The Nutty Anti-Abortionist

I was going through the vast Hudson archives the other day and discovered that there was one extremely obvious “Get Out of Town” candidate that I have never addressed. I feel extremely guilty for my non-action, though, as perhaps a one-way ticket to anywhere could have potentially saved our state from nationwide humiliation.
Being a tactful person, I tend to shy away from attacking one’s appearance. After all, I’m a pretty hideous creature – I’m short, fat, and old. But I really can’t help myself in this case. Quite honestly, the person in question this week looks like a clown. She has exaggerated features, attempts to dress like somebody half her age, and wears at least three times as much makeup as any person should ever consider. No, I’m not talking about Tammy Faye Bakker…but that’s a close guess.
This person also has a bit of a past. As a young adult (the key word here is adult) she discovered that she was pregnant, and had an abortion. The parents of the man she married didn’t especially take a shine to this young harlot, so they secretly wed in Las Vegas many, many, many years ago.
Around this same time, she (conveniently) discovered the Lord, and became a “born-again virgin”. Thus began her lifelong quest to force everybody to follow her beliefs. She spent most of the ‘80’s as an abortion protester, picketing not only outside clinics that performed the procedure but also outside the homes of physicians. She made the talk-show rounds, and still brags of her appearances on Oprah. She opened a “crisis pregnancy center” that resulted in so many complaints that she was investigated by a Republican governor. Ultimately, she pled no contest to a couple of charges in a plea bargain in which 19 charges, including four felonies, were dropped. The most notable of the charges were promises she made to pay teenagers to stay pregnant so their babies could be put up for adoption.
In the 90’s her crisis center morphed into the Abstinence Clearinghouse. Through this organization she argues that “true feminism” is limiting a woman’s access to contraception, sex education, and reproductive choices. She also protested against the movie Kinsey, argued against cervical cancer research (after all, it’s God’s punishment for premarital sex), and put on “purity balls” where daughters pledge their purity to their fathers. Oh yeah, she also makes a pretty good salary. Her organization has received nearly three million dollars in government funding since 2002, and receives a combined salary of around $125,000 a year from the two non-profit organizations.
Although she was the public face of abstinence for the last few years (and few faces could sway people away from sex as easily as hers), she remained one of the leaders of the anti-choice movement. She was a regular fixture in Pierre for every legislative session, bugging those poor public servants on a constant basis. Her husband also somehow ended up on the state’s controversial task force regarding abortion. Any expert testimony that was against their stand was eliminated from the final report, which was filled with the types of non-provable anecdotal tales this person is famous for.
Earlier this year, her tactics finally prevailed and her abortion bill passed. Her reaction? “We’re going to party.” Since then she’s the go-to girl for any quote from that side of the fence. When scientific polls showed that the majority of the state’s residents were not in support of the bill, her response was that her non-scientific polls showed otherwise. When hearing of other plans from her opponents, she was quoted as saying “I’m hearing a lot of things that are making us giggle.” When the petition drive to repeal the law commenced last month she argued that this shouldn’t happen because our elected representatives had already represented our wishes, and that signing the petitions would put people on mailing lists they don’t want to be on. Hmm. Somehow I ended up on her mailing list, but I guess I’m supposed to deal with that because she’s somehow privy to the only true beliefs any person should have. And we can’t forget my favorite anecdote of the year where she told the daily paper that a local coffee shop had refused to serve her because of who she was. Right. I really believe that story.
Obviously, everybody has figured out who I’m talking about. Leslee Unruh, it’s time. As a conservative Republican I would think you’d like to do your part to lower everybody’s taxes by closing your doors. Pack your bags and hit the road. There’s gotta be some shady televangelist that would just love your sunny disposition and Mary Kay makeup.