Jon Stewart points out the fallacy in the lies told about Planned Parenthood.
Stewart claims that Senator Jon Kyl (R-AZ) only lied to get his way. Kyl claims that 90% of what Planned Parenthood does is abortion when the actual number is around 3%. Easy to get 3% mixed up with 90%.
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Why do politicians lie? They want to get their way. Life is simple. Now I understand.
Is lying ever justified in politics? What if you REALLY believe in something? Or against something? Isn’t lying just a little ok?
hopefully the american public will see through the right wing distortions of the issue. the truth always comes out in the end
Why isn’t that kind, e. I would hope so also.
unfortunately, the truth does not always come out.
Pat is correct. Lies will continue to be spread if people who know the truth don’t get out there and right the wrongs.
It will be interesting to see how consistent Jon Stewart will be in this campaign of exposure. Seems there was a young feller from Illinois who stood up in the U.S. Senate a few years ago and declaimed strongly against raising the ceiling on the national debt, saying that it was absolutely the wrong thing to do and that a nation should spend within its means. He said he would vote against the measure. Today he is saying that he has changed his mind. Sounds to me a bit like being for the war before one was against it.
I don’t think exposing Kyl’s lie is going to change many minds. Pro-Lifers have hated Planned Parenthood for years. One exaggeration isn’t going to cause many to reconsider their views.
It will, however, give people something to talk about. The Daily Show staff wake up early in the morning and view hours and hours of footage to find one 4 second statement that they can ridicule. Sometimes they do a great job. Other times, not so much
I am not sure that I necessarily buy the 3% number either without some proof. Where did this number come from?
Statistics can be manipulated mightily, no matter which side of the political spectrum one might fall. The City Health Department released a report that 40% of all pregnancies in NY City end in abortion. So I suspect that 90% may be closer to reality than 3% for Planned Parenthood in NY.
@Kelly, you are aware that abortions are performed in private clinics as well as other facilities not just at Planned Parenthood?
That actual number of abortions performed in a state has very little to do with PP.
So why do you question that only 3% of the services Planned Parenthood does are abortions?
Kelly, I would guess that the number used by the “fact checker” came from Planned Parenthood itself. That is the percentage PP uses in their own literature. Make of that what you will. Stewart did not happen to mention that.
Sorry, Moon, but it looks to me like PP is an abortion mill. Probably about 28% of the abortions performed in the U.S. Over 332,000 in 2009 by their own calculations. And the federal money goes into a common PP pot, which means that fed funds to the health care side of the operation just means the freeing up of other PP funds for the abortion side. Sort of like a shell game. I know that this is not going to change your own philosophy about abortion. But can we at least stop pretending that PP is only a minor player in the abortion industry? From what I have seen, the revenue from abortions appears to be a big part of their earned income.
I read somewhere that Planned Parenthood performs an abortion every 95 seconds in this country. If you take their own abortion numbers it seems to be correct.
I agree with Wolverine, while the federal money may go towards women’s health that only frees up all of their other funds to go straight to abortions. If your performing one every 95 seconds you need all of it you can get I suppose.
@moon howler
My skepticism comes from the fact that PP appears to have a very strong motive to minimize the number of abortions that are reported at PP clinics. PP wants to keep those federal dollars coming. If abortions appear to be a minuscule part of what PP provides, then the public may not mind continued funding for those other “predominant” services at PP clinics. Nevertheless, one cannot really argue with the logic of the points made by Wolverine and Dan.
@Wolverine
I have never said that Planned Parenthood is only a minor player. Nor do I ‘pretend’ or use sneaky words like ‘mill’ to convey my dislike of abortion. I also am not going to throw up my hands in mock horror at your ‘new’ findings.
What I have said is that PP provides many other health services and that less than 5% of its actual services are abortion services. I am emphasizing that much of what they do falls into the prevention zone.
However they aren’t the only abortion provider in town. I don’t know what percent of all abortions they provice. My guess would be from a quarter to a third. So what!
As for money, neither one of us know their bookkeeping procedure. I expect they probably keep fairly close records. They sure used to. How does any other business keep records separate? How do you know the change you just got back at the laundry wasn’t used at an abortion clinic? You don’t.
Reminder, abortion is a legal procedure in the United States. No one forces anyone else to have one either.
Sounds like you need to change your reading habits. That is a sophomoric statistic.
Title X family planning does not include abortion funding. The patient herself must pay for that. However, can it be offset by other money?
Let’s take Susie. Susie goes in for an abortion. She is also on food stamps and she gets a small amount of money from Social security because she has a disabled parent. Is some of that tax money offset by abortion? Yea, I suppose so. What are you going to do about it? Abortion is a legal service. And she didn’t go to Planned Parenthood for her abortion. She went to a privately owned facility.
The co-mingling money argument is bull crap.
@Kelly, yea, I just did. This isn’t a new issue.
I think that motivation might stem from personal beliefs. I don’t think you need to look at profit. Check out some of the for-profit clinics if you want to sing the money song. I actually won’t fight you on that one. Its a shame that people who care deeply about providing safe, legal abortion services have to waste so much effen time dealing with its very existence. However, Planned Parenthood isn’t one of those places.
If you are a public service and believe strongly that people should have access to contraception and abortion services profit isn’t your motive.
You are aware that much of the money received by PP is medicaid type reimbursements for services?
@Moon-howler
“Sounds like you need to change your reading habits. That is a sophomoric statistic.”
Are you talking about the stat that says how PP performs an abortion, on average, every 95 seconds?
How exactly do I need to change my reading habits, it’s simple math? PP put out their official abortion count for 2009 as 332,278.
If you break that down over 365 days:
332,278 / 365 (days in a year) = 910.35068….. (rounded down to 910 a day)
910 / 24 (hours in a day) = 37.916666666…. (rounded up to 38 an hour)
38 / 3600 (seconds in a hour) = 94.736842…. (rounded up to 95) or 1 every 95 seconds.
Why do I need to change my reading habits with simple math, and why is it sophomoric?
Wolverne,
What have you seen? Sounds like you also are creating your own facts. The logic that you shut down Planned Parenthood to stop abortion is simply lack reason. What other organization provides such comprehensive birth control services as an affordable rate. Did you and Kelly even bother to read my experience at the Falls Church Planned Parenthood?
Answer this question, WHO will fill the void of these services if you think you know it all, if you want to end abortion. You END abortion by NOT getting pregnant!
Thank you for the math lesson.
Why do you care? Why is it that men always want to get into a pissing contest with some woman over a legal procedure?
I don’t see what 1 abortion every 95 seconds has to do with anything. How many contraceptive pills rx’s are written in an hour? Who gives a rats ass.
I don’t know why you waste your time on such things. It proves nothing. Go out and convince men to keep their flies up and to get vasectomies if you want to do something productive.
Allow me to point out a glaring hypocrisy if I may. The same people presuming to force me and my daughter one day, to bear a child, are the same people railing against the health care mandate. Let me tell you, paying for health care is a helluva lot cheaper than properly raising a child. Let me also add, there is no problem with “crying” communism over the health care mandate, but forcing me and other women to carry a child, give birth, and then raise it is NOT government control over private citizens?
Let me share some facts for you people about childbirth in this country, unlike shelling out some money for healthcare, which will SAVE your life in the end, giving birth, in this country, is not without real risk, and I mean to your life.
http://abcnews.go.com/WN/changing-life-preventing-maternal-mortality/story?id=9914009
“According to the World Health Organization, the U.S. ranks behind more than 40 other countries when it comes to maternal death rates, with 11 deaths per 100,000 pregnancies when measured in 2005. More women die in the U.S. after giving birth than die in countries including Poland, Croatia, Italy and Canada, to name a few.”
Apparently a ton of people care Moon, that is what you don’t get. PP has a stigma because of the huge volume of abortions they perform while at the same time claiming to just be about womens health. Their ‘womens health’ argument is clouded by ‘an abortion every 95 seconds’. That is the truth, good, bad or indifferent. No matter how much you piss and moan about it that isn’t going to change.
Until you can acknowledge that simple fact without attacking someone for simply pointing it out we aren’t going to get anywhere with this conversation (keep in mind, I’m pro-choice).
I didn’t attack anyone. Want to see an attack? I have that in my back pocket.
You aren’t really pro choice or you wouldn’t be trying to fight with me about it. You would be supporting my efforts. And for the record, I have been doing this a long long time.
Every so often I get sick of the entire discussion and basically get out my rubber stamp that says hate abortion? don’t have one. You can figure out what the male one says.
I understand that people oppose abortion. It is a legal procedure. Those who oppose abortion should realize that eliminating unwanted pregnancy is the answer to reducing the incidence of abortion. That really is a no brainer.
By the way, don’t be flippant. Planned Parenthood doesn’t claim to just be about women’s health, although I would classifiy being an abortion provider is about womens health. They are also about male reproductive health.
What they are saying is that federal funding is just for family planning excluding abortion. They have never denied that some of their facilities have abortion services. That’s what you just don’t get. The issue isn’t about abortion. Its about title X funding.
Yes, Elena, I did read about your experience at that PP clinic. Now you go read the adverts for almost every PP clinic on the web and you will see that almost all of them offer abortion services right up front and center, either in-clinic or by referral. You must have been working in an anomaly.
As for who would provide the women’s health services? How about PP minus the abortion side? Quite frankly, I do like the work PP does on the women’s health side. It looks to me to be a valuable contribution which I could support even with a donation. In fact, the clinic where you worked sounds exactly like what I have in mind.
But, my friend, I have this personal thing about abortion on demand (as opposed to rape, incest, and a real threat to life). It just seems to me that we have become a society in which we are now able to engage in risky behavior without having to accept responsibility — that includes male and female. Always somebody out there who is willing to provide the solution which will rid us of that pesky “inconvenience” caused by our own risk taking. And in this case the price is paid by the most helpless of all living entities. I think that is a mighty sad commentary about our society. We are like a casino where the addicted gambler gets to play and never loses, even when the die come up snake eyes. Given the current state of play, there is not much I can do about it; but I sure do not have to like it or to be timid in my criticism.
I agree with much that has been said here. Keep the flies zipped and the knees together or, at the least, get down to Planned Parenthood BEFORE you engage in the risky behavior. Then maybe we wouldn’t have to have these disputes so much. Unfortunately, we have raised successive generations who increasingly seem to think that the risky behaviour is O.K. because there is always a way to make someone else pay the ultimate tab. We have also produced generations of males who are taking advantage of this whole thing and who are not being made to pay a price themselves. Sometimes I look at that and wonder how we allowed the male predators without conscience to have the advantage of easily getting rid of any of the consequences they cause by their behavior. Well, it looks to me like all the rest of us have become enablers in that case also. What astonishes me about the current generation is how so many females have somehow become themselves the enablers of the male predators, even to the point of taking the kind of risks that will cause them to head for the PP abortion clinic. The woman goes through all of this, and the predator walks away with just a bill from the clinic, if that. How about more women with the strength to tell the predator to put his thingie back in his pants because she does not want to risk a visit to an abortion clinic?
Wolverine, There is a lot of irresponsible sexual behavior. This behavior is often exacerbated by influence from advertising, music, movies, and peer pressure. The last thing I want is for those kind of people is for them to become parents. That is what makes generational poverty. Young, irresponsible kids having kids is not a solution. That is not to say that everyone who seeks services, abortion or otherwise at Planned Parenthood is irresponsible. I was simply responding to some of your observations.
Just out of curiosity I went to the Planned Parenthood clinic website. (as opposed to the PAC or the political arm) I looked to see how many clinics actually offered abortion services. I was very surprised by the results. Some states had 0 PP facilities. (ND) Other states like Iowa have 25 clinics. 16 of those clinics provide abortion. Utah has 9 clinics. 1 clinic there provides abortion service. Virginia has 7 facilities. 5 of them provide abortion. There seems to be very little consistency. Wyoming has 1 clinic that does not have abortion services. Next door neighbor Montana has 12 clinics. 4 provide abortion.
Wolverine,
I imagine that RU486 will become more and more common place and people who are against abortion, will have to become even more extreme in their efforts to control a womans body. No one LIKES abortion, no one looks forward to an abortion. If 97% of what planned parenthood done is family planning, what excuse does anyone have in promoting their demise?
There are 800 health centers around the Country, in places that have the most needy populations, their goal is to PREVENT pregnancy. Abortion is LEGAL in this country, well, legal until doctors are too afraid for their lives to perform the procedure.
Abortion has been going on as long as women have had unwanted pregnancies, is it pleasant, no, but will women always want control over their own bodies, YES.
I did one of my graduate research papers on abstinence vs BC education, and all the research clearly demonstrated that abstinence only was not effective in pregnancy prevention, yet, conservatives insist on forcing this failed method. Sex is not a dirty word and young people should be given effective information to PREVENT pregnancy if they become sexually active. There are lots of reasons that young women become sexually active too early, too much parental love and attention are NOT some of those reasons.