Healthcare Bill and Selling Out Women

Aimée Thorne-Thomsen, Executive Director of the Pro-Choice Public Education Project, says:

Many of us who believed in the ideals of hope and change thought that we could achieve universal health care, if not in policy, then certainly in practice. That didn't happen. Poor people, immigrants, and women, among others, were all used as bargaining tools from the very beginning. As often is the case, women's bodies and health, was the ultimate battleground. The Stupak Amendment and then the Nelson Amendment in the Senate banned the use of public funds for abortion. Both were unnecessary and redundant because the Hyde Amendment, which has been renewed every year since it was first introduced in 1977, remains in place. But that wasn't enough. Stupak and Nelson went further by also barring women who would use the exchanges from getting insurance that would cover abortion. When that still did not satisfy Stupak and his anti-choice cronies, the President agreed to sign an executive order barring public funding of abortion in return for their support for the overall bill. Women's health was traded away for a handful of votes.

I've heard it said that the Democrats love women, unlike the Republicans who obviously hate us, so that's why women should vote for the Democratic candidates. Well, of course, they love us. If it weren't for women, they wouldn't have anything to trade off for votes in case of need. Today, whenever you need some conservative support for your legislation, all you have to do is to humiliate women and deprive them of their rights even more.

I keep wondering what would have happened in this respect if Clinton had been elected instead of Obama.