Julie Burkhart of Trust Women Foundation, and Tammi Kromenaker, director of Red River Women’s Clinic in North Dakota, talk with Rachel Maddow about how patients and practitioners are weathering clinic-killing TRAP laws that are the new strategy in the GOP war on women’s health services.
Appearing before Planned Parenthood’s annual convention last Friday, President Obama pledged his continuing support for women’s reproductive rights. In a speech before the National Academy of Sciences on Monday, Mr. Obama promised to keep science a sphere “not subject to politics” or “skewed by an agenda.”
On Wednesday, his administration betrayed both reproductive rights and science. The Justice Department announced that it would appeal a federal court ruling that would make morning-after pills available without a prescription for girls and women of all ages.
The administration’s continued stubbornness may please some conservative groups critical of the president. But it will hurt girls and women and is bound to undermine Mr. Obama’s credibility when he calls for principled, evidence-based policy-making on other issues, like global warming.
—From the New York Times Editorial Board today.
I, too, am deeply disappointed in President Obama’s administration today.
The President has again and again vowed to restore scientific evidence to its rightful place in guiding public policy.
Here’s what the medical/scientific experts say on access to Plan B:
The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (The College) and the Society for Adolescent Health and Medicine (SAHM) oppose the U.S. Department of Justice’s May 1 decision to appeal a recent U.S. District Court ruling requiring that emergency contraception products be made available over-the-counter without age restriction. The medical organizations stand behind their support of the Court’s ruling, citing strong scientific evidence on the safety and efficacy of emergency contraception for all women of reproductive age.
(via sciencedeniers)
Birth Control 101 by TomPreston.
Forty years after the Supreme Court affirmed a woman’s constitutional right to privacy, including the right to choose, we shouldn’t have to remind people that when it comes to a woman’s health, no politician should get to decide what’s best for you. No insurer should get to decide what kind of care that you get. The only person who should get to make decisions about your health is you.
— Shakesville: President Obama at Planned Parenthood (via hopeisreal42)
(via hopeisreal42)
These predatory measures directly affect folks’ abilities to take care of themselves and their families and communities. ALEC hasn’t technically targeted reproductive rights, but around here we know that the more hurdles a person has to leap in order to be allowed some measure of self-determination, the less control they have over their reproductive autonomy. ALEC is, however, targeting Oklahoma – remember, top 5 in poverty and poor health, and the front line for the battle against the Keystone XL – for environmental deregulation, union-busting, and healthcare denial. This is a totally parasitic relationship. Go home, ALEC, you’re drunk on coal and guns.
— OK4RJ | ALEC Holds Annual Meeting in OKC, Looms Menacingly Over Flyover Country (via ok4rj)
Ruth Bader Ginsburg on women taking over the Supreme Court!
Happy 80th Birthday, Justice Ginsburg!
Administration Again Fails on Over-the-Counter Emergency Contraception
The Obama administration’s newest plan to make emergency contraception over-the-counter to some groups and not others only creates more confusion and a new set of barriers to access. I guess this administration would rather play Russian Roulette with teen pregnancy than make it easier to prevent.
Of the many and varied lies told by anti-choicers in their quest to separate women from their basic human rights to bodily autonomy, the claim that women need to lose their rights in order to protect Black people is one of the most odious. It is an odious claim in no small part because the mostly white conservatives who pretend to be “concerned” about Black women getting abortions aren’t fooling anyone, since they spend the rest of their time attacking the civil and economic rights of ordinary Americans in ways that disproportionately harm Black people.
— Amanda Marcotte, Florida’s Racist Anti-Choice Bill Prompts Walkout By Female Legislators
Focused on Gosnell, Congressional Republicans Suddenly Very Worried About Violence Against Women
Suddenly, GOP Congressmen are very worried about violence against women. You know, when there’s abortion involved.
“Thank God for the men who stood up today to speak for women and against violence against women.”
When Minnesota Congresswoman Michele Bachmann spoke those words on the House floor, anyone who hadn’t been watching the whole show might have thought she was praising colleagues after a vote to reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act.
Instead, she was talking about the Gosnell trial.
Still convinced that there is a “media blackout” that needs to be exposed, a handful of Republican Congressmen (and one Republican Congresswoman) took to the floor to give one-minute speeches on the ongoing trial of Dr. Kermit Gosnell, the Pennsylvania doctor accused of murder. By extension, they could then discuss the horrors of abortion and the need to “speak for the unborn” and protect women from harm.
