The "dislikes" outnumber "likes" in this YouTube screenshot
Susan G. Komen for the Cure just can't keep its story straight about its decision last week to defund cancer screening at Planned Parenthood. Doing some straight reporting, Laura Bassett at Huffington Post writes about anti-choice Vice President Karen Handel's specific goal of ending Planned Parenthood's Komen funding, which runs counter to the Komen claim that this fiasco was completely apolitical, didn't involve Handel, and was simply a result of procedure changing for grant administration:
Karen Handel was the prime instigator of this effort, and she herself personally came up with investigation criteria," the source, who requested anonymity for professional reasons, told HuffPost. "She said, 'If we just say it's about investigations, we can defund Planned Parenthood and no one can blame us for being political.'"
More, same source:
Americans United for Life and other pro-life groups have been pressuring Komen for years to cut ties with Planned Parenthood because some of its clinics offer abortions, even though none of Komen's money was used toward abortion services. Handel's internal strategy, the Komen source told HuffPost, was to exaggerate those attacks and use them to convince the leadership that funding Planned Parenthood was a political liability.
"Komen's been dealing with the Planned Parenthood issue for years, and you know, some right-wing groups would organize a protest or send out a mailing every now and then, but it was on a low simmer," the source said. "What Karen's been doing for the past six months is ratcheting up the issue with leadership. Every time someone would even mention a protest, she would magnify it, pump it up, exaggerate it. She's the one that kept driving this issue."
Note that in the
Andrea Mitchell interview, CEO Nancy Brinker specifically denied Handel's hand in the matter:
BRINKER: Well, let me just for the record tell you, Karen did not have anything to do with this decision. This was decided at the board level and also by our mission, Andrea. Everything that we get up and do every day is about the mission. To provide women, vulnerable populations, with care, treatment, and screening.
Based on the Mitchell interview and the HuffPo piece, Brinker was being less than candid. It certainly appears Komen was at fault for not only pulling the plug on women's health via Planned Parenthood, but lying about what they did and how they got there.
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