theocracy watch

Meanwhile, south of the border - way south - the only medical facility in the state of Mississippi that provides abortions is under siege. This from a fundraising letter forwarded to me by my former comrades at the Haven Coalition, which I helped run during my last years in the US.

As summer begins, your Feminist Majority Foundation is preparing to protect the lone remaining abortion clinic in Mississippi. The Jackson Women's Health Organization is facing a week-long siege by Operation Save America (formerly Operation Rescue) from July 15-22 to make Mississippi "the first 'abortion-free' state in America."

Flip Benham, the director of Operation Save America, has said "We will not wait for the President, Congress, or the Supreme Court to end abortion."

Your Feminist Majority Foundation is determined to help this clinic and protect women's access to abortion in Mississippi. We are sending organizing staff to help the clinic withstand the protests this July and to work with law enforcement to ensure the safety of the clinic and its healthcare workers. We need your help to ensure that doctors, healthcare workers, and volunteer clinic escorts are safe and the clinic remains open.

We need to immediately raise $25,000 for security equipment and staff. Half of your emergency tax-deductible contribution will help the Jackson Women's Health Organization get the security assistance they need.

The other half of your tax-deductible gift will support the Feminist Majority Foundation's Clinic Defense Project, which will be working closely with the Jackson clinic and with other targeted clinics across the country.

We need your help now to keep the Jackson clinic open and keep the Feminist Majority Foundation strong in our struggle to stop this domestic terrorism against women's health care providers. We cannot allow anti-abortion zealots to win through violence and intimidation.

Operation Rescue, as they were then known, invaded New York City in 1992, trying to shut down several family planning clinics. I was involved in clinic defense, at that time the most exciting activism I had ever done. But it was easy for us: the police, the city government and the general population was on our side. Outside the clinics, sanitation workers and taxi drivers would honk their horns and raise their fists in support. There was a pro-choice march through the city, and thousands of people helped fund, organize and staff round-the-clock clinic access teams.

But this is Mississippi.

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