Republican War on Women | Without Facts, Lie, Distort, & Mock Women's Rights

After watching this video on YouTube , of Howie Rich training Tea Party goes in guerrilla Internet tactics like giving Liberal books a 1-star rating on Amazon and Conservative ones a 5-star — even though they haven’t read either book, Senator Jon Kyl’s strategy of lying on the Senate floor about Planned Parenthood services comes right out of this Tea Party activist guide.

Howie Rich pretty much tells Tea Party people to do what is required to destroy the enemy (that would be me). Educating Americans factually is not part of their goal. Smear the opposition — which is a classic Eugene McCarthy tactic — is embraced by the Tea Party, then leveraged by the Republican War on Women by Senator Jon Kyl on the Senate floor.

Arizona Senator Jon KylAfter having his statements read into the official Senate record and being trampled by the opposition for telling utter, total lies, the esteemed Senator from Arizona explained that his comments ‘were not intended as a factual statement.’

Arizona Senator Jon Kyl

This is a new low in the Republican War on Women — reading whatever you want into the Senate record, then saying it wasn’t intended to be factual. Didn’t Senator Kyl take an oath of some kind, in which he promsed to tell the truth ‘so help me God’.  Presumably, like all the men in the Republican War on Women — which has a few Democrats who champion their war — they are answering to God and not the oath they took as civic citizens, supporting the Constitution.

Calling Senator Ky’s dramatic lies about Planned Parenthood a new low doesn’t mean that I’m giving Glenn Beck a pass on calling the women who have used Planned Parenthood’s services ‘whores’.

Calling women ‘whores’ goes back to the men who wrote the Bible. Every woman knows she’s a ‘whore’ because getting her to see herself this way is part of religious strategy. Women are whores and men must keep us in line.

There is no evidence that Jesus Christ felt that way about women, but the fundamentalists of every religion do what is required to get women so submit. Women are whores in every country from America to Sudan to Afghanistan.

Glenn Beck | Planned Parenthood Women Are Whores

Glenn Beck’s ratings are dropping so fast his show is cancelled at FOX. People can make their own determination about Beck, but I think every person should listen to him talk.

Of the women he calls ‘whores’ for having an abortion, the trusted Guttmacher Institute just reports that 31 of abortions go to Catholic women and 18 percent are on born-again Christians or Evangelicals.

I think Senators who knowingly lie on the floor of the Senate should be censured. The statement that 90% of Planned Parenthood services go for abortion suggests that those who enforce the Hyde Amendment, reviewing Planned Parenthood’s books are somehow being manipulated or turning the other way to irregularities. Trust me, prochoice accountants don’t enforce the Hyde Amendment.

Timothy Carney’s Planned Parenthood Budget Analysis

I’ve read three times Timothy Carney’s Washington Examiner analysis of why Planned Parenthood’s pie chart of services is misleading, and I’m clueless. And because Anne of Carversville is committed to sharing the truth, I will share his analysis with readers.

Personally, I believe the truth will set us free, and I only want readers to make their OWN decisions, based on facts. Hence, we send you to hear and read those who disagree with our support of Planned Parenthood.

This is the Planned Parenthood Services pie chart distributed — not to liberal bloggers, as Carney writes — but to all who desire to see it. You can read the entire Planned Parenthood report on their services here. I will upload it on AOC.

These 2009 statistics have not been challenged in any significant way in audits; and remember — Planned Parenthood has had its back up against the wall for over 90 years, and especially in the last 35 years. It is unfathomable to me that if Planned Parenthood was lying about its services, that fact wouldn’t have been unearthed years ago.

Timothy P. Carney writes:

These numbers are incredibly misleading, and should not be taken as a factual statement.

First, let’s use Planned Parenthood’s own terms, and break out the services the provide for pregnant women:

What one darn minute. What do you mean ‘First’? I’ve read a lot of pie charts in my business career, and Carney’s ‘First’ is ‘Last’.

‘First’ is the fact that 86% of Planned Parenthood services above cover contraception, sexually-transmitted diseases, and cancer screening and prevention. That’s ‘First’. I do not believe that the vast majority of women seeking these services are pregnant.

Planned Parenthood admits that 3% of their healthcare services go for abortion. Besides abortion services, there are then 11% of services that are ‘Other’ services.

I was with Planned Parenthood in Washington last week and reviewed their services in an earlier post. This additional information is relevant. Every year, Planned Parenthood affiliates provide:

  • contraception to nearly 2.5 million patients

  • more than 1.1 million pregnancy tests

  • nearly one million Pap tests, identifying about 93,000 women at risk of developing cervical cancer.

  • 830,000 breast exams, helping alert patients to possible cancers.

  • nearly 4 million tests and treatments for sexually transmitted infections, including HIV

  • more than 1.5 million emergency contraception kits

  • education programs to nearly 1.2 million people

Carney objects to Planned Parenthood listing their services as events, writing:  ‘Is a service a visit? Does it make sense to use “service” as a unit? Does a pregnancy test really deserve the same portion of Ezra Klein’s pie chart as a vasectomy, an abortion, or a primary care client?’

Given the reality that Planned Parenthood functions as a health clinic, yes it calculates services as ‘events’ because that is how the health care industry is organized. If I have a mammogram, it is an event or service and my insurance policy reimburses that service. If I have a pap smear, it is an event or service.

Is it possible that one woman has three services at Planned Parenthood? Yes. Planned Parenthood reports that the 11.4 million services in 2009 were allocated across about 3 million people. That’s the way healthcare is run in America.

Devaluing Women’s Lives

Which service doesn’t count as important? I can have a pap smear but don’t count my mammogram? If Planned Parenthood doesn’t count it, they don’t get paid. That’s how health care reimbursement works.

As always Carney represents a group of people who want to now redefine what a health care service is; they subscribe to a higher authority than American health care reimbursement policies.

Judy Chicago (American, b. 1939). The Dinner Party (Margaret Sanger place setting), 1974–79. Mixed media: ceramic, porcelain, textile. Brooklyn Museum, Gift of the Elizabeth A. Sackler Foundation, 2002.10. © Judy Chicago. Photograph by Jook Leung Photography

Abortion services should not be valued as a medical procedure based on heathcare accounting rules, but on his assertion that an abortion is of higher value than saving a woman’s life because PP discovered she has deadly cervical cancer as part of her Pap smear.

One in eight American women will get breast cancer in her life. The rate is higher for African American women, who are disproportionately served by Planned Parenthood, often the sole souce of women’s health care in poor communities.

Why is her breast exam and saving her from dying of breast cancer not relevant in the Republican War on Women?

Reality is, in the Republican War on Women, the mother’s life is devalued tremendously. Remember that she is the ‘incubator’ not a human being with a right to live herself. The Republicans have made this fact very clear, as does the Vatican. 

Carney is not into factual analysis, and I’m clueless as to his main interpretation of the data, but here goes:

Reading the entire Planned Parenthood document, we see:

Other Women’s Health Services - 10 percent of services in 2009

  • Pregnancy Tests 1,158,924

  • Prenatal Clients 7,021

  • Midlife Clients 12,424

Abortion Services — 3 percent of services in 2009  332, 278

Other Services - 1 percent of services in 2009

  • Primary Care Clients, Women and Men 19,796

  • Adoption Referrals to Other Agencies 977

  • Other Services, Women and Men 56,204

Carney picks out two numbers: the 7,021 number of prenatal clients and adoption of 977.  Prenatal care is the care a woman receives during her pregnancy until she gives birth, and adoption is pretty straightforward. Then he takes the number of abortions, creating this pie chart, concluding:

I fail to see what this graph accomplishes in the debate. Abortion is legal in America and Planned Parenthood provides them, about 27% of total abortions in America. Pregnant women go to Planned Parenthood often because there is no other alternative in many cases.

There is nothing in this chart that invalidates the fact that 3% of Planned Parenthood total services go for abortion procedures or services.

If you listened to the Glenn Bleck ‘whores use Planned Parenthood’ commentary’ and watched the Howie Rich video, you know that the strategy is to say and write anything that will ridicule the real issues under discussion.

This chart below is Carney’s equivalent analysis of the health services or events Planned Parenthood pie chart to something that his readers can understand:

3 Million Clients | 332,278 Abortions

We can look at the statistics in another way, citing an analysis that is also used by the media.

If Planned Parenthood serviced about 3 million clients in 2009 and performed 332,278 abortion, then about 11% of people walking into Planned Parenthood are receiving a legal abortion. You would think it’s 90%, listening to Senator Kyl and Glenn Beck.

No one minimizes the situation of abortion, but to sit and listen to Glenn Beck scream ‘Ooooooooohh, it’s just not convenient for me to have a baby now, so I’ll kill it’ reminds me that men don’t have babies and often aren’t around to help a woman rear their child.

Remember that Planned Parenthood treats men as well as women, and I don’t see the numbers broken out by gender.  Next, we will take a look at the Planned Parenthood budget and the estimated income from its abortion services. For now, these figures will get us started.

Pro-life Life Decisions International estimates Planned Parenthood 2009 abortion-services revenue at $125 million or about 10% of revenue. Private Contribution alone represent 28% of PP revenue, so the argument that the Hyde Amendment isn’t operating at Planned Parenthood is false. Taxpayer funds aren’t being used to support abortions. Period. I’ve read bloggers talk about administrative expenses, even use of the copy machines. All of those expenses are 11% of the Planned Parenthood budget.

You cannot make a case that the Hyde Amendment isn’t operating with Planned Parenthood, if one deals with the facts.  Anne