Stefanik votes against contraception
By Ken Tingley
It would have been shocking if Rep. Elise Stefanik had two common-sense votes in one month.
After voting to assure the right of same-sex marriage, she voted this week against a congressional bill that would guarantee your right to use contraception. I know, I know, it is shocking that in 2022 we are even worried about such things, but considering the Supreme Court’s most recent decisions, can mandatory chastity belts be far off?
When my son was getting to that age when he needed to have - the talk - I was dreading it. I remember my own father, taking me into the bedroom and closing the door after I incessantly asked where babies came from for more than a week. He explain to me the birds, bees, how the anatomy of men and women is different and how babies are made. It left me so confused, I asked dad if we could go over that again. The second time didn’t go much better.
So when I started down that road with my son years ago, he went into great detail about what he was taught in sex education class and how they showed him how to use a condom with a banana as a prop.
I was relieved and had new-found respect for those brave sex-education teachers.
We wanted our son to be safe from sexually transmitted disease and an unwanted pregnancy that might change the course of his life before he was ready. Thank you Queensbury schools.
I read a statistic that 5 percent of pregnancies are unintended. I suspect it is higher than that, and imagine how much higher it would be if the students weren’t taught about contraception.
You might be shocked to learn there are still those who believe that abstinence is the only solution to unwanted pregnancies. They live in a fantasy land.
So after the Supreme Court overturned Roe vs. Wade, there was concern that the same logic could be used to overturn same-sex marriage and contraception. As a child of the 1970s, I was shocked to learn that contraceptives were illegal for a long time. I guess that is why they were sold in the gas station men’s room. In 1965, when I was 8 years old, 26 states banned the use of contraceptions by unmarried women. And it took a Supreme Court decision to make it legal for married women.
Yeah, this is “The Handmaid’s Tale.”
So the House of Representatives brought forth a bill this week that confirms the right to use of contraceptives and gives the medical community the right to provide any device or medication used to prevent pregnancy. That includes condoms and the morning-after pill.
Rep. Elise Stefanik and most of her Republican colleagues voted against this.
I suspect Rep. Stefanik felt her conservative reputation would take a major hit if she voted with Democrats twice in the same month. She issued a statement that the bill “allows non-FDA approved drugs, which put women’s health significantly at risk.”
Studies have shown that long-term use of birth-control pills can slightly raise the risk for cervical cancer and heart attacks, but so can eating fast food.
But here is where the real Stefanik turns this into a political game that bolsters her conservative reputation. She said the bill “sends taxpayer funds to Far-Left abortion providers like Planned Parenthood.”
If you were wondering, just 3 percent of Planned Parenthood’s spending is on abortions.
But it does provide valuable medical services to the poor in rural areas like Rep. Stefanik’s district. Planned Parenthood spends 42 percent of its money combating sexually-transmitted diseases, 34 percent promoting contraception, 11 percent on women’s services and 9 percent on cancer screenings.
Rep. Stefanik said she is “proudly pro-life,” but she has “helped to expand access to over-the-counter FDA approved contraception.”
She wants it both ways.
It leaves me again wondering: What does Rep. Stefanik really believe?
Sympathies
If you were not aware, the wife of long-time Post-Star outdoor columnist Bob Henke passed away this week.
I hired Bob to write the column three decades ago and he became a staple at the newspaper where is columns not only informed but entertained. His wife, Janice, often lovingly made it it into his copy.
The Post-Star obituary was, as expected, beautifully written by Bob, and chronicled the length and breadth of a beautiful partnership. This was a master craftsman at work and a reminder to always appreciate the ones we hold dear.
Please join me in sending Bob and his family sympathies at this difficult time.
But I think Bob is going to be OK. He posted this on Facebook the other day with a a photo of single sunflower:
“I know there is an afterlife because, according to quantum mechanics, every time you imagine something, you create an alternate universe where that exists as reality. Therefore. I have for the past decade, ever since the diagnosis, been actively imagining a universe where, in an afterlife, she and I could fly about anywhere we wanted from the beginning of time to sometime in the future and spend infinity learning everything there is to know—together. That said, I am not big on signs, spirits, etc. However, on Sunday when the hearse and police left and I was suddenly irrevocably alone, I walked out around the fields to gather my thoughts. The sunflowers are not due to bloom for 2 to 3 weeks but right there, facing me, was a single fully developed bloom. I marked it with flagging tape so I can give some of the seeds to the kids. Whether she sent it or not, it might make a nice remembrance.”
Same-sex marriage
I have made no secret of my disdain for politicians over the years. There have been very few who have managed to earn my respect.
One of them was former state Sen. Roy McDonald.
McDonald, a Republican’s Republican, proved to be one of the deciding votes in making same-sex marriage law a dozen years ago. His party and half his supporters turned on him because of it and he was not re-elected. That was a loss for many of our communities.
After I retired in 2020, Roy invited me out to lunch. We’ve stayed in contact since. His story made it into my book “The Last American Editor” and now a more detailed account is going to be part of an award-winning anthology published by Something or Other Publishing.
It’s called “Roy McDonald: Profile in Courage.” Republican voters blew it when they let Roy get away. The story and anthology an be pre-ordered today.
She and Matt believe in increasing their net worth.
Her hypocrisy knows no bounds. I found it astounding that a young woman, married, made it to age 35 before becoming pregnant. There might have been some birth control method involved. She is entitled, but apparently the rest of us are not.