Tears, tempers fly in Nancy Pelosi's campaign
"One by one, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi had leaned on her rank-and-file Democrats for months to cast off personal prerogatives for the sake of a history-making health care bill. But for Connecticut Rep. Rosa DeLauro, this was too much to ask.
So when Pelosi announced late Friday that she would allow an amendment strictly limiting insurance coverage of abortions, it touched off an angry yelling match between DeLauro and another Pelosi confidant, California Rep. George Miller, and tears from some veteran female lawmakers, according to people in the room"
A temporary NancyCare "victory" yes - but at what ultimate cost?
More here:
"Reproductive rights is the heart and soul of the Democratic Party. Democratic activists take as a given that Democratic politicians will protect a women's right and ability to choose. Last night the Democrats all but gave away a woman's ability to choose, although they still gave lip service to a woman's right to choose.
64 Democrats voted in favor of the Stupak Amendment, which greatly expands the ban on federal funding of abortion, and reaches deep to make it difficult for women to obtain private health insurance covering abortion. 219 Democrats voted in favor of a final bill incorporating the amendment.
This is a stunning development, one which anti-abortion activists could not have imagined just weeks ago. The Speaker of the House and Democratic majority, notwithstanding their lip service to women's reproductive rights, were willing to throw those rights aside to hand the Obama administration a temporary legislative victory."
More from Ellen Malcolm: an "assault" on women's reproductive rights?
"The effect of the Stupak/Pitts Amendment would be to deny the millions of women who get covered through the exchanges access to comprehensive reproductive health care that includes abortion services. These women would be denied coverage available today in private health plans. The Amendment bans private insurance companies that participate in insurance exchanges from providing coverage of abortion. It tries to camouflage the impact by providing an "abortion rider" that women could choose to pay extra for to cover costs if they have an abortion.
How gullible do they think we are?"
Do you really want an answer to that last question Ms. Malcolm? I suspect that you already know by now.
Malcolm concludes:
"There's no point in passing a health care reform bill that makes women less healthy, less safe and less able to exercise their constitutional rights."
In point of fact, I am hard pressed to find any point at all in passing the "health care reform bill" in its present form.
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