The Washington Post published an article that suggests that all of the partisan wrangling over Planned Parenthood funding might have fatally damaged the public legitimacy of the organization. The article is informative. However, assuming its thesis is accurate, the author subtly seems to assign fault to Planned Parenthood itself for this current condition:
Put another way, the Republican Party waged public war against Planned Parenthood and politicized it and then criticized the organization for defending itself against its public war and for being politicized.
I do think that the head of Planned Parenthood, Cecile Richards, should not have temporarily joined the Obama campaign as an adviser. Beyond that, however, I don't blame an organization for aligning primarily with the political party that supports its efforts-- the National Rifle Association, or the AFL-CIO, for example.
An official with the Planned Parenthood Action Fund (the political action wing of the organization) put it well:
Links:
Article in the Washington Post (October 20, 2012): Planned Parenthood's funding is targeted in partisan debates
Op-ed in The New York Times by Campbell Brown that criticizes Planned Parenthood for being partisan (June 23, 2012): Planned Parenthood's Self-Destructive Behavior
Planned Parenthood has become so embroiled in partisan politics that its mission to provide health care and family planning services to women is threatened.I don't see how Planned Parenthood's quest to maintain government grants or to locate alternative forms of government funding by appealing to a political party that supports its mission is an improper foray into "partisan politics." Planned Parenthood only seems to be partisan because one political party has focused a lot of negative attention on them. If you ran an organization that became a bete noire of one political party, what would you do? Would you react defensively and look for love from the other major political party? This is wrong?
Put another way, the Republican Party waged public war against Planned Parenthood and politicized it and then criticized the organization for defending itself against its public war and for being politicized.
I do think that the head of Planned Parenthood, Cecile Richards, should not have temporarily joined the Obama campaign as an adviser. Beyond that, however, I don't blame an organization for aligning primarily with the political party that supports its efforts-- the National Rifle Association, or the AFL-CIO, for example.
An official with the Planned Parenthood Action Fund (the political action wing of the organization) put it well:
“We’re not on the side of a party,” she said. “We’re on the side of policy. And there’s just a clear, dramatic distinction between what President Obama has been committed to and delivered and what Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan have promised to destroy. So we don’t have a choice.”A counterargument of sorts was made in the summer by Campbell Brown, who detailed in a New York Times op-ed what she saw as a pattern of self-destructive partisanship by Planned Parenthood even before the major Republican push to pull funding from the organization. I think Brown is persuasive in arguing that the political wing of Planned Parenthood has not always made the best tactical decisions and has overreacted to the behavior of potential allies. But these are not the actions that have caused Planned Parenthood to be publicly labeled as "politicized" and "controversial." Instead, primary blame lies with Republicans, who have themselves overreacted to the relatively small part of Planned Parenthood's work (3%) that focuses on abortion, to the detriment of many women who don't care as much about abortion as they do cancer screenings and family planning.
Links:
Article in the Washington Post (October 20, 2012): Planned Parenthood's funding is targeted in partisan debates
Op-ed in The New York Times by Campbell Brown that criticizes Planned Parenthood for being partisan (June 23, 2012): Planned Parenthood's Self-Destructive Behavior
Comments