The Wars Against Women Continue

This week saw Iowa's Republican Governor, Kim Reynolds, sign a six-week abortion ban for her state. Unlike Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who signed his state's six-week ban in the middle of the night, Reynolds appeared at the meeting of the Family Leadership Summit, an evangelical Christian group to hold her bill signing. This was the base that supported the bill, so she played to the crowd with her actions. The state previously allowed abortions to take place until the twentieth week of pregnancy.

The bill that had passed the legislature a few days before was opposed by a large crowd that appeared in the building to protest this measure. Originally overturned by the State Supreme Court, it was brought back after the US Supreme Court delivered the Dobbs' decision. Once enacted, others such as Planned Parenthood again asked the courts to invalidate this new law by submitting petitions to the State Supreme Court. Many expect that this law will make its way to the Supreme Court. The problem with the six-week bans is that most women do not know they are pregnant that early and if they learn so at eight weeks, they have no recourse in that state. Exceptions were allowed under certain circumstances, such as rape and incest, if reported to proper authorities, or in cases of fetal abnormalities, incompatible with life and miscarriages.

To further emphasize the political action she was taking, other guests at the Summit included moderator former Fox Host, Tucker Carlson (of recent infamy) and several Republican Presidential candidates: the aforementioned, Gov. DeSantis, former Gov. Nikki Haley, former VP Mike Pence, SC Senator Tim Scott, and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy. (The former President DJT, was not there.) Most of these candidates praised Reynolds for her courage in pushing this bill with Pence saying: "that she has signed a bill with historic protections for the unborn."

However, according to NBC News, polls earlier this year from the Des Moines Register, a major newspaper in Iowa, showed that over 60% of the state's residents say abortions should be legal in most or all cases; 35% said the procedure should be illegal in most or all cases. Over two-thirds of Iowa women would allow abortion in most or all cases, while for Democrats in the state, approval is at 87%. Younger voters under 30 and those living in urban areas were also in favor of legal abortions in most or all cases.

Despite all of this information, the elected officials played to the conservative minority and voted for the six-week ban.

That pretty much mimics national polls that have been taken ever since Dobbs.

However, today there are twelve states with a six-week ban: Georgia, Idaho, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Texas.

Bans enacted but under court review occur in these states: (there is some overlap) Arizona, Montana, North Dakota, South Carolina, Utah, and Wyoming. Bans for 12-15 weeks and 18-22 weeks remain under review in several states. For example, Florida has a six-week ban passed into law, but the Florida Constitution allows abortion as a right and the state has a 15-week limit in effect. Montana has a ban on second-trimester procedures, but the state Constitution allows abortion as a right, so several recent laws are on hold. Twenty-four states and the District of Columbia, on the East and West coasts primarily, have legal abortion care and some have constitutional protections enacted. A few states in the upper Midwest and Hawaii also have protections in place.

However, the Republican House, in its attempt to control the District of Columbia, is currently trying to remove this healthcare right from the District. It has barred the City from deploying its funds to pay for abortions in the past. This measure is unlikely to pass the Senate, but the intent to strip the city of this self-governance is yet another intrusion by the Republicans on the rights of women.

Some states have tried to ban their residents from going across state lines to seek abortions in nearby cities. Other authorities have even suggested that law enforcement, which can subpoena Google histories in certain cases, be permitted to look for searches for abortion services. Those searches, known as keyword warrants, are invaluable to law enforcement and are considered invasions of privacy by freedom of speech advocates. The United States does not have a national privacy law and options vary from state to state.

Location data is key to many Google services. When you park in a public garage, you might see lists of nearby restaurants, for example, on the Google map. Google employees requested that data about services in areas considered private, such as abortion centers or fertility clinics, be automatically deleted from location and search histories. Google grants these keyword searches 80% of the time but has said that information considered overly broad or exceptionally personal will be challenged. I guess time will tell.

Moving from the House to the Senate, we now see the dumbest Senator in the Senate- the one who could not even state the three branches of government when elected from Alabama, the former football coach Tommy Tuberville act against women. He demanded the military retract its plan to provide funds for women in the military to travel to states that allow abortions if they were stationed in a state where the procedure is not allowed. Major corporations have already indicated they will allow this option for their employees. Some corporations stated they will move from states where these restrictions are severe, so the military is not doing anything untoward. But this stupid Senator has refused to allow any military promotion to go forward unless and until the military rescinds this travel allowance. To date, he alone has held up about 270 routine military promotions across the combined services over the past few months. The Commandant of the Marines recently retired; no one is currently in place to lead the Marine Corps. The Pentagon claims he is interfering with military readiness. The Senate has the option of voting on each promotion, one by one, but it is laborious and time-consuming. I think they should start doing this immediately. Other Senators have tried, even other Republicans, to change his mind, but he is enjoying his fifteen minutes of notoriety and has dug in.

Meanwhile, women in the military, who have served honorably, are being treated poorly by his intervention. These women, whose service allowed women in other countries to have their full freedoms, are being denied theirs, in their own country. The service men and women in our military do not get to choose the bases they serve on; the military assigns them with its needs in mind. Consequently, they may end up on some bases in the South, where there is a wide area with no abortion care available from South Carolina across Alabama, Louisiana, and Texas.

But Senator Tommy doesn't care, he wants to make life difficult for these women who are paid low salaries and supposedly get free medical care. But that medical care is now being limited and denied by him and other short-sighted, self-serving, and grandstanding politicians.

A Gallop poll, in June 2023, found that the number of Americans who favor rights for abortion care has gone up since the Supreme Court Dobbs decision in 2022. 59% say abortion should be legal during the first three months or trimester of pregnancy, while 34% say it should be legal under any circumstances. 52% in this poll say abortion is morally acceptable. While most oppose a third-trimester abortion, 22% approve. (Such procedures are rarely done and often involve problems with the pregnancy development or the health of the mother.) Second-trimester abortions, usually up to 24 weeks, should be allowed, according to 37%.

Galop stated it has polled on this issue since 1975 and the number of those who believe it should be illegal fell to its lowest point of 13% in 2023. Support for the availability of the oral prescription drug, Mifepristone, is 60%. Courts are still deciding on this and some states have stockpiled supplies in case it becomes restricted or banned in the future. The FDA recently allowed for this medication to be dispensed at pharmacies with a prescription; previously, it could only be dispensed in person. This change would allow telemedicine visits where prescriptions could be sent to pharmacies and would assist women who were not near providers' clinics. Whether mail order could distribute it or pharmacies in states that banned abortions could provide it is still unclear. Also noted, medical abortions (by pills) are less costly than surgical abortions.

Of course, there is no rational case made for banning a drug that has been safely used for over thirty years. Once again, women's healthcare is being compromised for political reasons.

I haven't even touched on the number of Obstetricians who are leaving their OB-GYN practices because they fear being arrested for treating miscarriages or ectopic pregnancies. Nor have I addressed the cases of septic miscarriages (known as medical abortions) that threaten the lives of pregnant women. I also did not mention the details of a Florida woman who had to carry a pregnancy to term when early on she learned it was so damaged with congenital deformities that it could not live. These circumstances came about because zealots want to control women and their health care.

Enough for tonight. I cannot leave without mentioning the death of Dr. Susan Love, a physician, and surgeon, who revolutionized the care of women with breast cancer. She fought against the disfigurations caused by the radical mastectomies which were common when she started her career. The lumpectomy and more modest limited mastectomies that followed were mostly her doing. She changed the lives of many women, even those with a cancer diagnosis, for the better. As a woman, a lesbian, and a surgeon, many in her profession did not welcome her when she started in the 80s, even as a former chief resident from Harvard. Her book, "Dr. Susan Love's Breast Book" became the bible for many with breast cancer and will be released in its seventh edition this fall. She was 75 when she died this week.

“Til next week-Peace!