The Politics of Abortion

Submitted by Meteor Man on Tue, 06/27/2017 - 12:08pm

As we fight the same old cultural battles of the 60's all over again, it's reassuring to see that Cecile Richards, President of Planned Parenthood, is not giving an inch. From The Atlantic: https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.theatlantic.com/amp/article/531726/
Planned Parenthood Still Believes It Can Win The Culture Wars

"It’s more important than ever that we stand loud and proud for the ability of any woman—regardless of her income, her geography, her immigration status, her sexuality, her sexual orientation—to access the full range of reproductive health care,” Richards said. “We’ve got to pull the curtains back and be open and honest about this procedure that one in three women will have at some point in their lifetime, and their right to make that decision.”

She is not alone. Sister Simone enters the fray over at Common Dreams: https://www.commondreams.org/news/2017/06/26/sister-simone-republicans-t...

"This bill preys on the most vulnerable!...Medicaid dollars benefit seniors residing in nursing homes, including many Catholic Sisters who have served their entire lives tending to the most vulnerable. It also affects people with disabilities, whose care can be too expensive for a family to manage. But, Republican efforts to cut Medicaid funding arbitrarily will jeopardize their lives and well being."

This article from Huff Post in 2015 contains my favorite quote from my favorite nun, Sister Joan Chitister:
No One Is Pro Abortion: http://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/7957558

I do not believe that just because you’re opposed to abortion, that that makes you pro-life. In fact, I think in many cases, your morality is deeply lacking if all you want is a child born but not a child fed, not a child educated, not a child housed. And why would I think that you don’t? Because you don’t want any tax money to go there. That’s not pro-life. That’s pro-birth. We need a much broader conversation on what the morality of pro-life is.

I'll wrap this up with a link to Sister Joan Chitister's Huff Post Blog:

Tags:

Obamacare Repeal Planned Parenthood. Abortion

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Comments

Submitted by earthling1 on Tue, 06/27/2017 - 1:26pm

Cecile Richards supported Clinton's opposition

to single payer. Understandably, there would be no reason for PP if there was Medicare to all.
This comment got me hide rated at GOS.
But you can't be FOR the best healthcare for women, and against Medicare for all.

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Submitted by UntimelyRippd on Wed, 06/28/2017 - 12:39pm

Single-payer would be a boon to PP.

@earthling1
Single-payer means exactly that: One source of payment. It reflects only the demand side of the equation. The supply side, which is where PP lives, would get paid and paid and paid, because millions of women would suddenly be able to see a physician for regular reproductive health maintenance services.

Richards' support of Clinton represented a shocking abandonment of the actual interests of her organization, in favor of playing the insider politics game (with a hefty measure of identity politics thrown in as well).

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Submitted by dkmich on Tue, 06/27/2017 - 2:11pm

While I obviously support abortion rights and birth control,

I am not fan of Planned Parenthood. If the GOP takes every dime, it will be just dessert.

I am also in favor of changes to the abortion laws. As technology advances, it becomes more and more important for abortion to be "the" last resort and for birth control to be freely available. I also think the rights of men to be or not to be fathers have to be given more weight.

—

"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon

Submitted by thanatokephaloides on Tue, 06/27/2017 - 3:03pm

Why ?

@dkmich

While I obviously support abortion rights and birth control, I am not fan of Planned Parenthood. If the GOP takes every dime, it will be just dessert.

Why?

—

"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar

"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides

Submitted by Pricknick on Tue, 06/27/2017 - 5:11pm

I too ask why?

@thanatokephaloides
I detest Cecile Richards, but Planned Parenthood does a lot of other very important work with family planning and helping those who have little get decent healthcare. The abortion work is but a fraction of the overall scope of PP.

—

Regardless of the path in life I chose, I realize it's always forward, never straight.

Submitted by TheOtherMaven on Tue, 06/27/2017 - 3:51pm

How do you "win" when you give away

everything that you claim to be fighting for?

Edit: Canada does just fine without any laws regarding abortion at all. Maybe we should go and do likewise.

—

There is no justice. There can be no peace.

Submitted by thanatokephaloides on Tue, 06/27/2017 - 6:33pm

no laws on abortion at all

@TheOtherMaven

Edit: Canada does just fine without any laws regarding abortion at all. Maybe we should go and do likewise.

We'd have to rid ourselves of roughly one-third of our population -- devout Catholics and the various flavors of hyper-Evangelical Protestants -- in order to pull that one off.

One example: Oklahoma has a law which requires married women to obtain their husbands' consent to medically necessary hysterectomies. Today. In 2017.

There is absolutely no reason behind any such law any atheist would accept as real. None whatsoever. That law exists solely to pacify preachers. Period.

And gak!!

—

"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar

"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides

Submitted by FuturePassed on Tue, 06/27/2017 - 10:33pm

We wouldn't have to get rid of anyone.

@thanatokephaloides
We have to outvote them. We'd also need a movement led by people who aren't willing to accept compromises that anointed politicians believe will add to their vote totals. Bernie Sanders had a 100% vote rating from Planned Parenthood. Hillary Clinton changed her position on late term abortion depending on the particular electorate from which she was seeking office.

I damn well do have other places to go.I wish Cecile Richards would find one.

Submitted by lizzyh7 on Wed, 06/28/2017 - 10:52am

As well as hammering on the point

@FuturePassed that their religious views should NOT be part of making laws, especially laws where the practice of medicine is concerned. We were supposed to have freedom OF as well as freedom FROM religion, at least according to those founders they love to spout off about.

—

Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur

Submitted by UntimelyRippd on Wed, 06/28/2017 - 12:44pm

Yet somehow Canada managed it, despite also having

@thanatokephaloides
1/3 of their population being devout Catholics.

One of my father's closest friends was almost murdered by that American whackjob, standing in his own living room about a mile from my Dad's house (in Canada). The bullet ruined his shoulder and ended his practice -- a man who helped deliver literally thousands of babies over his career.

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Submitted by UntimelyRippd on Wed, 06/28/2017 - 12:53pm

Religion is the weapon of the misogynists, not the source.

@thanatokephaloides
Which is not intended to be a defense of religion, generally.

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Submitted by Meteor Man on Tue, 06/27/2017 - 3:51pm

Quality Healthcare For All

I am an ardent supporter of Father's Rights, which is the primary reason for my enduring contempt for Sheila Keul, who was a big pusher of the "deadbeat dad" narrative and punitive child support collection practices:

This sort of paternity suit--a by-product of requirements that mothers who want to receive welfare to name some guy as the father of their children--has become a national scandal, affecting an estimated 10 million men. The child-support money doesn't even go to the woman and her children, but to the county government as a sort of reimbursement for the welfare checks (minus, of course, the cost of paying all the bureaucrats who enforce the system). Furthermore, most states don't even require that the man be personally served with a summons for the paternity suit, which means the county can just mail it to an address where the presumed dad might have lived. This virtually ensures that a lot of men, especially low-income men, will never receive the summons. And if they don't, and the time period--usually 30 days--passes for them to contest the paternity summons in court, well, tough luck. The county can obtain a "default" (no-show) judgment declaring them to be the father, and they're on the hook for wage-garnishments, even if a blood or DNA test proves conclusively that they never could have been the dad.

http://www.iwf.org/blog/2426540/When-%22Deadbeat-Dads%22-Aren't-Even-the-Real-Dads

One of the most depraved aspects of family law is the idea that absentee Father's should be punished for not making child support payments by repealing trade and business licenses as well as drivers licenses. I also believe that it is a travesty that courts enforce child support payments even when the mother denies visitation rights.

There is a lot of controversy over exactly what services Planned Parenthood provides. Here is a Wiki summary:

Services

The services provided by PPFA affiliates vary by location, with just over half of all Planned Parenthood affiliates in the United States performing abortions.[47] Services provided by PPFA include birth control and long-acting reversible contraception;[48] emergency contraception; clinical breast examinations; cervical cancer screening; pregnancy testing and pregnancy options counseling; testing and treatment for sexually transmitted infections; sex education; vasectomies; LGBT services; and abortion.[49][50] Contrary to the assumption of some, Planned Parenthood conducts cancer screenings but does not provide mammograms.[51]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planned_Parenthood

I can't agree with giving a prospective father or anyone else authority to deny a woman the right to make a very difficult decision based on medical consultation and her own informed conscience. Compelled child birth is not an acceptable demand to impose on any woman.

Peace Out

(my reply to dkmich insists on being a new comment. I don't know why)

—

"They'll say we're disturbing the peace, but there is no peace. What really bothers them is that we are disturbing the war." Howard Zinn

Submitted by thanatokephaloides on Tue, 06/27/2017 - 6:40pm

rubber, meet road!

@Meteor Man

Regardless of how one feels about Fathers' Rights et al, this is where the rubber hits the road:

I can't agree with giving a prospective father or anyone else authority to deny a woman the right to make a very difficult decision based on medical consultation and her own informed conscience. Compelled child birth is not an acceptable demand to impose on any woman.

I am an ardent supporter of Father's Rights, which is the primary reason for my enduring contempt for Sheila Keul, who was a big pusher of the "deadbeat dad" narrative and punitive child support collection practices: This sort of paternity suit--a by-product of requirements that mothers who want to receive welfare to name some guy as the father of their children--has become a national scandal, affecting an estimated 10 million men. The child-support money doesn't even go to the woman and her children, but to the county government as a sort of reimbursement for the welfare checks (minus, of course, the cost of paying all the bureaucrats who enforce the system). Furthermore, most states don't even require that the man be personally served with a summons for the paternity suit, which means the county can just mail it to an address where the presumed dad might have lived. This virtually ensures that a lot of men, especially low-income men, will never receive the summons. And if they don't, and the time period--usually 30 days--passes for them to contest the paternity summons in court, well, tough luck. The county can obtain a "default" (no-show) judgment declaring them to be the father, and they're on the hook for wage-garnishments, even if a blood or DNA test proves conclusively that they never could have been the dad. http://www.iwf.org/blog/2426540/When-%22Deadbeat-Dads%22-Aren't-Even-the-Real-Dads One of the most depraved aspects of family law is the idea that absentee Father's should be punished for not making child support payments by repealing trade and business licenses as well as drivers licenses. I also believe that it is a travesty that courts enforce child support payments even when the mother denies visitation rights. There is a lot of controversy over exactly what services Planned Parenthood provides. Here is a Wiki summary: Services The services provided by PPFA affiliates vary by location, with just over half of all Planned Parenthood affiliates in the United States performing abortions.[47] Services provided by PPFA include birth control and long-acting reversible contraception;[48] emergency contraception; clinical breast examinations; cervical cancer screening; pregnancy testing and pregnancy options counseling; testing and treatment for sexually transmitted infections; sex education; vasectomies; LGBT services; and abortion.[49][50] Contrary to the assumption of some, Planned Parenthood conducts cancer screenings but does not provide mammograms.[51] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planned_Parenthood I can't agree with giving a prospective father or anyone else authority to deny a woman the right to make a very difficult decision based on medical consultation and her own informed conscience. Compelled child birth is not an acceptable demand to impose on any woman. Peace Out (my reply to dkmich insists on being a new comment. I don't know why)

—

"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar

"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides