You may remember the Robert Conrad who was an execrable actor a while back. Now, there is another Robert Conrad who has been nominated by George W. Bush to a federal appeals court. The Center for Investigative Reporting has information on his controversial writings, which should have kept him off the federal bench entirely.

Conrad's critiques of liberal causes could well stir up the Democratic nest: In 1999, when Conrad was a prosecutor for the U.S. Attorney's Office in Western North Carolina, he went after a group of nuns who opposed the death penalty. In a letter to the editor printed in the Catholic Dossier, he referred to Sister Helen Prejean as a "church-hating nun" and said that her book was merely "liberal drivel." In the late 1980s, while he was in private practice, Conrad attacked Planned Parenthood in an Op-Ed titled "Planned Parenthood: A Radical, Pro-Abortion Fringe Group," Conrad claimed in the Charlotte Observer piece that "Planned Parenthood knowingly kills unborn babies, not fetuses, as a method of 'post-conception' contraception, and to them that's OK."

I am so sick of the Big Lie of "unborn babies." There are no such things. Babies, by their very nature, already have been born. The dishonesty on the far right never ceases to amaze me in its brazenness.

Senate Republicans recently used the nomination of Conrad and other nutty Bush appointees and the lack of interest of Senate Democrats in voting on the wingnuts as a pretext to delay consideration on Global Warming legislation. What seemed to be a blind devotion to the most politically unpopular White House occupant ever actually was a desperate attempt to stack the federal appeals courts with rightist judges who hold the Constitution and the rule of law in utter contempt.

NARAL has a petition urging Senators to oppose this reckless and inappropriate nomination.

Conrad has a clear anti-choice record. In 1988, Conrad wrote an op-ed piece for The Charlotte Observer in which he labeled Planned Parenthood a "radical, pro-abortion fringe group" that "promotes a radical abortion agenda."

From 1983 to 1986, Conrad served on the board of directors for the Charlottesville Pregnancy Center, an organization seemingly modeled as a so-called "crisis pregnancy center" (CPC). Many CPCs intentionally misinform and mislead women who are seeking pregnancy-related assistance by providing medically inaccurate information about pregnancy, contraception, or abortion. In fact, the Charlottesville Pregnancy Center's website includes anti-choice propaganda like, "Remember that abortion doesn't erase a mistake - it only adds new ones."

One of the favorite tricks on these anti-choice brainwashing centers is to talk about the medical risks of abortion but conveniently leave out the greater medical risks of full term pregnancies. Here are some facts from Planned Parenthood that the militant fundamentalists continue to deny.

Abortion is a very safe procedure. It's about twice as safe as having your tonsils removed, and is 10 times safer than giving birth if it is performed before the 18th week of pregnancy.

Sign the Petition!