This is the article that appeared in the November 2024 edition of Catalyst, our monthly journal. The date that prints out reflects
the day that it was uploaded to our website. For a more accurate date of when the article was first published, check out the news release, here.
“Fact-checking” has blossomed into a journalistic industry. Too bad it’s so corrupt. By corrupt I mean dishonest. The latest example comes by way of the October 3rd edition of the New York Times.
On the first page of the “National” section there was a full-page spread listing 21 instances where Sen. JD Vance and Gov. Tim Walz said things during their debate that the paper deemed worthy of fact-checking. Vance was subjected to 17 of them.
Let’s stop right there. Why was Vance subjected to 80 percent of the “fact checks”? Are we to believe that Walz has a near monopoly on speaking the truth?
Of the 17 quotes by Vance that were analyzed, only one was deemed to be true. Four of his remarks were deemed false. The other twelve were scored as either “exaggerated,” “misleading” or “needs context.” By contrast, of the four quotes by Walz that were scrutinized, one was deemed to be true, one was said to be false and the other two were scored “misleading” or “exaggerated.”
The Times opened with the following quote by Vance: “The statute you signed into law, it says a doctor who presides over an abortion where the baby survives—the doctor is under no obligation to provide lifesaving care to the baby who survives a botched late-term abortion.”
Kate Zernike scored this as a false statement, saying, “Mr. Vance is distorting the so-called born alive law that had been in effect in Minnesota since the 1970s. That law required doctors to report when a ‘live child’ was ‘born as the result of an abortion,’ and to provide ‘all reasonable measures consistent with good medical practice’ to care for that infant.”
Zernike completely misrepresented what the law said.
She only acknowledged the first part of the second sentence of the 1976 law. This is inexcusable.
Here is what the entire sentence says: “All reasonable measures consistent with good medical practice, including the compilation of appropriate medical records, shall be taken to preserve the life and health of the child (my italics).”
The law signed by Walz in 2023 deleted the italicized words, replacing them with “to care for the infant who is born alive.” Now why would he want to do that?
It should be obvious that to “care for an infant” is not the same as to “preserve the life” of an infant. Keeping the baby warm is a poor substitute for keeping him alive.
In her analysis of Vance’s comments, Zernike further said, “Doctors have argued to get rid of these laws because there are already laws requiring them to provide appropriate medical care to any human.” Similarly, in her reply to Catholic League email subscribers who contacted her, she said that the law Walz repealed “was duplicative of other laws that prevent infanticide.”
This is astounding. When it comes to other demographic groups in our society—gays, blacks, et al.—we can’t have too many laws protecting their human rights. But when it comes to infants, one is enough. Sorry, this is a lame excuse.
Zernike wrote in her Times piece that in the “extremely rare cases of infants who have been ‘born alive,'” they were “close to death,” and doctors said it took “decision-making away from families….”
That’s rich. First, why did she put quotation marks around “born alive”? Is not the issue what to do about babies born alive as a result of a botched abortion? There is nothing so-called about that.
Second, since when do doctors allow parents to make decisions for them when faced with the prospect of saving the life of their baby? Are they not obligated to save lives, and not to defer to others whether to intervene? Where does this stop? And why choose to start with innocent babies?
Since when have we expected doctors to be mere “care givers,” professionals who “care for an infant who is born alive,” but who do nothing to save the child’s life?
In her reply to our supporters, Zernike defends this position, saying, “this does not allow a doctor to kill a viable child (her italics).” This is a red herring. Neither Vance nor I said so. Vance spoke about the doctor being under no obligation to attend to the child, and I defended that interpretation.
She said in her Times response to Vance that in the five years that Walz has been governor of Minnesota, “there have been eight recorded infants ‘born alive.'” Three were classified as “previable”; two had “fetal abnormalities and died shortly after birth”; and three were provided “comfort care” and died shortly after birth.
The key question is whether any of these babies could have survived had they been given proper medical attention.
Let’s say the babies may have died anyway. What about the seven cases that occurred between 2015 and 2019 where reports simply said that “comfort care measures were provided as planned”? And what about a 2017 case where records show “no specific steps taken to preserve life were reported” of a baby born alive?
Passively allowing babies to die is barbaric, just as Vance said. Lying about it is just as bad.
