An Unsettling Answer from the Bush Administration
The Administration’s much-delayed response to a simple query from several Members of Congress is more confusing than clarifying. Led by Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY), Members asked the President, “Do you support the right to use contraception?” Shouldn’t be a tough one to answer.
But it took a year, several requests, and bouncing the request down from the President to the Assistant Secretary for Health at HHS to find out that the Administration “supports the availability of safe and effective products and services to assist responsible adults in making decisions about preventing or delaying conception.”
On first read it might provide some comfort. But take a minute to think about it. Shouldn’t they be supporting products and services to assist ALL people to make RESPONSIBLE DECISIONS, rather than only responsible adults having access? But the next choice of words – selected over a year – is even more concerning. Notice that they don’t actually talk about contraception. And they don’t say products and services to prevent pregnancy – rather it is to delay conception.
The Administration’s much-delayed response to a simple query from several Members of Congress is more confusing than clarifying. Led by Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY), Members asked the President, “Do you support the right to use contraception?” Shouldn’t be a tough one to answer.
But it took a year, several requests, and bouncing the request down from the President to the Assistant Secretary for Health at HHS to find out that the Administration “supports the availability of safe and effective products and services to assist responsible adults in making decisions about preventing or delaying conception.”
On first read it might provide some comfort. But take a minute to think about it. Shouldn’t they be supporting products and services to assist ALL people to make RESPONSIBLE DECISIONS, rather than only responsible adults having access? But the next choice of words – selected over a year – is even more concerning. Notice that they don’t actually talk about contraception. And they don’t say products and services to prevent pregnancy – rather it is to delay conception.
With opponents of contraception falsely but effectively undermining birth control by, among other things, equating it to abortion, the Administration seems to play right into this. The “response” did little to clarify Bush’s position or to provide useful information to the public.