Media Blind to GOP Hypocrisy in Health Care Debate

The confrontations between the GOP, the Democrats and their supporters in this health care debate have reached hysterical proportions. But not once in all the media coverage have I heard a conservative Republican pontificating on the sacredness of the doctor-patient relationship asked how one reconciles that position with the governmental restrictions their party has championed on women's health care for the better part of three decades.

Senator Chuck Grassley (R-IA) is one of the Gang of Six, the three Republican and three Democratic senators charged with hammering out a health reform compromise. Speaking to Iowans recently, he set himself apart from those who think that "when Grandma's lying in a hospital bed with tubes in her," government policy has a place, by declaring: "I am just the opposite." In a recent NPR interview, he singled out, as markers of progress in making health care reform more palatable to Republicans, his caucus's staunch opposition to rationing care and its insistence on "no interference in the doctor-patient relationship."

Carrying the banner for patients' rights on the subject of end-of-life care, Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK) passionately declared on Meet the Press that "The idea that we ought to talk about our future health and what our family and what we want done is a good idea, it's legitimate. What is not legitimate is having the government even weigh in on it. It is intensely personal, your health care, your plans, your family. There is no role for government in it."

What's stunning is that these are the same people who, with their party, have brought us an avalanche of governmental regulations dictating the availability of women's reproductive health care. It's even more stunning that the media is failing miserably to call them on it.

Indeed, conservative Republicans have spent years limiting the access of American women to birth control, emergency contraception, and pregnancy termination services, while requiring expensive medical tests, irrespective of medical need, and literally putting words into doctor's mouths in order to impede if not prevent women from getting reproductive health care.

Grassley has a 100 percent rating from National Right to Life Committee. Call it by any other name, but he's apparently quite content letting government ration women's reproductive health care, enthusiastically supporting efforts to withhold access to a legal procedure, to family planning services, and to birth control.

Coburn has the dubious distinction at this moment of being from the first state in the Union where Republicans are fighting -- first in the legislature, now in the courts -- to pass a uniquely onerous law. As one of its elements, the law would require that any woman who chooses to end a pregnancy have not just an abdominal ultrasound -- irrespective of medical need--but that she have a transvaginal ultrasound, if that would "display the embryo or fetus more clearly."

It's hard to imagine any test more "intensely personal" than a transvaginal ultrasound. It is an extremely invasive test wherein the woman lies half naked on an examining table while a cold, plastic probe is inserted inside her and painfully maneuvered for image clarity.

According to this legislation, the woman has no right to refuse -- even if her pregnancy is the result of rape or incest. Here's her choice: an invasive sodomization with a transducer, upon orders of the State, or carrying an unwanted pregnancy to term.

Nor does her doctor have a right to refuse. If the woman is terrified, does not want a transvaginal ultrasound, or has already suffered forced penetration, her doctor is helpless to protect her. If the doctor does refuse to do the test, he or she can be fined $10,000, have his or her license suspended or revoked, or be sued by the woman, the spouse, parent, sibling, guardian, or "current or former licensed health care provider" -- this from the party that fights so vociferously for tort reform. (The statute generously adds that the woman will not be prevented from "averting her eyes," and that if she does, neither she nor her doctor will be subject to prosecution.)

Beyond the facile dismissal of pregnancy termination as a covered service, thereby restricting access to a safe, legal procedure for hundreds of thousands of women each year, what has happened with women's reproductive health care in this country, despite its pertinence to health care reform, is essentially invisible in this debate. Yet we have to ask: Would people stand for it if the health care reform model being promoted gave the State the power to mandate a non-medically indicated, invasive, costly test as a prerequisite for the open heart surgery Grandma needs to save her life? If it countenanced State mandates forbidding her to refuse to have the test or the doctor to refuse to give it? If it put words into her doctor's mouth?

While many are fretting over the notion of a government takeover of health care in the spirit of Big Brother, for women in America, in the area of reproductive health care, that takeover has already occurred.

It's time this came up in the health care reform conversation.

This piece was written for The Women's Media Center website, a non-profit organization founded by Jane Fonda, Gloria Steinem, and Robin Morgan, dedicated to making women visible and powerful in the media.

Comments

[SewaneeLeftist]

Very good points, good article; WE need to call the media on this every time they fail to do the fair and balanced coverage we keep on hearing they're doing. More important, we need to call the Rushpublicans every time they try this baloney.

[jennysez]

That is beyond reprehensible!

I've had that kind of ultrasound performed, and it felt like I was being raped by overenthusiastic elephant. Not only was it painful to have that probe shoved inside me ( and I have to say, not being a lesbian, I was incredibly uncomfortable having a woman use what looks like a giant vibrator on me, I know its a medical test, but it looks like a giant vibrator, and for me anything that gets a condom wrapped around it and lubed up before being put inside me had better have a man at the other end of it) but I was left bleeding and in pain for days afterward.

The idea that a state government wants to mandate women for any reason is disgusting! And they're screaming about "death panels"?! Effing Rethugs!

[rsaillant1]

Please.....Let's get one thing straight, we should be talking about reform
of that particular branch of the insurance industry that issues payment for
costs as they relate to fees from Doctors, Hospitals, Clinics, Pharmacies,
and the like.

Blue Cross-Blue Shield, United Healthcare, et al; do not provide you with
health care, they pay for it, after you've signed on and prepaid for it.

Just like State Farm, as the insurer for your automaobile, doesn't install
the new fender and paint the new fender, they pay for it as they have agreed to do,
via contract.

These health care insurance companies are blending themselves in with
the actual care provided by medical people and facilities. They are insurance companies
only, and must be regulated as such. That is the real isssue.

[springsm]

The media gave up their responsibilities as accountable newspeople in 1999. They endorse the liars, push their favorites, deny and ignore crime and criminals. UNLESS it is something they can manipulate to their own benefit. I have zero respect for 99% of them. Too bad...honesty and integrity are no longer part of their job descriptions. Ethics and credibility were gone long before that.

[sdskelton03]

I don't see hypocrisy. I see two unrelated issues.

[grooveygrover]

health insurance covers viagra, do you get it now?

[sdskelton03]

No, still don't. In fact, I get that even less.

Rx medicine to help obtain an erection and abortion surgery don't seem to be related to me in any way.

A better relationship would be between Viagra and an Rx medicine that helps a woman with vaginal lubrication or tenderness.

[revealator]

It's very simple. Either the doctor-patient relationship is sacrosanct under any circumstances, including abortion, or it it isn't, You can't have it both ways (unless you're a Republican).

[lagumbo]

The media is own by the republicans. David Gregory, of MEET THE PRESS will do all he can for the republicans to help them spread their lies. He is one of those hacks that just won't except a blackman as president, so it is no surprise. If you want to hear the truth, check out Dr. Rachel Maddow and Keith Obermann. They won't lie to you, and if they make a mistake in reporting something they will come back and correct their mistake. I just this moment was flicking the channels and saw Glenn Beck holding class. With a board and chalk. Saying PRESIDENT OBAMA is setting up , what Beck call OBAMA'S BATHIST ARMY. Yes, that's what I saw. I just love to see how PRESIDENT OBAMA is driving beck, hannity, limbaugh,the right wingnuts ,gopers and their crazies insane. It is truly a beautiful sight. ha ha ha ha

[Shammie2000]

Most of the meida is own by ReThug's, to expect anything less, would be (un-civilized)

[slowtono]

This from an award winning journalist. I would like to know what her health care is. To me the line really advocates for the argument, that when push comes to shove you will be forced to go through procedures that you don't want or agree with, thus death panels. How quickly we got there.

[bruin1954]

What are you talking about. HR3200 in no way forces anyone to got through any procedures and has absolutely no reference to 'death panels'. You should read it.

[grooveygrover]

why do you personally attack the author?
can't get your point across otherwise?
what is your point?
you still didn't get it across

[rkfdred]

What I find really hypocritcal is when the repubs try to say we shouldn't let government get between a patient and the provider and then they turn around and say they can't support a bill because it may pay for abortions. Now isn't that allowing politicians to get betweeen a patient and provider? I am tired of the pick and chose method these guys are using to make their point. It shouldn't matter what your opinion on this matter is, it belongs in church not the health care debate.

[mrspractical]

The government should not come between a Dr. and patient when the Dr. is recommending treatment. Abortions are elective procedures, albiet for reasons we can sometimes understand.
That's the difference. If a Dr. is recommending abortion for medical reasons, the gov't should stay out. But if someone is electing this procedure, safety protocol should be followed. Please see my post below for why I think this legislation could enhance the safety of woman who elect to have abortion.

[swift goat pet for truth]

So, a woman gets pregnant. Then she finds out she has cancer and should be treated by chemo. The chemo will kill the fetus.

So, her choices are, forgo the treatment, and cancer will spread. Take the chemo and carry the dead, rotting fetus in her body until the end of the third term. Carry the fetus to term and risk the cancer spreading all over her body. Or take the chemo and the abortion.

That is your "elective procedure"
Nice.

[humanbeing-rick]

Very good and valid points made, Angela. Thank you for your insights.
Hopefully it may help some to realize the great hypocrisy that the Republicans respresent, on many issues and policies. The same for the "blue dog" Democrats, they are even worse hypocrites.
Anyone skilled at critical thinking and logical thought would conclude the same, as witnessed by facts and by our scientists, professors, and geniuses' respected opinions.
One could conclude that the Republicans represent the idiots of America.
Enter the state of idiocracy for America, a third world banana republic.

How does an intelligent minority deal with living in a country dominated by an idiotic majority?

[mrspractical]

Before having an abortion, I would think it's pretty important to make sure you're actually pregnant with a live embryo/fetus. Miscarriages are extremely common and often the baby is not expelled right away. It happened to me more than once, I didn't know the baby had died until it was revealed by ultrasound.
So without this type of ultrasound, it is likely that doctors would perform surgery when not necessary. There are also other things that could be revealed by ultrasound, such as an ectopic pregnancy, a life-threatening condition, which would require emergency surgery.
Perhaps that is why this legislation is being introduced, to prevent unnecessary procedures and ensure that the woman is receiving all proper precautions. Don't we want those who choose this route to have the safest experience possible?

[mtnyogini]

That's nonsensical.

[mrspractical]

If you can be more specific, I'm sure we can have a nice discussion. If you can't I will assume that you just cannot accept the idea that doing ultrasounds before invasive surgical procedures might actually have some medical benefit.

[donnyquixote]

"Indeed, conservative Republicans have spent years limiting the access of American women to birth control, emergency contraception, and pregnancy termination services, while requiring expensive medical tests..."

Limiting access? Really? Ohhh, you mean by refusing to foot the tab! I get it now, like how Republicans "limit access" to housing by opposing the federal subsidy of those who took mortgages they couldn't afford, or how Republicans "limit access" to transportation by opposing the ridiculous "Cash for Clunkers" morass, or how Republicans refuse "access" to the internet by refusing to subsidize the DSL charges for those who don't yet have it.

98% of the media outlets in this country spend every hour in the day scraping together every and any angle for how Republicans are wrong, racist, hypocritical (insert your own insult and/or criticism here), so the author taking the media to task for their failures to criticize the GOP is laughable. What the media has done, to be sure, is to give creedence to hacks like this author, from whom claims of "access" are conjoined with "failure to subsidize," and whose cries for "reproductive health care" have little to with reproduction, and everything to do with whatever means are sought to PREVENT reproduction. So who is the hypocrite and the one really being disingenuous? If asked, the author would probably admit that in her perfect world, any 12 year-old girl should be able to get a free abortion, without informed consent and without parental notification.

[jhNY]

You need to adjust your reception, and your whole entertainment set-up, as right now your home projector is blocking out entirely what the media is actually doing, which is acting as supplicant footstools to the plutocracy.

And by the way, nowhere in this article, the one to which you are supposedly reacting, is there any such link between "access" and "failure to subsidize". Read it again, maybe for the first time, and you'll see that you've just read words in there that don't exist so you can rebut points that were never made.

[donnyquixote]

maybe you need to broaden your myopic understanding of the entire health care reform debate, which is rooted in, if not entirely driven by the notion that somehow the government is obligated to provide healthcare to every member of its citizenry, regardless of the cost to those who will ultimately be paying for it. if you can't grasp this obvioius tenet, than anything that you offer is meaningless.

like the true fundamental rights; live, liberty, property, our Constitution demands that government protect these rights from being infringed upon, rather than demanding that the government provide these rights. the idea that "access" to healthcare (in this case, birth control/abortion) doesn't exist, in part because the government doesn't yet entirely foot the bill with a subsidy, is preposterous. one supporter of "reform" actually stated that she had a right "to be free from fear of losing [her] healthcare..." tell me exactly what part of the Constitution deals with this "right?"

[Gidster]

Wow!

By lack of access, the author does not even infer subsidies. She means that even the information regarding birth control have been obfuscated by abstinence only BS.

Teaching teens about being responsible is as important as teaching them their self worth! Because teens have sex, whether you like it or not, and now due to "Virginity pledges" they are engaged in alternate sex acts at an even higher rate! The STD rate is also much higher, at 25% of teens.

So your irrational rant against subsidizing birth control was not only ignorant, but had nothing to do with the article.

And to your last point, if your ilk had not vilified, demonized and defunded comprehensive sex education, there would be far fewer 12 year olds in that position in the first place!

[grooveygrover]

this is great, but really parents have an inherent responsibility to their children to make sure they know the score and how to protect themselves. I am always telling my son that I will get him whatever he needs. That being said as a woman i believe it is my responsibility to protect myself and my body from anything unwanted. Again it comes down to education, if not through school then through parents. To assume a child will be abstinent when they are constantly bombarded with sexual messages is at the very least naive if not down right neglectful.

[demigod]

A twelve year old girl is still a child and certainly should have an abortion if she became pregnant. She's not able to be a mother, and it's none of your business. If her parents are so whacked that they would give her a hard time, then they don't need to know. You people are absolutely crazy.

[Gidster]

So fanned!

[grooveygrover]

you might have an argument if health insurance didn't cover viagra or other enhancement drugs
since your premise fails so does the rest of your argument

[RS]

Regarding the title of your article Angela: The reason the mainstream media is TOTALLY BLIND to Republican hypocrisy is because the mainstream media is OWNED BY RIGHTWING REPUBLICANS. Here's the proof:

Jeff Bewkes (CEO of Time Warner)
Bob Iger (CEO of Disney)
Sumner Redstone (Chairman & CEO of Viacom and chairman of CBS Corporation)
Rupert "Herr Goebbels" Murdoch (CEO of News Corporation)
Jeff Immelt (CEO of General Electric)

[demigod]

Exactly right. I worked at the FCC during the Reagan Administration, when the air waves were auctioned off to private investors, almost always Republicans, and all the rules about how many licenses could be owned by whom were thrown into the trash. This resulted in wealth corporations buying up the television and radio stations all over the country. This is why we get almost no investigative reporting, only pre-digested pro-business and pro-war crap for news. Republicans are complete hipocrites on the health care issue, given their total intrusiveness into womens' health and reproductive rights. The Republican Senators stand between the patient and her doctors. They not only ration the care, they deny it purposefully.

[RS]

And don't forget that the Fairness Doctrine was abolished in late 1988. That paved the way for more media consolidation in the 1990s--and the Telecommunications Act of 1996 which was RAMMED DOWN OUR THROATS by the Republican Congress and signed into law by then-President Clinton removed even more media ownership regulations. Is it any wonder why rightwing media glutton Rupert Murdoch backed Hillary Clinton's recent presidential run?