 by Sandra Fluke |
Women across the country have reason to celebrate tonight. Why? Because on Wednesday, the law that provides American women with access to preventive health services, including birth control, at no cost—no co-pay, no increase in premium, no deductible—goes into effect.
This victory wouldn't have been achieved without the work of Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-MD) who originally proposed requiring insurers to provide this coverage as part of the Affordable Care Act, and without the resolve of the Obama administration, which stood firm when opponents attacked the measure—sometimes in vitriolic terms.
But our work isn’t nearly done. Unless American women actively take advantage of these benefits, our efforts will have been in vain. And polls suggest that too many American women don't know about them. That's why we need to spread the word.
So, here's what the law does for women:
• It guarantees them a free annual well-woman visit, and if needed, follow-up visits. That visit will now include a no-cost screening for domestic or intimate partner violence. For sexually-active women, the visit must also include a free annual screening for HIV and counseling for other sexually transmitted infections.
• It entitles women over 30 to a DNA screening for HPV (human pappilomavirus) every three years, regardless of pap smear results. Detecting and treating HPV will reduce these women’s risk of cervical cancer.
• It allows pregnant women to receive a free screening for gestational diabetes, not only ensuring that they receive care during their pregnancy, but reducing their risk of developing Type 2 diabetes in later years. They are also entitled to comprehensive support for breastfeeding, including assistance for moms struggling to breastfeed, as well as equipment like breast pumps, which is especially important for new moms returning to work outside the home.
• Finally, perhaps the best known benefit of this policy is that adult women can access contraception at no cost. This includes any FDA-approved form of contraception, including sterilization procedures, but not any form of abortion. To reiterate what we've said from the start: Access to contraception allows women to control the timing of pregnancies, ensuring that mothers and their children are as healthy as possible.
Although the contraception coverage policy is well known, it is also shrouded in misinformation. No woman should hesitate to take advantage of contraception coverage or any of these services because she fears doing so will increase her or anyone else’s taxes. Although other federal programs do, and should, provide funding for contraception and health services for the poorest women in our communities, this regulation has no impact on anyone’s taxes because it is not funded by the government.
But let's not leave out the most important information: how to access these benefits. Women receive these preventive services through their private insurance from their school or employer. They don’t need to sign up for this program or pay any additional fees. But they do need to find out when their next insurance plan year begins, and make sure their plan qualifies. That's because—with the exception of women who access their insurance through certain religiously-affiliated non-profits and schools, who unfortunately must wait another year for contraception coverage—this policy takes effect August 1. But each woman’s insurance plan will implement these benefits with the next new plan year after today. So if a woman’s insurance plan year begins on September 15, she’s eligible for these services beginning September 15.
So tonight, women of America, I hope you’ll celebrate. But don't forget to share the information as well!
Sandra Fluke graduated cum laude from Georgetown University Law Center and has served as president of Georgetown Law Students for Reproductive Justice. She has endorsed and campaigned for President Obama.
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This cheap trick to buy the votes of child bearing aged women by focusing on them as a separate class provided with the freebies of no co-pays or deductions in their insurance health insurance is a cost that will have to be born, nd it will be a cost paid for by the increased premiums, co-pays, and deductions in the health insurance by men of all ages, older women past the age of child bearing, and children. There ain't no free lunch.
And that iswhy this might be a selling point to this despicable 28 yr old professional student and Progressive Politics gadabout Sandra Fluke, whose Georgetown law school is suing the US Health and Human Services Separtment in Federal Cour along with scores of other Roman Catholic Dioceses. So don't count your Chuckens before they're hatched ( pun intended)...its not a done deal yet for you single gals.
Too, seems married women who are eyeing their overall family's insurance needs and costs are saying no deal to this cheap trick, as they are being polled as a group now favoring Mitt Romney over Barrack Obama. Day One of the Romney administration in January, 2013, and the repeal of ObamaCare will be underway beginning with the executive order to rewrite and reissue the regulations on the chippy giveaway to take into consideration the Freedom of Religion and its expression and practice.
I was worried that smackdown I gave Fuzzie down below wouldn't stop him from taking a few swings at a woman... Sure enough...
Fuzzie doesn't do originality; he's trying to outdo the Humbaugh® with that "cheap tricks" slur...
And that "married women" stuff is from May, and probably skewed... Chris Matthews put the first chalk marks on Romney's electoral tombstone last week, and that was before Romney managed to offend even British conservatives.
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2012/07/31/team-obama-romney-trip-an-embarrassing-disaster/
And here's CNN's electoral map which gives the President 247 electoral votes with Obama leading in Ohio and Florida and even up a point in Virginia...
http://www.cnn.com/election/2012/ecalculator#?battleground
Florida or Ohio plus Virginia or Colorado or Nevada means an Obama victory...
And goodness, I just saw that "Kiss my a**" snafu by a Romney aide in Poland... That's not going to play well...
Neither is his confusion about where the capital of Jerusalem is located...
Keith,
Would you rather pay the WIC/Food Stamp costs for poor women who can't get birth control? When my husband and I were first married, we lived on ramen and hot dogs. We didn't qualify for Medicaid, we didn't have employer insurance and if I had a baby, I would have needed help.
Also, that is and extra $200-1000 per woman back into the economy. I can't take a normal pill and my contraception (for medical purposes not to prevent pregnancy) is $86/month. Right now, because most women use these drugs for contraception, my employers can and in the past have denied coverage. If I don't take these, I can end up losing an ovary or developing cancer.
The purely financial benefits to this are great. Less unintended pregnancies make healthier more stable families. Less reliance on programs for the poor. Healthier women who use healthcare less. Greater survivalbility from cancer being caught earlier and less expensive treatments. Its easier to treat stage 1 cancer than it is stage 4.
We need to move to a preventative model in healthcare instead of a fix it later model.
Less Abortions
Healthier Families
Fewer Healthcare Costs
Less Welfare Recipients
---I still fail to see the problem. Men are just whining because they can't get their viagra covered and deny us our contraception.
Men are whining?
I didn't have insurance when my wife and I conceived our 2nd child as I was in University studies and my wife in Nursing School, soI took on a jo (1st was born in a U.S Army hospital overseas while I was in the service free of charges), so I took on a job that paid hourly wages so I could put away enough to pay the bills for prenatal care and delivery and post delivery status, and that was at the height of Lyndon Johnson's Great Society and wefare builup system that we prabably would have qualified but were too proud to take advantage of.
The ObamaCare preventive care isalready being watered down with the utilization of best practices and procedures restrictions planning already underway, as in the trial baloon the floated back in 2010 to discourage mampgrams in women until after age 50, and to discourage PSA testing completely in men, as the supposed decades old marker for possible Prostate cancer is now seen as too costly as a routine annual blood test (kills as many men as breast cancer kills women, you know). And you can bet once up and running in 2014 this statitcally dependant utilization committee of politically appointed rather than medical institution and practioner appointed bueracrats will be laying down more and more restrictions on practices and procedures in the battle to keep down the soaring costs of over use of freebies in the system. If people have to pay some of the cost, they will make wiser decisions bout their health.
I'm not sure about poor little Sandra Dluke...perhaps she is a struggling finacially stessed thied year law student now in having just finished her 7th year of post high school education endeavors. But I do know that after here arrival on the political scene whining befor Democrat female Senators and Congresswomen about the need for co-pay free contaceptives from her Jesuit Roman Catholic Georgetown University, she immediately left for two weeks of Spring Break in the warmth and sunshine and ritzy shops and spas of Paln Springs with her boyfriend, the son of a wealthy Democrat Party financier planning on some serious funfilled days and nights of out of wedlock fornication. I can see her need...but I suggest its not up to me or my sister or aged mother and son and daughter to pay for her co-pay and deduction free health insurance provision of oral contaceptives. We all have our own expenses to pay for in insurance premiums that are going higher and copays and deductions that are detting larger. Get the picture now, Spydergirl?
get a life
I've got life, Marlin. What I'm interested in is protecting some of the income I have coming in from retirement pensions and some dividends and interest from savings, as I am retired now, have my own health issues, and like to send a few dollars out to my kids to spend on grandchildren now and then; I dont need to be subsidizing the Sandra Flukes of the this country.
What an absolute SHOCK to read that you are motivated solely by your own self-interest, Grandpa.
No, Keith, you don't get it. Middle Class women like me and like Sandra don't go without our coverage. Its the woman working at Walmart for $8/hr. The woman who's struggling with three kids and $10/hr and her husband is laid off from his construction job. Its the young students who are trying to better themselves and being hit with ever increasing tuition bills.
Conservatives yell and scream about food stamps and social programs. Preventative care is a money saver in the long run. In the end, you'll pay less for your healthcare because women will be paying less for theirs. It REMOVES a drain on the healthcare system and on social programs.
When I get paid by my employer, my compensation is more than just the check cut twice a month. Its my health insurance, my 401K, my life insurance. My healthcare from age 16-60+ revolves around my reproductive organs. Cancer screenings, endometriosis, ovarian cysts, breast cancer screenings, the timing of my children, menopause, etc. But, up until the ACA, most of these were consider elective and my employer and the insurance company could refuse to cover them. That means in effect, I was getting compensated less because my insurance premiums did not cover the things I need insurance for.
By your argument, I have been paying for men's erectile dysfunction pills and not getting my own healthcare covered. Yet, I pay my premiums every month just like you do. Give it time. Seriously, this is going to reduce the cost of healthcare because our insurance companies won't be shelling out for pregnancy costs. Women like myself will not develop ovarian cancer. Its cheaper to pay $200/year for contraceptives than $200,000 for chemo and surgeries. And your spouse, sister, daughter will be healthier.
Insurance only works by managing a group's health. Its part and parcel. You are already paying for the smoker's lung cancer, the fat man's hearth disease, the miner's black lung. And we are paying for your anti-psychotics. By moving towards preventative healthcare, we are reducing the overall cost on the system and this will bring down your premiums. Not raising them.
That is a lie. For the most part preventative healthcare does not lower costs. Most of the time it raises healthcare costs.
Spydergirl, have you seen the prices Wal Mart charges for oral contraceptives (generic) and the discount plan they have for their own employees? Very affordable.
But if not, go to the Planned Parenthood local offices or the rural free clinics and get them free of charge. (Please don't stop in for the abortions, orabortion causing Plan B drugs however!) Failing that, buy a good reusable many, many times diaphragm, and use condoms. The two together are foolproof, and protect against STDs, which should be something the hot to trot single gals like Sandra Fluke should consider!
More than one way to skin a pussy...err, cat!
I've heard the name "Longey" is wishful thinking at best.
I still don't understand how other people are going to pay for benefits that come from that persons health insurance.
And Georgetown already covered this before they started whining about having to cover something they've been covering for the last 20 years.
Quoting Sandra....."Well Mr. Romney, You will not be the VOTE that we chose".
Wheaton College started yelling and screaming about having to provide contraception, too and then they found they already offered it. Now they want to eliminate it so they can get a waiver for being a religious org. Good grief Charlie Brown!
Keith, as a woman, a grandmother and mother, aunt and sister, I can quantitatively state without fear of contradiction, you are a complete moron. Peace out.
Just a note about the Affordable Health Care act.. I am seeing people get health insurance refunds all ready!!! (from benefits not used.) I think a lot of haters may change their minds.. Can't wait for the entire thing to be implemented!
The AHC act will be a benefit to all of us. benefits for women will start tomorrow. The rethuglicans only want to repeal the AHC and replace it with nothing. The rethuglicans embrace ryan's pathway to destruction that will increase health care premiums for the elderly by over $6400/year (approx 4-5months of social security income). I also cannot wait for it to become fully implemented. Funny how the rethuglican males want to destroy women's rights to health care--these men seem to forget they are also responsible for pregnancy/don't restrict their access to viagra or cialis/deny any need or want a male wants but are determined to punish women for wanting health care.
There are no refunds for benefits not used under tge law; there is supposed to be refunds from Imsurance companies that took too high a percentage for salaries and bonuses and profits and so called overcharging in their premiums, but by and large they will go to the employers that contact and pay the premiums either as refunds for "overpayments" or credits against future premiums.
It's a lie, of course, that the mandate magically offers access to preventive services. The services have always been available. They're just now "free" to the consumer, which is exactly the worst way to structure things economically. The mandate is economically unsustainable, but by the time that becomes apparent it will be too late. Have a nice day.
Massachusetts likes it!
Likes what?
Mark,,,, I'm sure you are as old as I am and I remember when Johnson signed Medicare into law... The republicans yelled and screamed that it was going to bankrup the country , it was the worse thing that had ever happened and bla bla bla.... Well, it is by far the best thing that has ever happened to us older people.. I was recently in the hospital for 2 days.. My bill was 35,000.00 dollars.. Thank God for medicare . We don't need to be giving more tax breaks to the millionairs at the expense of people that have worked all their lives but were not lucky enought to end up wealthy.....
Keith,
Audits show that women's preventative health and contraceptive access save social costs in the long run.
And seriously, why the sheer vitriol for Sandra Fluke? You and your ilk should seek therapy for your odd anger issues. We should applaud young, smart, focused students getting involved in political issues. You should look up and actually read (if you can read) her testimony. It's available on the internet and you may be surprised how reasonable and thought it is. Try, perhaps, to live life for a second outside your Limbaugh filter.
You're spot on about Grandpa's anger issues, Coppercladd, but his denial is so deep it would take a therapist far more skilled than most I've known to address the issue. It would also require a therapeutic milieu and some motivation on his part to walk out of the mud wallow he's known all his life (now watch him hit me with the same sort of lame putdown. That's the "game" his defenses force him into). He rips on me for my past where I addressed some similar issues, but I had an "advantage" with my alcoholism in that I had to get honest or keep going back to my own wallow. Whatever my current situation is, it's healthier than my old one. He, however, prefers the "luxury" of being dishonest and deludes himself--as does Limbaugh--into thinking his reality where "he is king" is the preferred one. We could ask his former wife--or Rush's three exes, or Newt's--about that subject and get a different point of view, naturally.
A bit of poetry an old friend of mine used to open therapy groups with... From Bobbie Burns...
Oh would some Power the gift to give us,
To see ourselves as others see us.
Bobbie Burns, now, showing some class, Cabbie. Lot better than your usual dripple of progressive blog citations that I don't wate my time reading.
When you've been around the block as many times as I have, sober, not circling in from drunk binge to detox and rehab so many time like you did in your mispent youth while I was giving my wife and children physical and emotional support for so many years and actually helping other people in my social systems employments, instead of just from their bars and stips clubs to either home or a detox like you spend your work hours doing, you might learn a thing or two about life.
Also, the need of government to find the chance that there might be problems that they could begin to address, adding the government employers to do it and taxing the good people for more of their moneys, of course, and getting more and more control on their lives because they think bureucrats know better how to handle those problems than their "subjects" in the body politic.
Take the crys now for legislation and borrowed money from the Chinese and Japanese and Brits and Danes for more emergency farm aid! Seems the stories are so awful about expecteded loss of corn crops (the underpinning of so much in the agriculture chain, from corn syrups used in sweetened soft drinks to the chickens and eggs and beef and pork on our supermarket shelves and fast food restaurants, and so the story goes, and the legislation for the government aid goes grinding on.
Even the Secretary Agriculture, however, admitted in a reckless moment, that this years corn crop is still expected to be the 3rd largest in history, as the good family farmers and agribusiness had planted huge amounts of acreage to the handy crop, expecting even more use for ethanol in the Obama government accent on "green", energy, while he cut back by 15% from oil and natural gas exploration and production permits on federally controlled lands and off shore, and put the brakes on two new refineries well underway in Yuma and North Dakota approved under the Bush Administration, and shoveled tax and borrowed funds into GM and some other firm for Electric car production for all that excess electricity from his windmill and solar farms (NOT), and of course, the consumer won't buy those cars, they prefer the ones they had been buying.
Get the picture, Cab Driver? Government planning and interventions is the problem, not the solution. And I don't want to see my income or dividend or capital gains from my hard earned lifes work taxed away from me to pay for such foolishness by Ivory Tower academicians in the offices of Wahington, DC.
There is no problem with access to health care; there is a problem on how not to make it into another Government boondoggle of ever higher wasteful cost asnd taxes.
Man, I thought when you called me "Cabbie" you might be giving up the honorarium, but I see the honorarium [kaching!?] crept back in...
And everyone here knew you weren't reading my news story extractions; it's pretty clear your lack of knowledge is self-inflicted...
Better not read these Quinnipiac poll numbers either...
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/01/us/politics/polls-give-obama-edge-in-pennsylvania-ohio-and-florida.html?_r=1&hp
Obama up by six in Ohio and Florida and eleven in Pennsylvania... And there's some interesting information about women voters you might find troubling...
In all three states, most women say they prefer Mr. Obama. About half of female voters in Florida back him, while his support is even stronger in Ohio and Pennsylvania, where nearly 6 in 10 women say they favor him. In Ohio, men prefer Mr. Romney, while they are more closely split in Florida and Pennsylvania.
Finally, it was "Ivory Tower Academia" sorts who taught me about Burns... And Pope and Keats and Wordsworth and Coleridge and Blake... And Whitman (whoops, watch out, he was gay), and the guy whose initials helped inspire my moniker...
If it weren't for them, nobody would be reading that stuff... Of course your definition of an "Ivory Tower sort" is somebody who disagrees with you, which is particularly problematic.
Really on the Scotsman and and the English romantics and the American battle orderly Whitman...Ivory Tower academicians. I was immersed in their works in High School myself, taught by real eductors, public school teachers in my Junior and Senior year. Then went on to read them anew and discuss them at length in honors seminars at University with my fellow students in my Magna Cum Laude awarded BA program. By the way, didn't you say your dropped out of your educatational pursuits.
I've answered your nonsense about the Quinnipiac poll (small liberal arts college in Connecticut, leaning hard left, of course...though relatively respected. But flawed in that its process is to poll registered voters, and not likely voters (the motivated ones that will turn out for the only poll that counts held on Nov 6th). And it is conservatively estimated that the registered voters polling gives an overemphasis to Democrat Party registered voters by an 8% margin on average.
Pennsylvania: 2010 Tea Party revolt, new Rebublican Governor, Senator, Five (5) new Republican Congressmen, and control of the State Legislature elected.
Ohio: New Republican Governor, new Republican Senator, and new Congressmen elected.
Florida: New Republican Governor, new Republican Senator, and new Republican Congressmen and control still of the State Legislature up in Tallahassee.
Bad trend, Cab Driver. And the faltering economy is still the issue, Obama's attacks on the Coal industry and fracking of natural gas field will hurt him very badly in Pennsylvania especially, his renegging of the use of the remaining TARP funding when he took office to provide relieve for home owners facing forclosure and having homes underwater on expensive alternative mortages will hurt him very badly in Florida and Ohio as well. Black fundamenalist ministers are leading a blow back on Obama's gamble that that interest group will follow him hell or high water in great numbers going to the polls to vote in 2008 while he stated his support for the gay marriage thing and ordered his federal attorneys not to prosecute DOMA (Defense of Marriage Ace) as the law of the land. He risked losing fundamentalists votes in Black and Hispanic and White voters to obtain campaign contriputations fro, LBGT and their Hollywood and Manhatten ultra liberal synpathizers, as the finanical and business community have nostly turned up their noses and closed their pocket books to his pleas for capaign funds.
ISM figures reported today, down big time, probable due to slumping auto sales and prodcuction mostly, and sinking consumer and business spending and atttutude. Jobs and Unemployment figures for July and revisions for June and May due out Friday AM, and judging by the ISM figures and trend of the past month and quarter of new unemployment claim numbers, it ain't going to be pretty. Instead of a shrinking number of Swing States in play as the Obama campaign had hoped at this stage with their $200 million and counting spurious and falsehood filled early attack adds on Romney's business and government accomplishments and ethics and character, the number of Swing States has grown, adding Wisconsin and Michigan to the mid-West contingent at play. And after all of that wastefull spending and nastiness, Obama's overall favorability rating fell 8% and the voters support for the best candidate to handle the nations financial and economic problems showed Romney well in the lead with a 56& to 39& breakout.
Add to that Real Clear Politics taking an average of all the polls this last week have the national race figs at 46% to 46% dead even tie, Bad news for an otherwise personally popular incumbant who charm and Jive talking is wearing very thin as the all important economy continues to sour, and his only message on that is continue to blame Bush, Congress, headwinds, earthquakes in Japan, etc, but never his wasteful spending, threats to tax and tax and borrow and borrow and spend and spend.
Time is running out, Cab Driver. Time is running out on JIVE TALKING OBAMA.
I refer you to my answer to Spydergirls comments onmy earlier post above, Coppercladd.
Anybody need me to point out the "egocentric" elements of Grandpa's "defense" of his indefensible and boorish attacks?
Didn't think so...
The other piece of this puzzle that seems to get little air time is that although these services must be provided with no patient responsibility, there is nothing to prevent the health plans from creating coverage criteria. For example one major health plan will cover cholesterol screening only if you already have hypertension or heart disease, but if you are a healthy adult it is not covered under their screening benefit. Now explain to me just what are they preventing in that case?
In the "political realm," the issues you raised are addressed by the policy makers. After legislation becomes "law" (although subject to judicial review, of course), the executive branch and their administrators develop regulations and guidelines--i.e. "policy"--to determine how to implement the goals of the lawmakers.
The Teapublican paranoia actively works to "sabotage" such reasonable approaches through the use of fear and "wedge issues," but students of politics and history who followed Bush 43 and Karl Rove's tactics in their "agenda driven policies" recognize that is just a smokescreen for insuring the special interests they represent are freed from the "hassle of regulations." Their motto is "Trust us." In reality, they corrupted the system to attempt to hang onto power; now they're trying to regain it after being bitten hard on their hind ends by their own karma.
The disingenuous cries of innocence from the folks that brought you Halliburton, the Iraqi War, and the 2008 Banking crisis are particularly hypocritical.
And yes, Democrats are capable of similar shenanigans, but right now it's the super-wealthy "privileged" sorts who are trying to get the blowtorches off their butts...
More Alzeimhers patients in the future? Statins have been linked to increased dementia, you know, as the human brain requires cholesterol at proper levels for proper functioning, you know.
But we don't need govenment utilization committees to address that issue, we do need physcians with the freedom to read and keep up to date on medical research instead of having their time trying desperately to meet the paper work and reporting needs to big brother government messing with the nations health system, which trying to squeeze in the time to see the occasional additional patient.
By the way, there is nothing in the (Un)affordabile Care Act that provides for financial assistance to train more physicians, nurse practioners, and physicians assistants to actually to the patient care effectively. Bit of a problem, as they want to pack 30 million ( mostly into Medicaid) more souls into annual physicals (even if they don't want them or don't need them, as is the case with most under 50 individuals) into what is already a somewhat stretched medical delivery systems. And think of the unecessary spending on prescriptions and lab tests and other diagnostics that will bring down in the future!
Keith, From where did you get your glass house? I'd love to live a life where I could throw stones without consequences and have no need for curtains (sarcasm). You are certainly angry and my thought is that you have issues with more than one platform apart from health care. Perhaps a little of the previously mentioned fornication could do you some good. With all your medical research, did you happen to read that sitting in front of a computer all day bashing others is restricting you from vitamin D? Go outside and take a walk.
And why do you know so much about other people's personal life? Did you go on vacation with Sandra Fluke and her boyfriend? I'm interested to know how you know that they 'fornicated' while on vacation? Should you be on a watch list? I'm not saying I'm an expert on how you should live your life or how our government should be ran, but I do know that I should be an expert on nobody else's life but my own and make sure that I am living my life to the fullest with any and all circumstances that are presented to me.
One parting comment, Don't be so angry that you can't use spell check.
Deduction..Sandra girl was whinning for her free oral contraceptives just before her trip, and had been agitating for that.
I use a laptop, have a hammock in my backyard, and get my Vitamen D from lovely New England sunshine when it ain't raining, as it had been most of July (no drought here.we are all lush and green in these parts),so never fear. I am retired, Kaylee, but thanks for your concern. If you naven't met my explanations of my background, i assure you I know quite a bit of what I'm speaking of from my life experience, my University studies, my military service, my being a son, husband, parent, grandparent. I had a rich career in some year in secondary Education, and work in social services occupation for the Dept of VA and Dept of the Army medical institutions and also Non-Profit, and in supportive employments in Unversity in both State medical care institutions and the private sector in industrial production, where I also served as a union contract negotiator with the responsiblity of bargaining fringe benefit (like health insurance coverage and pay scales, besides elective stewartship positions. I also served in stewartship and executive board positons and conract negotiating teams (work rules) for the National Association of Government Employees in local unions with New England VA employments in my employment in their Psychology Services, and as a stewart and organizer of professional employees with the local American Federation of Government Employees at Madigan Army Medical Center while woking in the Social Welfare services, mostly with family members of service and retired service personnel in the Puget Sound area.
Let's just say I know from whence I speak, to use an old Tommy Smothers line. And I do my share of looking out for the little guy, as I was and still am pretty much one of them. .
I wonder now if Sandra is going to need our help from the government to get to her job interviews or to do her home work for her. I am a pretty big fan of feminist causes, equal pay for equal work, career women, elimination of the glass ceiling and this lady has sent us back to the 1950s. So let me get this straight, you go to a university which does not provide birth control, and you testify before congress that you are to poor, to lazy or to stupid to get it? Planned parenthood provides it for FREE and there was a location less than 2 miles from the G-town campus. How in the heck is that unaffordable or inaccessible? You can get 1000 lifestyle condoms for less than $150 dollars. That is 40 hours at 5 bucks an hour and you have enough protection to get busy twice a day for a year and a for a massive water balloon fight. I would further like to point out that chemical/pharma based birth control does not stop DISEASE!!! Sandra, please let us know when you will be testifying before congress, lobbying for us to spend tax dollars to help ensure flush the toilet after you go or turning off lights when you leave the room. I think anyone that considers them selves a part of the women's rights movement should be ashamed for supporting anything this sorry excuse for a woman does. Is being slave to a government any different than being a slave to a man? Selling you soul and freedom for a few hundred bucks...shame on you Sandra.
Georgetown graduating law students walk right into average salaried jobs paying $150,000 a year, with bonuses available. They can still be working at passing their state bars and get that kind of pay. Of course, our good Sandra, progressive gadabout for liberal causes and agitator, will most like take some kind of underpaid free legal service or fee for income based legal service program her being all concerned for the little women. Sure she will!
Uh, Brad, Mitt Romney has called for de-funding Planned Parenthood... And it strikes me as reasonable that private insurers should provide the coverage they always have (that's the issue, incidentally, but you don't appear to be aware of that fact) and not burden PP unnecessarily.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/13/mitt-romney-planned-parenthood_n_1343450.html
Cabbie,
1. Not too surprisingly, all Republican Presidential Candidates pledged to de-fund Planned Parenthood and are on record with statements at least before 4/5/2011.
http://www.sba-list.org/suzy-b-blog/breaking-republican-presidential-hopefuls-tell-sba-list-defund-planned-parenthood
2. Georgetown has no claim to "freedom of religion" protection of any kind. Their faculty/staff/student handbook condones sex between consenting members of the university and they have a university sanctioned student organization for LGBTQ. I don't have a problem with that - it's just that the Catholic church regards both behaviors as sin - just like contraception. You don't get to pick and choose unless of course you are really a secular institution.
Oh - opps - I should have said "unmarried consenting members of the university"
Planned Parenthood does most of its businees through charitible contributions, not Govenment grants. And there is that nasty little thing about the federal grants not being fungible (separateable) from their cost in providing their main reason for being, being the nation's foremost abortion mill. There preventive women's health services other than doling out contraceptive and and Plan B prescriptions and performing abortions are referred out don't you know, Cab Driver? Do i really have to teach you everything?
Now kids, this is what we call PROACTIVE measures instead of REACTIVE measures which generally cost a great deal more.
Kids? I lived through the character sapping, wastefull spending social welfare Lyndon Johnson Great Society that decimated traditional family life in the urban black and rural white communities that it took until the Republican Congressional conservative revolution of 1994 to begin to dismantle. Now Nationalist Socialist Obama is trying to bring it all back in, in spades, Miiiam. And i ain't no "Kid"! LOL!
SL, So your argument is that because ROMNEY may defund planned parenthood, Sandra had lost the ability to use it today or when she testified? The sun could explode tomorrow, should we have a senate hearing on it? With as disappointing as the 4 years have been it would not surprise me if POTUS was taking W's advice (Gitmo, QE 1 and 2) but do you really think Obama is influenced by Romney?? That it makes no difference who we vote for. Do you hear how silly you sound, Sandra sold out women because Romney , who was not even the nominee at the time, was thinking about defunding planned parent hood.
It used to be "a chicken in every pot" to buy votes.
Now its "birth control for every chick".
And before you get upset... its just wordplay folks.
Finally, something good comes out of Chicago besides Jass and Rock!
Jazz, I really wasn't thinging "Jess" there.
Now all of us "strong women" can let someone else pay for our contraceptives and checkups. We're too strong to be paying for that sort of stuff ourselves, and if you disagree, you're a woman-hater, and you're trying to oppress us!
Brilliant comment Amanda. (sarcasm!) Do you understand how insurance works? People pay in and they get benefits in return. Only people with insurance that they or their employer pays for will receive these benefits. Have you ever used your health insurance to receive medical care? When you did, did "someone else" pay for that? Please use your brain.
This is smart policy that will reduce overall costs and strain on the overall health care system, which should lower premiums in the long run. It's pretty basic and obvious.
Right, single women get the free ride, married women past child bearing age, all men, and their children get the higher premiums, co-pays, and deductions to pay for the free contraception and preventive health services for those middle-class gals, single or married of child bearing ages that are covered by employers' health insurance programs. This isn't an issue at all for the less well to do folks on Medicaid or using Federal of State or Charitable Family Services. And it is definitely not an access to card issue, it's simply a I'll give you your gimmie, you gimmie your vote transaction, pure and simple.
Waaaaaahhhhhh! I don't think you understand how preventative care and pooled insurance works. All these covered procedures will reduce, not increase, the overall cost of health care and thus everyone's premiums, because they will prevent more unwanted or badly timed pregnancies and catch cancer and other diseases while they're easier to treat.
Hang it up grandpa. Everybody isn't a right-wing caricature of the left-wing bogeyman in your fever dreams that you paint them to be. If we treat you the same, let's see... you must be an old, white, misogynist, woman-hater who wishes we could turn the clock back 60-70 years to "the good old days" when women knew their place and 'sluts' got what they deserved, eh? How about all the men (way more than women) who indulge in "tobacco products and wine and beer nights and rock concerts and bar cover charges"? Your mentality is quickly on it's way out as your generation passes, and good riddance.
This is your last snack troll, move along.
Can't wait for real Obamacare to kick in, for those of us who have NO insurance, and so no access to these fabulous changes.
Hope your not in one of those states that are running from the eventual huge balooning costs of this thing if you are expected to be covered under the ACA.
Insurance is not a necessity for access to health care for the truely needy, Pity you.
Greeting and congratulations from Canada where we have enjoyed universal health care for decades. Down the road, money and lives will be saved each time a ACA provision kicks in. I look forward to the day that the US joins the rest of the industrialized free world and enacts Medicare for all. (I am an ex-pat American who will vote for Obama by absentee ballot, along with hundreds of thousands of other ex-pats living all over the world.)
Thats why the Canadians that can afford it carry supplemental health insurance and stream south to the US medical institutions for both quality necesssary and elected health care, especially cancer care and involved surgical life saving care? Your vaunted rationed national health care system? Don't make me laugh.
Is this only for women who have insurance?? What about those of us who haven't been able to afford insurance??
You will be able to purchase affordable insurance (or get help) in 2014 when the bulk of the ACA kicks in. It could have happened sooner, if it weren't a certain obstructionist political party. We have to take baby steps though to protect the delicate interests of insurance executives and elderly white men everywhere!
Ok Tomsss thank you for your input. I thought that's how I understood it too. Just checking since my doctor charges around $425.00 just for a yearly exam I got my hopes up for nothing!
Charitable clinics, federal, and state free or reduced fee for service clinics,or the good old Planned Parenthood clincis for your preventive health services, Amy. or spend less on tobacco products and wine and beer nights and rock concerts and bar cover charges, and buy a diaphragm and an economy pack of condoms for your birth control needs, Amy.
I'm a man and I can't believe how stupid many who have posted here are. This is about health care folks, not sex. This is preventative health care for women. Why are some people such idiots?
The guy who lives across the street from me is a conservative Republican and he just fumes about the new health care law because he says we can't afford to pay for all of those people to get health care. Who the hell does he think was paying for it before? I worked in a hospital emergency room for 20 years and I know from experience that it is illegal for the hospital to not give care in most situations. When people come to the ER and can't pay for the care they receive, the hospitals cranks up charges for all its services to cover the costs, the insurance companies raise their premiums, and a portion of tax money is spent reimbursing the hospital for costs it can't cover. So everyone pays already. The difference is that getting care in the ER is 5-8 times more expensive than going to see a doctor at a regular clinic. So you have already
been paying for the most expensive health care there is for these people. Now
thanks to the new health care law, you'll be paying less for the same thing.
Grow up people and learn the facts before you spew your idiot opinion out of
your a**!
There isn't any neglect of women's preventative health care needs in the US of A. That is the BIG LIE, CR.
So here is my simple question for CR-3164070. If they could not pay for it before the health care bill passed, after the $3500 a year tax, which they will probably also not be able to pay, how will the be able to pay for it now? If you are honest with yourself, which based on your post may be difficult, the answer is they don't. The people that can afford it will pay for themselves and for some share of the people that can't. So this is medicaid/medicare for all. The problem is this bill does nothing to lower cost (in fact will increase the cost of healthcare per capital) or accessibility. How many more hospitals does it build. (none) How many more doctors will there be because of this bill? You really think there will be more ? The most important thing in my opinion is what disincentive is there to keep people out of the emergency room? In an ER situation there is a limited amount of staff, a limited amount of human resources. You have just entitled everyone in the country to use those services, and to do so with no cost deterrent. The free loaders will still be there, but now so will every John Q. Public. I think that this is going to be an incredible burden to the ER teams. I think we would have been much better off establishing government run non critical care units adjacent to the ER. This bill extremely disappointing and merely glosses over who pays for what but does not create a system for better health care for all people. CR-3164070, more people in the ER with the same number or less doctors will cause a decrease in accessibility.
CR, Thank you, for your intelligent and factual comment!! I can't believe how selfish and cranky some of these comments are.
Amen Ely and CR~~These low information fox watchers, will never accept facts. They are beyond help. Their minds have been closed for so long, they will never be able to open their brains ever again.
somebody has to pay for this stuff!!! no such thing as "free"! now we all can look form higher premiums on our insurance bills thank to mr. O. and hs socialist cronies!!!
The well being of a woman is so much more than her reproductive rights. We don't need free birth control, we need self control. The right to reproduce has always been within our power, no government program can give or take that away. We hold a unique and beautiful place in civilization and I am saddened by the constant denial and abuse of that natural gift. We keep concocting new ways to try and "equalize" ourselves to men and in the process have just made ourselves more sexually available and "user friendly". There are other solutions to women's issues linked to sexuality. Check out the link and be open to other ideas that may have alot of merit and may be more worthy of celebration than free birth control. But, be forewarned- if you are honestly looking- you might be put back on your heels and be inspired to dig deeper to understand it- this just scratches the surface.
Sorry, not sure why this didn't paste the first time :/
Or, the second time... WomenSpeakForThemselves.com
Another interesting read is this:
Any choice has consequences, but some have ripple effects that are far more reaching- affecting not only the individual woman. We need to respond in a manner that respects all of humanity and not just champion the woman, claiming success when she can get aid from the government to have unbridled relations. I think it is a confusing message that is being sent out. I would be sickened to see men posting such victories so they can have consequence free sex- really...think about what that would look like. And yet, somehow women find this liberating....I really think it is confusing for men and women alike. Are we taking into consideration the emotional costs of this behavior or is this strictly about the physical health. Both have costs, one is much farther reaching.
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It is so strange how my links keep disappearing....?
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You can't post links until Newsvine lets you. You can try contacting them for permission.
Sandra - the shallowness of your case and your mindset shows in your opening paragraph - women now get lots of stuff "at no cost". Really? No cost. So this stuff just costs nobody anything. AMAZING. Sounds like cold fusion.
You think by forcing insurance programs to increase what they cover, more and more and more, adding requirements and features... has "no cost". No cost. Free. FREE. Everything is FREE. So awesome that Obama found the magic bucket of fairy dust and we all now have all kinds of stuff at "no cost".
@!$%#ing amazing.
Who pays for your health insurance?
I pay for my health insurance. I'm one of those evil guys that didn't build his business. You know the type.
We all pay for our health insurance. We just ask that the insurance companies we pay, do what they are suppose to do. Insure us!
They pay for a man to get Viagra, but not for women to prevent unwanted pregnancies. Is that a double standard. Which is most important?
Randy-
So how is Sandra Fluke getting anything "free" from you?
Sandra never did this for herself anyway. She did it for other women who were in need for their own personal health reason. Men who have never had female sex organs, should have nothing to say about the matter. Let the women handel it.
Chris because Rush told him that he was paying for it of course, after all Rush wouldn't LIE would he. BOL
In response to "Thankful Mom", my insurance most certainly doesn't pay for Viagra. I made a personal choice to purchase a very high deductible policy for my family, so on top of not paying for Viagra, it pays for little else until I hit a very high deductible. That was my choice, that I made as a consumer. But my main point is that very few plans pay for viagra, so your point is bogus. Start again.
In response to TheRealChris, I didn't say anywhere in my post that Sandra is getting anything free "from me". I was responding to her point that some benefit, ANY BENEFIT, is ever EVER "free". NOTHING IS FREE. When some politician somewhere says something is "free", what they really mean is that you don't have to pay for it, they'll simply make someone else pay for it.
In this instance, the person paying for it is everyone who purchases insurance, because the insurance companies will pass it on. Which means we ALL pay for it. Or if the insurance companies eat it, then the insurance companies take less profit and so the INVESTORS in the insurance company pay for it in the form of lower dividends or a depreciated stock price.
And I, as a consumer that wants to buy insurance MY WAY, not the GOVERNMENT'S WAY lose. Because when the government says every insurance policy MUST include X and MUST include Y and MUST include Z, that means that I as a consumer don't get to make the choice about whether I want to have a policy that includes X but NOT Y or Z. The government decided that for me. I'm a big @!$%#ing baby and Mr. Obama and his goons have decided for me what I MUST BUY rather than creating a mechanism that allows insurance companies to offer products that consumers want and respond to the market demand for those products. No, I'm not allowed to be an adult, a consumer, that uses MY resources to buy MY insurance for ME. Nope. I've got to do it the way the goons say I have to do it, and only their way.
So.... you dolts can walk around all fat dumb and happy and hope King Obama offers you more and more and more and more "free" stuff all day. I hope the sky is a nice rosey shade of pink in your world full of free stuff. In my world, someone pays. In this instance, we all do.
Mr. Bullard you have truly been brainwashed. Have you any knowledge of the concept of socioeconomics? I think not you sound like one of those who choose to drop the socio and keep the economics. I wonder how you would think differently if you were not able to pay for your expensive plan?
And another thing Mr. Bullard, when you say we all pay for it. I say we all benefit from it. So I personally have no problem with the concept. You seem to exhibit a mentality that is going to tear this society apart (there goes that socio thing again) an extreme capitalist ideology: ME, ME, ME, AND %#$@ YOU.
Errol - Of COURSE you don't mind all of us paying a bit more so you can have a benefit that you want that many of us don't. It's your way.
And my plan isn't an "expensive" plan. It could have been. There were options. I evaluated and chose one that had a high deductible. You see, I'm a consumer, and I shopped for an insurance package for me and my family and I weighed the pros and cons and benefits of various programs. It's called being a responsible adult that makes their own decisions and is responsible for their own actions. You should try it some time. It's quite gratifying.
Personally, I would prefer a plan that doesn't include a bunch of crap that Obama and his goons happen to think is "important" for me. For me and my family, there are other features that are MORE important. Unfortunately, the insurance companies are now forbidden from constructing an insurance policy that is right for me, because the Obama goon squad have decided that I need to be taken care of like a little irresponsible pussy boy. Me and the rest of America. Thanks Obama for treating us all like little babies that can't think for ourselves, feed ourselves, take care of ourselves, or make our own choices with what to do with the resources we've earned. Oh wait... that's right, we didn't earn them. It's not ours. We didn't "build it" ourselves. Only the great collective "we" created what we have, so the great collective "we" will now make our decisions for us. I get it now.
What a circus this is.
Where is my free stuff at ?
You need to pay for my life.
You need to pay for my birth control pills.
Be a real shame if people like fluke had to pay their own way in life.
You
are
the
only
circus her......re-reg.
He's definitely a clown. Probably too fat to get back in the car.
One of those people Reagan set free when he closed the mental hospitals.
Mr. Bullard you have truly been brainwashed. Have you any knowledge of the concept of socioeconomics? I think not you sound like one of those who choose to drop the socio and keep the economics. I wonder how you would think differently if you were not able to pay for your expensive plan?
Mr. Bullard you have truly been brainwashed. Have you any knowledge of the concept of socioeconomics? I think not you sound like one of those who choose to drop the socio and keep the economics. I wonder how you would think differently if you were not able to pay for your expensive plan?
And another thing Mr. Bullard, when you say we all pay for it. I say we all benefit from it. So I personally have no problem with the concept. You seem to exhibit a mentality that is going to tear this society apart (there goes that socio thing again) an extreme capitalist ideology: ME, ME, ME, AND %#$@ YOU.
This is for you ho-lee-cow; You're just an idiot! We're trying to hold a forum in the penthouse and you're still in the lobby looking for the elevator; or at least, I hope you're looking it. The elevator I mean.