We Fight Low Information
Rick Broderick: The pro-life people are correct when they say there is a culture of death in this country; they are wrong in thinking that the locus of this culture is Planned Parenthood. It is a culture of death that prevails on Wall Street, K-Street, Hollywood, and our ever expanding Military-Industrial-Congressional Complex.
Brent Budowksy: When Republicans try to destroy collective bargaining with the fanaticism of Javert trying to destroy Valjean, they create backlash and fear that escalates the organizing and activism of labor and its supporters.
Victoria Defrancesco Soto: Obama is the ultimate ladies’ man, but not because of his swagger or looks. His popularity among women boils down to politics. His administration has aggressivly courted women by highlighting women’s policy issues.
On Saturday, April 28th, We Are Women is joining together united in solidarity with all women to make a loud and clear statement that women must be treated as equals deserving dignity and the right to decisions dealing with their own healthcare.
You’ll note that women writers took the top three spots this week — led off by Sikivu Hutchinson’s fine examination of the recent Planned Parenthood attack. And they also took five of the top 10.
Sikivu Hutchinson: Although no one was injured in the attack, the fascist demonization of Planned Parenthood by inciters like Rick Santorum and Mitt Romney continues to put women’s lives in the line of fire; in an era of vanishing clinics and mounting violence.
Victoria Defrancesco Soto: The GOP’s culture war is not only alienating Latinas, but in turn, they are also alienating the families that are politically guided by mama.
Carl Matthes: I would suggest Mr. Trudeau take us even further down the path of lunacy by composing strips showing similar compulsory exams for men! After all, men are half of the pregnancy equation.
Carl Matthes: If Rick Santorum were Pope, nuns would would be given veils. If he was President, women would be brought into the bedroom only for procreation.
LA Progressive Editor Dick Price’s report on the meeting local Occupy representatives had with Wells Fargo Bank officials in downtown Los Angeles — Wells Fargo Meets Occupy: Where There’s Smoke There’s Smoke? — led this week’s list of 10 most read articles.
Randy Shaw: Considering that polls show that 99% of all women and 98% of Catholic women who have had sex have used contraceptives, Democrats should follow Senator Barbara Boxer’s lead and aggressively frame the November elections around this issue.
ulie Driscoll’s look at the long-term effects of the Komen Foundation’s ill-advised decision to strip its funding for Planned Parenthood for what were rather obviously political reasons, led this week’s LA Progressive 10 Most Read articles list.
Tina Dupuy: Of course, the market for Republicans is just like the Bible or the Constitution. They worship it piously as long as they believe it agrees with them.
Sikivu Hutchinson: Religious Right charlatans who preach an anti-government mantra are vociferously opposed to progressive health care, birth control, foster care and school discipline policies, as well as to repealing racist sentencing laws and prisoner reentry policies.
Julie Driscoll: We trusted Komen to have the best interests of women at heart, until the “best interests of women” Komen had previously played up turned out to be denying poor women much-needed breast cancer screenings.
Julie Driscoll: Komen is between a rock and a hard place: Fund Planned Parenthood and the anti-choice zealots breathe fire; de-fund it and progressives who’ve firmly supported its cause withdraw support and trash it on Facebook and Twitter and blogs.
Tanya Somanader: Wednesday, America’s most well-known breast cancer organization Susan G. Komen succumbed to right-wing pressure and ended its partnership with Planned Parenthood, causing Rep. Jackie Speier to drop her support.
Tanya Somanader: 10 bills stood out as particularly perturbing and far-reaching efforts to stymie women’s access to abortion services, birth control, and vital health services like breast cancer screenings.
Madeline Janis: The attack against LAANE is consistent with the broader effort by the right to cripple progressive causes and leaders. And as the recent assault on Planned Parenthood reminds us, they are willing to do almost anything to achieve their aim.
Bob Letcher: How did you intend everyday people who are out here woozily wondering how to grasp your intention in “putting it that way” to go about—well… grasping your intention in putting it that way?
Ted Vaill: The ultimate Republican strategy for the 2012 election is this: they know that they will lose if the economy continues to improve and unemployment figures drop substantially.
David Love: Republican overreach is in the air. You can see it, smell it, taste it everywhere, as you have in years past. And the only surprise is that it happened so quickly this time around.
Frank Dryden: Since you would assume that elected officials are neither stupid nor irrational, one can only conclude that it is their intention to raise the number of abortions in the country regardless of the cost.
Steve Ybarra: If Republicants allow Planned Parenthood to go down, they and all those who remain quiet are responsible for the deaths of women from backstreet abortions and the millions of unwanted children who will end up on the streets homeless at age 15.
Randy Shaw: Instead of Obama’s election proving the type of launching point that conservative groups experienced after Ronald Reagan’s 1980 election, community organizing opportunities are less available today than in past decades.
Lately, the sound of galloping hooves and rustling white sheets has risen in a deafening squall from the Capitol. Like their Klan ancestors, elite white males in Congress’ political lynch mob are once again savaging communities of color. The House’s vote to gut Planned Parenthood is a criminal act against poor and working class women [...]
Tina Dupuy: What Planned Parenthood really does is keep poor people out of emergency rooms. The clinics treat people with or without insurance for ranges of health issues. Yes, low-cost community clinics save taxpayers’ money. Lots.
Rev. Irene Monroe: Using women’s health care as a bargaining clip to pass H.R. 3590 has diminished, if not eliminated — for poor women and women of color who cannot pay for reproductive health care out-of-pocket — not only a safe abortion accessible to them but also emergency contraception.
The distortions about Planned Parenthood are meant to paint them as evil genocidal racists. Nothing could be further from the truth. The dedicated people at Planned Parenthood provide our schools with curriculum and materials to teach youth how to prevent pregnancy and disease transmission, they provide low cost and free women’s health exams including cancer screening, and they provide access to birth control and counseling.
JP Sotille: Like so many of the so-called “Left” in America, Maher has basically accepted the key notion that a whole population of like-minded people have decided to kill Americans because of an irrational religious belief system.
Ivan Eland: Less scrupulous Republicans, such as McCain and Graham, should realize that their line of attack on Benghazi is not strong–Americans don’t usually vote on foreign policy unless a huge catastrophe has occurred.
By purchasing and dedicating commemorative bricks, Americans everywhere will be helping Advantage US Vets establish the Roots & Sprouts Farmstead as a not-for-profit workplace which will directly hire jobless honorably discharged veterans.
PCL offers monthly Open House Events on the 2nd Saturday at 2pm and 3rd Thursday at 6pm. Click here to learn more.
Human Trafficking and the Planned Parenthood Debacle
Nikki Junker: Planned Parenthood should make mandatory for all employees training on Human Trafficking and provide a list of resources in each clinic that can be provided to potential victims.