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Title: Democratic Women Boycott House Contraception Hearing After Republicans Prevent Women From Testifying
Source:
http://thinkprogress.org
URL Source: http://thinkprogress.org/health/201 ... venting-women-from-testifying/
Published: Feb 16, 2012
Author: Igor Volsky
Post Date: 2012-02-16 15:42:35 by Ferret Mike
Keywords: None
Views: 38058
Comments: 90
This morning, Democrats tore into House Oversight Committee Chairman Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) for preventing women from testifying before a hearing examining the Obama administration’s new regulation requiring employers and insurers to provide contraception coverage to their employees. Republicans oppose the administration’s rule and have sponsored legislation that would allow employers to limit the availability of birth control to women. Ranking committee member Elijah Cummings (D-MD) had asked Issa to include a female witness at the hearing, but the Chairman refused, arguing that “As the hearing is not about reproductive rights and contraception but instead about the Administration’s actions as they relate to freedom of religion and conscience, he believes that Ms. Fluke is not an appropriate witness.” And so Cummings, along with the Democratic women on the panel, took their request to the hearing room, demanding that Issa consider the testimony of a female college student. But the California congressman insisted that the hearing should focus on the rules’ alleged infringement on “religious liberty,” not contraception coverage, and denied the request. Reps. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) and Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) walked out of the hearing in protest of his decision, citing frustration over the fact that the first panel of witnesses consisted only of male religious leaders against the rule. Holmes Norton said she will not return, calling Issa’s chairmanship an “autocratic regime.” Watch a compilation of the heated exchange: ky on Feb 16, 2012 at 10:52 am This morning, Democrats tore into House Oversight Committee Chairman Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) for preventing women from testifying before a hearing examining the Obama administration’s new regulation requiring employers and insurers to provide contraception coverage to their employees. Republicans oppose the administration’s rule and have sponsored legislation that would allow employers to limit the availability of birth control to women. Ranking committee member Elijah Cummings (D-MD) had asked Issa to include a female witness at the hearing, but the Chairman refused, arguing that “As the hearing is not about reproductive rights and contraception but instead about the Administration’s actions as they relate to freedom of religion and conscience, he believes that Ms. Fluke is not an appropriate witness.” And so Cummings, along with the Democratic women on the panel, took their request to the hearing room, demanding that Issa consider the testimony of a female college student. But the California congressman insisted that the hearing should focus on the rules’ alleged infringement on “religious liberty,” not contraception coverage, and denied the request. Reps. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) and Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) walked out of the hearing in protest of his decision, citing frustration over the fact that the first panel of witnesses consisted only of male religious leaders against the rule. Holmes Norton said she will not return, calling Issa’s chairmanship an “autocratic regime.” Watch a compilation of the heated exchange: A picture of the witness table: Issa also dismissed the Democrats’ woman witness as a “college student’ who does not “have the appropriate credentials” to testify before his committee.
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Begin Trace Mode for Comment # 31.
#4. To: Ferret Mike, *Extended Clip Progressives* (#0)
Killing babies is "preventative health care"? I don't think so! What could be more unhealthy than dead?
We're talking about contraception here, not abortion.
There's no substantive health benefits to not having babies. Old maids don't live longer than mothers.
For some women, like my friend with a heart defect, or another with diabetes, pregnancy is life threatening.
Advise them to keep their legs together.
Tell me, how does that work out in a marriage?
The woman gets her tubes tied.
#34. To: hondo68 (#31)
That is also condemned by the Catholic church. "Who is he who cannot warn that no woman may take a potion so that she is unable to conceive or condemns in herself the nature which God willed to be fecund? As often as she could have conceived or given birth, of that many homicides she will be held guilty, and, unless she undergoes suitable penance, she will be damned by eternal death in hell. If a woman does not wish to have children, let her enter into a religious agreement with her husband; for chastity is the sole sterility of a Christian woman"
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#6. To: hondo68, Ferret Mike, A K A Stone (#4)
Killing babies is "preventative health care"? I don't think so!
#12. To: lucysmom, *Liberal Rehab Staff* (#6)
We're talking about contraception here, not abortion.
#18. To: hondo68 (#12)
There's no substantive health benefits to not having babies.
#24. To: lucysmom (#18)
For some women, like my friend with a heart defect, or another with diabetes, pregnancy is life threatening.
#28. To: hondo68 (#24)
Advise them to keep their legs together.
#31. To: lucysmom (#28)
how does that work out in a marriage?
Replies to Comment # 31. The woman gets her tubes tied.
End Trace Mode for Comment # 31.
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