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Hillary: Bush Administration to Redefine Contraception as Abortion (’A Dire Threat to Women’s Health’)

Posted by DAMOZEL in Politics, Society.
Jul 22nd, 2008 | Comments

Annnnd….attempts by state and federal governments to interfere with a woman’s freedom to control what goes on inside her own personal womb continue apace. Joe Windish has an earlier piece about an 8th Circuit decision that unleashes the State of South Dakota on women who seek abortion in that state by letting the state insert a word or two on behalf of its legislature into the discussion. At this rate, I’m afraid, just having the state insist on telling women who are trying to make a decision about its legislators’ personal views is going to be the least of our worries.

Hillary Clinton is (in her words) ’sound[ing] the alarm’ regarding the Department of Health and Human Service’s pending regulations that will redefine common forms of contraception as ‘abortion.’ What’s in a name?:

These proposed regulations set to be released next week will allow healthcare providers to refuse to provide contraception to women who need it. (HuffPost)

That’s bad. That’s very, very bad. The ramifications are serious, both for those who think it’s not the government’s business to impose its current ideology on health care issues such as availability of contraception to the poor or who are already grumbling about all the women on welfare who expect taxpayers to pay for their children’s basic necessities.

If you’re one of those, you should definitely sign this petition. Here’s why:

As Clinton says:

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services is poised to put in place new barriers to accessing common forms of contraception like birth control pills, emergency contraception and IUDs by labeling them “abortion.”…

These rules pose a serious threat to providers and uninsured and low-income Americans seeking care. They could prevent providers of federally-funded family planning services, like Medicaid and Title X, from guaranteeing their patients access to the full range of comprehensive family planning services. They’ll also build significant barriers to counseling, education, contraception and preventive health services for those who need it most: low-income and uninsured women and men.

The regulations could even invalidate state laws that currently ensure access to contraception for many Americans. (HuffPost)

Via Melissa McEwan, this clip from her press conference:

"This is a gratuitous, unnecessary insult to the women of the United States of America. … It is an end-run around the rights of women to make choices about our own health, and we are not going to stand for it. … We will fight you every step of the way." (via Shakesville)

Women everywhere have cause to be grateful to her for speaking out on this issue. Taylor Marsh says:

Senator Clinton keeps fighting for us. Her post at RH Reality Check, which is cross-posted over at Huffington
Post, hits it out of the park.

She does. Watch, listen, and learn.

I hope the Obama campaign will very quickly weigh in on this issue as well—it will help vitiate my feelings of concern about how very mistaken he was about the current law in his recent statements about late term abortions. I know he’s off spreading goodwill and educating himself about the war, but this is really going to have an impact on women and families—including all those low income families on the South Side of Chicago.

CROSS-POSTED WITH SLIGHT CHANGES AT BUCK NAKED POLITICS

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StockBoySF

I wonder if McCain has given it any thought.... I know that Carly Fiorina thinks that McCain is against the Bush plan.... :)

StockBoySF

Oh, and how long is Bush in office and who says he's irrelevant?

runasim

First of all, I think it's a losing proposition to lump late term abortions with birth control as abortion.
That's one of the reasons pro-choicers lost ground. By rejecting all limits, it made it easier to attack abortion as a whole.
So, I think Obama was right in one case, and Hillary is right in this case.
Frankly, it gets a little tiresome to see one played against the other all the time, and still. It gets more than tireome to see Democrats form the circular firing squad at the drop of a news bulletin.

Speaking about this particular issue, though, gave me an idea. I think Hillary should take over as head of the Dept of Health & Human Resources. Obama the pres, and Hillary in charge of health. it's a win-win.

DLS

I was the first to post about this and I hope against hope you won't overreact about this.

It's a sop to the Religious Right (whom the GOP exploits at election time) probably timed to help these people vote for McCain this November.

Overreaction is unmerited. There is no absolute "right" to abortion (much less being described in evasive weasel words in place of "abortion"), and it is properly and legitimately a matter of states and localities to legislate on as they see fit, which includes a complete prohibition if that's what a government wants. Get the law changed (the intention of this law was obvious, which is why I presented it as a new issue on this site in the first place; for those who are curious, I disfavor this obvious R.R. sop), or vote with your feet against it if you cannot get it changed.

Contraception (birth control) is not abortion, obviously, if it's used before conception. (RU-486 use for early abortion, the most logical and least harmful time as well as least controversial time to engage in abortion, is a target of this law.)

Don't overreact to this yet. Wait to see what Obama or Clinton have to say about extending federal health care to girls and women of childbearing age and if the federal government would provide abortion services to them and under what set of guidelines or limitations.

runasim

DLS-

You persist in interpreting the Constitution according to your own ideology, and you're welcome to do so , if it amuses you

You should just keep in mind that you are not convincing those who have read the FF ragarding the Bill of Rights and will not be swayed by your convictions.

You realize, I hope, that when the Constitution was written, there were NO state laws regarding abortion. The original activist judges were religious zealots who allowed abortion restriction laws to stand without Constitutuional foundation.

.

runasim

DLS
Deferring to State legislatures will not fix this anymore than doing so fixed segregaton.
This discriminates against all women and against poor women in particualr.

The wealthy lady will just travel to another state or even to Europe to take care of her problem, but the poor young girl will be stuck listening to complaints about the tax money she'll need to raise her baby.

Women get it from every angle, and this country is going back to the middle ages
when it omes to how they are treated.

DAMOZEL

My point about late term abortions is that Obama mis-stated the law or else intends to change it in a way that doesn't make a lot of sense.

A mother who is going to give birth to a child with such severe birth defects that it cannot survive the birth probably should be allowed to avoid this experience on a 'severe mental distress' test. It doesn't make sense to make 'diagnosed mental illness' to be the test. Mentally ill people may give birth to a normal child, etc. etc.

Obama's position wasn't principled; I think he misunderstood what the law is. I'm not getting at him---but it made him look as if he's not that bothered about women's issues.

StockBoySF

I'm not entirely sure what DLS meant, but the way I see it regulating abortion is not a federal issue and it can be argued whether or not it should be a state or local issue... In an ideal world (like that will ever happen) the voters will let their representatives (at whatever level of government) know how they feel and those representatives will write and pass laws accordingly.

Personally I'm against abortion, but it's not my place to tell anyone else what decisions they should and should not make, so I"m staunchly pro-choice. Though I'm against abortion, I can see that there would be exceptions... It's a complicated and very personal (and in many cases gut-wrenching) decision. I think if there's any law it should be a law which guarantees the right to have an abortion. Perhaps we should have a law which prohibits healthcare providers and pharmacists from forcing their beliefs on others.

This is a prime reason why I'm not a Republican. I thought Republicans were for limited government interference (and states rights) and yet time and again the Republicans will force their hypocritical moral views on everyone else for their own political gain. That's one reason why I like Ron Paul- he has a libertarian ideology (which I like) and you could clearly see those in the foundations of his policies. His policies were not based on political convenience.

runasim

Damozel,
,I see that Obama will have to explain what he said, because I didn't understand him AT ALL the way you claim'
Needing a doctor to certify that a woman is in mental distress does not mean she can't claim to be in mental distress. In fact, the donctor's statement strengthens her claim against spurious objections.

On the other hand, late term abortions on demand do provide a lot of opportunity for cirticism. Since the dawn of sonograms, even many women who are pro-choice are squeemish about it. Pro-choicers have to adjust to a few current realities, even when those don't fit neatly into their ideals. .

The pro-choice lawyers made an error the last time an abortion case reached SCOTUS, IMO.They failed to object to the governement having any right at all to intervene in this area. One day there will need to be a show-down about Constitutional law and the Bill of Rights.

Think SCOTUS when you vote.

roro80

The most important part of HRC's post, I think, is the idea that Bush's Dept HHS is trying to redefine birth control pills, emergency contraception, and IUD's as a form of abortion. It redefines what is legally and medically the termination of a pregnancy to mean also the prevention of a pregnancy. This allows, as is the purpose of the redefinition, for a doctor or pharmacist to deny birth control to their patients because they are against abortion.

It's also a first step, I imagine, to other restrictions as well. If abortion does end up going to states to decide, will this new definition of abortion mean that birth control is also outlawed in those states that vote against abortion? Will residents of South Dakota need to be told that what they're asking for causes suicidal ideation (one of the things they're now required to say for an abortion) when asking to refill their pill prescription?

Let now all the women in the room count how many "abortions" they've had in their lives, under this new, fact-free definition. Thousands maybe?

AustinRoth

If true (and I will wait to see if it really is nothing more than more Chicken Little squawking), it is almost using HHS as the Vatican. Other than The Church (and other religious extreme groups), who could possibly equate preventative, pre-conception actions with reactive, post-conception actions?

The logical next step is to make it a sin, er, sorry, crime to THINK about contraception.

Again, IF true, I cannot see how this stands up in court. It would indeed be window dressing, designed to be overturned and to generate press.

DAMOZEL

AustinRoth:

It is an action by the executive branch to change a definition within certain regulations. The outcome, as roro90 says, is to prevent contraception from being covered by insurance. In other words, the ideological war of the administration against the right to choose is getting carried onto another front via the executive branch's regulatory powers.

It probably WON'T stand. It's just a further sign of the lengths to which they'll go to restrict women's control over their privacy. HRC is right to call them out NOW.

As you say, Runasim, DLS's argument is not in fact the law. I see no reason why this issue which goes fundamentally to a woman's right to control her body---which I'd call a 'liberty interest' or part of that penumbral 'right to be left alone' by the state--should be a matter for the state to decide.

From a moral standpoint, I might well argue that abortion is wrong. This is because of my religious beliefs.

But I do not think, DLS, that a state consisting of a majority of persons who might agree with my beliefs about the nature of the soul, or when life begins, or the rest of it, should be able to impose this view by legislative fiat on people who do not share it.

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