Opinion Piece Argues Abortion-Rights Groups Deserve 'Payback' From Dems For Reform Agreements

Main Category: Abortion
Also Included In: Health Insurance / Medical Insurance
Article Date: 24 Mar 2010 - 4:00 PDT


"If health care reform becomes law, you can thank pro-choicers" because when "forced to decide between sacrificing abortion coverage and voting down coverage of everything else for 30 million people, abortion-rights supporters took the hit," author and journalist Katha Pollitt writes in an opinion piece in The Nation. Pollitt adds that one "can call pro-choice leaders hypocritical or cowardly or feeble or excessively deferential to the president's agenda," but one cannot call them "selfishly obsessed with their own political purity," a label she says is apt for "anti-choicers" like the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) and Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.).

"The way I see it, the Democratic Party and the Obama administration owe supporters of women's rights a huge payback for cooperating on its signature issue," Pollitt writes. She suggests seven actions Democrats could take to fulfill this "payback." First, they should fully fund Title X, "the only federal program dedicated to supplying reproductive health services to low-income women and men," she writes. Obama also should move "[f]ull speed ahead" on the Paycheck Fairness Act. Another solution would be to fully "[c]onfront maternal mortality," she says, noting that a recent report from Amnesty International showed that maternal mortality in the U.S. has doubled over the past two decades.

Though President Carter signed the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women in 1980, the U.S. remains "one of a handful of countries that have not ratified" the document. Democrats should hold a vote on the measure -- even if they lack enough votes to pass it -- because "American women should know which senators think we should have fewer human rights than women in nearly every other democratic country," Pollitt contends.

Democrats also should fully fund the Violence Against Women Act, which is up for reauthorization in 2011, Pollitt notes, adding that a series of recent controversies involving male Democratic leaders' actions toward women reinforces the need "to have lots more women in office." To that end, party leaders also should support Connie Saltonstall in her primary campaign against Stupak, Pollitt concludes (Pollitt, The Nation, 3/18).

Reprinted with kind permission from http://www.nationalpartnership.org. You can view the entire Daily Women's Health Policy Report, search the archives, or sign up for email delivery here. The Daily Women's Health Policy Report is a free service of the National Partnership for Women & Families, published by The Advisory Board Company.

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