1069

Abortion Proposal Sets Condition on Aid

By ROBERT PEAR, NY TIMES
July 15, 2008

WASHINGTON — The Bush administration wants to require all recipients of aid under federal health programs to certify that they will not refuse to hire nurses and other providers who object to abortion and even certain types of birth control.

Under the draft of a proposed rule, hospitals, clinics, researchers and medical schools would have to sign “written certifications” as a prerequisite to getting money under any program run by the Department of Health and Human Services.

Such certification would also be required of state and local governments, forbidden to discriminate, in areas like grant-making, against hospitals and other institutions that have policies against providing abortion.

The proposal, which circulated in the department on Monday, says the new requirement is needed to ensure that federal money does not “support morally coercive or discriminatory practices or policies in violation of federal law.” The administration said Congress had passed a number of laws to ensure that doctors, hospitals and health plans would not be forced to perform abortions.

In the proposal, obtained by The New York Times, the administration says it could cut off federal aid to individuals or entities that discriminate against people who object to abortion on the basis of “religious beliefs or moral convictions.”

The proposal defines abortion as follows: “any of the various procedures — including the prescription, dispensing and administration of any drug or the performance of any procedure or any other action — that results in the termination of the life of a human being in utero between conception and natural birth, whether before or after implantation.”

Mary Jane Gallagher, president of the National Family Planning and Reproductive Health Association, which represents providers, said, “The proposed definition of abortion is so broad that it would cover many types of birth control, including oral contraceptives and emergency contraception.”

“We worry that under the proposal, contraceptive services would become less available to low-income and uninsured women,” Ms. Gallagher said.

Indeed, among other things the proposal expresses concern about state laws that require hospitals to provide emergency contraception to rape victims who request it.

Nancy Keenan, president of Naral Pro-Choice America, said, “Why on earth is the Bush administration trying to discourage doctors and clinics from providing contraception to women who need it?”

>snip<

link


Discuss.

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"I do love this idea that one can scream and scream and scream, with that utopia just one more scream away."
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1069

You know, the very fact that such a preposterous human rights violation could even be proposed by the highest office in the land, and not be met with jeers and garbage-throwing, followed by running the proposers out of town on a rail, preferably tarred and feathered, just shows me that women are still not fully considered human beings and the equals of men. And that we don't even truly consider ourselves fully human and equal, no matter what ideals we give lip service to. If we did, we would never stand here and allow such vile propositions to ooze down from the leaders of our nation; even if rejected, such proposals reinforce the idea that we are second-class, second-rate, not-entirely-human. Unworthy of the rights men hold to be self-evident for themselves. Unwilling, unable, to do whatever we have to do to take those rights for ourselves.
Do we deserve them, if we can't or won't fight for them?
Why are so many women so weak, so cowardly, so masochistic, so disheartened?
Why are so few fighting this?

Imagine if this were applicable to men, this proposal.
What if doctors were no longer required to perform prostate exams on men if they found it morally objectionable? And what if, further, huge numbers of medical personnel did find it morally objectionably, on the grounds that it might turn men gay, and the bible says homosexuality is an abomination?
What if men started dying left and right of prostate and colon cancer because doctors refused to screen them or treat them, because they felt it to be an abomination in god's eyes to do so?
What if doctors refused to treat AIDS patients, because they felt AIDS was God's punishment for sinners?

For eight years, this administration has encouraged a return to archaic views about women, and our role in society.
This administration has created a national climate that is unsafe for and hostile toward women.
Now Bush wants to give us one last kick in the teeth on his way out the door. Then we can get on with the business of supporting him in high style, with secret service protection for the rest of his natural life, by handing over a sizable percentage of our income to the government.
In eight years, Bush has set women back half a century, by encouraging and enabling a national climate of misogyny.

People are talking about outlawing contraception as if this is a reasonable proposition.
People on this very board. People everywhere.
The same way that, a decade ago, people earnestly debated whether abortion was a moral option (yes, a decade ago, considering abortion a moral option was viewed as a- at least potentially- reasonable position. A person who responded to such a stated position with hysteria, abuse, obscenity, and threats of violence and bodily injury was considered mentally deranged and not fit to take part in such discussions. My, how times change, eh?)

Under the Bush regime, the national climate has shifted so much that women can no longer express their belief in abortion as a moral decision, without fearing for their safety and that of their families.
Under Bush, hate, vitriol, abuse, and hysteria are the order of the day.
Women who desire to control their own bodily functions are thought to deserve such treatment. There is no longer even any pretense that it's about "protecting children". That facade was necessary for awhile, but now it has been discarded entirely, showing the truth that lies beneath, the truth that powers this horrible movement: not loving babies, but hating females.

And this is what things have come to, while we all sat around twiddling our thumbs and telling one another that this, too, shall pass: forbidding women access to contraception is now viewed- for the first time in over half a century- as a potentially reasonable and rational option.
Perhaps women's health, women's lives, are not as important as the feelings of Christian men. It hurts their feelings not to be able to imprison, enslave, subjugate, and debase women. After all, the bible says they're supposed to be able to. It makes them morally uneasy, it makes their consciences hurt, not to be allowed to abuse females the way their God commands them to.
So now the government is considering putting their right to harm women over women's right to health care, to equality, to citizenship, to life.
In 2008, this seems a reasonable proposition to many people, apparently. Perhaps to a majority. I guess we'll find out.


They say you end up with the government you deserve.
We must've been awfully bad, to deserve this.
America's a joke, in extremely poor taste.
Fortunately, America is not the world, although it thinks it is. And one can still leave it, if one has to.

DarkWizard12

The fact you said it was a violation of human rights is stupidity. So I don't really see what the point of your post is. Everything else looks like trash:

"The national climate has shifted so much that women can no longer express their belief in abortion as a moral decision, without fearing for their safety and that of their families.",

OK, will this mean you will stop now?

Yes, you can leave, the faster the better. Lord knows I don't want you voting here.

1069

You know, there's no law that says you have to respond to every thread, even the ones you don't understand.
Anyway, isn't it past your bedtime?

CaptainCourtesy

Moderator's Warning:

Let's cut out the personal attacks an debate the topic.

__________________
"Never fear. Him is here" - Captain Chaos (Dom DeLuise), Cannonball Run

====||:-D

Jerry

Well Mrs. Keenan, it has to do with the right to life, something which you have no respect for. I'm sure you are aware of all the arguments related to the matter of abortion, so I can only assume that by asking this question you arer attempting to paint the policy in something other than an objective light, and I for one dismiss it as such.

When you no longer advocate killing children on a whim, on demand, for any or no reason, we can talk.

__________________
Palin/Miller 2012!

winston53660

Who is advocating the killing of children

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http://winstoncreative.com/

DarkWizard12

the anti-life crowd. We know, we know, but what else is it? Freedom? Liberty? If you call killing liberty...so be it.

but, its not so much abortion that bothers me as it is the crowd itself. When you have the bulk of them saying stuff like this ""The national climate has shifted so much that women can no longer express their belief in abortion as a moral decision, without fearing for their safety and that of their families."" How the hell can they be taken seriously? ONly one word for them in my book: Lunatics.

So in an attempt to have a serious debate: IF abortion ever becomes illegal and criminalized, will you (the pro-choice crowd) concede that it is by your own definition, "murder"(unlawful killing)?

prometeus

Perhaps you should own book S instead.

DarkWizard12

Only...one...word...for...them...in...my...book...

sounds abour right. Has your foot been in your mouth lately?

and you could have called me on my capitalization errors.