The Center For Disease Control And Prevention (“CDC”) reported this week that the abortion rate in the United States dropped in 2009 to an all-time low.
The reason? Increased use of contraception, more particularly increased use of the most effective types of contraception.
For example, sixty percent of teenage girls who have sex now use the most effective kinds of contraception, including the pill and patch. IUD use is increasing. These devices essentially prevent “user error.” And, use of the “morning after” pill — emergency contraception — is also rising.
Controversy raged in the U.S. earlier this year after the Obama Administration proposed requiring health insurers to cover the cost of contraception. Catholic groups called the proposal an attack on religious freedom. Rush Limbaugh called Sandra Fluke a “slut” for her advocacy in support of the proposal. Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) said “[w]hile some Americans may not feel that government mandates forcing them to pay for contraception are an infringement on their religious beliefs, others consider it to be an assault against their freedom of conscience.”
Now, however, we seem to have proof that increased use of contraception is causing a decrease in the abortion rate. The Obama Administration wants contraceptives to be more widely accessible, at lower cost. The abortion rate could drop even lower.
Prevention, of course, is often the best medicine. Doesn’t the Right want to prevent the need for abortion? Doesn’t the Right want the abortion rate to decline? Shouldn’t the Right embrace the CDC report and call for the increased availability of proven effective contraception?
Richard Lugar served Indiana as a Republican United States Senator for decades. But in the Tea Party world, he was too moderate and too prone to compromise. The party nominated Richard Mourdock, whose “interesting” views on rape, pregnancy and abortion caused him to lose in a state that Mitt Romney carried easily.
It looks like Georgia might have an opportunity to follow in Indiana’s footsteps and hand a “safe” Republican seat to the Democrats in 2014. Former Susan G. Komen for the Cure executive Karen Handel could run for US Senate in Georgia in 2014.
You might recall Handel. She resigned after trying to get Komen to stop sending breast cancer screening grants to Planned Parenthood because it provides abortion. In her recent book, Handel says that members of Planned Parenthood “a bunch of schoolyard thugs.”
Handel is given a chance of winning the nomination:
“If she ran, she would be going up against Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.), whom Roll Call reported may be vulnerable to a primary challenge from the right, given his ‘willingness to reach across the aisle and his comfort with the idea of compromise.’”
That’s the same thing that doomed Lugar. He was comfortable with the ‘idea of compromise’ with Democrats, a trait that is verboten in the Tea Party world.
So, Handel says that Planned Parenthood is comprised of “schoolyard thugs”? That’s just like, in Richard Mourdock’s world, pregnancy from rape is “something that God intended to happen.” Great. Replace another compromiser with a reproductive rights radical. That’s learning the lessons of the 2012 election.
The GOP might intend to lose its Senate seat from Georgia.
The “war on women” is costing the GOP with women. Recent polls show President Obama opening twenty point leads over both Mitt Romney and Rick Santoum among women voters. A McCain supported from 2008 quoted in a New York Times article is fairly typical. She said she had recently become “fed up” with the GOP, and may vote Democratic in November: “I’m looking to hear how the candidates propose to put people back to work, not what they think about contraception. I hope to God they stop talking about this,” she said.
The Right’s response to this is to claim that it is “the left” that is waging a war on women. Bill Maher is at the center of the Right’s counter-attack.
The Daily Caller claimed that President Obama had employed a double-standard by refusing to repudiate Maher for calling Sarah Palin the “c” word, while criticizing Rush Limbaugh for calling Sandra Fluke a “slut.”
Michelle Malkin devoted her March 7 blog post to describing the entire litany of bad names that Bill Maher, Keith Olbermann, Matt Taibbi, Ed Schultz, etc. have called conservative women over the years.
Sean Hannity did a six minute segment the other night, with the words “The Left’s War On Women” plastered to the bottom of the screen, where he Dana Perino and Kimberly Guilfoyle ranted about all of the bad names Bill Maher et al. have called women over the years. The words “disgusting,” “typical,” “double-standard” and “misogynistic” were bandied about freely:
And then there is ShePAC, a political action committee pledging to “fight” for conservative women. The splash page on its website says:
Tell President Obama to lead by example. President Obama, who’s calling for civility while failing to offer it, needs to tell Bill Maher he doesn’t want money from someone who treats women this way.
Its slick two-minute video takes President Obama to task not only for taking Bill Maher’s money, but also for appearing on David Letterman’s show after Letterman called Sarah Palin bad names:
Bill Maher and David Letterman are comedians. They earn their living being outrageous. That’s what they do. They are not leaders of “the left.” They are not the ideological heart and soul of the Democratic Party.
The “war on women” is not about calling women bad names. It is about policy. It is about efforts to enact “personhood” measures designed to limit access to abortion. It is about forced ultrasound legislation. It is about efforts to de-fund Planned Parenthood. It is about imposing unnecessary state requirements for operating abortion clinics. It is about legislation seeking to brand un-wed mothers child abusers.
The name-calling on the Right by the likes of Rush Limbaugh is an incident of the broader attack on women’s health issues. It is supportive of that attack. It is not itself the attack.
The attack is far worse than name-calling. When successful, it affects the real lives of real women. Sarah Palin will survive any bad names Bill Maher or David Letterman ever call her.
Several news organizations reported yesterday that the Susan G. Komen Foundation’s decision to yank funding from Planned Parenthood might not have been motivated by the ongoing congressional “investigation” of the organization. Suspicion fell on Komen’s vice-president, former Georgia Secretary of State Karen Handel:
Handel had the backing of former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin in a failed 2010 bid to become the first female governor of Georgia, one that was spiced up by debates and negative advertising over Handel’s position on abortion rights.
Handel has complained about the attacks on her position and said she was ‘staunchly and unequivocally pro-life’ in a blog post at the time . . .
She also attacked Planned Parenthood. ‘First, let me be clear, since I am pro-life, I do not support the mission of Planned Parenthood, Handel wrote.
Karen Handel
That got me thinking. Just what is the “mission” of Planned Parenthood?
I went to the Planned Parenthood website to find out. And there it is, a “mission” statement spelled out in four bullet points:
“to provide comprehensive reproductive and complementary health care services in settings which preserve and protect the essential privacy and rights of each individual”
“to advocate public policies which guarantee these rights and ensure access to such services”
“to provide educational programs which enhance understanding of individual and societal implications of human sexuality”
“to promote research and the advancement of technology in reproductive health care and encourage understanding of their inherent bioethical, behavioral, and social implications”
So, is Handel against “comprehensive and complementary health care services?” Is she against the preservation of privacy in health care matters? Is she against access to health care services? Is she against educational programs on human sexuality? Is she against the advancement of technology in reproductive health care?
Three percent of Planned Parenthood’s services involve abortion. Thirty-four percent of those services concern contraception. The organization estimates that its contraception services alone avert 277,000 abortions annually.
All of this sounds pretty life-affirming. Who is really “pro” life?
It is abundantly clear that Mitt Romney will say anything that he thinks will help him get elected. His views are untethered to anything he said previously on any issue. He claims the right to re-make himself at will, stating that his thinking evolves with the times to account for changed circumstances.
“In the private sector, if you don’t change your view when the facts change, well you’ll get fired for being stubborn and stupid,” he says, attributing the quotation incorrectly to Winston Churchill. The quote actually comes from John Maynard Keynes, the British economist whose writings called for government intervention in the economy to keep market forces in check. Given the stance of the today’s GOP against all things government, First Read issued an “irony alert” on Romney’s invocation of the lion of government regulation into economic matters.
But its all really par for the course with Romney. Nothing means anything to him. If something sounds good, he’ll go with it.
Back in 1994, Romney was running against Ted Kennedy for Senate in liberal Massachusetts. He flashed his pro choice bona fides whenever he could to blunt the fact that he was personally opposed to abortion. He instead framed the issue as not wanting to impose his personal beliefs on anyone. He could be personally opposed to abortion, but nevertheless believed strongly that it should be safe and legal.
He was particularly adamant in a televised debate against Kennedy:
“I believe abortion should be safe and legal in this country.”
He had believed that abortion “should be safe and legal in this country” since 1970 when his mother ran for the Senate as a pro-choice candidate.
“Roe v. Wade has been the law for 20 years, and we should sustain and support it.”
“I sustain and support [Roe v. Wade] and the right of a woman to make that choice.”
“My personal beliefs . . . should not be brought into a political campaign.”
In response to Kennedy’s attack that he was “multiple choice” on abortion rights, Romney recounted that a “dear” family member of his died many years earlier “from an illegal abortion.” Romney thus stated that, since that time, he and his family have been “committed to the belief” that they would not impose their personal views on abortion onto others. “You will not see me wavering,” Romney stated quite definitively.
Here it is:
Romney had a good story to tell. He was personally and powerfully affected by an illegal and unsafe abortion. His mother courageously ran for the Senate as a pro-choice candidate in 1970. Like his mother, he pledged not to impose his personal views on abortion on others. He understood that Roe v. Wade was the law of the land, and said in no uncertain terms that the decision should be “respected” and “supported.” Many pro-choice persons would agree wholeheartedly with the views Romney expressed in 1994.
Romney went on Mike Huckabee’s program over the weekend. He does not think that Roe v. Wade should either be “supported” or “respected.” Instead, he says he favors a constitutional amendment to overturn the decision:
Make no mistake about Romney’s statement. He says he not only supports overturning Roe v. Wade by constitutional amendment in the present, but also that he “would have” supported such an amendment, as in “the past.” That was a “past” in which he said that the decision was the law of the land and that he supported access to safe and legal abortions because a “dear” relative of his died from an illegal and unsafe abortion.
Who knows whether Romney still believes that his mother ran a courageous campaign as a pro-choice candidate back in 1970, three years before the Supreme Court issued Roe v. Wade. Maybe he believes it, maybe he doesn’t. It makes no difference to Romney. The past is something that he can re-write whenever it suits him. He’s afraid of being fired — or, in this case not being hired — because he might look “stubborn” and “stupid.” He wouldn’t want that to happen. He will just make it all up as he goes along. He wavers all of the time.
Stung by the continuing criticism of her claim that vaccinations against HPV could lead to “mental retardation,” Michele Bachmann today issued a strong endorsement in favor of healthcare privacy:
“I oppose any governor or president who mandates a family’s healthcare choices and violates the rights of parents on these issues.”
Healthcare decisions, Bachmann said, “are best left to parents, the children and their doctors and should take into consideration the child’s health and the family’s values”:
Bachmann, of course, touts herself as being “100% pro-life” and thinks abortion should be illegal in all circumstances. She even said recently that as President she would “most assuredly” confront the Supreme Court over Roe v. Wade.
Call me old-fashioned, but I thought the decision whether to terminate a pregnancy was one of those “healthcare choices” “best left” to the pregnant woman, her family and her doctor, taking “into consideration” the woman’s health and, of course, “the family’s values.”
I guess for Michele Bachmann, a “family’s values” should only sometimes be taken into consideration when in the making of healthcare decisions. Sometimes the government can make a healthcare decision for a family, sometimes it can’t.
Healthcare privacy thus is just one more thing Bachmann knows when she sees it.
