they "lead" your cause against those that oppose it (me), they are your leader as this issue goes..
UPDATE:
NOW backs away from comments by its Morris president
By Rob Jennings, Daily Record
The National Organization for Women is sidestepping the uproar ignited when its Morris County chapter president opposed a double-murder charge in the Laci Peterson case.
NOW officials declined to comment Monday on statements made this weekend by Mavra Stark, "out of respect for (Peterson's) family and what they're going through," spokeswoman Rebecca Farmer said by telephone from Washington.
Farmer would not say whether NOW opposes fetal homicide statutes that exist in at least 23 states. The laws have been opposed by some pro-choice groups even though legal abortions are exempted from prosecution.
"Right now, the issue is connected to the case," Farmer said.
California's fetal homicide statute is the basis for a second murder charge against Scott Peterson, 30, of Modesto, who is accused of killing his wife when she was eight months pregnant.
Stark, who heads the Morris County NOW, spoke Monday with the national organization's vice president, Terry O'Neill. Stark said O'Neill told her that NOW "felt it wasn't the right thing to take a position right now" on either the Peterson case or fetal homicide statutes.
After her conversation with O'Neill and fielding a flood of critical phone calls and e-mails from across the nation, Stark modified her earlier comments about the widely publicized Peterson case.
"I was thinking out loud," said Stark, who had mused on Saturday that the double-murder charge could provide ammunition to the pro-life lobby.
On Monday afternoon, Stark said the "viability of the Peterson fetus … makes a great deal of difference" in assessing the criminal case.
"The position I was veering very close to was not even in synch with those of all the pro-choice organizations I belong to," said Stark, who had previously speculated that the double-murder charge could strengthen efforts by pro-lifers to enact a ban on late-term abortions.
Stark's weekend statements sparked both a local and national firestorm, generating harsh criticism from Bill O'Reilly and other talk show hosts. She declined interview requests from NBC's "Today" show and numerous TV and radio stations.
"It is embarrassing to me, as a woman, that (she) said that," said Assemblywoman Alison L. McHose, R-Newton, who is pro-life. "I find it troubling that the Morris County chapter of NOW feels it is necessary to denigrate the life of the child that was killed out in California."
Both Laci Peterson's body and that of her unborn son were identified Friday after washing up on the shore of San Francisco Bay. Scott Peterson, who pleaded innocent at his Monday arraignment, could face the death penalty.
Some pro-lifers, including Assemblyman Michael Patrick Carroll, R-Morris Township, hope fetal homicide laws will establish a precedent that fetuses are human beings, thereby fueling efforts to reverse the U.S. Supreme Court's 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion.
Carroll said he would support fetal homicide legislation in New Jersey, where efforts to pass such a law so far have been unsuccessful. McHose said she would back a fetal homicide statute that would apply from the moment of conception.
Assemblyman Richard Merkt, R-Mendham Township, who is pro-choice, said he would support "an appropriate piece of legislation" on the subject.
"It would depend on how it's drawn. Truthfully, I often see good ideas that are couched in dreadful or deceptive language," Merkt said. "There's an old saying that bad cases make bad law."
Much of the reaction to Stark's comments came from outside Morris County after Stark's quotes in Sunday's Daily Record were distributed nationwide on the Drudge Report, an Internet news site.
"They (NOW) are doing themselves no favors by raising this issue. They look ridiculous," said Katy Raymond of Belton, Mo., a mother of three children who said her pro-life views were cemented after having a miscarriage.
