If you thought the contraception debate was about expanding or protecting women’s existing right to reproductive health care, think again. If you were waiting for the other shoe to fall, congratulations. You are not blinded by your own bias and can see clearly and painfully exactly how much the left, especially the new Democratic constituencies attracted under Obama, care about the signature women’s issue according to left-centered feminists. Which is to say they do not care at all. Women, you have served your purpose, and it is time for reassignment back under the bus. Contraception coverage, decided and issued just over a month ago, is already up for review:
Taking a conciliatory tone and asking for a wide range of public comment, the Obama administration announced this afternoon new accommodations on a controversial mandate requiring contraceptive coverage in health care plans.
Coming after a month of continued opposition from the U.S. bishops to the mandate, which was first revised in early February to exempt certain religious organizations, today’s announced changes from the Department of Health and Human Services make a number of concessions, including allowing religious organizations that self-insure to be made exempt.
Note that they are asking for public comment. It would be irresponsible for organizations such as NOW, Emily’s List, and NARAL to remain silent on this. I expect to see a big fundraising push to raise awareness about this issue. There’s a war on women, for goodness sakes! And women must fight the good fight! I’m waiting for it. I’m just sure it’s going to happen…
But wait. There’s more!
About that new student rule, which Sandra Fluke fought so hard for, and for which she suffered so much indignity, may not be as permanent as she would like, or as immediate. The proposal suggests ways that universities can easily skirt the rules. It’s so nice of the Obama administration to publish the loopholes at taxpayer expense so that these universities don’t have to pay lawyers to figure it out themselves. Obots are right that Obama is like Jesus in one sense: The lord giveth and he taketh away.
News of the changes also came as a separate ruling on student health insurance coverage was announced by the Department of Health and Human Services this afternoon. Under that ruling, health care plans for students would be treated like those of employees of colleges and universities — meaning the colleges will have to provide contraceptive services to students without co-pay.
Religiously affiliated colleges and universities, however, would be shielded from this ruling, according to a statement from the HHS.
“In the same way that religious colleges and universities will not have to pay, arrange or refer for contraceptive coverage for their employees, they will not have to do so for their students who will get such coverage directly and separately from their insurer,” the statement said.
I’d be very curious to learn what Fluke’s opinion is of this specific issue, and the other reproductive health proposal (both linked in the article above) overall. If she or anyone else participating in the debate on the pro-contraception side can support this, it does raise some questions. Most notably: So, it’s okay (to segregate medical care by gender) if you’re a Democrat? I wonder if it will even be an issue, if any self-labelled feminist of the progressive/liberal persuasion will comment on it at all. I’m guessing not if the last three years are any indication. I mean, who cares if Obama’s health care plan segregates women’s reproductive health care, or if it rolls back EEOC rulings that have stood for 12+ years? He’s the coolest m*therf*cking feminist president evah!
Cross-posted from P&L.
The Crawdad Hole 
It looks to me that Obama thinks a woman’s proper position is slightly behind him and to the side so she can be included in the photo-op as a prop.
“Be sure to smile and nod your head while I’m speaking.”
😆
Obama’s been rolling us back to the 1950’s since Jan 2009. Race and Sex divisions seems to be his specialty. Remember he’s in full campaign mode now, everything he does is politically “wedgie” on the issues.
Exactly. Remember Andrew Sullivan and Goodbye to All That? Why does he still have a job? He’s called this whole thing wrong AND he’s a Trig birther. WTF?
Andy is a perfect Village Idiot.
He has been consistently wrong about everything.
BTW, we now have Fluke’s tepid response, from the NYT, which is furiously spinning this:
So basically she trusts he’s just kicking the can so he can deliver after the election. It couldn’t possibly be a walk-back because his campaign tactic known as The War on Women (TM) didn’t work and he actually lost support, including among women, in the polls, now could it?
LOLOL. I tweeted your post with “Obama throws Fluke under the bus.”
I should’ve waited and said “Fluke says view under bus is pretty.”
He really did throw her under the bus. He closed one loop-hole for employees and opened up a whole other one specifically targeting students and declared that a change in that area will require a new law.
Basically, we’re now segregating by gender and, more loosely, age. Young women in college may see their access to birth control decrease under the ruling, if universities sees the switch to self-pay programs as cheaper.
Right now a number of colleges, including some religiously affiliated colleges, provide students access to BC. I even found this ProchoiceAmerica link from 2010 (PDF) that specifically uses Fluke’s school, George Washington University, as an example (page 6) of how to win coverage for female students. So at least as of 2010, her school was already providing access. Curiouser and curiouser.
Guess who’s handling “public relations” for Sandra Fluke….
Anita Dunn, Obama’s former Communications Director.
True story.
Same Anita Dunn who was on Gov. Ted Knowles campaign in Alaska (the guy who lost to Sarah Palin)?
Small world, huh.
Same Anita Dunn who did the PR for Game Change ? Oh my, a hit piece on Sarah timed for what would have her been wrapping up the GOP Presidential nomination, that Anita Dunn? 😀
Fluke attends Georgetown, the oldest Jesuit and Catholic U in the USA. George Washington U is non-denominational.
Very much on topic. Bristol Palin takes Obama to the woodshed.
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/bristolpalin/2012/03/mr-president-when-should-i-expect-your-call/#comment-422
Saw that. Definitely enjoyed it. The women of the right should just keep reminding the public of this double standard every time it’s relevant to the conversation. Repetition will change perceptions.
Funny that you and Denise posted this at the same time!
Well done, Bristol!
http://tbogg.firedoglake.com/2012/03/19/single-mom-waiting-for-her-presidential-booty-call/
From Bristol’s blog, good move, she pulled the teenage mom card on BO 😀
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/bristolpalin/2012/03/mr-president-when-should-i-expect-your-call/
Jinx!
LOL, you beat me by a minute, which is about the same time I checked the thread to see if it was posted yet, then write my comment 😛
Totally awesome when all our great minds think alike !
Obama ongoingly using wimminz as hockey pucks is just becoming SOP with him. Any woman who falls for it is so stupid, I honestly don’t know what to do for them. But what I found really interesting about the linked Catholic article is the comment section. It seems our Catholic sisters are a whole lot more fed up with the Church’s stance on their birth control than they are with the Obama mandate. Which confirms the statistics that the vast majority of Catholic women use birth control and aren’t willing to breed like rabbits ala Rick Santorum, and would prefer that the Church STFU at this point and be grateful for the concession they already got. Read those comments. They’re really worth it.
I’m shocked to learn that some Catholics ignore Catholic doctrine! Why, they seem to be thinking independently or something.
It kind of reminds me of what Molly Ivins said about Republican women in Texas. I don’t have the quote but it was basically that the men would be would be talking about abortion and contraception and the women would roll their eyes and pretend to agree.
Most Catholic women vote Dem. Or at least used to. Maybe Obama’s cured them of that.
Speaking of Catholics, NPR’s wait wait don’t tell me segment made fun of the Pope. More power to them.
Do they ever crack jokes against Obama? Or mullahs?
I guess they don’t want to risk getting defunded or fatwa’d.
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/tim-graham/2012/03/19/npr-game-show-host-goes-string-pope-jokes-starting-hes-gay-icon
That Chicago produced show is a clunky full-time propaganda vehicle for Obama’s campaign. Speaking of Catholics and NPR, one of my local affiliates was broadcasting a full mass yesterday morning. Not sure why I hadn’t noticed before, but listening to the priest going on was quite jarring…on one of my favorite stations for listening to rock. Guess it’s been a while since I’ve been to church. 🙂
I don’t know anybody with full prescription drug coverage. Maybe it exists in some policies somewhere, but everybody I know has to pay a copay or even full price if their medication is not covered. I’m talking about heart medication, blood pressure, etc. So given that reality, the whole argument is flawed from the start. We have seniors, women even, forced to chose between food and life saving medicine, while Dems run around creating this narrative about fairly well off students attending expensive colleges with full medical insurance who can’t afford contraception. Our priorities are all screwed up.
The problem is the Rush and the Republicans didn’t make that argument.
Yes, but it’s been so convoluted by the media and politics, the truth is hard to find. Romney for example, in the debates said over and over again, “contraception is working just fine, leave it alone.” Harry Reid, who is supposed to be our great Dem champion has been so wishy washy on contraception that in 2006 he got a 50% rating from the pro-lifers and a 57% rating from the pro-choicers. Tim Kaine who was the head of the DNC is both anti-contraception and pro-life.
it’s amazing to me still how intractable the women of the left are in changing their outdated point of view on what constitutes women’s issues. Their conduct has calcified, and their “club” is an ever shrinking group of people. I’ve written alot about it, especially yesterday:
http://www.womenwintoo.blogspot.com/2012/03/whack-mole.html
the good news is that we wouldn’t need them to change the culture into one that promotes women into economic and power parity. It’s truly a shame however to realize that these feminists have turned into another exclusive country club set. Blech…….
Great post!
I know! This is 2012, can we not start demanding financial and political equality now? How about the right to some basic respect and dignity when we run for public office?? But no, instead we’re still here in 1972 acting like “contraception, the only right a woman will ever need!”
Because women have largely been written out of our children’s history books and Women’s History Month is a joke, we have a whole crop of young women who believe that all women’s progress has come from the left. While nothing could be further than the truth, it makes convincing them that all women, liberal and conservative, share the same concerns very difficult.
Top Ten Enemies of Planned Parenthood.
http://pjmedia.com/blog/planned-parenthoods-10-most-feared-enemies-in-2012/
I’m still in the camp, between a woman, her doctor, safe, legal and rare.
This is a good read, learned a few things along the way.
Yes, I always find it “interesting” when a woman has a personal story that includes “a couple of abortions” when she is fairly young and “rising through the ranks” (of the Planned Parenthood organization even!)
Then later, when life circumstances make it convenient for her, experience a change of heart to fit the right-wing memes and sell some books. Yeah, that is interesting.
Nothing like using the services to help yourself have control over your family planning but then working to slam the door shut for other women…
Yes, good link. I just needed to vent a little about the woman who wrote the anti-choice book.
I’m still in the camp, between a woman, her doctor, safe, legal and rare.
Me too.
That said, as an immigrant I have never understood the why Planned Parenthood gets govt funding.
I didn’t get that either. PP is subsidized a million a day ? Yet it profits millions? Maybe I misunderstood.
The Crisis Centers actually look like they help young women better than PP with the adoption alternative assistance. Nobody should be paying 35-100,000 to adopt a baby these days, perhaps if there were more options like this available ?
Fun fact, PP has already been using those transvaginal (rapers ? ) sonogram thingys to help them find the little “glob of cells” to kill it.
they get gov’t health funding to support the healthcare of low income women and men related to reproductive health. The separation of abortion services from the family planning has been done for years.
They are also non-profit, so by law they can’t “profit”. They do have “assets” in buildings and equipment. PP Annual Report according to the report, the government does provide funding. There is a pie chart showing the services they cover and I have known people (men) who went to planned parenthood for STD testing because you don’t have to have insurance to go there, it is private and the prices for services are lower than other providers. I got birth control pills from PP when I was college age because of the privacy. I don’t know if they offer abortion services in my state.
Ok, I get (& applaud) govt funded medical clinics – but why just for reproductive health?
Coming from a poor country, that’s what puzzles me.
PP has its own mission – I think there are other health organizations who accept public and government funding and provides other health services…
In my state, we have a birth to three program that provides free health screening and any needed assistance for children before they reach school age. It covers speech therapy, occupational therapy and other kinds of services to serve kids who need earlier help through the public schools. Once they reach school age, the services are offered in school.
There are some other services, like immunizations, that are free through the health department. It is a messy, cobbled together system that isn’t easy to use. I wish we had basic healthcare for everyone as a social program but probably PP would still be needed because women’s health would somehow be excluded.
We only hear about PP because the mission bothers some people.
I know our state has some programs too – I’ve seen them at the county offices.
Yeah. I can’t understand why there are no free public clinics that people can just walk in to (and wait in line obviously) that coexist with private healthcare.
The ER is used as a public clinic, everything is red-tape mangled, and then there is the Obamahorrorcare.
Our priorities are all screwed up.and getting worse by the day. 🙄
Layoffs and restructuring at Oprah Winfrey’s beleaguered OWN channel.
some really brave ladies that very few in this country know about
The Ladies in White
http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/Cuba-Pope-Ladies-White/2012/03/19/id/433069
I have not heard of them. Thanks.
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/03/19/women-charged-1-billion-more-than-men-for-health-care-report/
this is something that women on both sides should be up in arms about