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Macguffin,
This poster was seen floating around the city as I strolled home. I think I must have one for the living room.
Yours,
P
Dear Puffin
I have heard a heartwarming report that this billboard actually exists somewhere in Fort Wayne, Indiana:
These folks (a great Facebook group btw, definitely worth following) seem to think that it is real and not photoshopped. And Puffin, I can’t adequately express the depth of my hope that this is real. After all, Mike is a past winner of the Asshole of the Month award here at MacGuffin and Puffin. Unfortunately, until I get some sort of verification, I can’t quite make myself believe it. Some cursory googling has revealed bugger all. (Also it sure looks photoshopped…..)
Does anyone know if this is real? Let me know here, on twitter, or on tumblr.
Edit: for those who are interested, this, this, and this are some of the reasons that I think Mike Pence and his ilk should be tarred and feathered and run out of town.
Love
MacGuffin (who would very much like to have 20 minutes alone with Mike Pence in a dark alley.)
Dear Puffin
Prepare yourself for a rant of epic proportions. I’m fucking furious.
So the House passed HR3, aka the No Taxpayer Funding for Abortions Act, aka the let’s redefine rape act, aka the let’s destroy women’s reproductive rights act, aka the let’s keep doctors from making the right medical decisions act, aka the totally pointless act that ‘codifies’ a rule that was already in existence even though it shouldn’t have been (the Hyde amendment), aka the worst piece of legislation since the Patriot Act. I am, not unexpectedly, right royally pissed the fuck off about this. Open Congress summarizes the bill thusly:
This bill would make permanent and expand the Hyde amendment restrictions on the use of federal funds for abortions. It seeks to prohibit even indirect funding streams that may potentially come in contact with abortion services. For example, it would deny tax credits to companies that offer health plans that cover abortions and it would block anybody with insurance that covers abortions from receiving federal subsidies or medical cost tax deductions, even if the abortion is paid separately with personal funds. Women who use tax-free Medical Savings Accounts would have to pay taxes on the costs of abortions.
Slate is less circumspect:
HR3 eliminates any tax credits or deductions taken by individuals or employers for health insurance, if that insurance plan covers abortion, even if they don’t use the service.
Ron Swanson does not approve
Quite how this qualifies as ‘small government’ I do not know. Apparently the GOP wants to limit the government’s ability to control the blatantly amoral shenanigans of corporations, but it’s totally necessary for zillions of civil servants to spend countless hours fiddling the tax code around to make sure that no money that was ever touched by the government can even indirectly pay for a legal medical procedure. And that, apparently, is a good use of my tax dollars. Yes, it is much more important than auditing Wall Street executives who are stashing cash in small Caribbean islands. Those baby-killing wimminz are much more deserving of IRS scrutiny. The government fucking prints the cash dudes, at a certain point it’s all government money unless we plan to go back to the barter system, in which case me and my knitting buddies will school the crap out of all of you. We actually know how to make stuff, assholes.
Also apparently we have completely forgotten about job creation. At the juncture I will do something I’ve never done before and quote John Ashcroft in defense of my own argument: “While women need the right to birth control and abortion, we also need to be able to have and raise children, and that means equal opportunity, good jobs and equal pay.” We’ve been distracted by all those gay teacher’s unions having abortions! After them! But on the other hand we have created a whole new profession: abortion auditors. It will now be up to the IRS aka the Ninja Abortion Squad, to make sure women don’t spend any government money on abortion.
Because H.R. 3 bans using tax credits or deductions to pay for abortions or insurance, a woman who used such a benefit would have to prove, if audited, that her abortion “fell under the rape/incest/life-of-the-mother exception, or that the health insurance she had purchased did not cover abortions.” Essentially, the bill turns Internal Revenue Service agents into “abortion cops.”
The taxpayer would have to prove that she had complied with all applicable abortion laws. Under standard audit procedure, a woman would have to provide evidence to corroborate facts about abortions, rapes, and cases of incest, says Marcus Owens, an accountant and former longtime IRS official. If a taxpayer received a deduction or tax credit for abortion costs related to a case of rape or incest, or because her life was endangered, then “on audit [she] would have to demonstrate or prove, ideally by contemporaneous written documentation, that it was incest, or rape, or [her] life was in danger,” Owens says. “It would be fairly intrusive for the woman.”
The Daily Kos has a good breakdown of how totally ridiculous this is.
HR3 would disallow tax deductions for your health care expenses if your private insurance plan covers abortion. Not if you actually get an abortion. And not if a member of your family does. All it takes for you to see your taxes hiked is if the private insurance plan you selected and paid for with your own money permits coverage of abortion at all. For anyone. Even if you never get one and never plan to. If you bought a plan that agrees to cover abortion if someone else totally unrelated to you needs one, then you lose eligibility for any tax deductions for the cost of your insurance, and your tax bill shoots up. Republicans take your cash, because you agreed to buy a plan that might someday pay for someone else’s abortion.
Or as the ACLU put it:
It manipulates the tax code so as to penalize millions of Americans by taking away tax credits to small businesses that offer insurance plans that cover abortion along with other pregnancy-related care and by precluding families from deducting medical expenses related to abortion.
How is this not the GOP telling me how to spend my own money? Apparently I lose my tax break for privately purchasing a health plan that covers abortion, even if I never plan to have one, even if I were physically incapable of getting pregnant, even if I don’t have a fucking uterus. All this, of course, is taking place while Texas approves a tax break for people who want to buy yachts worth $250,000 or more. So…. I lose my tax break if I buy an insurance plan that might, once, maybe, cover an abortion for a woman I’ve never met, but tax breaks for quarter million dollar yachts are totally cool. Maybe I can recoup the money I lost because of my health insurance by buying a quarter million dollar boat. Of course if I had a quarter million to spare I would just fly to a civilized fucking country (like Albania, Australia, Bahrain, Belarus, Belgium, Bosnia, Cambodia, Canada, Croatia, Cuba, Denmark, Estonia, Germany, Greece, Hungary, North fucking Korea, Latvia, Lithuania, Macedonia, Mozambique, the Netherlands, Norway, Slovenia, Sweden, Vietnam or Yugoslavia) and get a goddamn abortion.
Because you know what? Whether you like it or not, abortion is a perfectly acceptable option. And don’t give me that ‘adoption not abortion’ crap. For one thing, as Barbara Ehrenreich points out, “no one has been able to figure out, even with expert counseling, how to use adoption as a method of birth control, or at what time of the month it is most effective.” Pregnancy is difficult, dangerous, and should be done right, with care and attention and, if possible, love. To quote Garret Hardi, “Society does not need more children; but it does need more loved children… There should not be the slightest communal concern when a woman elects to destroy the life of her thousandth-of-an-ounce embryo. But all society should rise up in alarm when it hears that a baby that is not wanted is about to be born.” No one should be forced to remain pregnant. Surely we can cope with this idea by now.
Pregnancy is not some walk in the park. Aside from everything else, it’s dangerous. Almost 30% of births in the US are by caesarian section, which is major surgery that involves cutting your abdomen open and surgically removing the baby. And that’s fairly common. There can also be terrible terrible complications, even in the perfectly planned births of healthy babies to healthy mothers. Stories like John and Sherry’s are terrifying, impossible to predict, and they do happen. Pregnancy and birth are major medical events. Even when everything goes perfectly it’s difficult, painful, exhausting, and it completely disrupts your life, as it should, since it’s a big fucking deal. It’s not something that can be shrugged off with an ‘oh just have the baby and put it up for adoption.’ We who are pro-choice don’t think that pregnancy is not a big deal. We realize exactly how big a deal it is and we demand the right to make the intelligent, informed, responsible decision not to have the baby. Some of us are not willing to sacrifice 9 months of our lives to an unwanted pregnancy and are not willing to remain celibate in order to ensure that the problem doesn’t come up. (Note please that no one is asking men to abstain from sex in order to avoid unwanted pregnancies. Apparently using condoms fulfills the responsibility quota for men, but not for women.) When men remain celibate in order to completely eliminate the risk of unwanted pregnancy then I will too. Heterosexual sex without procreation will cease to exist and the lesbians will have all the fun. But wait, there is a better option than celibacy. It’s called birth control, and failing that, abortion. Get the fuck over it.
And don’t you dare even bring God up. If you seriously intend to tell me that I have to drop out of school or take time off work in order to spend 9 months growing an unwanted life and then push a 7 pound thing out of my vagina because the inaccurately reported words of some mythological dude told you it was morally right then I will laugh in your face. You might have a faith as deep and true as can be, but I, for one, do not believe in this ‘God’ person, and if you think that I’m going to let your insanely outdated cultish belief in a supernatural deity influence my medical decisions then you have another think coming.
The GOP position on health care “calls for ‘improving public health through flexibility and innovation’ and ‘giving patients and providers control over treatment options.” Unless those options include abortion, apparently. Y’all saw this video right?
That mother’s baby was being crushed to death inside her. The mother and the doctor were prevented by law from making the right medical decisions on behalf of the mother’s child/the doctor’s patient (both the mother and the fetus, although fetuses aren’t people, so it’s not actually the doctor’s patient, but you know what I mean.)(Also, can we have an episode of House about this? House would never stand for the government telling him what he could and couldn’t do for his patients.) Besides, if you truly believe that a fetus can feel pain (it totally can’t by the way) then how the fuck was it right to sentence this mother and child to three weeks of torture?
But according to Joe Pitts (R-PA) author of the abominable Protect Life Act, this is all fine and dandy, because “abortion is not health care. Abortion is the most violent form of death known to mankind.” More violent, apparently, than Danielle’s fetus being crushed. Or, you know, people being chopped up by machetes in Rwanda, or being stoned to death for being gay.
This leads me to Chris Smith, the reprehensible republican representative from New Jersey who, during the House debate, said that future generations “will note with deep sadness, that some of our politicians, while they talked about human rights, never lifted a finger to protect the most persecuted minority in the world: the child in the womb.” (emphasis added)
GET FUCKING REAL
1.) For fuck’s sake don’t let the Jews hear you say that. No seriously, that’s heinously disrespectful to actual people who have actually been persecuted. As opposed to a bunch of cells in some teenager’s uterus.
2.) You are a total fucking douche and as far as I’m concerned you must be morally bankrupt and I hope you someday realize what you have done and I hope your wife/daughter/everyone you know is ashamed of you and tells you so to your face. Seriously, how the fuck do you live with yourself?
3.) More persecuted than the women you are denying health care to? Because “the most immediate effect if HR3 passes into law would likely be that every insurance company in the country would drop abortion coverage, as no employers or individuals are likely to take a tax raise just to keep a plan that covers abortion services. This will result in more dead pregnant women, since insurance companies will also drop coverage for expensive late term abortions that are used to save women who develop conditions such as eclampsia later in their pregnancies, a service that can cost thousands of dollars.” Via.
4.) More persecuted than the victims of Joe Pitts’ Let Women Die Act, which would “allow hospitals that receive federal funds but are opposed to abortions to turn away women in need of emergency pregnancy termination to save their lives.” Currently, “if a hospital can’t (or wont) provide the care a patient needs, it is required to transfer that patient to a hospital that can, and the receiving hospital is required to accept that patient. In the case of an anti-abortion hospital with a patient requiring an emergency abortion, ETMALA would require that hospital to perform it or transfer the patient to someone who can. Pitts’ new bill would free hospitals from any abortion requirement under EMTALA, meaning that medical providers who aren’t willing to terminate pregnancies wouldn’t have to — nor would they have to facilitate a transfer. The hospital could literally do nothing at all.” I would like to think that no doctor would allow that to happen, but these days I’m not so sure.
5.) Also those fetuses are apparently more persecuted than, say, all the rape victims who were not ‘forcibly’ raped. Because yes, the forcible rape thing is back. Like a bad penny, this piece of cold hard shit just will not go away. Forcible rape. As if there were any other kind of rape. As if there were some other, non forcible way to force your penis (or whatever) into your victim. Or violate them in whatever other way. Violation is, by nature, forcible; that’s why it’s a violation. Rape is the act of forcing someone into sex, but according to the new forcible rape language, it’s not rape if the victim says no but does not physically fight off the perpetrator, or if the victim is drugged or threatened, or if the victim is physically or mentally incapacitated, or if it’s statutory rape. I guess this means it’s open season on coma patients. They didn’t fight the perpetrator off and they didn’t say no, so…..? And also, you know, when uncle Lester the molester threatens to beat the shit out of his 15 year old niece unless she keeps quiet about what he’s doing to her, that’s not rape any longer. And if he knocks her up she can’t have an abortion on medicaid, and her insurance wont pay for it, and Planned Parenthood will be gone or inaccessible. This is going to be a great new world guys.
For all these reasons and many more, Chris Smith, Joe Pitts and the authors of HR3 win the Asshole of the month award for May, even though we’re only 5 days in. I can’t imagine anyone is going to beat this in the next 25 days.
Love
MacGuffin, who is seriously disillusioned with America in general these days
Other posts filed under Feminism and Politics:
Close your eyes and think of England: the secret agenda of the uterine wall, revealed!
New passport application questions
Asshole of the month- March (Mike Pence will be the first against the wall when the revolution comes)
NAACP chapter president says gays have ‘hijacked’ the civil rights movement, presumes to speak for Dr Martin Luther King Jr and generally makes a fool of himself.
Dear Puffin
It is refreshing to see someone on the right speak out against their party, especially on social issues. In fact it’s so rare these days that I feel like people on the right who do speak up deserve a gold star. I’m happy to report that today I have two candidates. Well, one and a half. Aside from the actual substance of current GOP/TEA politics, I have to say that one of the things that pisses me off most profoundly about the right is their attitude to the party line, which seems to be less a line than a razor wire which will violently decapitate you, should you cross it. Or maybe a cliff. They do seem more and more like unholy crosses between Wile E Coyote and a particularly obedient lemming, desperately running over a cliff and not quite aware that the ground under them is gone and had been for quite some time. [Update: I don't know why it is that the left gains legitimacy by questioning itself and earns points for hearing every view and being flexible and, (fine I'll say it), humoring the extreme opposition, while such mental agility would be suicidal for a right winger. Why is that?]
Alan Simpson, however, gets a gold star today for taking a stand against the anti-abortion nut jobs and homophobes that seem to be speaking for his party. And the especially nice thing is that he is taking an explicitly moral/ideological stand, rather than hiding behind the law. It would have been easy for him shelter behind the current legislation (abortion is legal, remember?) and simply argue to uphold the law. But Simpson is actually going out on a limb and declaring that this anti-woman crap is wrong. Which is awesome. Of course, the fact that we’ve gotten to the point that this seems like going out on a limb is depressing as hell. But be that as it may, Simpson earns a solid gold Death Star for this interview.
SIMPSON: Who the hell is for abortion? I don’t know anybody running around with a sign that says, “Have an abortion! They’re wonderful!” They’re hideous, but they’re a deeply intimate and personal decision, and I don’t think men legislators should even vote on the issue.
Then you’ve got homosexuality, you’ve got Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. We have homophobes on our party. That’s disgusting to me. We’re all human beings. We’re all God’s children. Now if they’re going to get off on that stuff—Santorum has said some cruel things—cruel, cruel things—about homosexuals. Ask him about it; see if he attributes the cruelness of his remarks years ago. Foul.
Now if that’s the kind of guys that are going to be on my ticket, you know, it makes you sort out hard what Reagan said, you know, “Stick with your folks.”But, I’m not sticking with people who are homophobic, anti-women, moral values—while you’re diddling your secretary while you’re giving a speech on moral values? Come on, get off of it.
Fun fact of the day: you know who else crossed the party line? Barry Goldwater, famously spoke out against homophobia, especially with regard to the military. And the dangers of the religious right. Yeah. Him. The father of the modern conservative movement. (Or at least he was, before Reagan got in there) Here are a couple of my favorite quotes from one of his Washington Post articles
Everyone knows that gays have served honorably in the military since at least the time of Julius Caesar. They’ll still be serving long after we’re all dead and buried. That should not surprise anyone.
Some in congress think I’m wrong. They say we absolutely must continue to discriminate, or all hell will break loose. Who knows, they say, perhaps our soldiers may even take up arms against each other.
Well, that’s just stupid.
The conservative movement, to which I subscribe, has as one of its basic tenets the belief that government should stay out of people’s private lives. Government governs best when it governs least – and stays out of the impossible task of legislating morality. But legislating someone’s version of morality is exactly what we do by perpetuating discrimination against gays.
Of course, his most famous quote on the subject was this:
You don’t have to be straight to be in the military; you just have to be able to shoot straight.
FYI, Barry Goldwater was also pro-choice. And every year Planned Parenthood gives the Barry Goldwater Award “to an outstanding public official who has supported Planned Parenthood and reproductive health issues”. So, conservatives, put that in your pipe and smoke it.
I just don’t know what happened to this country Puffin.
Yours, from somewhere between anger and regret
MacGuffin
Dear Puffin,
Republican Rep Mike Pence wins the Asshole of the Month award for March with this op-ed in the National Review. He also beat off some stiff competition to get himself in the running for biggest jerk of all time.
On Feb. 18, 2011, with bipartisan support, the House of Representatives passed the Pence Amendment, which would end taxpayer funding for Planned Parenthood. In response, Planned Parenthood used its vast resources to launch slick Madison Avenue television ads portraying the group — the nation’s largest abortion provider — as an altruistic organization that provides health-care services to the poor and has only an incidental interest in abortion.
Planned Parenthood has vast resources? Really? Now are those the vast resources of federal funding that you’re in the process of cutting, or are they different vast resources? How many vast resources do they have, and where are they coming from? Are you talking about the private donations from citizens? Cause arguably people’s willingness to shell out cold hard cash is a better indicator of public opinion than the plurality you claim to represent. And yes, how dare the not-for-profit clinic portray itself as “an altruistic organization that provides health-care services to the poor”. How dare they!
Despite efforts to suggest otherwise, the Pence Amendment does not reduce funding for cancer screenings or eliminate one dime of funding for other important health services to women; the money that does not go to Planned Parenthood as a result of the Pence Amendment will go to other organizations that provide these services. If the Pence Amendment becomes law, thousands of women’s health centers, clinics, and hospitals will still provide assistance to low-income families and women. The Pence Amendment would simply deny any and all federal funding to Planned Parenthood
So… if you still plan to fund the cancer screenings and other health services… why can’t Planned Parenthood just do it? You’re already paying them to do this exact job. And Title X of the Public Health Service Act already prevents Planned Parenthood from using federal dollars on abortion services anyway. Since the abortion programs are not government funded they will be the only part of Planned Parenthood’s program not affected by this cut. So by definition, what you’re doing here is slashing funding for cancer screenings, STD testing, prenatal care and other sexual health programs. No no, I understand. Despite your efforts of suggest otherwise, you are, in fact, reducing funding for cancer screenings. Once we wade through the bullshit it becomes clear that what you’re trying to do is force PP to de-prioritize abortion services and use the private donor money to fund the services you do approve of. Except that a lot of that donor money was given specifically to fund abortions. Edited to add: I’m getting really sick of this ‘money is fungible’ argument. It’s not. There is actually a large body of law on this issue, written specifically to ensure that donated money goes to the causes the donor wanted to support. So when PP gets private donor money for abortions they cannot use that money for cancer screenings and vice versa. This is the same law that makes sure the money you give to a college scholarship program is actually spent on that program, rather than on the football team, or a new computer lab. Do some fucking research Mr Pence.
Never mind that bills specifically targeting identifiable organizations or individuals (aka bills of attainder) are totally illegal. Rep Jerry Nadler points out “[an attainder is] a legislative[ly] enacted penalty, in this case no funding, directed at an identifiable person or organization to punish them for something. Article I Section 9 says ‘no bill of attainder or ex post facto should be passed.’ Fundamental foundation of constitutional law. If Planned Parenthood or anyone else is doing terrible things and ought to be punished, that’s up to the courts”. Abortion is legal. End of discussion.
Planned Parenthood clinics focus mainly on abortion — and because money is fungible, there is no way to fund the useful services without freeing up money for the organization to spend on abortion. In 2009, the group made only 977 adoption referrals and cared for only 7,021 prenatal clients, but performed a record 332,278 abortions. In other words, a pregnant woman entering a Planned Parenthood clinic was 42 times more likely to have an abortion than to either receive prenatal care or be referred for adoption. Planned Parenthood recently made plain the centrality of abortion to its mission by mandating that every one of its affiliates have at least one clinic that performs abortions within the next two years.
Oh, I see. You have a problem with the fact that the abortion clinic provides abortions. Got it. And I really admire the way you skew those stats. Why is it that my facts are merely statistics, but your statistics are facts? (Hats off to Sir Humphrey Appleby) I don’t suppose it matters to you that people can get the other services elsewhere- adoptions through churches, government agencies, international agencies, and many others. And prenatal care is still (for now) more widely available than pregnancy termination. At this point there is almost nowhere else to go if you need an abortion, and Planned Parenthood serves ONLY those who have no other option. So does Planned Parenthood provide a lot of the abortions? Totally. Get over it. And anyway, my tax dollars paid for your stupid war in Iraq. We spend government money on morally dubious causes all the time. (Not that abortion is morally dubious). The abortions that Planned Parenthood provides are funded without government support. When the war in Iraq is funded by private donations then I’ll call the game even and we can all go home.
Advocates for the abortion industry have sought to portray efforts to defund Planned Parenthood as a “War on Women,” but the issue is big business, and that business is abortion. This legislative battle is about Big Abortion vs. American taxpayers. As Abby Johnson, a former Planned Parenthood director, recently said, “Planned Parenthood’s mission, on paper, is to give women quality and affordable health care and to protect women’s rights. In reality, their mission is to increase their abortion numbers and in turn increase their revenue.”
Big. Business. Ok. But Planned Parenthood is a registered 501(c)3, so by definition they are not a business, and they do not constitute an ‘abortion industry’. Second, if they were powerful enough to warrant either of those pejorative names, do you think for a second that we would even be having this argument? If Planned Parenthood and this mythological abortion industry were actually as powerful as he makes out, they would have funneled enough money into the pockets of congressmen like Mr Pence that this discussion would not be happening.
According to its most recent annual report, the organization raked in $1.1 billion in total revenue. Of that amount, $363.2 million came from taxpayers in the form of government grants and contracts. While current law prohibits Planned Parenthood from directly using tax dollars on abortions, taxpayers subsidize its overall operation, freeing up funds that can be diverted to direct spending on abortion.
Mr Pence fails to note that while Planned Parenthood ‘raked in’ $1.1 billion, they also spent a little over $1 billion, and wrote off $78 million in lost investments. Planned Parenthood made a $4.9 million budget shortfall in their 2009 annual report. (For those who don’t know, all non-profits file an annual report with the IRS, along with form 990, every year. They do not make these numbers up, and they do get audited. And Planned Parenthood, I suspect, gets audited rather a lot.) Oh and Mr Pence? When it goes back into the capital fund, it’s not a profit. It’s not going home with anyone.
And on a related note, those publicly available tax forms allow us to find out all sorts of fascinating information about non-profits. Like the fact that Candie’s Foundation, an abstinence only teen pregnancy prevention center, paid only $35,000 to actual teen pregnancy programs, but managed to pony up over a quarter of a million ($262,500) to Bristol Palin, the nation’s most famous teen mom. As well as $165,000 in TV advertising. Because abstinence ads on TV can totally replace pap smears, cancer screenings and prenatal care. Screenshots of the tax forms in question can be seen here. If we are serious about de-funding Planned Parenthood in favor of foundations like this, then they had better start spending some of their vast resources on some of the services Planned Parenthood will no longer be able to provide. Like, say, infertility counseling. Which is another service Planned parenthood provides.
And for all the talk about how poor women would be harmed if taxpayers stopped subsidizing Big Abortion, it is telling to see how Planned Parenthood is spending its money. According to a June 2008 story in the Wall Street Journal, Planned Parenthood was flush with cash and using its profits to rebrand itself.
I’d love to know what article he’s talking about, but he provides no link and the WSJ covers Planned Parenthood kind of a lot. And according to their annual report and 990 form….. um…. I don’t see any significant money going to marketing or construction. In fact their entire budget is program funding. If he’s talking about the affiliate clinics then thats a different issue. And while its probably a worthwhile exercise to talk about the dialog that takes place between the government, the national body and the affiliate bodies, it is completely disingenuous to spin the numbers this way.
The effort was designed to build the business by targeting wealthy consumers to complement their existing customer base of poor and minority populations. While taxpayers underwrite its operations, Planned Parenthood is building luxury health centers in shopping centers and malls, designed by marketing experts with touches such as hardwood floors, muted lighting, and large waiting rooms.
Oh horrors, a comfortable and non-threatening environment to go through one of the worst experiences of your life in. FYI, Planned Parenthood is supposed to be the alternative to sketchy clinics in Mexico. And what a terrible idea, putting clinics in convenient locations! Everyone knows that they belong on the wrong side of town, between a meat packing plant and an abattoir. But never fear, this is all part of the plan. Put clinics in out of the way locations and then slash funding for things like public transit. That way no matter what services the clinic offers, it wont matter! No one will be able to get there!
And note that he refers to ‘consumers’ and ‘customers’. Not patients. As if Planned Parenthood was a retail establishment selling bespoke abortions and custom tailored pap smears to discerning ladies of quality on Park Ave. Its all an attempt to create a sense that the people who ‘patronize’ Planned Parenthood clinics are not from ‘main street’. Except that they are. And casting the debate in retail language makes it seem like PP has some sort of profit-motivation to ‘sell’ more abortions.
And Big Abortion routinely puts profits over women’s health and safety. When women testify in favor of tightening safety standards at clinics, Planned Parenthood fights them. And despite the fact that 88 percent of Americans favor informed-consent laws that provide information about the risks of, and alternatives to, abortion for women, Planned Parenthood opposes these efforts and works to keep women in the dark. And tragically, in some instances, Planned Parenthood has refused to cooperate when law-enforcement officials have sought information to help girls they believed to be victims of child rape or molestation.
Frankly I have no idea what Mr Pence is talking about. Profits? It’s a 501(c)3. Keep women in the dark? Planned Parenthood is not pushing abortion. It offers abortion to women who seek it out. This is all part of that weird idea that women get ‘recreational abortions’. Yes, we really enjoy it. I often finish off a weekend of debauchery with a pedicure and an abortion. And fine, lets just talk about the advantages of an abortion as opposed to adoption, since the pro-life position on unwanted pregnancy seems to be “oh just carry the baby to term and then give it up!”, as if the 9 months you spend pregnant are some sort of cake walk that will have no effect on your life. Having an abortion means you do not have to ask for maternity leave, take time off school, run up huge medical bills (sometimes on drugs that used to be $10 and are now $1500), and spend 9 months growing a baby you do not want. Pregnancy is complicated, difficult and sometimes dangerous and doing it right takes a lot of effort. You need to eat right, exercise, see a doctor regularly and a thousand other things. Lets just hope you have health insurance. And pregnancy is still risky. If something goes wrong you might require a c-section, which is major surgery involving cutting your abdomen open. And even in the best of cases, giving birth involves pushing a 7-9 pound person out of your vagina. It is not pleasant and is not something that should be gone into lightly! Sometimes abortion is the right answer. Deal with it. It is not your call or my call.
The nation’s largest abortion provider also offers some helpful services, but that should not translate into Americans’ being forced to fund them. Many organizations that provide charitable services, such as the Salvation Army, do not expect to be underwritten by American taxpayers. Why should Big Abortion be the exception?
For the 99th time, Americans are not being forced to fund abortions. The only Americans funding abortions at Planned Parenthood are the ones who voluntarily write a check. Like me. Also, the Salvation Army is a religious organization (actually its a church), which is why it is not underwritten by taxpayers. Although I expect that to change shortly.
As Abby Johnson has said, “There are better uses of our money. Planned Parenthood provides shabby, limited health care.” If supporters of Planned Parenthood wish to support the organization, they have every right to do so, but they should not expect everyone else to sign the check.
I grow tired of repeating myself.
The time has come to deny any and all federal funding to Planned Parenthood Federation of America.
— Rep. Mike Pence is a Republican congressman from Indiana.
Rep Mike Pence is an asshole.
Dear Puffin
Todays’s asshole uterus of the day comes from the Florida state government where Rep Scott Randolph (D- Orlando) has been reprimanded for using a dirty word on the house floor. The word? Uterus.
House GOP spokeswoman Katie Betta: “The Speaker has been clear about his expectations for conduct on the House for during debate. At one point during the debate, he mentioned to the entire House that members of both parties needed to be mindful of decorum during debate.
“Additionally, the Speaker believes it is important for all Members to be mindful of and respectful to visitors and guests, particularly the young pages and messengers who are seated in the chamber during debates. In the past, if the debate is going to contain language that would be considered inappropriate for children and other guests, the Speaker will make an announcement in advance, asking children and others who may be uncomfortable with the subject matter to leave the floor and gallery.”
Um ………………….what? Yes, as a lady I find it very very disrespectful when people refer to a part of my body by its correct anatomical name. Seriously guys, show some respect for the vajayjay. Rep Randolph’s actual comment was to suggest that his wife should “incorporate her uterus” as the only way protect her reproductive rights. I think he makes a very very good point. On the other hand, I also see the GOP’s perspective in this. I mean, government regulation is the only hope if we are to be saved from the hordes of unregulated uteri that lurk around every street corner. Beware the impending uterus invasion guys. Its just one short step from recreational abortions to weaponized wombs marching the streets of America, terrorizing the populace. Suddenly I see why people are afraid of feminists. Cause that was totally our plan guys, and the only thing stopping us from taking over the world is the brave men and women of the GOP, valiantly trying to regulate us and prevent us from making any trouble. Like, you know, me making my own choices about my uterus. Did you hear me? UTERUS!
This reminds me of a great scene from Boston Legal
All together now, uterus, uterus, uterus, UTERUS! (That is definitely one of those words that becomes stranger the more you say it. Like spatula. Seriously, say spatula to yourself 20 times and see).
Also, as we all know, the Dodge Ram logo is just a stylized uterus. Don’t believe me?
Inappropriate I say, inappropriate! I hereby demand the removal of all such pornographic depictions of lady parts from America’s automobiles!! Never again shall our children (or our congressional pages) be terrorized by the specter of an aggressive sheep-womb charging at them on I-95!!
Be afraid Puffin. Be very afraid.
MacGuffin
