More Roses for Senator Boxer, and choice in Oregon

April 5th the Senate voted 52-46 to overturn the odious Global Gag Rule that President Bush imposed in the first days of his first term. The debate occurred with very little advance notice.

The Global Gag Rule denies U.S. family planning aid to foreign health care providers that use their own, privately raised funds to provide legal abortions, to provide counseling or referrals on legal abortion, or to publicly support legal abortion within their own countries.

The vote came on an amendment (S.AMDT.278  proposed by Senator Boxer) to prohibit the application of certain restrictive eligibility requirements to foreign nongovernmental organizations.  S.600, (Foreign Affairs Authorization Act, Fiscal Years 2006 and 2007) is a bill authorizing a number of foreign policy programs. By adopting the Boxer Amendment, the Senate stood up for the right of poor women around the world to take control of their own lives and their own futures.

The Global Gag Rule forces providers to choose between receiving desperately needed funds or maintaining the ability to provide patients with full and complete information and the right to speak out on an important public health policy issue. Either choice hurts the women

The effects of the Global Gag Rule have been dramatic. In countries throughout the developing world, health care providers have been unable to agree to sacrifice their rights and ignore their responsibilities to provide women with information about all of their legal options. Clinics have closed leaving tens of thousands of poor people without the services they need. Contraceptive supplies in some clinics have run out, leaving thousands of women at risk for an unwanted pregnancy and sexually transmitted disease. In fact, rather than preventing abortion, the Global Gag Rule only makes unsafe abortion more likely because it cuts off funding for contraception.

The fight continues.  S.600 has not passed the Senate. And the imperative to think globally, act locally is stark and obvious here in Oregon.

There are people here suggesting women can be legislated back to the 1950's. Barefoot, pregnant and dependent on someone else, or welfare, for basic survival is NOT a place for women. We should NOT be made to beg for our space on this planet. Contraception, pro-life/pro-choice; women's health issues are PRIVATE matters between a woman and her health care provider (and possibly her partner.)  No matter what your personal decisions are in these areas, it just seems that to take legislative action to diminish the options we have as women is just fucking wrong.  

We cannot legislate science, we should not legislate religion; we should not be legislating choice.

Three bills before Oregon lawmakers include a bill instituting a mandatory 24 hour delay for women seeking abortions that incorporates a biased, anti-choice lecture. One is a bill requiring a young woman between the ages of 15-17 to notify a parent prior to her abortion and obtain consent--or petition the courts for consent. And a third bill, a backdoor trap, would require that clinics providing abortion care meet the guidelines of ambulatory surgi-centers, effectively shutting down abortion care across the entire state except for a single clinic in Portland.

The troglodyte who represents me responded to my letter saying these bills do not endanger women's lives. This is clearly incorrect, any delay increases the chances of medical complications. He further implied that until the Supreme Court strikes down Roe v Wade, or the law changes, the Oregon Legislature cannot ultimately prevent an adult woman from choosing to have an abortion--which it will just as soon as he has his druthers. Old white male asshole.