Allahpundit posted yesterday on the trial of Kermit Gosnell and the testimony of the other monsters who worked in his charnel house — excuse me, family-planning clinic.  With Gosnell on trial for eight counts of murder thanks to the deliberate execution of newborns that managed to survive the savagery of Gosnell’s late-term abortions, the trial yesterday included another horrific tidbit, and an excuse that sounds very, very familiar:

A second Delaware woman, who worked at Dr. Kermit Gosnell’s West Philadelphia abortion clinic, testified today that it was “standard procedure” to snip the necks of any babies that were delivered by patients before the abortion due to labor-inducing drugs.

And Lynda Williams, 44, of Wilmington, said Gosnell taught her how to flip the body of the baby over and snip its neck with a pair of scissors to ensure “fetal demise.”

Williams also testified that she followed Gosnell’s orders one time, when Gosnell was away either running, swimming or working at a clinic in Delaware, and took a baby that was delivered in a toilet and snipped its neck.

“It jumped, the arm,” she said, showing the jury by raising her arm.

Williams told investigators she only snipped a neck the one time, “because it gave me the creeps.”

So why did she agree to do it at all?

“I only do what I’m told to do,” she told the jury. “What I was told to do was snip their neck… I never knew it was murder.”

I’m sorry, but that excuse wasn’t good enough at Nuremberg for people in a military organization.  It’s certainly not good enough for people taking jobs in abortion mills.  What exactly did she think fetal demise meant? For that matter, what exactly did she think Gosnell was doing in all of these abortions?

Oh, right — Gosnell told her the babies were already dead:

Williams said she asked Gosnell about the baby that moved, and said Gosnell told her it was just an “involuntary response” and a “last breath” because it was “already dead” due to drugs that had been administered earlier.

So why bother to stab the babies in the neck to “ensure fetal demise”? After Williams got creeped out, did she report the issue to authorities, who might have been interested in investigating this practice?  Apparently not; she still worked for Gosnell at the time one of his patients died allegedly through malicious neglect, which is why she was also arrested.

While we’re asking questions, let’s ask again why the crime-obsessed media hasn’t taken an interest in this case.  It has nearly everything that the media usually wants — horrific tales, serial killings, grotesque deliberation, even a villain who liked to make and keep trophies of his victims.  We even have living victims willing to go on camera to talk about their experiences with Gosnell. So why has no national media outlet taken advantage of this target-rich environment?

Let’s go back to the grand-jury report on Gosnell, which delivered a powerful indictment against the government health agencies that were supposed to protect women from butchers like Gosnell:

We discovered that Pennsylvania’s Department of Health has deliberately chosen not to enforce laws that should afford patients at abortion clinics the same safeguards and assurances of quality health care as patients of other medical service providers. Even nail salons in Pennsylvania are monitored more closely for client safety.

The State Legislature has charged the Department of Health (DOH) with responsibility for writing and enforcing regulations to protect health and safety in abortion clinics as well as in hospitals and other health care facilities. Yet a significant difference exists between how DOH monitors abortion clinics and how it monitors facilities where other medical procedures are performed.

Indeed, the department has shown an utter disregard both for the safety of women who seek treatment at abortion clinics and for the health of fetuses after they have become viable. State health officials have also shown a disregard for the laws the department is supposed to enforce. Most appalling of all, the Department of Health’s neglect of abortion patients’ safety and of Pennsylvania laws is clearly not inadvertent: It is by design. …

State health officials knew that Gosnell and his clinic were offering unacceptable medical care to women and girls, yet DOH failed to take any action to stop the atrocities documented by this Grand Jury. These officials were far more protective of themselves when they testified before the Grand Jury. Even DOH lawyers, including the chief counsel, brought private attorneys with them – presumably at government expense.

The national media is just as complicit as these government agencies in keeping the Gosnell story under wraps.  They want to bury it because of what it says about abortionists, abortion itself, and the cheapening of human life.  They don’t want to find out how many Gosnells are out there butchering women to this day, but it’s more than that. To hear stories of expedited “fetal demise” is to question why we suck babies out of wombs in the first place. Clearly, that’s a conversation the national media doesn’t want.  They want us to talk about only what they tell us to talk about, and if that means turning a blind eye to the women and babies victimized by this industry, well, so be it.

Update: LifeNews reports MRC’s Matthew Philbin’s fascinating analysis of media priorities over the last week:

The Rutgers basketball story continues to transfix the media, and why shouldn’t it? Mike Rice, the disgraced former Rutgers basketball coach allegedly killed a woman and at least seven viable, born-alive babies “by plunging scissors into their spinal cords” in his filthy, macabre “house of horrors” abortion clinic.

Oh wait, my mistake.

Rice was fired last week from Rutgers over video of him shoving, kicking and yelling at his players, throwing basketballs at them and – most damning – using “homophobic slurs.” That’s made Rice the most notorious villain in America. And in one week it earned him 36 network news stories clocking in at 41 minutes, 26 seconds of air time on ABC, CBS and NBC.

Now, had Rice been accused of killing a woman and eight babies, he’d be enjoying the same anonymity as Kermit Gosnell– provided the killings were carried out in an abortion clinic. Gosnell is the West Philadelphia abortionist who ran an unimaginable charnel house of a “clinic,” for 30 years. Witnesses testified that he may have murdered over 100 babies outside the womb. Gosnell’s trial, underway for weeks, has featured wrenching testimony and horrific details. And it has received exactly zero seconds of airtime on the broadcast networks.

Incredible — which describes the mainstream media pretty well.

Update: This is a few months old, but the 3801 Lancaster Project made this documentary of the case that’s worth a watch.  There may be more coming, too.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J7YmrsY4KSY

Caution: Some disturbing images included, as you may well imagine.