Planned Parenthood

Republicans Claim To Be Pro Women’s Rights: Really?

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The Republican Party leadership in Congress loves to claim that the Democrats are wrong in calling them anti women, and campaigning against women.

But the facts belie Republican claims as shown as follows:

Both in Washington DC and in the states, Republican leadership is attacking women’s rights, women’s health, and women’s safety.

The House of Representatives passed a bill weakening the Violence Against Women Act two weeks ago.

Virginia passed legislation requiring women undergoing an abortion to undergo medically unnecessary and physically invasive sonograms.

Senate Republicans are blocking a measure to deal with wage discrimination against women.

On abortion, seven states have made it more difficult to get an abortion, by making the deadline for getting one much earlier, before knowledge of fetal abnormalities or health risks are available, Criminal penalties are also set up to intimidate doctors from performing abortions, making it more difficult to stay in business, and endangering the lives of women who often cannot gain an abortion even at the risk of their own lives.

Planned Parenthood has been systematically attacked, with funds cut for basic health care services for the poor, on the argument that the main activity of the group is abortion, when it is only about 3 percent of the funding of the organization, and is not its primary role in promoting women’s health.

The 1963 Equal Pay Act under President Kennedy is being fought bitterly, with the attempt to update the law to help women gain equality in pay for equal work being opposed by Republicans, and states such as Wisconsin are going backward on women’s rights to equal pay.

Domestic violence legislation is being fought by Republicans, who do not wish to include lesbians, native American women, and undocumented immigrant women who are in danger, and can no longer report abuse to law enforcement authorities, to go after the abusers.

How can anyone say that the GOP is NOT declaring “war” on women? One is judged by one’s actions, not words!

Republican Lies And Deception Gets Worse! Jon Kyl And “Factual Statements”!

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The Republican Party is both famous and infamous for its lies and deceptions on a regular basis!

Is there any sane, normal, truth telling Republican left?

The latest outrage is Senator Jon Kyl of Arizona, who claimed that Planned Parenthood spends 90 percent of its money on abortion services!

The problem with Kyl’s statement is that it is a TOTAL DISTORTION of the truth, as only THREE percent of Planned Parenthood funds are spent on abortion, while women’s health services, including fighting breast cancer, is the bulk of their activities, and the GOP is willing to ignore women’s needs in their crazy struggle against abortion, while not giving a damn what happens to children AFTER they are born or to women’s health!

But even worse is that a Kyl spokesman says Kyl defended himself by stating what he said was not meant to be a “factual statement”!

So Kyl is saying that he is exaggerating, lying, manipulating the truth, etc, or is that NOT what he is doing?

One could not make up such stupidities and inanities as this if one wanted to downgrade the Republican Party, as they are much better at doing it to themselves! (head shaking in disbelief)!

The Tea Party Movement Revealed: Radical Anarchists Of The Far Right!

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The Tea Party Movement has now been revealed as what it is: radical anarchists of the FAR Right, a dangerous group that will brook no compromise, and now plans to challenge Speaker of the House John Boehner in the 2012 primaries, because he had the gall to make a compromise deal with Barack Obama and the Democrats to avoid a government shutdown at the last possible moment last evening!

Obama and the Democrats agreed to about $39 billion in budget cuts from the original budget sent by the President, a record amount, which Barack Obama claimed was a victory for common sense.

Actually, the Democrats and Obama gave in too much, but they held out for protection of the environment, the funding of the President’s Health Care law, and continuation of miniscule funding of Planned Parenthood.

Boehner has been in an impossible position having to deal with House freshmen who are totally irresponsible in their demands for massive budget cuts, and have been, unfortunately, assisted in their recklessness by House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, who has been undermining Boehner all along, as he and Congressman Kevin McCarthy have been working to push Boehner into an untenable position as Speaker.

If one thinks Cantor and McCarthy are “friends” of Boehner, one has to be absolutely blind! We will now see a large negative vote on the permanent budget for the next six months, when it comes up for a vote next week, and Boehner is in great danger of a revolt led by Cantor and McCarthy, and he might wish he had not been elected Speaker! To imagine that John Boehner might be seen in a sympathetic light by some shows how far right the GOP is going!

And if there is a true “Rasputin” of the Far Right, it is Congressman Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, who has recklessly and irresponsibly promoted a radical attack on Medicare and Medicaid in the fiscal year 2012 budget and beyond, in his role as Chairman of the House Budget Committee!

What Ryan proposes is to make Medicare a voucher system, and put Medicaid under block grants that state governors decide how to dispense, all of which means the total destruction of both programs for future generations of elderly, sick, and poor people, all this at the same time as the plan to defund the President’s Health Care program for all Americans not covered under either plan now!

All this while tax cuts down to 25 percent top rate from 35 percent for the ultra rich top two percent, and also cuts in corporate taxes further, which means an attack on the middle class and the poor, as America is transformed more than ever into a plutocracy, rather than the image of a democracy, in which we have government of, by, and for the people, not the elite rich!

With the concessions made by Obama and the Democrats this time, in the next round there can be NO concessions, as this is a battle for the future of the entire nation, and the plutocracy that has developed MUST be stopped dead in its tracks!

And realize finally that this is not just an economic struggle, but also a social struggle, as the Tea Party Movement has its ugly desire to intervene in people’s private lives, as related to abortion, gay rights, and women’s rights. This is a battle for economic and social justice, the battle fought by progressives and liberals for more than a century, and a constant struggle that one can never rest from, as the far right continues its determination to dictate the continued dominance of an evil, selfish, greedy plutocracy!

The Budget Battle Over H.R. 1: Dishonest GOP, So No Further Cuts!

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The House Republicans claim to be working toward deficit reduction, and are threatening a government shutdown, and the answer, after looking at what they are demanding, is MAKE MY DAY! GO AHEAD AND SHUT THE GOVERNMENT DOWN! YOU WILL BE BLAMED FOR IT AS IN 1995!

The whole discussion is dishonest, because the debate is not just over deficit reduction!

Understand that the Democrats and President Barack Obama have agreed to $33 billion cuts, while the Republicans have demanded $61 billion, and some Tea Party Movement members of the GOP still want $100 billion!

But while the Democrats have compromised, the Republicans have not, and they have an agenda beyond deficit reduction!

The conservatives are trying to promote other causes in H. R. 1, and the Democrats need to stand strong and proud and show they have some backbone!

Why is this the case? Consider the following:

The Republicans want to block funding for the Obama Health Care law!

The Republicans want to ban funding for financial regulatory reform!

The Republicans want to block the Environmental Protection Agency from reducing mercury and other pollutants from cement plants!

The Republicans want to block the EPA from reducing carbon dioxide pollution from power plants and refineries!

The Republicans want to block Department of Education regulations on for-profit colleges, which have victimized students with high debts without helping them gain employment, an extremely corrupt system!

The Republicans want to prohibit funding for a consumer products complaints database!

They also want to prohibit federal funds being used by Planned Parenthood for women’s health services!

The Republicans want to wipe out family planning programs for poor women, which includes medical and health services!

Also, the desire is to wipe out National Public Radio and the Public Broadcasting System gaining any federal funding!

This attempt to wipe out education, health care, environmental protection, financial reform, and consumer reform, and ignore women’s issues is an attack on basic needs of the American people, in favor of the rich and the corporations, and MUST NOT be agreed to by Democrats!

As the old saying is, the Democrats should declare that they will negotiate a fair reduction in the deficit, but will NOT agree to such outrageous demands as above until HELL FREEZES OVER!

The House Republican Budget: Very Clear What The Party Is Trying To Do To America!

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The House of Representatives Budget plan devised by the majority Republicans is a clear cut attack on the middle class and the poor, and all of the social and economic progress of the 20th century Presidents and Congresses which brought prosperity and a growing middle class to American society!

The budget document is an obscene attempt to promote the super wealthy and corporate agenda at the expense of the middle class, and the poor, and with no compassion or conscience displayed at all!

Imagine this:

1. The destruction of 700,000 jobs due to the budget cuts.

2. Cutting of three million low income people from community health centers.

3.Cutting of food and health care assistance to pregnant women, new mothers, and children.

4. Major cut in funds for Head Start.

5. End of federal funding for National Public Radio and PBS.

6. Forcing states to fire teachers and aides, making class sizes dramatically larger.

7. Cutting of some or all financial aid to over 9 million college students who are low income or middle income.

8. Slashing of funds to the National Institutes of Health, cutting research on cancer, Alzheimers, and Parkinsons diseases.

9. Cutting all support of Planned Parenthood, and family planning programs.

10. Putting 10,000 veterans into homelessness because of cuts in housing vouchers.

Other plans are in the works to prevent all abortions, cut the Environmental Protection Agency ability to protect against industrial pollution, and to do nothing to create new jobs, hoping to make economic conditions worse, with the hope that the American people would blame the Democrats and President Obama for the poorly performing economy!

This is a time for all decent people to make clear through calls and emails to their Congressmen and Senators that they will not tolerate the war on America’s middle class and the poor being perpetrated by the Republican Party!

It is time that excuses for budget cuts be replaced by tax increases on the wealthy and the corporations, who have to take responsibility on the national and state levels to help resolve the inequities that exist in America. They have received enough benefits over the past ten years, and really the past thirty years, and it is time to pay up as good, responsible Americans!

Republican Party Doctrine: Life Begins At Conception, And Interest In Life Ends At Birth!

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The Republican Party is working full scale against a woman’s right to choose, attempting every strategy possible to prevent abortion, no matter what the situation, and badmouthing Planned Parenthood, an organization which only has abortion rights as a small part of its mission to promote family planning, so as to make better parenting of children, which is something very much lacking in America!

So when one analyzes the Republican stand that life begins at conception and every child must be born, no matter what, and then realize that the Republicans now are trying to eliminate ALL aid to poor women and children, due to the budget crisis, one has to wonder how they can look themselves in the mirror!

Leave it to the GOP to try to eliminate all health, education and housing aid for the poor, and basically blaming poor people for being poor, when a large percentage of the poor ARE children born to teenage or 20s women out of wedlock, with the majority of the women being WHITE! This is the 19th century Social Darwinism at its worst being brought back in the 21st century!

So the Republican Party believes life begins at conception, and their interest in life ends with the birth of the child! Now you are on your own, and we don’t want to support you or even care about you, unless of course you kill your child, but no assistance is offered if a poor woman or couple cannot afford the child that is being forced on them by the strange morality of the Republican Party!

The GOP War On Women and Children: Despicable And Disgraceful! :(

Ronald 1 Comment

Associate Justice Antonin Scalia, appointed by President Ronald Reagan 25 years ago, and arguably the most conservative Justice in more than half a century, recently stated that women were not protected in the Constitution.

That shocking statement seems to be working itself out in the attack of the Republican Party, in Congress and in the states, on the rights and freedoms of American women and children.

Witness the following:

Republicans are trying to reduce women’s access to abortion care, and have been also trying to redefine rape, so as to lessen the opportunities or reasons for abortion.

A South Dakota legislator proposed a bill to make the murder of an abortion doctor justifiable homicide.

The party in Congress is trying to eliminate one billion dollars aid, including food, to low income pregnant women, mothers, babies, and children.

The party in Congress has proposed that hospitals be able to reject an abortion for a woman in danger of dying as a result of medical problems from the pregnancy.

Head Start, started under President Lyndon Johnson nearly fifty years ago, has been marked for a billion dollar cut in funding, eliminating spots for 200,000 children.

The Republicans want to cut spending on employment services, meals, and housing for senior citizens, with two thirds of them being women.

The GOP called on Friday for elimination of all federal funding for Planned Parenthood health centers, which promotes responsible family planning.

And this series of actions against women and children are sponsored by people who profess to be “good Christians”, religious people who demonstrate absolutely no concern for life once it is born, and are mean spirited and nasty in their vicious attacks on women’s rights! 🙁

The Republican women in Congress, as a group, make one wonder how women could be so uncaring and lack compassion for those less fortunate, whether poor, young, or elderly. In many ways, they are actually worse than the Republican men! There is no way that Jesus Christ would approve of these “true believers”, who he would consider hypocrites in the extreme! 🙁

The GOP Attack On Women: Nothing New But Now Enhanced!

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The Republican leadership in the House of Representatives has talked about creation of jobs, but instead is focusing on a war against women and their medical care! 🙁

Bills have been introduced to take away federal support of women having Pap tests, breast exams, and HIV tests, because it is all considered part of “family planning”, a code word for the organization Planned Parenthood, which the Republican Party wishes to destroy.

The Republicans have also introduced legislation to tax medical plans of women and their employers who have private health insurance which cover abortion procedures.

They also have tried to redefine rape, so as to avoid the idea of abortions to cover rape and incest, as they wish to force all pregnancies to full term, no matter the age or health or mental state of the prospective mother.

And yet, does the party show any concern about the well being of children born to mothers who do not wish to have children, or cannot afford the economic expense of unwanted children? Of course not, as their only goal is to require birth, but show no concern about life after birth! 🙁

Attempting to outlaw abortion for all reasons will not stop the practice, but will force women who do not wish to have children to obtain a dangerous, “back alley” abortion, which could lead to their deaths.

The Republican Party claims to believe in smaller and less government, certainly when it comes to economic regulation, but again is proving it is very willing to intrude on people’s private lives as to their social interactions and their personal bodies, and that is reprehensible! 🙁

The Status Of Abortion Rights On the 38th Anniversary Of Roe V. Wade

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Today is the 38th Anniversary of the Roe V. Wade decision of the Supreme Court, giving women the right to choose to end a pregnancy in the first two trimesters.

That decision in 1973 led to furious reaction, and the formation of the Right To Life Movement, as well as the Pro Choice alternative.

Conservatives and devout Christians and Orthodox Jews have been fighting to limit the right, including banning abortions at an earlier point after conception; pushing women considering an abortion to watch a live video of the fetus; eliminating insurance coverage for abortions; preventing public financing of abortions; and requiring parental consent and waiting periods for minors.

The abortion rate has been going down, and in many states, it is difficult for abortion doctors to open and conduct their business. Also, demonstrations by Pro Life groups have complicated the operations of such abortion centers.

There have been a few high profile murders of abortion doctors over the years, and threats to many other such specialists.

The issue had been muted somewhat recently because of the economy, but now it is entering national politics, with former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum, a likely candidate for the Republican nomination for President in 2012, bringing up the issue by stating he is amazed that President Barack Obama, as an African American, would support abortions.

Additionally, Randall Terry, of Operation Rescue, has made clear that he will challenge President Obama for the Democratic Presidential nomination in 2012, knowing full well that he cannot beat the President, but will force the abortion issue to the forefront and, at the least, attempt to embarrass the President on that issue. For good measure, he also plans to fight the idea of gay marriage and gay rights, and make it an issue in the Democratic campaign. Ordinarily, one would think that Terry would run in the Republican Party, but his plan is to run as a Democrat solely to complicate the Democratic Party race for the 2012 campaign.

The South, Mountain, and Great Plains states, basically conservative and Republican, are in a position to ban abortion rights at a pace never before seen, with more conservative legislators and many more Governors who support such bans.

But also, the key states of Wisconsin, Michigan and Ohio have now elected legislatures and Governors bent in that direction, so the activities of the National Abortion Rights League and Planned Parenthood are meeting a fundamental shift in the balance of power.

So 38 years after abortion rights were granted by the Supreme Court, the right of a woman to control her own body and reproductive activities is under sustained threat!