If we look at the SGK non-apology today, there is no language suggesting that they will fund Planned Parenthood in the next grant cycle (i.e., they will have the "eligibility to apply"). Kalli Joy Gray's front-page diary backs this up clearly.
Now, it may be that off-line PP and SGK hammered out a memorandum of understanding that should PP decide to re-apply, they would be re-upped pending some number of variables that allow the anti-choice forces at Komen to claim victory.
The past 48 hours has made it clear that PP has public opinion and the principled arguments on its side. Given that, it seems Ms. Richards and the PP executive have decided that's a good place to be, and a better place than they've found themselves in the national conversation in many years. That, politically, is the positioning adopted by the Obama administration as we head into 2012. And it's a positioning likely to allow both to see another day.
The problem remains, however, that powerful forces -- we now know including SGK -- want to destroy Planned Parenthood. End it. I have no doubt at all that Komen wants to supplant Planned Parenthood as the go-to non-profit women's health resource -- one that is "pro-life." And I have no doubt that "pro-life" men see a singular opportunity to divide women against themselves and blow up the most powerful single voting bloc for any number of progressive-minded policies they deplore.
One of the most frightening aspects of this story is that Komen felt PP was so weakened that now was the time to kill it. A McCarthyite investigation in Congress is underway, local PPs have surrounded themselves from coast-to-coast with Jersey barricades and barbed wire and smoked windows just to stay open. And in one state legislature after another, women's access to contraceptive services and health information is under heavy assault. The Supremes are aligned 5-to-4 against Roe as we speak, with casework making its way up the chain. By any measure, this is a dangerous time for American women.
I think the moment is now for Planned Parenthood to reintroduce themselves as THE indispensable non-profit health resource for American women. They should tell us ALL they do on behalf of women, how women's health research remains second-class, how the health market continues to discriminate against women, and how women need to seize control of all issues concerning their wellness -- from underinsurance to lack of insurance, from breast cancer to cardiovascular disease, from spousal abuse to substance abuse, from mental health to reproductive health, from neo-natal care to child care -- and lead the conscience of this country, by the nose if necessary, to the better day for American women and men that eludes us all.