I received a quote in an email recently that seemed too damning to be true.

And it was, or at least, the last three words were.

Even though the political proof of this particular Presidential candidate's abortion rights support is a well-known, well-accepted given, it struck me as being something the all-too-clever Hillary Clinton would never allow herself to be caught dead saying.

Senator Hillary Clinton is a known abortion advocate. Remember when Hillary's first post-Election-2004 speech bent over backwards to sound kinder and gentler toward the pro-life movement and ideals and we reminded folks this new rhetoric was just windowdressing by citing all her abortion-supporting quotes/actions up to that point? This "common ground" façade, then, began almost three years ago, when we blogged on her obvious hypocrisy.

Since then, she only has uttered lip service about wanting abortion to be "rare." Even those who support her know this. It's why they rave when she gives an abortion-supporting speech such as the one she gave to Planned Parenthood Public Affairs on July 17, 2007.

The emailed, suspect Clinton quote from that speech had three knockout words at the end:

When I am President, I will devote my very first days in office to reversing the ideological, anti-science, anti-prevention policies that this administration has put into place. I will start with reversing the Mexico City Policy and will not rest until we once again protect women's health, honor family privacy and restore fundamental constitutional freedoms to unlimited abortion.

I just had to go spelunking.

Here's what Planned Parenthood deems fit to publish about the Presidential candidates' quotes on abortion.

Reading those, it is clear this leopardess really has not changed her spots at all, but those three words weren't quoted there.

Clinton's own website states:

When it comes to each woman's ability to make the most personal of life decisions, Hillary has stood firm as an advocate for a woman's right to choose...Hillary has fought the relentless and insidious efforts by far-right Republicans to limit the protections of Roe v Wade, while also working hard to expand access to family planning services...And she helped found Vital Voices...

Vital Voices exists to make abortion rights equal to a global human right, objecting to what liberals call "Global Gag Rule" (as if it that was its official name) rather than objecting to the lack of bona fide medical care and resources in developing countries.

Planned Parenthood's and Hillary's own website quotes make it extremely clear that she is still most definitely 100% in favor of abortion staying legal and available to any woman who wants it and that she positively glows about "the importance of Roe v. Wade – that it truly is the touchstone of reproductive freedom and the embodiment of our most fundamental rights that no one, no judge, no governor, no senator, no president has the right to take away." (Excerpt of that July 17, 2007 speech to Planned Parenthood Public Affairs Retreat and Roundtable)

Various liberal/prochoice sites and authors were there to hear that speech and gave Clinton thumbs ups for being so definitively pro-Roe. For example, this one wrote: "Mrs. Clinton gets my vote for most improved. She didn't once call abortion tragic."

You can google dozens of liberal pro-choice sites yourselves, just as I did. Several of them (American Prospect and Salon, to name two) truncated the quote at "women's health" but otherwise left it as is.

The accurate, fuller quote comes, not from Planned Parenthood, but from Laura Echevarria, a former Director of Media Relations and a spokesperson for the National Right to Life Committee (NRLC) for seven years and a LifeNews.com columnist, who quoted Clinton in August of 2007:

[W]hen I'm president, I will devote my very first days in office to reversing these ideological, anti-science, anti-prevention policies that this administration has put into place. Starting with the 'Global Gag Rule' [Mexico City Policy] and going from there and I will not rest until we once again protect women's health, honor families' privacy and restore our fundamental Constitutional freedoms.

Laura actually transcribed the entire speech and had the transcription checked and double-checked by third parties, since she could not find a transcription online anywhere. Planned Parenthood did not transcribe it but they did post video of the speeches by Clinton, Obama and Elizabeth Edwards on their www.imoneinamillion.com website.

So while Hillary's actions speak louder than her words, those last three words apparently did not come from her lips in public at that speech.

As Laura shared with me, "[The inaccurate quote] may have started out that someone put 'to unlimited abortion' in brackets and someone else took the brackets out, etc. (Remember the telephone game when played when we were children?) but it is incorrect."

The overwhelming majority of us who have seen the incorrect quote are issuing or already have issued communications correcting and dismissing the inaccurate portion of the quote. We all believe it's important to make this known for the truth's sake.

Knowing how Hillary, Planned Parenthood and nationally known newspaper columnists persist in perpetuating falsehoods in support of abortion, we just really don't want to stoop to that level.

So if you see that quote misquoted anywhere, pass the word: Please respectfully inform the owner/author of that site or communication, that a correction is in order.

If there are any folks using that misquote, I urge you to cleanse it from your communications. Thanks.

And if any pro-choice folks feel the urge to point fingers or "pile on," may I repeat one sentence to you now?

It depends on what the meaning of the word 'is' is.