Cross-posted at brendan calling.

Talk about getting royally fucked! The Democrats want to knuckle under to the GOP on family planning funding in the stimulus:

WASHINGTON – House Democrats are likely to jettison family planning funds for the low-income from an $825 billion economic stimulus bill, officials said late Monday, following a personal appeal from President Barack Obama at a time the administration is courting Republican critics of the legislation.

Several officials said a final decision was expected on Tuesday, coinciding with Obama’s scheduled visit to the Capitol for separate meetings with House and Senate Republicans.

The provision has emerged as a point of contention among Republicans, who criticize it as an example of wasteful spending that would neither create jobs nor otherwise improve the economy.

Under the provision, states no longer would be required to obtain federal permission to offer family planning services — including contraceptives — under Medicaid, the health program for the low-income.

This is a crock of shit, and the Democratic Party should be ASHAMED to even consider this action. Susie puts it best

Only someone who’s never been poor is breathtakingly stupid enough to believe that birth control doesn’t have an immediate effect on the economic health of a family – or someone who’s cynical enough to draw a line in the sand over something he doesn’t believe anyway – like John Boehner.

What, an additional wage earner has no economic impact on a family? Or have we suddenly awakened in a world where free daycare, diapers and formula abounds?

Tell me about it, Susie. And let me add a fact or two. In my neighborhood, Southwest Philadelphia, median household income in was $26,781 in 2000. That’s $515 and change per week.

My child support payment accounts for about 30% of my monthly pay, and that’s on top of my mortgage, my student loans, food and living expenses, gasoline for the car. I’m barely eking by and I make substantially more than $26K. I cannot imagine what it is like to raise a family on that little money. Ask my brother what that’s like: he’s got two kids and makes a lot less than me.

At the same time, the price of insurance premiums goes up and up. My girlfriend is sensitive to certain forms of birth control pills, and prefers one specific brand. The price of the Pill, the most effective form of birth control, has gone up to about $60 per month (maybe more, I’m sure she’ll chime in here). the increased cost has had an impact on her budget, and she makes about as much income as me. Imagine how this will affect families that already have trouble making ends meet.

"What about condoms?" you ask. Yes they’re cheaper than the Pill, but when you’re only bringing in a little more than $500 a week, that’s an expense that could be covered by Medicaid. Furthermore, condoms have a much higher failure rate than the Pill.

But in their rush to roll over and spread their cheeks for the defeated GOP, the Democratic party has decided the poor should get a good fucking as well. Actually the proper term is probably "raping the poor", since the poor really don’t want to get fucked this way.

Why are the Democrats listening to the GOP anyway? First of all, the Republican party has been utterly defeated: they will not be voting in lockstep for the foreseeable future, because if all they do is say "no" they will have nothing to show the voters come re-election time. We don’t even need them to pass this stimulus bill.

In addition, haven’t the past 8 years pretty much demonstrated once and for all that the Republicans are the last people to be talking about wasteful government spending? These are, after all, the folks who brought you the Iraq War: now with more dead people and no end in sight! The folks who brought you the Department of Homeland Security, an entirely new federal department that spends a lot of your money to do nothing very well. The folks who brought you medicare Part D, which cost billions more than promised but passed anyway because the GOP lied about the costs.

Shame on the Democrats. Henry Waxman needs to hear from you:

Washington office: 202-225-3976
California offices:
(323) 651-1040 (phone)
(818) 878-7400 (phone)
(310) 652-3095 (phone)

Barack Obama needs to hear from you too. So does your representative in Congress. Fucking the poor on family planning? That’s not change I can believe in at all. I voted for Democrats because I believe in reproductive rights, contraception, access to abortion, and improving the lives of the poor and working poor. I believe in lifting up families, not keeping them down by saddling them with unwanted children they can’t afford to feed. I believe in rights for all women, not just those who can afford to be free. It is no longer 1842: birth control is a necessity for most families.

I call bullshit on you President Obama, I call major league unacceptable bullshit.