Debate Schedule

 

*From the NYTimes

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15 Minutes…

Is all the time you need to contact the Department of Health and Human Services to express your opinion (outrage) about the proposed rule to “protect” health care workers,” while seriously undermining a patient’s right to unbiased medical opinion and treatment. I’ve pasted today’s Op-Ed below, though it doesn’t tell you how to contact the department.

But how to contact them? The department hasn’t exactly made it easy (a sure-fire sign they don’t really want to hear from you). You can send a message through the ACLU here, or directly to HHS here (note: it looks like a comment page for the usability of the website, but is actually the only way to send the dept. a comment). Or, give them a call at 202-619-0257 or 1-877-696-6775. Better yet, do both. It’s too late to mail a letter–there are only 6 days left of the open comment period.

September 19, 2008

Op-Ed Contributor

Blocking Care for Women

 

By HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON and CECILE RICHARDS

 

LAST month, the Bush administration launched the latest salvo in its eight-year campaign to undermine women’s rights and women’s health by placing ideology ahead of science: a proposed rule from the Department of Health and Human Services that would govern family planning. It would require that any health care entity that receives federal financing — whether it’s a physician in private practice, a hospital or a state government — certify in writing that none of its employees are required to assist in any way with medical services they find objectionable.

Laws that have been on the books for some 30 years already allow doctors to refuse to perform abortions. The new rule would go further, ensuring that all employees and volunteers for health care entities can refuse to aid in providing any treatment they object to, which could include not only abortion and sterilization but also contraception.

Health and Human Services estimates that the rule, which would affect nearly 600,000 hospitals, clinics and other health care providers, would cost $44.5 million a year to administer. Astonishingly, the department does not even address the real cost to patients who might be refused access to these critical services. Women patients, who look to their health care providers as an unbiased source of medical information, might not even know they were being deprived of advice about their options or denied access to care.

The definition of abortion in the proposed rule is left open to interpretation. An earlier draft included a medically inaccurate definition that included commonly prescribed forms of contraception like birth control pills, IUD’s and emergency contraception. That language has been removed, but because the current version includes no definition at all, individual health care providers could decide on their own that birth control is the same as abortion.

The rule would also allow providers to refuse to participate in unspecified “other medical procedures” that contradict their religious beliefs or moral convictions. This, too, could be interpreted as a free pass to deny access to contraception.

Many circumstances unrelated to reproductive health could also fall under the umbrella of “other medical procedures.” Could physicians object to helping patients whose sexual orientation they find objectionable? Could a receptionist refuse to book an appointment for an H.I.V. test? What about an emergency room doctor who wishes to deny emergency contraception to a rape victim? Or a pharmacist who prefers not to refill a birth control prescription?

The Bush administration argues that the rule is designed to protect a provider’s conscience. But where are the protections for patients?

The 30-day comment period on the proposed rule runs until Sept. 25. Everyone who believes that women should have full access to medical care should make their voices heard. Basic, quality care for millions of women is at stake.

Hillary Rodham Clinton is a Democratic senator from New York. Cecile Richards is the president of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America.

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Groggy Morning Notes

My brain works in bullet points on mornings I haven’t had enough sleep but, for whatever reason, can’t go back to sleep. Consider this a cleaning session.

• Gross-out: My dog woke me up by vomiting. On my armpit.
• Every time I see the word “Pain” I first think I see “Palin.” Oh, the beautiful irony.
• I said a very stupid thing in yesterday’s blog post. In order to be optimistic and/or happy about a single public issue, I apparently need to block out everything else. Like the banking crisis which, I presumed, didn’t really affect me. Riiiight. What I had was a failure of comprehension. It didn’t really make sense to me at that point, and I didn’t understand that the Fed taking on bad debt (or even the rumor of it) is another example of cronyism and bailing out the big guys. Does the fed step in to save a failing small business, or all those near-mythical family-owned businesses destroyed when a big-box store comes to the neighborhood? No–only when mega-conglomerates implement extremely poor business practices and operate at the edge of a proverbial cliff, and that cliff crumbles beneath them do the feds step in. And yet there’s no consensus about what caused this bubble. Who is running this f-ing government, anyhow? At least Krugman’s article in the Times today shows a basic understanding of the financial system–and the government’s involvement in it–so start there, I guess. I don’t understand!

See? That’s my brain waking up, and there’s typically anger involved in the clearing of the fog. Kind of like learning.

Okay, now I need to edit, edit, edit, work, get hair cut, go to library, go to bank, etc. etc.

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Congress Does Something!

I know, shocking, isn’t it? The Times is full of good articles today*, including one on an amendment to the Americans with Disabilities Act from 1990. The way the law was originally set up placed the burden of proof of disability on the disabled person, and if that person managed her disability well–with or without the aid of medication or other services–the government could argue against the claim of disability, particularly in a case of employer dicrimination. Here’s a brief exerpt from the article:

Lawmakers said that people with epilepsy, diabetes, cancer, multiple sclerosis and other ailments had been improperly denied protection because their conditions could be controlled by medications or other measures. In a Texas case, for example, a federal judge said a worker with epilepsy was not disabled because he was taking medications that reduced his seizures.

In deciding whether a person is disabled, the bill says, courts should not consider the effects of “mitigating measures” like prescription drugs, hearing aids and artificial limbs. Moreover, it says, “an impairment that is episodic or in remission is a disability if it would substantially limit a major life activity when active.”

Senator Tom Harkin, Democrat of Iowa, the chief sponsor of the bill, said: “The Supreme Court decisions have led to a supreme absurdity, a Catch-22 situation. The more successful a person is at coping with a disability, the more likely it is the court will find that they are no longer disabled and therefore no longer covered under the A.D.A.”

This is such a positive step. Much of the body of laws and agencies set up to protect and assist people who need help are skewed against those who want to help themselves, but still need a safety net. Representative Jim Langevin calls the bill “one of the most important pieces of civil rights legislation of our time.”

Hooray for good news!

*I know, the financial crisis. I don’t have a damn dollar invested in these failing banks, mutual funds, etc., and like high gas prices, this development will only be good in the long run. Read Roger Cohen’s Times article today, titled “The King is Dead,” for one perspective on potential effects of the meltdown.

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Bitch Magazine Needs Your Help

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Newsflash

Thanks, KC!

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Day 2.5

Is everyong going to watch Palin tonight? I’m going to try. Even though conventions are just pep rallies, and the debates are the public appearances that matter, her convention speech is still her official introduction. I don’t think a large amount of people watched the speech she gave when she accepted the Republicans’ offer (lest we remain comfortable with the notion that McCain chose her; he wanted Lieberman, but the party people said they’d throw their full support behind him only if he chose Palin).

I tried to watch some last night. PBS is, without a doubt, the only station to watch. Not only do they cover all of the speeches (at least in the evening; I’ve never checked to see if they run anything during the day), but they avoid the endless garbage coming out of the mouths of most of the network folks.

Anyhow, I turned coverage on during GW’s satellite speech and, well, noun-verb-9/11. Then came Fred Thompson’s speech, which made me run from the room and hide behind a closed door. He was the initial GOP candidate who scared me during the primary–until he showed even less spunk than McCain.  He still freaks me out; I know it’s irrational, but ET still freaks me out, too. The speech (even though I couldn’t see it, I could still hear it) wasn’t very good, but Republicans don’t like good speeches–they don’t trust anyone who might be smarter than Joe the cable guy–so it was a roaring success. While watching the Dems at their convention, I often wondered at these “true believers” in the crowd, but the true believers in the GOP are a whole other beast. And I mean that quite literally; these people are absolutely alien to me. Barack Obama will eat your babies!

And then came Lieberman. Not a baby-eater, but one weird dude. I sat and watched his whole speech, tepid applause and all. I found myself not disagreeing with many of the ideas he mentioned, things like putting country before party, and caring about our fellow citizens without the encouragement of a natural disaster, but these aren’t values the GOP stands for. He got virtually no applause for the mildly Democratic notions he put forth, but rousing applause whenever he raised the volume of his voice and said “McCain!” or anything about defeating Obama. I can’t help but feel that racism is the entire foundation of the GOP. Maybe I’ll explore that idea in another post.

Happy watching!

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Pro-Life, Ideally

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about what it means to be Pro-Life. Like a lot of conservative rhetoric, the position means something other than the words used to describe it. Pro-Life, in practice, is decidedly Anti-Choice. But it’s not enough to say that. We need to understand why—beyond taking away a woman’s right to choose whether or not she’ll carry a pregnancy to term—Pro-Life is such an issue right now.

The issue is certainly in the news, for two major reasons. The first involves a Bush administration proposal intended to protect health-care workers from treating patients or dispensing drugs that do not support their religious beliefs. This is a relatively small group of individuals who fear legal action. One component of the proposal changes the definition of abortion to include any kind of birth control (condoms, however, are not included). The basic birth control pill, thus, would come under the umbrella term “abortion,” and doctors could refuse to prescribe it, or pharmacists could refuse to fill the prescription.

The second reason that the Pro-Life position is in the news is the election, and the way the conservative religious right has a stranglehold on the Republican Party. To be Republican is to be Pro-Life. Instead of focusing on domestic issues like the management of the economy and national security, many people choose party allegiance based on the moral issue of abortion. I have, in the past, ridiculed individuals who vote based on a single-issue position like abortion. However, I’ve recently discovered that I cannot ridicule such people, because I could never, ever, vote for an Anti-Choice politician.

Here’s why.

I fully support an individual’s choice to never have an abortion. If a person believes that there is no situation in which an abortion would be the best choice, not if a woman was raped, if a woman was a victim of incest, or if carrying a child to term would risk a woman’s life, then fine. That is an individual’s personal belief. If someone refused to support a family member or friend who chose to have an abortion, that is the individual’s right to personal belief. I don’t agree with this position, but I believe in the right to subscribe to these beliefs.

However, this is not the Pro-Life position. The Pro-Life position isn’t about personal opposition to abortion. Pro-Lifers seek to end abortions. But not through better sex education, better access to contraception, or changing cultural values about sexuality and pregnancy. They want to make abortion illegal. They want to take away rights and choices.

Personally, I would be happy if the number of abortions went down. An abortion is a difficult experience—physically, mentally, and emotionally. It’s not something I want to see a lot of women have to go through. But there will never be an end to abortions—they happen every day, all over the world. Before abortion was a safe and legal procedure, women were permanently disfigured and even killed by unsafe, illegal abortions. If made illegal, we would see a return of these dangerous procedures.

Pro-Choice is about protecting women. It’s about keeping the procedure safe and regulated. It’s about protecting a woman’s domain over her own body. It’s about keeping the State out of our uteruses.

But the Pro-Life position is even more complicated when you consider the class dynamics of our society. Imagine if a woman who lives a middle-class or better lifestyle were sexually assaulted and became pregnant as a result. She can’t go to a clinic and have an abortion, but there’s a good chance she might personally know a doctor. Maybe she has a family member who is a doctor, or even the friend of a friend. If even a semi-wealthy and well-connected woman wanted to terminate her pregnancy in a society where the procedure is illegal, she might have the resources to still obtain a safe abortion. She might even have to leave the country to have a medical abortion, but she’d be able to afford this expense. She might put the plane ticket on a credit card, but she has a credit card. And if the situation were even more dire, if her health was at risk, then her personal wealth just saved her life.

Imagine if a woman without financial means is in the same situation. It’s doubtful that anyone in her peer group is a licensed medical professional. She couldn’t afford to leave the country for a safe abortion, and even if she could, she might work a job in which she doesn’t have vacation time, or can’t take the time off, or doesn’t have anyone to watch her children. What if this woman knew her own life was at risk if she carried a pregnancy to term? What then?

Pro-Life isn’t just about state control over a woman’s body, or about legislating moral beliefs. It’s also about oppressing women without wealth and means. It is class warfare, disguised as a belief in the sanctity of life.

The sanctity of life is an interesting concept, and a term that’s bandied about quite a bit in the abortion debate. It means that “life” is something that is worthy of religious veneration. “Sanctity” isn’t hard to understand, but “Life” is a bit more difficult to define. Whose life? What kind of life? When does it begin? When does it end? There are no simple answers to these questions, but in the spirit of “sanctity,” I’d like to offer what Pro-Life should mean.

Pro-Life, Ideally

A person who calls herself Pro-Life believes that all life is worthy of respect and protection. She is a fierce opponent of the death penalty, as she believes it is not the duty of humankind to decide what persons—no matter how heinous their crimes—deserve to live or die. She is a strong supporter of universal health care, as she believes all children and adults have the right to live up to their potential, and that medical problems shouldn’t be an obstacle to that. She believes that there is no “life” without “quality of life,” so she is also a strong supporter of workers’ rights, especially the right to unionize. Unions are a necessary protection against rogue individuals and corporations who put profits ahead of their employees’ health and safety. She also strongly opposes industrial agriculture, notorious for gross, inhumane treatment of animals and mistreatment of employees—often illegal immigrants without the protection of law—in the name of large profits. She supports the government’s full funding of public education, including sex education programs and a wide availability of contraception, as she knows that an unwanted life will not have quality of life. She opposes abortion, and hopes that no woman will have to have the procedure, yet she knows that there will always be abortions. She seeks to keep them safe, legal, and rare.

If this were really the Pro-Life position, I could consider voting for a candidate with these personal beliefs. As long as the position means Anti-Choice, Anti-Woman, stronger government control over my personal health and safety, and the privilege of the wealthy and well-connected over the rest of society, I can never support any candidate who declares himself or herself to be Pro-Life. This candidate does not share my definition of life, or my values, or my belief about the role of government.

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