The Stupak-Pitts amendment takes me back to the days when abortion was not legal and the shame of an abortion was very much like wearing a big red letter A on your forehead.

How did Ms. Johnson become the director of a Planned Parenthood center that provides abortions up to 14 weeks without having seen an ultrasound image?

Dear Bishops: In our struggle to get health care for all, you saw an opportunity to make sure that American women can't afford abortions, a way to be the deciders for all of us.

That a woman consented to use her body as a surrogate was irrelevant, because there are some acts to which nobody is permitted to consent. As well-meaning as this approach might have been, its underpinnings are inescapably sexist.

Whereas the pro-choice movement was caught flat-footed by the surge of Democrats who voted for the Stupak amendment, they'll likely re-arm to fight anti-abortion language in any final health care reform bill.

I was more worried about Justices Scalia and Thomas, and now it turns out I should have been focusing on some Congressman from Michigan. The short, non-wonky version of where we are? We're screwed.

South Carolina, like a number of states in the Southeastern region, is being devastated by a silent enemy that hasn't attracted a lot of media attention lately: HIV, the virus that causes AIDS.

Most mothers behind bars are restrained during labor, delivery and post-delivery as a matter of routine practice in our nation's jails and prisons.

Bishops say they would gladly support health care reform if only they could be assured it doesn't cover abortion. We may soon see if that's true.