CTFL-AT answers - Certified Tester Foundation Level Agile Tester (CTFL-AT) Updated: 2024

Q. Aren’t you sentencing women to unsafe abortions?

A. Supporters claim legalized, elective abortion has improved women’s health.⁸ But history tells a different story. Legalization has only given abortionists the cover of law to continue endangering women and taking the lives of children. Abortion-on-demand has harmed women through substandard care and misinformation.⁹

For example, in 2013, Philadelphia abortionist Kermit Gosnell was convicted of not only murdering infants born after failed abortion attempts, but causing the death of a 41-year-old woman during a procedure in his filthy, run-down clinic.

Gosnell’s “house of horrors” is not an outlier in the abortion industry.¹⁰ Abortion clinics across the country are under investigation for dangerous, unsanitary conditions that jeopardize women’s lives and health.¹¹

Q. Doesn’t everyone agree abortion should be legal?

A. Two-thirds of Americans—including nearly 50 percent of Democrats and 70 percent of independents—believe late-term abortion should generally be illegal.¹² Eighty one percent oppose abortions in the third trimester—when the child can live outside the womb and women are at greater risk.¹³ Roughly half of Americans now identify themselves as “pro-life.” An increasing number of Americans oppose abortion because they’ve seen the harm it inflicts on women and realize the brutality of abortion to children.

Q. Don’t you care about women?

A. Part of caring about women’s health and lives includes making sure they’re informed of abortion’s serious risks.

Abortion victimizes both mother and child. Medical evidence shows the significant risks of abortion: Women can suffer from serious infections, depression, and increased risks of premature birth and other dangerous complications in future pregnancies.¹⁴

Women have even been injured and died as a result of legal abortion. Tonya Reaves, a 24-year-old single mother, bled to death in 2012, after an injury caused by a botched abortion in a midtown Chicago Planned Parenthood clinic.¹⁵

Yet, many women are never told about the negative effects of abortion or what an abortion will do to their child.

Those who care about women’s dignity and health should insist that women have the most accurate counseling and comprehensive care—for themselves and their children.

Q. Do you want to outlaw all abortion? Even in cases of rape? Aren’t your views extreme?

A. Rape is a horrific crime that is never the fault of the victim, who deserves prompt and compassionate care.

Facing a pregnancy caused by rape is a difficult and painful situation. But abortion increases physical and emotional harm to a woman and adds another victim to an already terrible crime.

We should protect the life of every child—regardless of how he or she was conceived.²³

What is extreme is using the case of rape to argue abortion should remain legal for any reason—through all nine months of pregnancy. Advocates of abortion argue for abortion-on-demand—even if performed only because the child is a girl, has a disability, or is simply inconvenient. That’s not a view in line with most Americans and only increases the number of women harmed by abortion.

Q. Doesn’t a woman have the right to choose?

A. Many women find themselves in complicated, painful situations that leave them with difficult choices. But when we talk about rights, we have to talk about the rights of all people. Every human being has the right to life—before and after birth. Nothing in the Constitution, rightly understood, prevents the government from protecting that right for everyone.

In fact, government has a duty to protect the most vulnerable in society and recognize the inherent value of all human life. We cannot exclude the youngest children from the precious right to life. We should recognize the dignity of every life by ensuring mothers have accurate information and children are welcomed in life and protected in law.

Q. How does America compare to other nations in terms of abortion law?

A. The United States is one of only a handful of developed countries in which late-term abortions after 20 weeks—5 months—are allowed. At that stage, the child is capable of feeling pain and women are at increased risk for the negative effects of abortion.²⁴ The United States—a country founded to protect unalienable human rights—should not deny those rights to the most vulnerable in our society.

Q. Men don’t know what it’s like to be pregnant. What gives them the right to talk about abortion?

A. Abortion is an issue that affects us all. Men are affected by abortion—by the loss of children, the harm to women they care about, and the loss of their role as fathers.

Abortion-on-demand can serve as a tool for some men to avoid committing to the mothers of their children.

But men who genuinely care about women are concerned about abortion’s threat to women and recognize that both mother and child have a right to life. They acknowledge their responsibility—whether as fathers or concerned community members—to support women during difficult situations.

Q. You supposedly care so much about the fetus before it’s born; why don’t you do anything to help children after they come into this world?

A. Recognizing the inherent dignity of both children and women demands that we care for both people—before and after birth.²⁵

Approximately 2,700 pregnancy centers across the country provide compassionate care to women and their children. These centers offer counseling, material support, community referrals, and medical care.

Most importantly, pregnancy centers empower women by letting them know they have real choices. Women desiring to parent can find support for expectant mothers and fathers. Birthmothers are educated on the beautiful choice of adoption. Pregnancy centers offer information on the many adoption providers who stand ready to connect birthmothers and their children with loving, adoptive families.²⁶

ENDNOTES:

8. “Top 10 Myths About Abortion,” Family Research Council and the American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians & Gynecologists, 2019.

9 .“Unsafe Abortion: More Information Needed for True Informed Consent,” Charlotte Lozier Institute, March 4, 2013.

10. “Exposing the Pervasiveness of ‘Back Alley’ Abortions,” by Denise M. Burke, Women’s Protection Project, Americans United for Life, 2013.

11. Ibid.

12. “Americans’ Opinions On Abortion, Knights of Columbus/Marist Poll, 2022.

13. “Historical Trends: Abortion,” Gallup.

14. Byron C. Calhoun, M.D. and Mailee Smith, “Significant Potential Harm: Growing medical evidence of abortion’s negative impact on women,” Defending Life 2013: Deconstructing Roe: Abortion’s Negative Impact on Women, Americans United for Life (Washington, D.C.: 2013).

15. Charmaine Yoest, Ph.D. “Batgirl v. Baby Girl,” Defending Life 2013: Deconstructing Roe: Abortion’s Negative Impact on Women, Americans United for Life (Washington, D.C.: 2013).

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23. “The ‘Hard Cases’ of Abortion: A Pro-life Response,” Family Research Council, 2000.

24. “Gestational Limits on Abortion in the United States Compared to International Norms,” The Charlotte Lozier Institute, 2014.

25. Helen Alvaré, Greg Pfundstein, Matthew Schmitz and Ryan T. Anderson, “The Lazy Slander of the Pro-Life Cause,” Public Discourse, January 17, 2011.

26. “Pregnancy Centers Stand the Test of Time,” The Charlotte Lozier Institute, 2020.

Lupus is not contagious, not even through sexual contact. You cannot "catch" lupus from someone or "give" lupus to someone.

Lupus develops in response to a combination of factors both inside and outside the body, including hormones, genetics, and environment.

If you suspect your symptoms might be related to lupus, take the Could It Be Lupus Questionnaire.

Lupus is a complicated disease that affects different people in different ways. For some, lupus can be mild — for others, it can be life threatening.

Right now, there’s no cure for lupus. The good news is that with the support of your doctors and loved ones, you can learn to manage it.

Start by learning as much as you can about lupus.

What is lupus?

Lupus is a chronic (long-term) disease that can cause pain and inflammation in any part of the body.

Learn more about lupus

Around 1.5 million people in the United States are living with lupus.

What are the symptoms of lupus?

Lupus can cause a lot of different symptoms that come and go over time. Common symptoms include a butterfly-shaped rash on the cheeks and nose, pain or swelling in the joints, and fatigue (feeling tired often).

Learn more about symptoms of lupus

How do doctors diagnose lupus?

There’s no single test for lupus. If your doctor thinks you might have lupus, they’ll ask  you questions about your symptoms and do a few different lab tests to find a diagnosis .

Learn more about diagnosing lupus

What are the treatments for lupus?

Most people with lupus take several different medicines to manage their symptoms. If you have lupus, you and your doctors can work together to find the right treatment plan for you.

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How can I manage daily life with lupus?

Living with lupus can be hard, but there’s a lot you can do to manage your symptoms and make your daily life easier.

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At the Lupus Foundation of America, we support researchers who are working to cure lupus and find better treatments for lupus symptoms.

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Defensive lineman Arik Armstead joined the 49ers "You've Got Mail" podcast presented by Delta Dental to discuss his fourth-straight nomination for the Walter Payton NFL Man of the Year Award, reflect on starting his own podcast and answer fan-submitted questions.

This past summer has been plagued with canceled flights, delayed departures and more airport passenger nightmares than one can count. From August 12 to August 20, 2023, there have been more than 3,270 canceled flights, according to reporting from USAToday and FlightAware.

While America maintains the safest aviation system in the world, the agency that manages our skies has been without a permanent leader since late 2022, when Stephen Dickson, a Trump appointee, stepped down as administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration (F.A.A.).

In early September, the Biden administration nominated Michael G. Whitaker to lead the agency.

If confirmed by the Senate, Whitaker will take control of the F.A.A. at a time of prevalent staff shortages, continued struggle between airline labor unions and management, and some of the highest demand for air travel since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.

On his first day as F.A.A. administrator, Whitaker’s likely to face the challenge of building a strong commercial airplane pilot workforce. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, there are currently close to 17,000 openings for airline and commercial pilots in the U.S., and not enough trained pilots.

Additionally, the United States is projected to have a shortfall of 8,165 pilots. This creates a dilemma for mainline carriers and exacerbates problems for regional carriers who are losing their licensed pilots in the mainline shortage.

Whitaker currently serves as C.E.O. of Supernal, a Hyundai Motor Group company that’s designing an electric advanced air mobility vehicle. Before his time at Supernal, Whitaker served as deputy F.A.A. administrator and group C.E.O. at InterGlobe — India's largest travel conglomerate.

He also spent more than 15 years in executive leadership at United Airlines.

Such experience proves to be of some value to Omar Brock, a licensed commercial pilot who launched the Brock Foundation, an organization dedicated to helping inner-city youth explore careers in aviation.

Through the Brock Foundation, Brock is taking his passion for aerospace to the next generation. With a model centered on mentoring young pilots of color, he has created an aviation pipeline that starts at free events around the country where young people are exposed to flying. Participants then receive free ground training through a partnership with Microsoft.

Brock started as a commercial pilot in 2020 after working as an airline flight attendant to pay his way through flight training. With an estimated 3 percent of the commercial pilots being Black and only 5 percent being Latino or Latina, Brock believes expanding the pilot pipeline to communities of color is a surefire way to solve current and future retail pilot shortages.

"[T]he barriers to aviation are the same today as they were years ago. For young future pilots of color, they lack access to exposure, resources, and industry mentors,” Brock said. "Once we check off the boxes on the ground training and providing mentorship, our programs push participants into the flight training process.”

The current commercial pilot shortage facing the United States has been years in the making. It’s a result of COVID-19 early retirement packages that airlines offered pilots to curb long-term costs. Other factors include mandatory commercial pilot retirement at 65, fleet expansion, and a new federal law that increases co-pilot minimum flight hours.

These changes have also caused airlines to trim their pilot training programs, which they are now trying to return to scale. Wage disparities and potential strike action have also caused a decline in skilled pilot availability. As such, some airlines have discontinued servicing regional airports throughout the country.

As aerospace expert Geoff Murray explained in his report for international management consulting firm Oliver Wyman, this turn of events has compelled airlines to make serious overtures.

"Pilots started seeing improved salaries and a renewed focus on pilot quality of life, a faster career progression timeline, and more job security," Murray said in his report.

"For regional airline pilots, salaries are as much as 86% higher than they were just three years ago; for the larger carriers, they're up modestly, but latest labor agreements and those expected to be negotiated in 2023 suggest significant increases to come," the report continued.

Murray, a partner at Oliver Wyman, further explained the change to Forbes.

"Nearly overnight, with the outbreak of COVID-19, the conversation shifted from shortage to surplus,” Murray said. “For carriers that were struggling with pilot supply, this has provided a momentary reprieve.”

However, the aviation industry still has a ways to go.

Rally For Air Service, a national advocacy group for regional airports, said that, despite rising passenger demand, 75% of U.S. airports have less air service today than before the pandemic.

"Airports have lost an average of 31% of their flights, a figure that has worsened and will worsen without action," Rally For Air Service said in a statement.

"Aircraft[s] have already been parked and will continue to be parked, causing significant disruption to small communities and Essential Air Service markets that rely on smaller aircrafts to keep them connected to the U.S. air transportation system,” the statement read.

That’s why the Brock Foundation partners with several high schools to speed up the pipeline and provide inflight training earlier for minority students. Its flight training program helps to lay the foundation for certification, licensure and ultimately the commercial pilot designation.

"When we do engagement in communities of color, we are the first encounter that most of our students have with a Black pilot," Brock said.

Through a test program—A.S.A.T.P.—at Morrow High School in an Atlanta suburb, the Brock Foundation is collaborating with the school district to turn students who are interested in aviation from student pilots to commercial pilots by graduation.

"In this program, we go in two to three days a week, and we teach the private pilot ground school curriculum," Brock said. "We work with sophomores, and in their senior year, we have committed to creating commercial pilots."

As the nation continues its search for more pilots, Brock and his colleagues at the Brock Foundation hope to expand programming by providing prospective pilots the ground and physical aircraft training necessary to gain commercial pilot certification.

Amid the current crisis, Brock sees a bigger opening for his foundation and the young people they reach.

"We want to open a Black-owned airport,” Brock exclaimed. “And we want to have a space where we take in the future aviators of tomorrow, and we want to acquire planes.”

Murray called programs like the Brock Foundation a remedy for the current staffing shortage.

"One obvious answer would be to recruit more women and minorities — something that has not proven easy for the industry to date, Murray said. "Besides an improved value proposition for new recruits and expanding the pool of candidates, carriers will also need to explore other solutions such as better sponsorship of candidates to make the career path more accessible."

For Brock and his team, accessibility to aviation for students of color is about exposing them to another feeling of freedom.

"Being up in the air and looking down at the world and everyone under you. And literally cloud surfing, it's a feeling of freedom that every young aviator should be exposed to,” Brock said.

With Whitaker’s nomination pending in the Senate and a more significant push for equity inclusion from the White House and the Department of Transportation, the Brock Foundation could be on the cutting edge of introducing more young Black and Brown commercial pilots to the freedom of the friendly skies.

For much of human history, most individuals have lacked economic freedom and opportunity, condemning them to poverty and deprivation.

Today, we live in the most prosperous time in human history. Poverty, sicknesses, and ignorance are receding throughout the world, due in large part to the advance of economic freedom. In 2023, the principles of economic freedom that have fueled this monumental progress are once again measured in the Index of Economic Freedom, an annual guide published by The Heritage Foundation, Washington's No. 1 think tank.

For twenty-nine years the Index has delivered thoughtful analysis in a clear, friendly, and straight-forward format. With new resources for users and a website tailored for research and education, the Index of Economic Freedom is poised to help readers track over two decades of the advancement in economic freedom, prosperity, and opportunity and promote these ideas in their homes, schools, and communities.

The Index covers 12 freedoms – from property rights to financial freedom – in 184 countries.

2018 Press Releases

Dr. Edwin Feulner, Founder of the Heritage Foundation presents a copy of the 2018 Index of Economic Freedom.

When the full-time whistle rang out in Dingwall on Sunday, you didn’t have to look far to find some disconsolate Partick Thistle supporters. 

Two thousand fans had made the long journey up to the Highlands, hoping to witness their team get their promotion bid over the line, before a second-half collapse saw Ross County score three times in the final 20 minutes to take the game to extra-time. The home side eventually triumphed in a penalty shoot-out to preserve their top-flight status, simultaneously crushing the spirits of the away contingent. 

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