Posts Tagged ‘ pro-choice ’

Act Now: Congress Introduces Harmful HR3 Legislation

February 2, 2011
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Speaker Boehner makes anti-women legislation a top priority.

No means no if you’re certain members of the GOP and the question is, “Does a woman control her own body?” But if you are a victim of rape, no means absolutely nothing. At least that will be the case if H.R. 3, a bill sponsored by Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.), is passed.

H.R. 3, is called the No Taxpayer Funding for Abortions Act, but it actually seeks to ban abortions in all but a very few instances including when the pregnant female was the subject of an act of “forcible rape.” Most of us blessed with female reproductive organs, and yes, brains, know that all rape is forcible rape. (An exception is Whoopi Goldberg who has her own definition of “rape rape.”) In writing the bill, Rep. Smith and his co-sponsors fail to define  ”forcible rape,” opening the door for a very scary interpretation of the could-be law. And they harm every victim of sexual assault past, present and future by supporting the idea that if there are no cuts and bruises, there is no rape.

Speaker John Boehner has made abortion a top priority and has said, “This common-sense legislation reflects the will of the people and deserves the support of the House.  It is one of our highest legislative priorities.  As such, I have directed that it receive the designation of H.R. 3.” This is our new reality ladies. We are dealing with a  Congress that seeks to impose their will on our health and our bodies, and unless we can prove we fought back hard and have the wounds to prove it, we don’t stand a chance.

What can you do? You can let your Representatives know that HR 3 is unacceptable. Contact them here. You can write letters to the editor and op-eds expressing your opposition. You can join the #DearJohn campaign on Twitter. You can sign the MoveOn petition.

But keep in mind, that while the language in the bill around rape is harmful, so is the bill itself. Currently, the Hyde Amendment restricts Medicaid funding for abortion.  But Hyde must be codified each year, and has been since it was introduced in 1976. Proponents of H.R. 3 seek to permanently codify Hyde and then take abortion restrictions a lot further. H.R. 3 would deny federal credits or subsidies to private health plans that cover abortion, even if the abortion is paid for using private funds. The new health care reforms allow insurers to accept federal subsidies if abortion services are covered with private funds. That would change under H.R. 3. And the bill would penalize employers offering plans that cover abortions by denying certain tax credits and deductions – to the businesses and the employees.

On the topic of abortion, Speaker Boehner once wrote, “… without respect for life, freedom is in jeopardy. When human life takes a back seat to other priorities – personal comforts, economics – freedom is diminished.” What happens, Mr. Speaker, when jobs, war and other national concerns take a back seat to a false crusade?

More than two women die every day in the United States from pregnancy related causes. Boehner, Smith and the other sponsors of H.R. 3 don’t seem motivated by that fact. Nor do they seem to be concerned about a recent report published in The New England Journal of Medicine that concluded, “The finding … does not support the hypothesis that there is an increased risk of mental disorders after a first-trimester induced abortion.” From the study: “The relative risk of a psychiatric contact did not differ significantly after abortion as compared with before abortion (P=0.19) but did increase after childbirth as compared with before childbirth (P<0.001).”

But Boehner’s not worried about women who give birth. “Women – especially minors – need to know about the risks of and alternatives to abortion … and I’ll continue to stand with all who seek to have a positive and meaningful impact in defending the right to life.”

Look, I’ve got way too much residual Catholic upbringing in me to ever take abortion lightly. And I know what it is to love a fetus – I miscarried at ten weeks. But those are my religious remnants and my personal emotions. They have no bearing on the fact that all women must have the right to control their own bodies and their own health. Period. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL) referred to HR3 as, “a violent act against women in and of itself.” From the reframing of rape, to the impact on small businesses, to the attempt to control a woman’s right to control her body, H.R. 3 is harmful.

Take action and let Congress know that you too want to, “reduce the footprint of government in our lives,” starting with your body.

Speaker Boehner Takes Office; Reproductive Rights at Risk

January 3, 2011
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Congressman John Boehner

Congressman John Boehner (R-Ohio) will become Speaker of the House Wednesday and women should pay attention. Boehner’s support for women’s rights doesn’t seem to extend beyond his campaign for more women’s restrooms near the House chamber. In fact, he represents a significant threat to women’s reproductive rights.

The man who called a healthcare provision for contraceptives “controversial,” has a 100 percent rating from the National Right to Life Committee and received the 2010 Henry J. Hyde Defender of Life Award.

After the midterm elections, it was reported that Boehner’s staff took a meeting with Randall Terry, founder of Operation Rescue. Talk about controversial. Terry is considered a terrorist by many and even a Catholic blogger found the meeting to be out-of-line. Wrote Michael Sean Winters:

“Mr. Bohener is admirably pro-life – although the rest of his policy positions are less admirable. But, he should know that the mainstream pro-life community considers Terry an extremist who has defended the murder of doctors who perform abortions. He is no pro-life hero and Mr. Boehner should find better uses for his time.”

The meeting isn’t that surprising considering Boehner has published a document called “Pillars of a New Majority.” The document is based on a  series of speeches he gave in 2010 and the first pillar is “Culture of Life.” It’s not about the wars in Afghanistan or Iraq. It’s not about the economy. It’s about abortion.

On the topic he writes:

“Americans love life, and we love freedom. They’re both intertwined, permanently, as part of the American character. America is a nation built on freedom. And without respect for life, freedom is in jeopardy. When human life takes a back seat to other priorities – personal comforts, economics – freedom is diminished.

He goes on to link abortion to the wars we are fighting overeas.

“It’s sadly ironic – and profoundly disturbing – that our government would endorse the destruction of innocent American lives on the same soil our men and women walk each and every day in defense of freedom and liberty. It undermines everything the fine men and women of our military are fighting for.”

Boehner claims he’s pro-freedom, but that doesn’t extend to a woman’s freedom to choose the best medical alternatives for her body. He also claims to be concerned about the risks of abortion, as outlined in a statement he issued following a recent decision by an Ohio county court to uphold a law requiring a 24 hour waiting period for women wanting an abortion. Said Boehner:

 “This is a critical victory in the fight to advance women’s health and defend the sanctity of unborn life. Women – especially minors – need to know about the risks of and alternatives to abortion … and I’ll continue to stand with all who seek to have a positive and meaningful impact in defending the right to life.”

More than two women die every day in the United States from pregnancy related causes. Boehner doesn’t seem too concerned about those risks.

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2010 Political Review (Slideshow)

December 31, 2010
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Here is a look back at just a few of the political stories we were talking about in 2010. What do you think 2011 will bring?

Mac D’Alessandro: We Don’t Need More Democrats; We Need Better Democrats UPDATED

August 25, 2010
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Time magazine predicts healthcare is no longer the number one issue on midterm voters’ minds. “Voters are far more concerned about the stalled economy or soaring budget deficits,” writes Time. But here in Massachusetts, the state that elected the 41st vote, healthcare is still dominating the discussion in at least one race leading up to the September 14 state primary. What little discussion taking place, that is.

Incumbent Stephen Lynch is facing a challenge in the ninth Congressional District from Mac D’Alessandro, the former New England Political Director for the Services Employees International Union. Lynch, you will recall, voted no on healthcare reform because he says the bill “stripped out all the significant reform.” D’Alessandro disagrees. “He should tell that to the people in the district whose children have pre-existing conditions,” he says. D’Alessandro says he got in the race because “The thought of (Lynch) going unchallenged gave validity to his healthcare vote.”

Winning in September won’t be easy for D’Alessandro. He entered the race late with little name recognition and far fewer funds and insider connections than Lynch. But he is running a smooth grassroots campaign and he easily wins over many of the people he meets on the campaign trail. D’Alessandro, you see, is not afraid to take a stance. I met with D’Alessandro last week, and while our discussion focused primarily on women’s rights, he had plenty to say on healthcare, Iraq, immigration reform, private industry, the environment and the economy. 

On disenfranchised women voters who feel let down by the Democratic Party, he says, “It’s not just women. Lots of progressives do. That’s why we don’t need more Democrats in office. We need better Democrats.” 

On the glass ceiling, he says, “It’s titanium coated and some of it is still so ingrained in our culture. I noticed especially with healthcare that a lot of people aren’t even aware of the insidious nature of some of the insurance industry’s practices.”

On choice, he states on his website, “A woman’s right to choose must always be protected.” And he is clearly against the Stupak amendment, something Lynch supported with an early healthcare vote in Congress last fall. 

You can read his position on the other issues on his campaign website. You cannot do that at Lynch’s site. With less than three weeks to go until the election, Lynch’s issues page merely says, “Coming soon.”

Stephen Lynch's blank Issues Page

So even if one could argue Lynch is not afraid to take a stance; that going against the Democrats on healthcare – in Kennedy country no less – was certainly a bold move, you have to wonder why he won’t defend, discuss or debate his vote.

On August 5, D’Alessandro invited Lynch to a series of debates. As of today, no debates have been scheduled. D’Alessandro’s team was told by Lynch’s campaign that the Congressman has assembled a debate negotiation team, but that team hasn’t been able to put anything on the calendar. If that isn’t a telling example of how Washington doesn’t work, than what is?

The voters in Massachusetts Ninth Congressional District deserve information, transparency and discourse. But Lynch isn’t cooperating. I have never found a candidate with whom I agree 100 percent and D’Alessandro is no exception. But assuming we align on the issues that matter most to me, I will always support the candidate who is willing to both talk, and listen, to their constituents. That is why, “I am a Mac.” 

Reminder: today is the last day to vote in the September primary.

UPDATE: Mac D’Alessandro announced on September 2 he has received the endorsements of three leading pro-choice, pro-women’s health organizations — NARAL Pro-Choice America PAC, the National Organization for Women PAC, and the Planned Parenthood Action Fund.

Sex and the City No Match for Dirty Dancing

May 27, 2010
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 There’s a lot going on in the world of chick flicks. It is opening weekend for “Sex and the City 2” and I am looking forward to seeing it even though I found the first movie to be a disappointment. Even with a sub par story line, I love those ladies — their clothes, their glamour, their friendship and their shoes. Oh, their shoes.

And Lionsgate has released the DVD/Blu-ray version of “Dirty Dancing” Limited Keepsake Edition. So many of my Carrie, Samantha, Miranda and Charlotte-loving friends have equally strong feelings for Baby, the heroine of that 80s classic. With all due respect to writer and co-producer Eleanor Bergstein, and she’s due plenty of respect, I didn’t connect with Baby in that way.  Maybe I was just too much of an Irish Catholic, blue collar, Cape Cod cottage kind of girl to relate to a gutsy, privileged Jewish girl who spends her summers at a resort. But with age comes wisdom, perspective and the opportunity to speak directly with Ms. Bergstein about her hit film, which, by the way, is also a long-running stage production.

Bergstein says so many people want to know if the movie is the story of her seventeenth summer.  But it is so much more than that. Sure it’s about dancing. “I have always been crazy about dancing and 60s music.” But for Bergstein, the movie is about, “The last summer of liberalism; the summer everything changed. It is a feminist movie,” she says. “It is about integrity and politics and the class structure.”

The story takes place in 1963, the year Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his “I Have a Dream Speech” and ten years before Roe V. Wade prohibited many state and federal restrictions on abortion.  “I was concerned that Roe V. Wade was going to be overturned,” says Bergstein and so she wrote a back alley abortion into her plot. Bergstein’s fears were not unfounded. Congress passed the Hyde amendment in 1976 banning Medicaid funding for abortion unless a woman’s life was threatened by her pregnancy. Then in 1980 the Supreme Court upheld the Hyde Amendment in Harris v. McRae thereby helping to erode a woman’s right and access to full reproductive health services.

I may not have clicked with Baby, but I certainly clicked with Bergstein. She recalls that at first the studio execs barely noticed the abortion storyline. They just wanted her to make the dancing scenes sexier. “They thought (the movie) was a terrible piece of junk that was going right to video,” she says. But then the film got attention from a potential sponsor- an acne cream. Sponsorship would have meant a picture of the cream on the movie’s posters. “Please don’t do it,” Bergstein begged the studio. But in the end, it was the sponsor who pulled out because of the illegal abortion and Bergstein held her ground against a studio pressuring her for a major rewrite. “It was part of the story, making it impossible to remove,” she says

Bergstein finds it “very troubling” that so few movies address abortion in the same way “Dirty Dancing” did. More recent films like “Juno” and “Knocked Up” have their characters give birth and then resume or start a normal, happy life. Even SATC’s baby-averse Miranda ends up living the New York fairy tale as a mom in Brooklyn with  her prince Steve after her unplanned pregnancy. Hooray for these middle class heroines with the means to make choices. But life isn’t that easy for all women. And for many, a lack of access to the full spectrum of reproductive services, can be downright dangerous.

Reproductive rights are under attack here in the United States where nearly one-third of  American women have an abortion by the age of 45.  Groups like NARAL and Planned Parenthood are doing what they can to protect these rights but they are challenged by the fact that many young women today don’t remember the days of back alleys and coat hangers and therefore don’t fully appreciate what is at stake. These young women will be hard-pressed to find references in popular culture. “My biggest fear,” says Bergstein, “is women won’t know how hard it is until it’s too late.”

“Dirty Dancing” stands out as a brave film with a strong message. Brava to Eleanor Bergstein for writing this film. May other women follow her lead.

Click here to listen to “She’s Like the Wind.” (Don’t you just love this song?)

Choice: The Untold Stories

May 3, 2010
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Thank you to Margaret Morganroth Gullette for writing a story that usually remains untold – about why a woman chose an abortion and the positive outcomes for her family.  In “My Mother’s Abortion Improved All of Our Lives” Morganroth Gullette writes, “My mother’s thinking about alleviating our poverty came into it.”  Read the full story here.

And thank you to Womens eNews for publishing it. If you’re not already reading Women’s eNews, check it out.

Chocolate Madness

April 28, 2010
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Yesterday someone asked me, “What is Chocolate Madness?” My response, “What isn’t Chocolate Madness?”

Chocolate Madness is:

 My childhood.

A medical diagnosis.

An awesome NARAL Pro-Choice Massachusetts fundraiser at which I have had the honor of being a judge for the last two years.

Chocolate Madness was held last night at the fabulous Cyclorama in Boston. Local restaurants and bakeries competed in several categories (I judged Light as Air: Chocolate Served in Crust) and then shared their treats with hundreds of partygoers. The funds from the event are used to aid the work of NARAL Massachusetts which includes supporting  pro-choice candidates and platforms, protecting reproductive rights and engaging activists on college campuses.

And who won the Chocolate Madness competition? Who cares? It was chocolate – and choice! Everyone was a winner last night.

For more on NARAL visit their website.

More Attention Needed on PreNatal Health

January 8, 2010
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Yesterday Zach Krajacic wrote in The Christian Science Monitor, “Imagine how many lives could be saved by passing a law that requires abortion providers to show mothers considering an abortion an ultrasound video of the procedure before they are allowed to perform the abortion.” His reasoning, “Upon seeing what happens during an abortion, many women might choose to have their baby rather than go through with the abortion.”

His thinking is so flawed says the woman who walked out of childbirth class when they showed the videos. I was happy to learn some breathing techniques but there was no way I was going to watch a birth on film. If I had been forced to see what happens during childbirth, I might have chosen to keep the kids in there. By the way, I would skip a life-saving organ transplant too if you made me watch a video of the operation first. How would a video preview affect Krajacic’s feelings about his annual regular prostrate exam or colonoscopy?

Krajacic infers that because so many pro-choice people also claim to be anti-abortion, then of course they would get on board with this brilliant way to reduce the number of abortions that take place. He writes, “If pro-choice advocates are sincere with their words, wouldn’t they be happy to see fewer women choosing to have abortions as a result of technology’s ability to help ensure a fully-informed conscience?”

According to RH Reality Check, “Eleven states are considering bills that would make ultrasounds mandatory for women seeking abortions.  I would have been happy to have ultrasound technology available to me when I was pregnant after a miscarriage and terrified I would lose another baby. But my insurance company wouldn’t pay for it.

Too bad men like Krajacic couldn’t spend more time worrying about how technology could positively affect issues like prenatal health, or high infant mortality rates, or the racial gap in premature births. But life isn’t really the issue here, is it?

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