This video says it all—Jeb!, speaking at the Southern Baptist Convention forum on the issues of Planned Parenthood, a potential government shutdown, and overall funding for women's health issues. Here's the breakdown of what Jeb! endorses:
•Defunding Planned Parenthood: check.
•Shutting down the government over defunding Planned Parenthood: check.
•Cutting overall funding for women's health issues: check.
And here's a partial transcript (emphasis mine):
Questioner: "We have a continuing resolution coming up to fund the government [...] shouldn't we make that an issue and say, 'Not one more red cent to Planned Parenthood'"?
Jeb!: "We should. And the next president should defund Planned Parenthood.
Look, I have the benefit of having been governor and we did defund Planned Parenthood when I was governor. We tried to create a culture of life across the board. The argument against this is, well, women's health issues are going to be—you're attacking... it's a War on Women, and you're attacking women's health issues. You could take dollar for dollar—although I'm not sure we need half a billion dollars for women's health issues—but if you took dollar for dollar, there are many extraordinarily fine organizations, community health organizations that exist, federally-sponsored community health organizations, to provide quality care for women on a wide variety of health issues. But abortion should not funded by the government—any government in my mind. [...]
If I'm president, we're going to respect the Constitution and get back to regular order way where democracy works again—where you submit a budget, you work with Congress, you pass a budget. And in that budget I can promise you there will not be $500 million going to Planned Parenthood."
Duly noted, Jeb! You want to get back to funding abstinence-only programs
like you did in Florida because they've proven to be so effective at stopping pregnancies and treating sexually transmitted diseases and a whole host of other women's reproductive health issues.
And just fyi, federal money doesn't fund abortions, except in cases of rape, incest, or life endangerment. So we'll put you on record as supporting women and girls being forced to carry their babies to term even in those horrific situations.
4:01 PM PT:
Wed Aug 05, 2015 at 5:04 AM PT (Laura Clawson): Once Jeb! realized his remarks weren't going over so well, he backtracked a bit, saying he "misspoke," because " there are countless community health centers, rural clinics, and other women’s health organizations that need to be fully funded. They provide critical services to all, but particularly low-income women who don’t have the access they need." But apparently those critical services aren't critical when provided by Planned Parenthood, which he still totally wants to defund. He just wishes he hadn't been quite so quotably dismissive of women's health.