Justin's Political Corner

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) has thrown his support behind an anti-abortion measure that’s currently moving through the state legislature, saying he will sign the bill into law if it makes it to his desk. SB 206 would require women to undergo an ultrasound before getting an abortion — which would mandate an invasive transvaginal probe for some of the women who seek early abortions in their first trimester — and force one of the state’s last abortion clinics to close its doors.

“I don’t have any problem with ultrasound,” Walker told reporters on Tuesday in Milwaukee. “I think most people think ultrasounds are just fine.”

Forced ultrasound bills mandate a medically unnecessary procedure that would otherwise be left up to the discretion of a woman and her doctor. Medical experts, including the largest national group representing thousands of OB-GYNs across the country, are opposed to this type of legislation because they say it interferes with their work and compromises their relationships with patients. “All of a sudden, the Senate is full of doctors,” Wisconsin Sen. Tim Cullen (D) said in reference to SB 206′s advancement.

And, even though the lawmakers who push for mandatory ultrasound measures sometimes deny it, these laws also require many women to undergo an invasive transvaginal probe. Before 12 weeks of pregnancy, a transvaginal ultrasound is the only way to detect a clear image— and, since the vast majority of women in the United States seek abortion services in their first trimester, those women must submit to an invasive probe in order to comply with these burdensome laws. Over the past year, reproductive rights advocates have repeatedly decried transvaginal ultrasound laws as “state sponsored rape.”

SB 206 doesn’t stop there. The proposed legislation also includes a provision that would impose additional restrictions on abortion clinics, which would ultimately force a Planned Parenthood clinic to shut down. Since there are only four health clinics in the entire state of Wisconsin that currently provide abortion care, SB 206 could end up severely limiting women’s reproductive access.

The anti-abortion measure was first introduced at the beginning of this month, and it has swiftly advanced in just over a week. Women’s health advocates are accusing the Wisconsin GOP of intentionally fast-tracking SB 206 so that its opponents won’t have enough time to mobilize against it. “This speed of passage sends a clear signal that these legislators want to deny any efforts to ensure due process and are refusing to allow sufficient time for medical providers, advocates, women and their partners to truly weigh in on the anticipated damaging effects of this legislation,” Sara Finger, the executive director of the Wisconsin Alliance for Women’s Health, said in a statement. Finger had less than 24 hours to analyze the legislation before testifying against it.

Walker is expected to follow through on his word to sign SB 206. Throughout his time in office, the GOP governor has approved several attacks on women’s health. Last year, Walker signed three different bills into law to limit abortion access and expand abstinence-only education. And his recent budget stripped family planning funding away from Planned Parenthood, forcing the women’s health organization to close force of its clinics in rural Wisconsin.

Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) is encouraging her colleagues in the House GOP to once again attempt to defund Planned Parenthood, even though in the last election 59% of voters said they were pro-choice and 53% opposed efforts to defund the women’s health organization. But not according to Blackburn, who told Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council yesterday that “the majority of the American people,” and “the majority of American women,” oppose abortion rights and Planned Parenthood funding.

Blackburn claimed that Planned Parenthood “outsources” cancer screenings and birth control services and uses federal money “to subsidize the abortion services,” while Perkins worried that the government was creating a “feeder system for the abortion business” by naming it as a “resource” for women.

Contrary to their assertions, the government is banned from funding abortion services (which represent just 3% of Planned Parenthood services) and the dollars are not fungible.

h/t: Brian Tashman at RWW

 

Kermit Gosnell has been found guilty of first-degree murder. Pro-choice groups cheered the ruling. He is a criminal, as Planned Parenthood, NARAL, and nearly every pro-choice writer who has written about this case have emphatically stated, and a vivid picture of what abortion was like before legalization. He has received due process and will soon receive his due – and deserved – punishment.

Even as Planned Parenthood and NARAL resoundingly decry Gosnell’s practice and applaud the verdict, the anti-choice contingent still wants totar pro-choice groups with the Gosnell brush. He’s a rogue, an outlier, and possibly a sociopath, but anti-choicers seemingly consider him a gift because the brutality of his crimes allows them to insist that this is what abortion really is and that it justifies excessive clinic regulations, and ultimately the re-criminalization of abortion. (Interestingly, when legal and aboveboard abortion provider George Tiller was shot inside his church, the “pro-life” crowd didn’t demand stricter gun regulations).

Having cheerfully shamed women seeking abortions, they now want to shame supporters of abortion rights by, as Jill Filipovic says, “conflating the illegal procedures performed by Gosnell with safe, legal abortion”.

But whatever incorrect argument anti-choicers want to make, they bump up against reality. Gosnell is the exact opposite of all the pro-choice community stands for. Planned Parenthood prides itself on putting the safety and needs of its patients first, and treats everyone equally, regardless of their income. It works with state and federal governments to maintain proper standards at every one of its clinics. Gosnell, taking full advantage of the free market, was able to make money in part because Planned Parenthood does not receive enough funding.

The anti-choice crowd wants us to be ashamed of Gosnell. But it’s their shame, because they are the ones who made him possible.

Their outrage only highlights their hypocrisy. The bestselling book The Good Nurse, by Charles Graeber, details the many years nurse Charlie Cullen was able to murder hundreds of hospital patients before being caught, tried, and imprisoned, but until the book’s release, the national outcry for hospital oversight reforms was decidedly muted.

If you really want to preempt the Gosnells, provide sex education in schools. Provide access to a wide range of affordable birth control, covered by health insurance. Crack down on pharmacists who refuse to fill prescriptions for birth control. Fund clinics. Fund and reform state and local government so that when a complaint against a business is filed, due diligence is quickly taken. Repeal the Hyde Amendment so Medicaid can cover abortions. Stop scaring women away from reputable clinics, because that won’t stop them from getting an abortion, just getting a safe one.

Pro-choice groups are in favor of strong regulations – that’s what Roe helped establish. That’s what states like New York had in place prior to Roe. Planned Parenthood clinics operate under established regulations, and so their patients receive quality care, even though clinics are overwhelmed.

h/t: Sarah Jane Stratford at The Guardian

Writing for the Christian Post today, Washington state pastor and anti-gay activist Ken Hutcherson said it was no coincidence that Jason Collins came out just days following President Obama’s speech to Planned Parenthood, contending that both incidents were satanically inspired as they will further “evil” and “both go directly against God’s Holy Word.”

“The enemy has impeccable timing,” Hutcherson writes, claiming that Satan is using President Obama’s pro-choice policies and the “gay agenda” to persecute Christians.

According to Hutcherson, Obama’s speech was no different than an endorsement of Adolf Hitler or Pol Pot, while “Collins is being used as a pawn, in the most dangerous game of Russian roulette for his soul.”

God’s moral line “has been crossed, and once again Obama has done nothing,” Hutcherson maintains. “Planned Parenthood and their poster child, Dr. Kermit Gosnell, long ago crossed the line, exactly like those going public with their sexual preference.”

h/t: Brian Tashman at RWW

Hours after President Barack Obama vowed to defend Planned Parenthood at the organization’s national conference on Friday, Sarah Palin wrote a lengthy missive on Facebook, tying the family planning organization to Dr. Kermit Gosnell, a provider of illegal abortions who is on trial for murder.

“Considering the role Planned Parenthood has played in looking the other way while the mass murdering abortion doctor Gosnell butchered babies born alive from his horrific infanticide procedures and abused his women patients, it’s perhaps not surprising that this same president sees nothing wrong with allowing his name to be so openly associated with this organization,” the former Alaska governor and ex-vice presidential candidate wrote on her Facebook page.

Gosnell, 72, ran an abortion clinic in Pennsylvania where he performed gruesome and illegal late-term abortions that endangered, and in some cases ended, the lives his patients. He faces four charges of first-degree murder and one of third-degree murder. He faces the death penalty if convicted.

The Philadelphia Inquirer reported that Dayle Steinberg, president and chief executive of Planned Parenthood Southeastern Pennsylvania, said at a gathering for her organization last week that some women came to Planned Parenthood after visiting Gosnell’s clinic and complained. “We would always encourage them to report it to the Department of Health,” Steinberg said.

She added, “These are criminal, horrendous … acts and should be appropriately punished.”

Conservative anti-abortion groups, including the Susan B. Anthony List, have used the Gosnell trial to boost support for abortion restrictions and charge that Planned Parenthood should be held accountable for failing to report the conditions at Gosnell’s clinic.

“Planned Parenthood last week admitted to knowing about the conditions inside Kermit Gosnell’s Philadelphia clinic yet chose not to act to help end the killing of newborn babies and butchering of women,” Susan B. Anthony List president Marjorie Dannenfelser said in a statement on Friday.

“It seems that nothing – not even eyewitness accounts of Gosnell-style conditions in their own clinics – is enough to make President Obama reconsider his unyielding support for Planned Parenthood, which in a single year performed more than 333,000 abortions and received half a billion dollars in taxpayer money.”

Planned Parenthood receives federal grants through the Title X family planning program, which it uses to subsidize contraception, cancer screenings, sexually transmitted infection screenings and other health services for low-income women. Planned Parenthood patients pay separately for abortion services, because the Hyde Amendment prohibits using federal funds to pay for abortions.

Planned Parenthood contends that it cannot be compared to Gosnell’s clinic because it performs legal, safe abortions in well-regulated facilities. “We have consistently said that this is a horrifying and outrageous case, that Gosnell ran a criminal enterprise, not a health care facility, and that he should be punished to the fullest extent of the law,” said Eric Ferrero, vice president of communications for Planned Parenthood.

h/t: Huffington Post

President Obama on Friday at a Planned Parenthood gala in Washington said the women’s health organization is “not going anywhere,” despite GOP-led efforts to defund it. 

President Obama’s right on.

h/t: TPM Livewire

KANSAS CITY, Kan., April 5 (Reuters) - The Kansas state Senate passed a measure on Friday that would ban Planned Parenthood from providing sex education in schools and require women to get more information about fetal development before having an abortion.

The measure was approved by a 28-10 vote and was expected to pass easily in the House of Representatives, which backed the 70-page bill in largely similar form earlier this week. Republicans have large majorities in both chambers. Republican Governor Sam Brownback, who opposes abortion, is expected to sign it.

Opponents of the measure say it contains 40 provisions that affect a woman’s health and intrude on her right to an abortion. Advocates said it mainly codifies existing practices, while helping women make more informed choices.

The Kansas bill is the latest development in a national fight over abortion that has seen lawmakers in several states pass new restrictions on abortion in the past two years.

Those have included laws approved in the past month in North Dakota and Arkansas that are seen as direct challenges to the U.S. Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade ruling in 1973 that legalized abortion.

The bill bars school districts from letting abortion providers such as Planned Parenthood offer, sponsor or furnish course materials or instruction on human sexuality or on sexually transmitted diseases.

The bill defines life as beginning at fertilization, but does not ban abortion from that point. (Reporting by Kevin Murphy; Editing by Mary Wisniewski, Cynthia Johnston and Peter Cooney)

h/t: Huffington Post

On Wednesday, RNC Chairman Reince Priebus published an editorial lambasting the mainstream media for “covering up” Planned Parenthood’s “support for infanticide.” According to Priebus, the national women’s health organization — in addition to providing contraceptive services, STD testing, cancer screenings, and reproductive care for millions of women across the country — is also in the business of murdering live babies. He claims that a recent committee hearing in Florida proves that Planned Parenthood officials support “the right to post-birth abortion.”

What’s “post-birth abortion”? What exactly happened in Florida? And how did this controversy explode in the right-wing media?

To understand the root of the current smear campaign against Planned Parenthood, it’s important to understand the context of the committee hearing that Priebus is referencing. That hearing was a debate over HB 1129, a politically-motivated piece of legislation seeking to ensure that any infant born alive “during or immediately after an attempted abortion” is entitled to all of the same rights “as any other child born alive in course of natural birth.” The “Infant Born Alive” measure rests upon the fundamentally flawed assumption that this type of situation is a real risk for women seeking to terminate a pregnancy. In fact, Florida does not perform abortions after the fetus has reached viability, so the situation that HB 1129 intends to address is incredibly unlikely.

And the original version of the legislation went even further. In this hypothetical medical situation, where an infant is “born alive” after an incredibly late-term induced abortion, the woman would have also been stripped of all parental rights. The Florida Association of Planned Parenthood Affiliates opposed HB 1129 because of this particular provision, which they believe is simply intended to intimidate and shame women. Planned Parenthood officials pointed out that the implicit assumption is that women who choose abortion can’t possibly be fit to care for a child — and that’s not something that should be codified into state law.

Last week, a lobbyist representing Planned Parenthood, Alisa LaPolt Snow, testified about the organization’s opposition to that aspect of HB 1129. During the hearing, she was questioned by a panel of anti-abortion state lawmakers who demanded that she respond to questions about this highly unlikely hypothetical situation. According to sources from the organization, the Republican lawmaker who sponsored HB 1129 repeatedly insinuated that women who choose abortions cannot be trusted, defending the provision revoking parental rights because “there is at least suspicion that that biological mother may not have the best interest of that born infant in mind.” When posed with a hypothetical scenario in which “a baby is born on a table as a result of a botched abortion,” Snow attempted to make the point that legislators don’t need to get in the middle of medical situations. “We believe that any decision that’s made should be left up to the woman, her family, and the physician,” Snow said.

That was enough for the right-wing media to proclaim that Planned Parenthood endorses “infanticide.” After the Weekly Standard posted a video of that portion of the exchange, it spread throughout conservative outlets — eventually inspiring Priebus’ breathless editorial suggesting that any politician who supports Planned Parenthood may also support infanticide.

Perhaps the ultimate irony of the right-wing’s imagined controversy is that — even in states where it’s not against the law to perform late-term induced abortions — Planned Parenthood clinics don’t provide that type of service. Many Planned Parenthood affiliates only perform abortions in the first trimester of pregnancy, when women can either take a pill or have a less-invasive surgical procedure. It’s actually the women who don’t have access to Planned Parenthood clinics, which are under attack across the country as GOP-controlled legislatures do their best to shut them down, who are forced to resort to dangerous, illegal, late-term abortion services like the ones described at the Florida hearing.

h/t:  Tara Culp-Ressler at Think Progress Health

After Republican National Committee chairman Reince Priebus penned a scathing op-ed piece Wednesday suggesting that Planned Parenthood — and Democrats — support infanticide, the reproductive health organization issued a clarifying response.

In the piece, published by the conservative website RedState, Priebus highlighted recent testimony from Alisa LaPolt Snow, a Planned Parenthood lobbyist, before the Florida legislature.

Snow’s answers left a number of Republicans, including Priebus, up in arms. The chairman pointed to her testimony as evidence that Planned Parenthood and pro-choice Democrats must endorse infanticide. 

h/t: TPM

Rep. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., offered legislation today to end federal funding for Planned Parenthood, thus reviving a fight from the last Congress that had Republicans and Democrats talking about a government shut down.

“As a woman, I believe America deserves better than abortion,” Blackburn said in a statement on her bill. “America shouldn’t celebrate abortion and our taxpayers shouldn’t subsidize abortion businesses like Planned Parenthood, who profit from the destruction of human life with taxpayer money. It’s fiscally irresponsible and morally indefensible.”

The bill would “prohibit family planning grants from being awarded to any entity that performs abortions.” Blackburn’s office cites a 2010 report from the Government Accountability Office saying that Planned Parenthood — the largest abortion provider in the country — receives $340 million from the Department of Health and Human Services under Title X, which provides funding for family planning services.

In 2011, Democrats said they would shut down the government rather than pass an appropriations bill that cut federal funding for Planned Parenthood.

“We agreed on a number [of spending cuts],” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said on the Senate floor at the time. “But we are not — we are not! — bending on women’s health.”

Republicans ultimately scrapped the provision, but talk of a government shut down is already growing as they prepare to fight for spending cuts when President Obama asks Congress to raise the debt ceiling.

Planned Parenthood says that the federal money does not pay for abortions. “[T]he idea that tax dollars fund abortion is not true,” the organization Gulf Coast affiliate says. “Every dollar from the federal government that Planned Parenthood receives pays for lifesaving cancer screenings, birth control, family planning visits, annual exams, testing for HIV and other STIs, and other kinds of basic care.”

Opponents observe that money is fungible, “meaning that every dollar the government gives Planned Parenthood for family planning services, STI and HIV prevention and treatment, and cancer screening ‘frees up’ money for it to spend on abortion care.”

Marsha Blackburn’s playing the GOP hobby horse: “Defund Planned Parenthood.”

h/t: Washington Examiner

The latest filings from Karl Rove’s American Crossroads show a last minute contribution of $1 million received just days before the election (10/29/12) from Gary Heavin — the co-founder of Curves International Inc., which calls itself “the world’s leader in women’s fitness.”

Curves, a chain of women-only fitness center franchises, claims nearly 10,000 locations in more than 85 countries. Heavin and his fellow co-founder, his wife Diane, sold Curves International to an private equity firm in October, but they remain prominently featured on the company’s website. The Heavins say they “share a passion for and commitment to women’s health and fitness.” But his massive donation to the right-wing super PAC is only the latest in a long pattern of their efforts
in support of policies that undermine women’s equality in the workplace and restrict women’s access to health care services.

American Crossroads spent $91 million to elect Mitt Romney over President Obama. Romney refused to endorse key pro-women legislation including the bipartisan Violence Against Women Act, the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, and the Paycheck Fairness Act, but backed reinstating the “global gag rule” on even discussing abortion as a family planning option and supported the infamous Blunt Amendment to allow employers to deny health benefits that go against their personal views. Crossroads also worked to help far-right extremists like Todd Akin, Richard Mourdock, and George Allen. Much of the American Crossroads attack strategy focused on criticizing Obamacare and those who backed the effort to expand health insurance access to all Americans.

And this past election isn’t the only time that Curves and the Heavins have worked against women’s reproductive rights. Gary Heavin pledged hundreds of thousands of dollars for controversial “pregnancy crisis centers” that try to talk women out of abortions and have been accused to providing false information. They also made large donations to abstinence-only education programs — programs which often misinform and make teens more likely to engage in risky behavior and become pregnant. Curves also pulled its funding for the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation over its objection to the charity’s funding for Planned Parenthood’s breast cancer screening services. In a 2004 editorial, Mr. Heavin attacked Planned Parenthood’s sex education literature, writing “I have a 10-year-old daughter. I would absolutely not allow her to be exposed to this material. I don’t want her being taught masturbation and told that homosexuality is normal.”

That anti-choice and anti-LGBT stance was further demonstrated when Curves partnered with the American Family Association — a group that has been identified by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a “hate group.” 

Gary Heavin has also been an outspoken enthusiast for televangelist Pat Robertson, who has blamed natural disasters on same-sex marriage equality and blamed 9/11 on abortion, the separation of church and state, and civil liberties groups.

H/T: Josh Israel at Think Progress Health

Earlier today, Erick Erickson of Red State retweeted a tweet from Kristina Ribali, the Director of New Media at FreedomWorks, linking to a “disgusting” LifeNews.com article accusing Planned Parenthood of promoting a video that shows young women “how to cover up those nasty cuts and bruises that result from a beating.”

The video in question does, in fact, appear to be a demonstration from an obviously abused young woman attempting to conceal the bruises and lacerations on her face with make-up until she hears a noise off-screen and quickly turns off the camera … at which point a message appears that reads:

65% of women who suffer domestic violence keep it hidden.

Don’t cover it up.

Share this and help someone speak out.

A URL for the London-based domestic abuse helpline that produced the ad is then provided.  Obviously, the entire purpose of the ad is to juxtapose the scene presented against the real message of speaking out against domestic violence, and LifeNews even eventually admits this, yet still presents the video as if Planned Parenthood is encouragingyoung women to conceal abuse:

But the way Planned Parenthood headlines it—with “How to look your best the morning after,” teens are mislead by Planned Parenthood into the cover up mentality. On the anti-domestic violence site, the video is introduced with the headline: “Don’t cover it up.” That headline makes a world of difference to young teens who run across the video.

Presumably, the reason Planned Parenthood headlined the video “How To Look Your Best The Morning After” is because the video is titled “How To Look Your Best The Morning After.”  The title is intentionally misleading in order to drive home to real message. 

And, of course, LifeNews was not alone as the geniuses over at Twitchy are likewise outraged about the video because they are apparently equally clueless:.

h/t: Kyle Mantyla at RWW