Planned Parenthood | Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota Action Fund

by Anna
Web Correspondent
Planned Parenthood Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota Action Fund

As a student at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota, the home of this year’s Republican National Convention, I’ve heard my fair share about Sen. John McCain these past few days — the good, the bad, and the ugly. From college-sponsored RNC roundtable discussions to casual chatter about RNC visitors staying at students’ houses, the world of John McCain (and now Sarah Palin) is everywhere.

It’s interesting to find myself in the midst of all of this at the time of year when I’m just returning to school and getting back to everything I do when I’m here, like online blogging for Planned Parenthood. Interesting because anyone even remotely supportive of women’s reproductive rights has a mouthful to say about the RNC, and I’m no exception.

McCain supports overturning Roe v. Wade and in February 2007, the Associated Press quoted McCain as saying, "I do not support Roe versus Wade. It should be overturned."

McCain also supports abstinence-only education that refuses sexually active young people medically-accurate sex education. He has voted against comprehensive sex education bills and funding allocations for preventive health care to reduce unwanted pregnancies.

On top of all this, John McCain holds fast to another of George Bush’s old favorites, the global gag rule, which states that no U.S. family planning assistance funding can be given to organizations that provide abortion services, offer counseling and referral for abortion care, or advocate legal abortion access in their own countries — even if they do so with their own funds.. This policy has prevented countless women’s and reproductive health organizations from helping local populations to their full potential.

Let’s just say that Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, McCain’s vice presidential choice, is no champion for reproductive rights either. She is supportive of abstinence-only sex ed and is opposed to abortion — even in cases of rape and incest. Palin is, if anything, less “progressive” than McCain in this realm.

The excitement of finding myself at the epicenter of the 2008 RNC becomes a lot more like bitterness when I reflect on the ideology towards reproductive rights that this year’s Republican presidential candidates hold. Not only do I disagree with the McCain platform, but I think many of his concepts are downright illogical. Abstinence-only education never has worked and never will; many STDs are on the rise among teens and unwanted pregnancies are still easy to come by. And legalized abortion, apart form being a personal choice issue, is far from being unnecessary. When I see that evidence that Republican policies towards reproductive rights work, I might revise my position.

Until then, I can safely say that McCain is a disappointment.

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