In July, 2013 Governor Rick Perry signed into law a bill, HB 2,  regulating abortion in Texas. What the bill did was bring the freewheeling abortion industry under the same type of regulation as other similar medical facilities. While useful in itself, it also exposed the utterly fraudulent nature of anyone who uses “women’s health” as an excuse to support abortion. Because abortion is big money and abortion centers, contrary to what Planned Parenthood claims, don’t exist to provide “cancer screenings” and “counseling” they predictably went crazy.

The Planned Parenthood challenge to the law landed in the court of a tame, agenda driven septuagenarian federal judge who granted an injunction… which survived for five days. From my post at the time:

People can disagree about whether the outcome of the ruling is just, but it is difficult to read the judge’s ruling and come away believing it is anything other than a crime against logic.

Texas immediately appealed and, on October 31, in what may very well be the shortest injunction in the history of abortion litigation a panel of the Fifth Circuit vacated the injunction and allowed Texas to enforce its law.

Planned Parenthood appealed to the Supreme Court and had its ass handed to them there.

The latest challenge was directed at the part of the law that requires abortion centers to meet the same licensing requirements as ambulatory surgical centers, because a dead woman is a small price to pay to keep the abortion industry in business. It went back to Yeakel’s court room and, sure as clockwork, he ruled in favor of the party he likes. He even went so far as to overturn part of the previous ruling by the 5th Circuit that had been affirmed by the Supreme Court.

Today a panel of the 5th Circuit reversed Yeakel and allowed the law to take effect:

The decision by a three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, in New Orleans, will have a far-reaching effect on abortion services in Texas, lawyers for abortion providers said. The ruling gave Texas permission to require all abortion clinics in the state to meet the same building, equipment and staffing standards as hospital-style surgical centers, standards that abortion providers said were unnecessary and costly, but that the state argued improved patient safety.

Thirteen clinics whose facilities do not meet the new standards were to be closed overnight, leaving Texas — a state with 5.4 million women of reproductive age, ranking second in the country — with eight abortion providers, all in Houston, Austin and two other metropolitan regions. No abortion facilities will be open west or south of San Antonio.

This decision was a winner for everyone but Planned Parenthood, the pro-abort movement, the quack doctors who perform abortions, and the addled Judge Yeakel.

Texas’s sovereign authority to regulate businesses and the medical profession has been upheld. The authority of the Texas Legislature has been affirmed. Tens of thousands of babies will survive. Hundreds or thousands of women will not be maimed, killed, or suffer future medical problems because they had an abortion in facilities with less regulatory oversight than your typical fast food restaurant.

Tactically, this validates how to successfully challenge the practice of abortion by legislation in an environment where Roe v. Wade is precedent and the federal judiciary is staffed with partisan activists like Judge Yeakel who think they are emperors.