If you needed yet another poll showing that people think birth control is a good thing and health insurance plans should provide it, while simultaneously showing the importance of how poll questions are worded, here you go. Quinnipiac included a series of questions on the issue in its national poll, and got wildly different answers depending on the specific question, finding that two out of three ways you ask about employer-provided birth control coverage, solid majorities are in favor.
Quinnipiac. 2/14-20. MoE ±1.9 percent.
Q: Do you think that health insurance plans should cover birth control as preventive care for women or not?
Yes: 71
No: 24
Q: Do you think the federal government should require private employers to offer free birth control coverage as part of their health insurance benefit plans or not?
Yes: 47
No: 48
Q: As you may know, President Obama recently announced an adjustment to the administration's health-care rule regarding religiously affiliated employers providing birth control coverage to female employees. Women will still be guaranteed coverage for birth control without any out-of-pocket cost, but will have to seek the coverage directly from their insurance companies if their employers object to birth control on religious grounds. Do you approve or disapprove of President Obama's decision?
Yes: 54
No: 38
Asked in a "what should happen" vein, without reference to government, people want their insurance plans to cover birth control. You can get a virtually even split on the issue if you ask a question that sounds like it was written by a committee composed of Grover Norquist, Rick Santorum and Jim Bob Duggar. And if you describe President Obama's policy in some detail, a solid majority is in favor—notably, this poll finds 45 percent approving of Obama's performance as president, so a significant number of people who disapprove of Obama's overall performance support him on this issue.
With that in mind: Please, Republicans, keep pushing on this one!
The poll also reminds us that a lot of the people who want Planned Parenthood defunded by the government want that because they just want Planned Parenthood gone: Of the 31 percent who want Planned Parenthood defunded, 39 percent would still take the same view "If you knew that federal government funding to Planned Parenthood was being used only for non-abortion health issues such as breast cancer screening." That means that 12 percent of the total respondents want to see Planned Parenthood defunded even if that means low-income women lose access to breast cancer screening. Totally coincidentally, I'm sure, 12 percent is also the percent of people who told Quinnipiac they thought birth control was "wrong." Funny!