Productive legislative session for ruining the state
MN House threatens women’s right to choose
Once again, the Minnesota House of Representatives has taken aim at women’s reproductive health in general and Planned Parenthood in particular. A bill has passed through the House that would prohibit organizations providing patients information about abortions from receiving state family planning funds.
This year’s bill is even worse than last year’s, specifying that groups who advocate for abortion rights or who engage in civil litigation on such issues are not eligible for family planning funding either.
All of these restrictions seem to be in direct opposition to the constitutional right to free speech and due process.
Eradicating funding to Planned Parenthood and other family planning organizations would not only be a crippling blow to women’s health—it is simply an uninformed, shortsighted move. Research has repeatedly shown that for every dollar spent on family planning, about $4 is saved in social welfare costs. State family planning funds granted to Planned Parenthood and other organizations are, in accordance with the law, used for family planning services only, not abortion. 95% of the services Planned Parenthood provides consist of contraception, Pap smears, breast exams, treatment of sexually transmitted infections, and other medical services related to crucial issues in women’s reproductive health.
I encourage all readers of the paper to urge their legislator to vote against family planning restrictions in the form of a Gag Rule and in favor of comprehensive health care and family planning.
Susan Moroz
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Productive legislative session for ruining the state
It's been a real productive legislative session with the Republican dominated legislature and our new Republican governor. Our air will get a little more filthy and cancerous thanks to no increase in gasoline and tobacco taxes.
Traffic jams will probably get worse. Women's rights were set back about thirty years, the State’s credit rating might be at risk, health and education funding will be cut, gangsters will be able to carry concealed weapons legally and children will be forced to pledge allegiance to the flag. But what more can we expect from a flourishing corporate plutocracy where the oil, tobacco and gun industries have the politicians bought and paid for.
