

This is a positive development, but it does not make this story any less outrageous.

*****

A response to the dismissive “what’s the big deal?” comments:

Look, if you don’t believe in God, and you reject the sanctity of life, and you believe that we are all nothing but a collection of random molecules, then I suppose I can’t really explain why the body of a deceased human ought to be treated with dignity. Particularly if you accept and promote abortion, I can’t tell you why dead bodies should be treated with respect, when you don’t even think living bodies should be treated with respect.

All I can do, in your case, is appeal to that natural instinct, that voice inside your head — “conscience,” it’s called — that tells you cannibalism is depraved, even if the person is already dead. What we have here is a form of Industrial Age cannibalism: using dead bodies for fuel.

All I can do is remind you that, God forbid, if your child died, or your mother, or you sister, you would be outraged in the very pit of your being if someone spit on their corpse, or defiled it in someway. By your professed logic, the act shouldn’t bother you. After all, you say, that body isn’t them. They’re gone. They are nothingness now. They don’t exist. What does it matter?

But we both know that it does matter. The only difference is that you don’t understand WHY it matters, or else you pretend not to, whereas I, and many other commenters on here, do.

I know it’s awfully cool and terribly trendy to carry on like materialistic utilitarians who scoff at totally outdated and completely old fashioned concepts like dignity and decency. I know we have this habit nowadays of thinking a thing is pointless if it can’t be ‘used’ in some manner. And, if a thing can be used, then we tend to say that it should be used, just on the principle that useless things have no right to take up space on this planet. But, again, deep in my heart, I know that deep in your heart you see this attitude for the vacant, hollow, lie that it is.

Yes, the body of a deceased human is useless. Yes, it can, apparently, be converted into electricity and, yes, electricity is useful. Yes, and so what? The Mona Lisa is useless, should we chop it up for firewood? Your grandmother isn’t nearly as useful as she once was, should we send her the farm to be put down? Music is useless, should we throw all the guitars and pianos into the inferno also?

No? Then maybe, just maybe, you really DO understand that sometimes the value of a thing has no relation to its usefulness.

What I’m saying is this: the body of a deceased child is useless, yes. But it has value. It has dignity. It deserves to be treated with respect.

Now, to those who call themselves Christians but still make excuses for this practice: you should be ashamed. Truly, you should be ashamed. Our bodies and our souls are not two separate entities. Your exterior is not some fleshy shell. Your body and your soul are in harmony with one another, and the two, together, make you you.

Jesus Christ became man, and this act forever puts to rest the debate about whether or not the human body, in and of itself, deserves to be respected and treated with dignity. God Himself took its form, forever elevating that form to something sacred. End of discussion. The argument is settled.

You are a Christian, are you not?

In any case, Christian or Jew or Muslim or Atheist, we should all be, at the very least, civilized people.

Civilized people don’t burn dead babies for fuel. They just don’t.

by Steven Ertelt | Vancouver, Canada | LifeNews.com | 4/23/14 4:03 PM

An energy plant in Oregon is reportedly burning aborted babies from Canada to generate electricity. UPDATE: Local officials say they will stop the practice while they look into the situation.

Following the LifeNews story below that received national attention, the Marion County Board of Commissioners issued the following statement:

Today the Marion County Board of Commissioners learned that the Covanta Waste-to-Energy Facility located in Marion County may be accepting medical waste containing human tissue from outside sources. In response to an April 21 article in The B.C Catholic, the board took immediate action to temporarily halt the acceptance of boxed medical waste at the facility.

Commissioner Sam Brentano, chair, said, “We provide an important service to the people of this state and it would be a travesty if this program is jeopardized due to this finding. We thought our ordinance excluded this type of material at the waste-to-energy facility. We will take immediate action to ensure a process is developed to prohibit human tissue from future deliveries.”

“We are outraged and disgusted that this material could be included in medical waste received at the facility,” said Commissioner Janet Carlson. “We did not know this practice was occurring until today. We are taking immediate action and initiating discussions with Covanta Marion to make certain that this type of medical waste is not accepted in the future.”

The board has called an Emergency Meeting to discuss the issue further for 9 a.m. Thursday, April 24, 2014, in the Board of Commissioners Office located at 555 Court Street NE, 5^th Floor, Salem.

The British Columbia Catholic newspaper reported in its edition this week that the remains of aborted and miscarried children from the Canadian province are likely being mixed with everyday trash and sent to an energy plant in Oregon. The paper contacted the British Columbia Health Ministry and received a response back saying that “biomedical waste,” including “human tissue” and “fetal tissue” are being disposed of through officially approved contractors. The provincials officials also confirmed some of that “waste” is shipped to Oregon.

The governmental officials also stressed that all provincial laws are being followed as that “waste” is being processed.

“The ministry understands that some is transferred to Oregon. There it is incinerated in a waste-to-energy plant,” the email to the Catholic newspaper indicated.

According to the paper, the Oregon plant in question is located in Brooks, Oregon.

Oregon Right to Life’s Executive Director Gayle Atteberry, upon receiving word of this new “alternative energy” source, emailed LifeNews:

“As horrified as I am to hear of the bodies of Canada’s smallest citizens being burned to create electricity for our homes, I am not surprised. When we do not respect the unborn babies’ right to life, what is stopping us from using their bodies for our own gain, whether that be burning them for electricity or destroying them for embryonic stem cell research? The next question is: are Oregon’s babies being burned as well?”

This news comes on the heels of a shocking report from England showing that the remains of as many as 15,000 aborted babies were incinerated by British hospital as a heating source.

While the pro-abortion movement frequently condemns pro-life advocates who draw comparisons between abortion and the Holocaust, the report of babies burned to heat UK hospitals is a shocking reminder of the callous way human life was treated by the Nazi regime. According to the report in the London Telegraph newspaper, the aborted babies were incinerated as “clinical waste” in “waste to energy” plans at British hospitals.

The hospitals, funded by the British government’s NHS health care program, admitted burning the babies’ bodies along with legitimate medical waste and trash. The Department of Health has reportedly issued a ban on the practice, prohibiting the hospitals from exploiting the bodies of babies victimized by abortion any further.

by Steven Ertelt | Washington, DC | LifeNews.com | 4/22/14 1:12 PM

The poll asked: As you may know, abortion on demand is the law in the United States. Whether or not we believe abortion should be generally available, we should at least place reasonable limits on such things as late-term pregnancies and provide adequate health and safety regulations for abortion clinics. It found 74% of Republicans agree.

Gary Bauer, president of American Values, told LifeNews: “While the country is almost equally divided on the issue of abortion, large majorities support reasonable, rational limits and life-saving regulations.Unfortunately, the Obama Administration position is abortion through all 9 months of pregnancy, for any reason, and with taxpayer subsidies for those who say they cannot afford it.”

Arina Grossu, director of the Center for Human Dignity at the Family Research Council, told LifeNews: “Women have a right to know the development of their unborn child at any stage. Unborn babies can feel pain by at least 20 weeks – five months – post-fertilization and must be protected from inhumane treatment. Late abortions pose higher health risks for women.”

“Further, it’s in women’s best interest to ensure that there are adequate health and safety regulations for abortion facilities. Tanning and nail salons, pools, and restaurants are more frequently regulated that most abortion facilities. Abortion facilities should be held to the same standard of regulation as other medical facilities. Many injuries and deaths of women could have been prevented at abortion facilities had they been adequately regulated,” she added.

American Values and Family Research Council (FRC) released the results of a commissioned national survey conducted by Wilson Research Strategies. The survey of 801 Republicans and Republican leaning independents was conducted March 18-20, 2014. The full sample has a margin of error equal to ±3.5%.

by Steven Ertelt | London, England | LifeNews.com | 4/21/14 10:28 AM

An aspiring glamor model in England says she wants to get an abortion so she can star on a reality television program. Josie Cunningham, 24, is a mother of two but wants to abort her third baby soshe could appear on Big Brother.

Yesterday, the aspiring model said she planned to abort the child to further her television career, adding: “This time next year I won’t have a baby. I’ll be famous instead”

She told the Sunday Mirror: “An abortion will further my career. This time next year I won’t have a baby. Instead I’ll be famous, driving a bright pink Range Rover and buying a big house. Nothing will get in my way.

She added: “I want to be famous for being me – Josie Cunningham, a glamour model in my own right. If I want to do that I need to put my career first.”

From the story:

Wannabe celebrity Josie Cunningham last night confessed the chance of appearing on TV’s Big Brother was worth more than her unborn child’s life.

Puffing on a cigarette and rubbing her baby bump, the controversial model and call girl– who will have her abortion at a clinic this week – said: “I’m finally on the verge of becoming famous and I’m not going to ruin it now.

“An abortion will further my career. This time next year I won’t have a baby. Instead, I’ll be famous, driving a bright pink Range Rover and buying a big house. Nothing will get in my way.”

Josie, 23, is already 18 weeks pregnant by either an escort agency client or a Premier League footballer. But she claims her late life-or-death decision has nothing to do with who the father is.

She says it is based on the breakdown of negotiations with Channel 5 to appear on the reality show.

Josie – who caused outrage in 2013 when she demanded a £4,800 boob job on the NHS to become a glamour model – said: “Channel 5 were keen to shortlist me then they found out I was pregnant.

“Then they suddenly turned cold. That was when I started considering an abortion. After the operation I will be going back to them and asking if they will still consider me.

“I’ve also had loads of other offers to further my career – and I’m not willing to give them up because I’m pregnant.”

 

In what can only be called a gracious historical act, a newsreel archive company called British Pathé has uploaded 85,000 historic films on YouTube—in high resolution, no less.

The collection spans from 1896 to 1976 and there’s obviously a lot of great stuff to comb through that ranges from politics to art to culture to sports.

One video that has caught The Daily Caller’s eye is the one below, in which American birth control activist Margaret Sanger (here called Margaret Slee, which was her second husband’s name) sternly demands that the women of the world have “no more babies.”

The snippet was filmed at the Dorchester Hotel in London. Sanger was the president of the America Planned Parenthood Federation at the time. That organization has since evolved into the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, a nonprofit organization that to this day advocates heavily for abortion.

Planned Parenthood has received massive amounts of funding from the U.S. government since 1970.

As the text below the YouTube clip explains, Sanger was specifically arguing that people in developing countries shouldn’t have babies until 1957.

WATCH:

by Steven Ertelt | Washington, DC | LifeNews.com | 4/16/14 1:06 PM

Last year, Tiona Rodriguez and Francis Estevez, both 17, were stopped for suspected shoplifting and a security guard found the baby’s body inside a bag. After questioning, Rodriguez told police officers that she had suffered a miscarriage the day before and did not know what to do.

Reports at the time indicated the dead newborn child found in her Victoria’s Secret bag was born alive and then likely asphyxiated to death. An autopsy done on the infant showed the baby was born alive at full term and it revealed that Rodriguez’s baby boy was actually born alive at full term and could have died of asphyxiation.

Now, the death of the baby boy has been ruled a homicide by the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner Tuesday – months after his October, 2013 passing. The child, who hasn’t been identified, died as a result of homicidal asphyxia, a spokeswoman said and she added that he was alive for less than a day.

The Manhattan district attorney’s office declined to comment to the New York Daily News on whether Rodriguez will now face murder charges. The teen, who has a 2-year-old son, reportedly said Tuesday that she had ‘no idea’ about the homicide ruling.

Officials also found hundreds of dollars worth of stolen goods inside the bags and then a security guard noticed there was a strong odor inside and found a tiny body under the loot. Rodriguez told officers that she had suffered a miscarriage the day before and did not know what to do, so had stashed the baby in the bag.

The London Daily Mail provides additional reporting:

Homicide prosecutors had been probing the case since the teen was arrested. She wasn’t initially charged over the macabre find.

The then-17-year-old, was released without bail after she pleaded not guilty to petty larceny and possession of stolen property charges.

However at the time, authorities said they couldn’t bring charges over the dead baby until forensic tests determined exactly how the full-term newborn died.

Preliminary reports from detectives suggested the fetus was born alive and may have been asphyxiated.

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‘I don’t want to ignore the elephant in the room, but we are only arraigning the shoplifts,’ Assistant District Attorney Robert Hettleman told the court at the October hearing, according to New York Daily News.

The court released Rodriguez’ friend Francis Estevez without bail and soon after more than a dozen uniformed police officers and detectives had descended on her Queens home with a crime scene unit truck, a neighbor said.

by Dave Andrusko | Salt Lake City, UT | LifeNews.com | 4/15/14 2:43 PM

More details are coming in following the horrific discovery of the bodies of seven babies in a garage in Pleasant Grove, Utah.

Megan Huntsman told police that “she either strangled or suffocated them immediately after they were born,” the Associated Press reported. “She wrapped their bodies in a towel or a shirt, put them in plastic bags and then packed them inside boxes in the garage of her home south of Salt Lake City.” Huntsman, 39, is charged with six counts of murder; she told authorities the seventh baby was stillborn.

Authorities are trying to find out why Huntsman killed the babies, as if there could be a “why.” She is being held on $6 million bail, $1 million for each baby.

Pleasant Grove police Lt. Britt Smith said that during the interview with police, Huntsman was “unemotional and matter of fact.”

The Salt Lake City Tribune reported that she appeared Monday in 4th District Court. Michael McFall, Jim Dalrymple II, and Jessica Miller described the scene.

“Huntsman, wearing a worn blue jumpsuit with the sleeves rolled up to her shoulders, appeared tired during the hearing.

“As she stepped in front of the camera, she pressed her hand to her face, covering her eyes. Seconds later when prosecutors asked for a $6 million bail, Huntsman merely blinked and showed no perceptible emotion.

“’That’s fine,’ she told Judge Steven Hansen blankly when he asked her what she thought of the massive sum.

“Huntsman has been on suicide watch ever since she was booked into the jail, said Utah County Sheriff’s Chief Deputy Darin Durfey.”

Huntsman’s former husband, Darren West, found the body of one baby last Saturday with fellow family members while cleaning out the garage of the house, which is owned by his parents. According to court documents, West called Huntsman, who admitted to him it was her baby.

When police arrived, they found the bodies of the other six babies, all apparently full term, stuffed individually into boxes.

Besides why Huntsman would murder six babies between 1996 and 2006, there are many other unanswered questions. For example, although West is currently not a suspect, Smith told reporters authorities believe he was living in the house during the time span the babies were killed.

(A later story from The International Business Times is that West is now denying that he was the father of the babies.)

Another question is how Huntsman’s three older daughters, aged 13 to 20, who still live in the house owned by West’s parents, could not have known their mother had been pregnant, or not see anything suspicious. Hutchinson left in 2011, reportedly kicked out by her former in-laws.

“Neighbors said they noticed Huntsman’s weight fluctuated over the years, with her toggling between baggy and tight clothes, but they didn’t realize she was pregnant,” the Associated Press reported. “Smith declined to say if Huntsman gave birth to the babies in the home or at a hospital.”

Still another question stems from the fact that Huntman’s youngest daughter, now a teen, was born during the decade she told police she killed the babies. “Why was one of them saved?” neighbor SanDee Wall said.

Huntsman will be back in court April 21, Utah County Attorney Jeff Buhman said. According to the Salt Lake City Tribune

“Buhman explained the high, cash-only bail by saying that Huntsman is a ‘flight risk and because this is a heinous, horrible crime.’

Buhman added: ‘This is a little shocking because of the number of babies that were killed.’

“Pleasant Grove detective Dan Beckstrom said after the hearing: ‘I’ve never seen anything like this in my career.’”