If Michele Bachmann's husband's Christian clinic can take Medicaid funds, can't Planned Parenthood receive federal funds?

This is why Dr. Bachmann has long tried to cover up his “pray the gay away” approach—he knows that it threatens his eligibility for the funds he receives. What I don’t understand is why people want to specifically restrict public funding for routine women’s healthcare. After all, no taxpayer money goes to fund the abortions that make up 3% of Planned Parenthood’s services.

Is anyone really against preventing breast cancer, uterine cancer, and ovarian cancer? Is anyone really against decreasing the overall number of abortions by helping women not getting pregnant in the first place? If 97% of what an institution does is unobjectionable to virtually everyone, and if the other 3% isn’t publicly supported in any way, that seems to me a remarkable success. Just try finding a person who you agree with 97% of the time.

@SavoirFaire I think they see it as if Planned Parenthood collapses, many fewer abortions will be done in the country. They don’t care about the yearly check-ups or diagnostic care. I also think they perceive Planned Parenthood as being the main place people go to for abortions, and in smaller towns, or bible belt cities maybe it is? Many towns the only hospital or hospitals are religious hospitals. Around me I have St. Francis, Baptist, and Methodist hospitals. I would assume they don’t do abortions? But, the truth is of curse abortions are done in other places besides Planned Parenthood, and if the entity went away, there would be another one to take its place, or hospitals would be doing them more often, etc. But, the people out in the sticks might have far to travel. Young people might not feel it as easy of an option; or, God forbid, they start doing back alley ones again.

I have to admit my knee jerk reaction at first was no money should be going to religiously based/run organizations, but it seems we do that now. Sigh.

I have mixed emotions about this. If, and it’s a big if, his practice is 97% secular, then maybe he should still be eligible for the funds. I’d prefer we not support any religious organization with government funds, though. Just because I’d rather keep government and religion completely separated.

If money is going to needy people, does it really matter how it is getting to them?

@chyna In my opinion yes it matters.

Sorry you feel that way. I’m just happy needy people are getting funds and food.

Planned Parenthood has a history that involves eugenics and black people. Fuck Planned Parenthood.

Old question some of you might be interested in about faith based organizations getting federal funds.

@chyna I don’t trust all the faith based organizations aren’t pushing their religion. I do believe many don’t, they abide by what is expected, but where I live Christianity comes out of the pores of people. I have a hard time believing at least some of them aren’t doing something to influence people to convert or be more religious. I hear people complain constantly that they can’t do anything religious where they voluteer or work because they get federal money, and how awful they thnk it is.

@chyna The money isn’t going to needy people, it’s going to the owner of the counseling clinic. They’re medicaid payments that he’s receiving, for the counseling he provides. Which includes the very controversial “pray away the gay” kind.

@cletrans2col I think you’ll find that pretty much all organizations that have been around for at least 50 years have some past you won’t agree with – especially if they started at a time when eugenics was both popular and respectable. Or when communism was popular, for many organizations.

@augustlan I was answering @JLeslie‘s comment, 3rd one down, where she says “I have to admit my knee jerk reaction at first was no money should be going to religiously based/run organizations, but it seems we do that now. Sigh.” I wasn’t actually answering the post, sorry.
I work for Medicaid and see so many poor people that have no resources, that we seek out any organizations that will help these poor women that are homeless with kids, or just need milk or diapers.
edit to add: I hate the “Pray away the gay” mentality, but that is in no way a representation of how all christians think or feel.

@cletrans2col Even if it is true, which I do not agree it is, I hope you don’t own any German cars, or any German products period. I really hope you aren’t related to anyone who is German with their history of eugenics. I also hope none of the people you associate with ever owned slaves in past generations in America. Give me a break. If there is a cent of truth, it is way in the past, has nothing to do with the organization it is today.

@chyna Don’t get me wrong, I want them to be helped.

@chyna Oops! Sorry. :)

No biggie guys, I just see things from a different perspective. Especially since I now work with Medicaid and want so badly to help these people.

@Aethelflaed Huh? Eugenics was popular and respectable?

@chyna :)

My second thought was, I guess Planned Parenthood is the otherside of my knee jerk reaction, and hence the question. Fair is fair.

@JLeslie When Sanger (the founder) was advocating it? Yup. So was thinking that masturbation was actively harmful, another position Sanger advocated.

@JLeslie I didn’t answer your post and I agree with your question. I don’t want money that is ear marked for people that are needy to go to so called counseling sessions to try to persuade anyone to change their lifestyle to fit in the counselors perception of what is acceptable in today’s society. Again, I want to point out, not all christians think this line of thinking is correct.

@Aethelflaed Not where I come from. From what I understand she was not in favor of killing people, nor in favor of promoting more births from people or people in situations thought of as more desireable. she was also not in favor of taking the choice away from the mother, but to provide her education so she could actively control her fertility. She did seem to want to avoid children being born into adverse and extremly disadvantaged situations, which is still a common belief I think. Still, so what? It has nothing to do with today. Pretty much every black person in the southern US, and the rest of us for that matter, should boycott the whole region if we go with your line of thinking.

@chyna I agree, I am not tryng to lump all Christians into one group.

@JLeslie Technically, that is called eugenics. A less extreme form, to be sure, but it’s still eugenics.

@Aethelflaed Joyceyn Elders was fired for recommending masturbation in the mid 90’s. The conservative bullshit lives on.

Fine eugenics. But, that word is associated with Hitler in its extreme form. It is a way for the religious right wing convervatives to try and show they are disgusted by the idea and they are not racist. I call it bullshit also. I am not saying they are a bunch of racists, just saying the tactic is annoying.

@Aethelflaed
That is just nonsense.

Calling that eugenics is akin to calling a banana an apple because it grows on a tree and is fruit as well.

On top, it’s disrespectful to the millions of people that have become victim to eugenics.

@JLeslie Actually, you are saying that.

@whitenoise I didn’t make up the definition for eugenics (which is, by the way, “The applied science or the biosocial movement which advocates the use of practices aimed at improving the genetic composition of a population.”). And no, it isn’t disrespectful. Eugenics is an idea that stands independent of Hitler and his crimes. What Hitler did was the most extreme application of eugenics. But as with all other ideas, eugenics is not defined by the most extreme application someone could dream up. You can have persecution without it becoming genocide. You can have rape that is less extreme than what Jack the Ripper did. You can have racism without enslaving everyone whose genetic composition is at least 1/8th “black”. And you can have eugenics without sending millions of people to the gas chamber. Why must we always abandon a word once someone has taken it to its most horrible extreme? Why should we not, instead, qualify those horrible and extreme acts, and say something like “severe persecution” or “eugenics that included genocide as a technique”? I would argue that instead, your position is disrespectful to anyone who has ever held a more moderate view of an idea, or has ever suffered, but not so extremely. The world is not so black and white, and there is great harm in discounting the gray.

Limiting immigration from counties whose national IQ is low is eugenics. Manipulating the DNA of a zygote to create a child resistant to smallpox or without Downs Syndrome is eugenics. Seeking out someone whose ancestors lived through and survived the Black Plague, thus suggesting the ancestors had some genetic immunity or resistance to the Plague, and having children with them in the hopes that those children are stronger is eugenics.

@cletrans2col Think what you want. I live in the middle of all that down here in the bible belt, and so many people say racist things, and I do not believe them to be racists, because I know them. Whatever they say in public, behind closed doors they want the blacks, to stop having so many babies out of wedlock at young ages, they believe those people cannot be helped, they do themseves in. In Memphis the city schools recently voted to give up their school charter to the county, and a whole bunch of white people out in the county (I am a white person here in the county, so people speak freely in front of me) were talking about how horrible it will be, they will probably start busing, those kids will ruin the schools, the adults voting will ruin the county board members, etc. However, two things, some of those people are racist, but most of those people are not racist, they would be saying the same things if the people were white, and behaved, dressed, and spoke the same way (so we could call it xenophobia, but I won’t even go that far). Let’s say they they are not racist at all, married to a black person, and half black themselves, but using the scary words like eugenics, which of course conjure up Hitler, I still call bullshit. It does not matter the literal definition of eugenics, it is how they use the word, and how it is understood today.

@Aethelflaed It doesn’t matter the literal definition, it matters how it is being used and understood. Communication is aout speaking to ones audience, and by using the word eugenics it does conjure up Hitler, and genocide. Remember, for the pro-lifers abortion is killing a human life.

@JLeslie Eugenics means genocide from certain people speaking to certain audiences. But that’s hardly how everyone uses the term; I personally hear eugenics far more often in other contexts than in reference to Hitler and genocide. And either way, what would you call what Sanger was in favor of if not eugenics? Isn’t letting the right co-opt the term to be synonymous with genocide for their own political gain letting them win?

@Aethelflaed I do not feel it is letting them win. We can try to rail against the evolution or understanding of the word, but that is a hard fight. Semite means Arab and Jewish, but no one uses antisemitic to mean anti-Arab, so the old definition doesn’t mean anything, it does not communicate what the speaker intends. The right using Eugenics is purposely trying to communicate genocide to their prolifers, they do not look up Ms. Sanger and see she was not in favor of killing people, or specifically after a race, but rather, from what I understand, did not want children born into difficult situations or unwanted situations. Still today most people want the same thing, maybe not through abortion, but through abstinence or birth control. Those people throwing around the eugenics term want the same thing pretty much most of America wants, they are no different, they just don’t support abortion. They still want the same end result. Many times it is the same people talking about the medicaid babies, the burden on society, and they look down on the lifestyle and cutural mores.

@chyna – it starts to matter when hundreds of other needy people unfairly get denied funds because of religious dogma.

You’re talking about payment for services rather than government grants. Two totally different things. Bachman shouldn’t be getting grants and he isn’t. Planned parenthood shouldn’t be getting grants either and they are.

@Jaxk Isn’t it all tax payer money?

@JLeslie

Surely you know the difference. Medicare is insurance given to the patient. the Patient chooses the provider and the insurance pays for covered services. Are you suggesting that the government choose the provider of services for medicare patients? Hell I accept government credit cards at my business and collect from the government. Are you suggesting that I shouldn’t be able to collect unless they like me?

@Jaxk From what I understood it was Medicaid they were speaking of. Can a Medicaid patient get an abortion paid for by Medicaid?

@JLeslie

My understanding is that federal funds can not be used for abortion. Therefore Medicaid will not cover them. That was one of the big sticking points for the health care debate. If you recall, a few Democrats led by Bart Stupak were pushing for a clause to eliminate abortion from the Bill. It ended with a presidential order than abortions would not be covered. The same holds true for Medicaid.

@Jaxk And before the health care debate, there was the Hyde Amendment that had been attached to budget bills since 1976 preventing federal funds from paying for abortion, thus rendering the whole debate more grandstanding than actual change.

@Aethelflaed Ok then, that is the point. I don’t want Medicaid funds used for services that are religiously based, and I am going to identify pray away they gay as religious.

@JLeslie

Lots of luck getting that through. Personally, I don’t have an axe to grind here but you’ll make it awfully difficult if you eliminate things like Catholic hospitals from proving medical services or Religious colleges from scholarships (Notra Dame comes to mind). The devil is in the detail.

@Jaxk How about the right lay of the money going to Planned Parenthood then? The point with my original question is you (I don’t mean you personally) can’t have it both ways.

@JLeslie

I think what is getting lost here is that the payment/grant is made to the person rather than the institution. When Bachmann bills medicaid, he is doing it on your behalf (not yours but you know what I mean). The payment is for you and applied to your bill. In the case of Planned Parenthood. the grant is to the institution not an individual. That distinction is quite significant.

In order to accomplish what I believe you (meaning you this time) want, You would need to isolate certain services as not covered by Medicaid. When you do that, those services would not be covered for any provider, not just Bachmann. Planned parenthood not only receives money from government grants but also from covered Medicaid services. The covered Medicaid services are not in dispute (to my knowledge) only the grants. Bachmann receives no grants.

@Jaxk I simply don’t agree the distinction matters. We will have to agree to disagree on that I think. I also was not aware of the grant vs paid medicaid benefit difference until you brought it up, I’ll have to look into it further. Thanks for the information.

@Jaxk Actually, Planned Parenthood receives both grants and Medicaid, same as Bachmann. The difference is, PP cannot bill Medicaid for an abortion, nor can it use the grant money to cover an abortion, with exceptions for rape, incest, and mother’s health. Bachmann receives not only grants of 30k for employee training from the government, but has received 137k in payments from Medicaid. So while I do think the distinction is critical, it also seems moot for this particular conversation.

@Aethelflaed

If Bachmann is receiving Grants, I didn’t know that. It would change the argument considerably. If they are receiving grants, those could be shut off the same way they were trying to shut off Planned parenthood. And for similar reasons. The Medicare payments would not change for either. The rules on abortion are universal regardless of vendor. Neither grants nor Medicaid can be used for abortion by anyone, not just PP.