Terrorism works. That's why people use it.

The operative quote from this paragraph:

"...the Tiller family is ceasing operation of the clinic and any involvement by family members in any other similar clinic."

You can bet your ass they don't to get shot by some right-wing lunatic and this is a tiny insurance policy against that.

"It's just a shame to see the story end this way"

Totally agree. You don't want to give any incentives for future attacks. Maybe pro-choice groups and medical/public health communities could set up another facility in the same city.

"Good God, do not close this abortion clinic for this reason."

What hypocrisy. Operation Rescue may as well hang a MISSION ACCOMPLISHED banner on their headquarters.

Even some abortion opponents, who had long devoted their efforts to closing down Dr. Tiller's clinic, said they did not wish to see it happen under these circumstances. Last week, Troy Newman, the leader of Operation Rescue, had said that closing the clinic now would send a worrisome message. "Good God, do not close this abortion clinic for this reason," he said in an interview with The New York Times. "Every kook in the world will get some notion."

This guy really expects anyone to think he's sincere? Wow.

so is troy newman admitting that his fellow travelers are kooks?

has anyone asked mr. "who me worry" newman what he THOUGHT would happen as a result of repeatedly and enthusiastically calling doctors who perform abortions "murderers"?

what was it that he thought would happen?

f&cking morons.

"Good God, do not close this abortion clinic for this reason," - Troy Newman

For pity sake, Troy Newman moved his Operation Rescue from California to Wichita specifically because Tiller was there.

"A violent lunatic" who, I fear, has the possibility of going all out Joe the Plumber. He obviously loves attention and the media seems quite enamored of him.

mhr, you so funneh!

The unfortunate fact is that violence and assassination sometimes produce the results desired by their supporters. It's difficult to know just how history was altered in many cases, but it's depressing how often these tactics aren't obviously counterproductive for those who practice them. What if Rabin weren't murdered in 1995? Abraham Lincoln...

Liberals never write sad columns about the women and children whose lives are destroyed every day by bomb attacks in the islamic world.

Something so lamentably stupid that I can only assume mhr has never been outside the Crackervision-sphere.

According to the history I've read, the consensus seems to be that Lincoln's assassination backfired. Lincoln's 2nd inaugural was all about reaching out to the south to heal the wounds of the war (which was still ongoing at the time). He likely would have thwarted the efforts of the so-called Radical Republicans in Congress and you might have seen an end to Reconstruction by the end of Lincoln's term. As to whether the result would have been better or worse, I don't feel qualified to make a judgement.

Dead right about Rabin, though. That still makes me sick.

"...to see the story end this way."

It may stop, but it never ends.

Rob Mac - yes, that's probably right. I put ellipses, just because of the difficulty of determining ex post what the assassination meant. Maybe it did backfire in the short term, but in the longer term I'm not as sure. Maybe there would have been even more conciliation and so we wouldn't have avoided the slaughterhouse cases or the civil rights cases (or, more generally, a conservative supreme court that stood in the way of progressive reform) had Lincoln lived. The strong amendments we got didn't really deliver for many years - hard to tell how Lincoln's assassination - and later ineffectual presidents - affected that.

If Newman really believes that abortion is murder and that Roe has led to a genocide, then his prayer 'do not close this abortion clinic for this reason' sounds slightly odd.

I have trouble imagining what sort of reason would lead one to implore god not to close Auschwitz.

Sounds like the guy fears that his donations are going to dry up now that the "murderer" has been dealt with. Sickening.

I ask you: was it Dr. Tiller or his assassin that was on the side of the Devil? Who did the Evil here? "Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord." Christ's sermon on the mount requires that we minister to the weak and the sick; by doing it to the least of His Brethren, we do it to Christ. So, who is the evil-doer here?

How soon do you think we'll see women in the midwestern states dying from the complications of their late-term pregnancies now that there's no one to save them?

Anyone got the statistics on the number of women who are *already* dying from complications developed from their pregnancies? Women that could have been saved if there was a doctor trained to save them?

Did the family have any choice? The clinic is closed because there's no longer a doctor around to perform the abortions. Or did Tiller have colleagues on staff ready to carry on his work?

In 1988, I worked as canvasser fundraiser for NYSNaral and acted as clinic escort during an assault by Operation Rescue. We saw then how vulnerable free-standing abortion clinics and doctors' offices were to demonstrators and harassers as compared to hospitals.

Building these clinics, originally a laudable effort to cut costs and improve accessibility has actually had the opposite effect.

I wish that Planned Parenthood, Naral, and all the other abortion rights organizations would take some of the rivers of money they've raised since Dr. Tiller's assassination and start offering fully paid medical school scholarships to students who will contractually obligate themselves to study abortion techniques and provide abortion services once they qualify as ob/gyns.

There should also be some sort of campaign to force any hospital that takes government money to either provide these services or referrals to these services. Same goes for medical schools when it comes to training medical students to do abortions....no training, no money from Uncle Sam.

The clinic is closed because there's no longer a doctor around to perform the abortions. Or did Tiller have colleagues on staff ready to carry on his work?

There was some talk about trying to continue with another doctor. I wouldn't be surprised if the Tiller family has been having to deal with a steady stream of death threats ever since the murder, which probably influenced their decision.

Say what you will about terrorism, it does work.

It is sad that Mr.Roeper got his wish and the Tiller clinic is now closed .However few physicians would or could follow in Dr. Tiller's courageous footsteps.

You quoted Troy Newman from Operation Rescue who did everything but pull the fucking trigger on Tiller. He cultivated terrorism and continues to do so and I am unconvinced he did not pay expenses and help plan Tiller's murder.

Tiller saved so many women's lives who are now just doomed to die trying to deliver a dead or dying fetus because people like Terry Newman have made Drs too afraid to give life saving care. Doesn't matter one little bit that 4yr old Billy and 2yr old Sally will now be orphaned because Newman and his group have doomed their mother to death. Newman himself stated publicly that a woman even one day pregnant who gets an abortion is a "baby killer". All these radical violent killers hear is "baby killer"...not mother saver. A handfull of cells is not a baby nor is a non viable fetus...it's a fetus...but all these lunatics hear from people like Newman is "Baby Killer"...we've got to stop the "baby killer" who is killing millions of innocent babies.

You don't think that is terrorism. You let anything by Newman on this blog that allows hi to say "oh, we didn't really want him to be killed...not that way...not until he's had a chance to make peace with his maker" while at home he's cracking open the champane and celebrating the death of a "monster...a baby killer", his group's intention made manifest...and you don't think you are enabling terrorism by extending this hypocrisy to the very people who encouraged and cultivated the murder of Tiller???

I don't buy it for a second. Operation Rescue is a terrorist organization as guilty of murder and terrorism as the actor who pulled the trigger...masking themselves as just another activist group. That's how they get away with their terrorism...Benen just demonstrated it to us (unintentional I know). Screw Newman and the Jeebus he rode in on. Tiller was a life saver for so many mothers and families you sick bastard. Now look at all the orphans you will be creating in the future.

It's a little late for these right wing aholes to be getting worried about what reaping what they have sown.

Calling Roeder a "violent lunatic" undermines clear understanding of both Roeder and the anti-women movement that he represents.

He has been attacking clinics since 2000. He knew exactly what he was doing and did it with relative ease.

He is violent, but calling him a lunatic isolates him from the rest of the anti-women movement. He is mainstream.

He vandalized a clinic in Kansas City both the week and the night before he murdered Tiller. They had him on video. The FBI did nothing either time.

See! The terrorists have won! This one even has a mouthpiece at Associated Press. How's that work?