The Republican War on Women: The National Front

This is the twenty-fifth in a series of articles on the subjects of women, abortion rights and the Republican Party. 

Republicans continue to say they don’t have to change their core principles, they only have to change the language they use to get their message out.  One perception they want to alter is the idea that they are running a “war on women”.  Looking at the news over the past few years, I’d say the Republican Party has a long way to go on this subject.

• Senator Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky): “Talk about a manufactured issue.  There is no issue.” 
•  RNC Chairman Reince Priebus:  “It’s a fiction.” 

The National Front

the facts and commentary:  The 114th Congress has only been in session a few days, but Republicans are already taking advantage of their majority to create new roadblocks between women and their right to make their own medical decisions.

On Thursday, January 22, the 42nd anniversary of Supreme Court's ruling on Roe v. Wade, the U.S. House of Representatives planned a vote that would ban abortion after 20 weeks, a measurement beyond that in the Supreme Court's ruling.  Late in the evening on Wednesday, John Boehner's office announced that vote would not take place.

Instead, in a surprise move, House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) allowed the U.S. House of Representatives to skip the committee process and put H.R.7, popularly known as the No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Bill (a bill that strictly limits a woman's access to abortion at any time and for any reason), to a vote.  Every single Republican in the House voted in favor.  They were joined by either 15 or 17 Democrats. (There seems to be some confusion on the Democrat vote count.)

• The bill prevents Medicaid from covering abortion. Poor women will be forced to have unwanted children with no way to provide for them.  I expect the GOP will continue to scream "Lazy! Freeloader!" and vote to cut government assistance for these families.  They will undoubtedly say these women should have taken "personal responsibility" for their family planning, while ignoring the irony presented by denying the family planning aspect of abortion services.
• The bill restricts a woman's ability to purchase a private insurance plan covering abortion--even if she uses her own money. So, the GOP wants to reach into a woman's wallet and tell her what she can do with her own funds? Is this intrusion an example of the "less-government" or the "more personal responsibility" portion of their party dogma? 
• The bill eliminates a small business tax credit currently given to those businesses that include abortion coverage in their health insurance plans under the ACA.  Not satisfied with telling a woman what she can and cannot do with her own body, the GOP also wants to tell small business owners they will no longer be permitted to choose the type of healthcare coverage they provide for their female employees.  Would this be considered another example of the GOP's idea of less-government?
• The bill prohibits the District of Columbia from using its own local budget to subsidize abortion care for the poor families living within the District. The GOP just can't seem to help itself.  
• The bill prohibits any tax deduction for abortion medical expenses, except in the case of rape or incest.  Apparently, the party of the right is totally unaware of the conundrum they have created with this prohibition.

Just last August, the House passed the Keep the IRS Off Your Health Care Act.  At that time, Representative Diane Black (R-Tennessee) said the IRS had "no business accessing or monitoring Americans' personal health information."  Representative Renee Ellmers (R-North Carolina) said "we cannot allow the IRS to have any say over our health and well-being."  Basically, the GOP has passed one bill prohibiting the IRS from having access to any personal healthcare information and another authorizing IRS auditors to demand proof of rape or incest.

This is what happens when you are a party run by hate.  It's like lying.  Eventually you lose track of the truth.

Before the vote was taken, over a dozen Democrats took to the floor to protest the bill.  Each read the same statement, "The House should vote for bigger paychecks and better infrastructure instead of attacking women's access to healthcare."

But taking on "bigger paychecks and better infrastructure" would mean actually moving the country forward, a direction that has been anathema to the right for six years and counting. 

Representative Gwen Moore (D-Wisconsin) submitted a motion to "recommit the bill" asking that it be amended to "prohibit any violation of medical privacy of a woman regarding her personal choice of health insurance coverage, including victims of rape and incest" which would have sent it to committee.  Republicans rejected the motion.

The Family Research Council applauded the bill's passage saying, "This is another victory for taxpayers, women, and their unborn children."

Statements like this drive me nuts.  Taxpayers are going to end up paying to raise the unwanted children born as a result of this bill.  Women who don't want an abortion are not being forced to have one; it is only those who do not want a child who will be forced to give birth to an unwanted one.  The only victory I see in this is that the far-right once again gets to tell me and my family how we will live our lives.

The bill now goes to the Senate.  President Obama has said that if the bill lands on his desk, he will veto it. "The Administration strongly opposes H.R. 7.  The legislation would intrude on women's reproductive freedom and access to health care; increase the financial burden on many Americans; unnecessarily restrict the private insurance choices that consumers have today; and restrict the District of Columbia's use of local funds, which undermines home rule." 

I am a woman, a fully functioning member of the human race.  I am capable of making my own family decisions.  I am capable of deciding if I can afford a child.  I am capable of deciding if having a child at this time in my life is right for me.  I am capable of deciding how I spend the money I earn. I am capable of deciding how I will provide for my employees.  I am capable of voting on how the area in which I live should spend my tax money.  And no one, not some politician in the House or the Senate, not a member of a church to which I do not belong, not an employee of a conservative organization to which I hold no membership, and certainly not some clerk at the IRS, has any business judging my choices. 

The Republican War on Women is "fiction?"

WHAT YOU DO SPEAKS SO LOUDLY

THAT I CANNOT HEAR WHAT YOU SAY.