women's rights

This weekend, many celebrated the passage of the health-care reform bill in the House of representatives, despite the approval of an amendment that will restrict availability of coverage for abortions, which many plans now cover.  The amendment will prohibit federal funds for abortion services in the public option.  It also prohibits individuals who receive affordability credits from purchasing a plan that provides elective abortions. 

Although pro-choice House members voted for the bill in order to keep it moving, they are vowing it will be stripped out in the Senate and conference committee.  On MSNBC Rep. Wassmerman Schultz says "Well that language, she's right, is very, very troubling. It was extremely painful for me to have to vote for a bill - to feel compelled to vote for a bill - that had that type of restriction on a woman's right to make her own reproductive choices. I am confident that when it comes back from the conference committee, that that language won't be there and I think that we're all going to be working very hard - particularly the pro-choice members - to make sure that that's the case."

Meanwhile, over in the White House, Press Secretary Robert Gibbs is as tight lipped about the amendment as he was about Sotomayor's views on choice, never weighing in on the debate.  Add this up with 64 democrats voting in favor of an amendment sponsored by a democrat in a democratic controlled House to take away my right to pay for an abortion with my own funds and I'd say we are in trouble.  Regardless of how pro-choice our President claims to be, I wouldn't put my eggs in his basket.  I think he'd rather push through a historic health-care reform bill and worry about "women's issues" later.

The FY2010 Appropriations Bill in the House of Representatives proposes to lift a special prohibition on the use of locally raised funds for abortion.  In a statement Congressman José E. Serrano, Chairman of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government, said the bill takes steps to reduce "undue congressional interference in local affairs and [eliminate] restrictions on the District that do not apply to other parts of the nation."

The bill would also discontinue the ban on Washington using federal money to register same-sex domestic and partners and providing them with benefits as well as bans on other funding related social issues.

Because Congress ultimately controls the District of Columbia, conservative members have played politics with abortion funding for years and the current bans have been in place since the days when Repulicans ruled the House.  Democrats are in for a fight from the republicans who want to keep the bans in place.

In the meantime, the Senate has not yet taken up their version of the Appropriations Bill, however, it is said they will run into staunch opposition if they eliminate the funding bans.

Today, the FDA approved the first generic version of Plan B emergency contraception.  It will be available by prescription only for women 17 and younger.  Currently, Plan B, the brand name drug, is available to women without a prescription to women 18 and older and soon, it will be available without a prescription to women 17  years of age.

At present, the generic drug, which is made by Watson Laboratories, will not be made available without a prescription because Duramed Pharmaceuticals has a patent on Plan B's nonprescription sales until August 24 of this year.  After the patent expires, Watson Laboratories will have to seek FDA approval for nonprescription use of the generic product. 

It has been a long slow road getting to where we are today in providing this important drug to women.  The option of a lower cost, generic version will now prove invaluable to women and families.

The first reaction to President Obama's nomination of Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court was extremely positive, as least from those on his side of the isle.  She has an impressive judicial record, a compelling personal story, she is a woman and will be the first Hispanic ever appointed to the Court.  However, it wasn't long before the unease started to set in and I started to question this impressive nominations position on choice.

As the New York Times reported yesterday, in nearly 11 years as an appeals court judge, Sotomayor has never directly ruled on a women's right to choose. However, she has written opinions that touched on abortion disputes where her opinion lay in favor of abortion opponents. In 2002 she wrote an opinion siding with the Bush Administration's policy to withhold aid from international groups that provide or promote abortion services overseas - otherwise known as the global gag rule.  This was one of the first Bush policies Obama overturned upon taking office.  And in 2004 she sided with anti-abortion protesters who sued police officers who allegedly used excessive force to break up the anti-abortion protest in front of an abortion clinic.  As someone who worked at an abortion clinic for years, the fact that she sided with the protesters worries me greatly.

That being said, the pro-choice community seems torn on the issue.  Wednesday, Planned Parenthood Federation of America sent out an email praising the nomination and Sotomayor herself, commenting on their confidence of her "commitment to the protection of our individual liberties".  In the meantime, NARAL Pro-Choice America sent a letter to senators urging them to demand Sotomayor reveal her views on privacy rights before any confirmation vote. 

Being pro-choice himself, it is of course not possible that President Obama does not understand the implications of this important nomination and of course, we all assumed he would appoint someone who would uphold Roe v. Wade.  With the last two decisions being decided by a 5 to 4 margin, there is no doubt that Roe v. Wade and the basic rights of women and families are at risk here.  However it is now being reported that President Obama did not vet the issue specifically.  I find that extremely hard to believe.  I am going to assume that when the Supreme Court is mentioned, a large percentage of the population calls to mind Roe v. Wade.  I'll go even further to assume that it is the only Supreme Court case that a large percentage of our population can even name!  And you are going to tell me that it didn't come up when vetting a new nominee to the Court?

I'm thrilled that Obama has nominated a women and a Latina.  I am excited at the possibility of a Supreme Court that looks more like America, but I want none of that at the risk of loosing my right to choose.  Luckily, I think our President understands the enormity of the decision he has made and hopefully he made the right one for everyone.  Still, I feel the administration may want to work on their answer to the question of how Sotomayor is going to respond when asked about her views on privacy, becuase they will be asked again, and they are going to need a more plausable response next time.

Monday, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of AT&T in the case of AT&T v. Hulteen, overturning a lower courts ruling which stated that decades-old maternity leaves should count in determining pensions.  Four AT&T employees who took maternity leave prior to the 1979 Pregnancy Discrimination Act sued the company to get their time credited toward their pensions. 

The Pregnancy Discrimination Act is an amendment to Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Discrimination on the basis of pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions constitutes unlawful sex discrimination under Title VII, which covers employers with 15 or more employees, including state and local governments. Title VII also applies to employment agencies and to labor organizations, as well as to the federal government. Women who are pregnant or affected by related conditions must be treated in the same manner as other applicants or employees with similar abilities or limitations.

In other words, prior to the Pregnancy Discrimination Act, when you took maternity leave those days did not count towards your pension, though other types of leave, such as short term disability are not removed from your pension.  Therefore, when women who had had children prior to 1979 went to retire, they had smaller pensions than those who had worked at their jobs for the same amount of time and had even take leave. 

Justices Ginsburg and Bryer dissented "By making it illegal to discriminate against women on pregnancy leave, "Congress intended no continuing reduction of women's compensation, pension benefits included, attributable to their placement on pregnancy leave," said Ginsburg, the court's only woman."

Considering that women already make less than men to start with, often end up taking some unpaid leave during their at least one pregnancy, if not more, and live longer than men, women are already at a disadvantage when it comes to our retirement years. 

There were 12.6 million employed women aged 55 and over in the U.S. in 2008 according to the Labor Department.  I'm guessing that especially in this economy, alot of those women now cannot afford to retire.  We need Congress to step up and fix this like they had to fix the mess the Supreme Court made out of the Ledbetter decision, otherwise women - who we all know are especially integral to society during a recession - are going to be incredibly harmed.

It is being widely speculated that President Obama will replace Supreme Court Justice David Souter, who is to retire, but expected to remain on the bench until a replacement is found, with a woman.  Currently, Ruth Bader Ginsburg is the only woman serving on the Supreme Court.  The three front runners are Elana Kagan, Sonia Sotomayor, and Diana Wood, with Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm also being talked about. 

As the blogs and newspapers immediately pointed, appointing a woman to the Supreme Court is going to be an appointment based upon quite a bit of "judgment".  SCOTUSblog points out age is going to be a factor. All four women mentioned above were born between 1950-1960 and while Diana Wood is the most respected judge, she is also the oldest - strike one.  Kagan and Granholm are the youngest and Granholm has the experience of being AG, dealing with law enforcement and legislature - plus 2 for Granholm.  Sotomayor however is a Hispanic and would be the first ever Hispanic nominee to Court - plus 1 for Sotomayor. 

However, as the Daily Beast pointed out over at DemConWatch.com a commentator is concerned that Kagan and Sotomayor may be too fat, yes, that is what I just said, too fat, and therefore may be a health risk and not last long on the Court.  The commentator went on to say that Diana Wood, while she is the oldest, is the only one who looks "healthy" - plus 1 for Wood.

In the meantime, the weight debate raged on over at The Washington Monthly where a commentator claimed "To all the short-sighted libs who are clamoring for the youngest-possible nominee... Right idea, wrong methodology. You want someone who will serve the longest, i.e. with the greatest remaining life expectancy-and that involves more than simple age. I tried assessing their respective health prospects, and ruled out all who even border on overweight. Best choice: Kim McLane Wardlaw, whose ectomorphitude reflects her publicly known aerobic-exercise habits."

And finally our friends at Salon put it so elegently when they said of Sotomayor "How do you say 55, overweight, and diabetic in Spanish?"

I'm going to guess none of these concerns came up when some of our "big boned" male justices were nominated, but I could be wrong.

Regardless, it is a wonderful feeling to not be gripped with panic over the Supreme Court being tipped towards over turning Roe v Wade because we are losing such a wonderful advocate.  Not to mention the wonderful feeling of hearing only women's names bandied about when it comes to having him replaced.   Even if it means having her weight and outfits and hair judged along the way as long as it gets us more diversity on the Supreme Court and Roe v. Wade is upheld, sexism be damned.

Almost three years after the FDA approved (a decision delayed 3 years by the Bush Administration) Plan B emergency contraception (the morning after pill) to be sold over the counter to women 18 and over, they reverse their original ruling, loosening it by allowing women (and men) 17 years old to now purchase the contraception without a doctors prescription.  As I stated when the FDA originally approved sales of Plan B OTC, the pill is shown to be safe for women even younger than 17 and with the teen pregnancy rate in our country - the highest among the most developed countries in the world - it can only well serve women, families, teens, and especially the impoverished to expand access to a safe and legal form of contraception.

The decision to reverse the ruling came after U.S. District Judge Edward Korman ruled in a New York case that Bush Administration appointees let politics, not science drive their decision to allow the over-the-counter access to these pills only to women 18 and older.  The Judge gave the agency 30 days to lower the age to 17 and separately evaluate if all age restrictions should be lifted. 

The controversy will of course rage on as the anti-choice community will use the same argument as the pro-choice community has been using all these years - we've turned this into a political issue.  Both sides have been polarized by feeling like this has been turned into a political issue at some point, but the fact of the matter is, whether you are pro-choice or anti-choice, this is a public health issue and what everyone wants is less abortions and less unwanted, unplanned pregnancies and the easiest, most cost effective, safest way to do that is to expand access to any and all forms of birth control.

Sarah Palin is really solid on her position of supporting rape survivors (she firmly doesn't), however, she may support advocates of rape.  Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin recently nominated Wayne Anthony Ross (yes, his initials are WAR, nice!) for Attorney General.  Apparently Ross was slotted for confirmation until it came out that he allegedly defended men who rape their wives, along with a long list of other vile discriminatory traits. 

According to a letter submitted to the Alaska State Judiciary Committee, Ross allegedly declared during a speech before a 1991 gathering of the "father's rights" group Dads Against Discrimination (so much irony from a many who calls homosexuals "degenerates" and vowed to undermine the sovereignty of Native American tribes, but ok, he's against discrimination, whatever... ) "If a guy can't rape his wife, who's he gonna rape?" 

In another letter, Ross denied the remarks, claiming "I don't talk like that!"  Ross, a long time supporter of Palin has publicly announced that his final wish before dying is to over turn Roe v. Wade. However, it seems Palin may need to ask her kindred spirit to step down before his appointment comes to vote and possibly avoid another embarrassment.

The North Dakota House of Representatives passed a fetal personhood bill, effectively outlawing abortion by declaring fertilized eggs have the same rights as human beings.  This dangerous bill could endanger use of contraceptives as well.  The Representatives voted 51-41 in favor of the bill today, which will now go to the Senate, which is anti-choice, along with the Governor. 

This is similar to a bill recently defeated in Colorado.  These bills are written to pose a challenged to Roe v. Wade.  North Dakota will likely end up in court defending this bill.

While I was thrilled last night that the candidates finally tackled an issue important to many women and an issue that they will have to deal with in their presidency, I was not thrilled with either of their responses. While Sen. Barack Obama went 90% of the way in standing behind women's reproductive freedom, he fell short when he started using Republican terminology such as "partial birth abortion" - something that does not even exist, but was made up by the anti-choice community to sound scary - and claiming he would ban late term abortions. And at no time during his ending remarks about us coming together to end unintended pregnancy did he mention birth control! This is a man endorsed by NARAL and Planned Parenthood and given his pro-choice education at the hand of Kate Michaelman, I was disappointed.

In response to Sen. Obama's comments about a ban on late term abortions (as long an there is as exception for the health of the mother) Sen. John McCain used air quotes to mock "health of the mother"! At that moment, he secured every undecided woman's vote for Barack Obama. He also allowed his true radical thoughts about women, the respect they deserve and their right to choose to shine through.

In an ad that played immediately following the debate, a young woman calls out Gov. Sarah Palin for feeling she should have to carry a child to term after being raped. I believe after his mocking last night, it is clear Sen. John McCain agrees. And in another example of his disregard for womens' health, in a January 2000 interview with Tim Russert John McCain states he understand that due to his policies women could die. I don't believe there should be any further doubt that a John McCain presidency would mean a slip backwards in time for womens' health.