In the House, Rep. Bart Stupak is trying to both effectively ban insurance coverage for abortion and enact a back door parental/spousal consent law that would apply to the whole country. How's that again?
In sum, the current House bill includes the Capps amendment, explained here by Rep. Lois Capps. I'm not a fan of the Capps amendment, this bill's exemplification of Democratic cowardice in defending women's rights, but one thing anyone with decent reading comprehension can gather is that it forbids federal funding for abortion by continuing the existing ban on same (the same ban that Obama now regards as a hallowed tradition, never to be challenged.) Rep. Stupak has lied, saying that the Capps amendment mandates federal abortion coverage, when it only says that at least one plan covering abortion must be available in the exchange alongside one that doesn't.
As has been pointed out repeatedly, because the majority of private plans now cover abortion, the Capps amendment is a step backward.
Stupak's main lie, popular among misogynists, is that because money is fungible, no effective barrier can be set up between federal premium dollars and coverage for abortion. This was flatly contradicted by the testimony of counsel to the Senate Finance Committee when they were marking up their version of health coverage reform. The Senators were told that not only was it possible to separate the funds, but existing plans already do this in relation to other restrictions on the use of federal money for health care.
Stupak's rule will likely have much of the same chilling effect as a spousal and parental consent law. Also, it will further stigmatize those who've had abortions, by singling out women who need the procedure. Even though the lifetime likelihood of having an abortion is nearly twice, among women, the lifetime risk of prostate cancer in men, and not much less than a woman's lifetime chances of getting diabetes.
A Capitol Hill source confirmed to me that if the House bill is opened to amendments on the floor, leadership expects that conservative Democrats and Republicans will combine forces to enact Stupak's ban on abortion coverage in the insurance exchange. If the bill goes to the floor under a closed rule, no amendments allowed, Bart Stupak will have had a lot to do with it.
I'm not alone in my displeasure over Obama's appointment of Alexia Kelley, an abortion opponent, to director of the Department of Health and Human Services' Center for Faith-Based and Community Initiatives. Kumbaya.
But that's not the worst of it. Kelley is apparently opposed even to contraception. Which is crazy with a side of guano.
Dr. George Tiller, one of the few physicians in the country who performed second and third trimester abortions, was fatally shot in church on Sunday. It seems that Tiller was marked for death because of his work. The man charged with murdering Tiller, 51-year-old Scott Roeder, has a 20-year history of anti-choice and anti-government extremism.
“I think abstinence is, I don't know how to put it — like, the main — everyone should be abstinent or whatever, but it's not realistic at all,” new mother Bristol Palin told Greta Van Susteren in an interview on Fox News (video below). Bristol's unwed, teenage pregnancy made headlines last year just as her mother, Gov. Sarah Palin, kicked off her vice presidential bid.
This is a follow-up to "Dems About To Collapse On Contraceptives In Stimulus Plan???". According to Elana Schor at TPMDC, "Family Planning Aid is Gone For Good From the Stimulus". True or not, we need to fully realize just how bad this is, so we understand the parameters that Obama is operating within. Hopefully they can and will be changed, but we cannot be effective in changing them if we don't understand them--particularly if we will fully mis-understand them. First off, Robert in Monterrey, aka "Eugene" had an excellent recommended diary at DKos yesterday, "This Is Not Acceptable", hitting three main points at the crux of the matter:
Why does this battle matter? First, contraception is economic stimulus. Family planning is necessary for American families of all incomes to enjoy financial stability and the ability to plan expenses. If you have an "oops baby" then your finances may suffer severely and unwantedly.
Second, this is a conservative effort to destroy the Obama Administration in the womb. If Obama caves, as now appears likely, then Republicans will have won a truly major victory. They never had a chance to stop the stimulus, but now they will have shown they can dictate some of its terms. They were active in pushing their bullshit talking points to the media - flawed as they were. If Obama is going to cater to their whims, we know from the Bush era how this story ends - Republicans will make more crazy demands, and Democrats will give in to them.
Third, this is part of the conservative effort to attack not just abortion rights, but contraception and the right to privacy. What they have done, and what Obama is about to enable, is something rather stunning - they have made contraception controversial. Sure, some of us might have felt a bit sheepish the first time we bought condoms or picked up the pill at the pharmacy, but we got over it, because it's not controversial or shameful but normal.
Not to the conservatives. They never wanted to stop at rolling back Roe v. Wade - they want to roll back anything smacking of sexual freedom. Griswold v. Connecticut is their true goal, the 1967 case that outlawed bans on contraception and established the right to privacy. If they are going to have a chance at rolling that back, they have to make contraception controversial. And if we are to stop them, we must not yield an inch to them - we must stand up and say "no, you lost, and we are keeping contraception funding."
Don't look now, but the Democrats are about to do something incredibly stupid, which:
(1) Betrays their base.
(2) Empowers a powerless opposition.
(3) Gives credence to a narrative trope that can be used to bash them repeatedly in the future.
(4) Totally misses the opportunity to start building a new narrative--the sort of thing that's absolutely vitale to long-term political success.
What's this all about? Simple: Caving into GOP pressure to remove contraceptives from the stimulus plan. AP reports:
House Democrats are likely to jettison family planning funds for the low-income from an $825 billion economic stimulus bill, officials said late Monday, following a personal appeal from President Barack Obama at a time the administration is courting Republican critics of the legislation.
Several officials said a final decision was expected on Tuesday, coinciding with Obama's scheduled visit to the Capitol for separate meetings with House and Senate Republicans.
The provision has emerged as a point of contention among Republicans, who criticize it as an example of wasteful spending that would neither create jobs nor otherwise improve the economy.
Under the provision, states no longer would be required to obtain federal permission to offer family planning services - including contraceptives - under Medicaid, the health program for the low-income.
Whatever happened to "states' rights"?
Democrats considered the politically-potent change as congressional budget experts estimated it would take slightly longer for the overall legislation to achieve an impact on the economy than the administration projects.
The Congressional Budget Office said the economy would feel the effects of almost two-thirds of the money over the next year and a half. The administration claims 75 percent of the funding would be absorbed in that period of time, and Obama has pledged that the bill he signs will meet that target and either save or create up to 4 million jobs.
While the debate surrounding the overall impact of the measure pits economists and their statistics against one another, Republicans quickly seized on the family planning money as evidence that the Democrats were advancing an agenda that went beyond the economy.
Yes, how dare the Democrats try to walk and chew gum at the same time! How dare they propose policies that have more than one intended purpose! Remind me again... who won the election?
