The acclaimed Chinese warrior and strategist Sun Tzu advocated the importance of knowing both yourself and your enemy before going into battle. For if "you know your enemy and know yourself," he wrote, "you need not fear the result of a hundred battles." But, Sun Tzu warned, "If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat."

Understanding our opponents is critical to success in the battle for human life. Organizations like Planned Parenthood, the National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL), the National Organization for Women (NOW), and EMILY's List are fighting daily to overturn our pro-life successes. Although it may be unpleasant at times, we cannot underestimate the benefit of knowing our opponents. Only then will we truly be prepared to defeat the culture of death and those who perpetuate it.

National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL) Releases Pro-Abortion Polling

 By: Jesse Magallon, Summer 2008 Intern

 On June 16, 2008, NARAL Pro-Choice America released a series of polling estimations that shows abortion to be an issue of steep contrast between Senators John McCain & Barack Obama. According to Democratic pollster Greenberg Quinlan Rosner (GQR), abortion is a key issue for women swing voters. To that end, GQR believes that women will vote for Obama because he is less restrictive on Roe v. Wade than McCain. GQR claims that Obama is more or less tied to the status quo while John McCain will actively attempt to undermine the 1973 Court decision.

According to Al Quinlan, (president of GQR), “The data shows that choice is an important issue that can move key voting blocs of pro-choice Republican and Independent women who can play an important role in building Obama’s winning coalition. Because NARAL Pro-Choice Americas communicates extensively with this unique swing constituency, NARAL’s efforts in 2008 can help Barack Obama win what may be a close election.”

Nancy Keenan, President of NARAL Pro-Choice America agrees. “This poll confirms what we’ve known for a long time now. NARAL Pro-Choice America is uniquely positioned to help pro-choice candidates win elections from the White House to the state house. We will be working tirelessly over the next five months to ensure NARAL Pro-Choice America’s endorsed candidate, Sen. Obama, becomes president-elect Obama on November 4, 2008.”

Ladies and Gentlemen, it is up to us, the ethical majority of Americans to prove NARAL wrong. Their radical agenda is so far from the mainstream of our nation’s plurality that it would be comical were it not so critical. Our contrast is clear; NARAL and other pro-abortion groups believe in a surgical procedure that suppresses human life. We are for saving these innocents. As Thomas Jefferson once said, “We confide in our strength, without boasting of it; we respect that of others, without fearing it.” With that axiom as our maxim, let us look forward to our future frontier without sacrificing the human life that has made us the confident and composed country we are.

National Organization for Women fears for their “reproductive liberty”

By: Margaret Martin, Spring 2008 Intern

With the commemoration of the 35th anniversary of Roe v. Wade on January 22nd, 2008, The National Organization for Women is faced with the reality that pro-life advocacy is spreading far and wide, and Roe is losing its security in the Supreme Court’s support. Sadly, any movement on the pro-life front toward state government collaboration is regarded by NOW as harassment to women’s rights. The increasing success of the pro-life movement from state to state is causing anxiety on the pro-abortion front that their “right to safe and legal abortion is slipping away.”

NOW President Kim Gandy, in a recent petition calling for monthly contributions to fund their 2008 “Campaign to Save Women’s Lives”, stressed their need for committed funding in order to “combat the constant stream of anti-abortion legislation.” With two recent articles on the NOW website referring to the anniversary of Roe v. Wade, Gandy refers to their “tenuous” position and “the need now, more than ever, to fight to keep Roe alive.”

The website also features urgent rhetoric about increasing threats to women and abortionists:

"In this time of many challenges to our liberty, preserving women's reproductive freedom calls for constant vigilance and concerted action," said Gandy. "Abortion opponents are attempting to eliminate access to abortion in many states -- by passing TRAP (Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers) laws to put clinics out of business, passing waiting periods and notice requirements that cut access to rural women, poor women and young women, and by enacting outright abortion bans that would jail doctors and revoke their medical licenses."

This challenge to preserve women’s liberty is not about an attempt from the pro-life standpoint to destroy the reproductive freedom of women, but rather to enhance the awareness of her own health and well-being and the life of the baby otherwise being thwarted by abortion. Thankfully, these fears on the part of NOW show the success of the pro-life movement in overturning abortion and call for a redoubling of efforts on the part a women’s true freedom in choosing Life.