Opinion Pieces, Editorial Comment On Stupak Amendment, Health Care Reform

Main Category: Abortion
Also Included In: Health Insurance / Medical Insurance
Article Date: 18 Nov 2009 - 6:00 PST

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Several newspapers recently included opinion pieces and an editorial regarding the House's approval of Rep. Bart Stupak's (D-Mich.) amendment to the chamber's health reform bill (HR 3962). The amendment would prohibit public and private insurance plans that receive federal subsidies from offering abortion coverage. Summaries appear below.

Opinion Pieces

~ Deidre Depke, Newsweek: Women on the left of the political spectrum "suspect that the president, for all the smooth talk, doesn't really walk the walk" on women's issues after the "big blunder" of the Stupak amendment, Depke writes. However, "it's silly to think that in 10 months in office, the president could have satisfied everyone on everything," she continues, adding that the "impressive reality" is that President Obama has repealed the "global gag rule," signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, nominated Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, and given seven of the top 21 positions in his administration to women. "In their hearts, women on the left know the score," but Obama has a "serious issue with women at the center -- the white center," Depke writes, noting that Obama's approval rating among black women is above 90% but is declining among white women. "To stem a politically disastrous widening of this gender gap, the president has to find a way to deal with festering discontent among women," she continues (Depke, Newsweek, 11/14).

~ Eleanor Clift, Newsweek: The "prospect of a Democratic Congress curtailing reproductive rights as a price for health care reform is yet another reality check for those of us who thought Democratic control of Congress and the White House heralded a new day for progressive politics," Clift writes. Controversial social issues like abortion rights "say more about the way Congress works, and where members get their money, than it does about the views of the voters," she continues, adding that "most Americans are reconciled to [abortion's] legality." Uninsured women "are not looking to Congress foremost to guarantee them abortion services; they want preventive health care and prenatal coverage," according to Clift. She notes that there "is widespread anti-incumbent sentiment" in general, with two-thirds of respondents in a recent Pew Research Center poll "say[ing] they are dissatisfied with the course of the country." Clift concludes, "They will be even more unhappy if health care reform is taken hostage by abortion activists" (Clift, Newsweek, 11/13).

~ Rickie Solinger, Long Island Newsday: "Until last week, the subject of abortion seemed set for a low simmer during the Obama administration," Solinger, an author on several books about reproductive politics, writes. She adds, "Not anymore," as the Stupak amendment "has blasted apart any hopes that the subject of abortion is politically manageable, culturally quiescent or settled." Solinger continues that "those who are placing abortion at the center of this debate are turning women's reproductive needs into a weapon against health care and a tool that some hope will help defeat reform legislation and undercut [Obama] in the process." This use of abortion "was startling and effective but hardly a political innovation," she notes, adding, "Abortion has, at least for the moment, become the linchpin that the rise or fall of health care reform depends on." Solinger concludes, "Everyone's life (and death) in America is now connected to abortion. The outcome of this intimacy is unclear" (Solinger, Long Island Newsday, 11/15).

Editorial

~ Philadelphia Inquirer: The House health reform bill "contains an unnecessary new restriction on abortion that the Senate should eliminate from the legislation," according to an Inquirer editorial. Rather than include the Stupak amendment, it "would be more sensible to adopt the requirements of a previous version of the House bill, which would have segregated premium payments and copays to allow for coverage of abortions," the editorial says. It concludes, "The fight over abortion shouldn't thwart health insurance reform. But neither should a new law to overhaul health care in this country end up further restricting a woman's right to lawful reproductive health services" (Philadelphia Inquirer, 11/16).

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