Most light -- and heat -- is the Susan G. Komen for the Cure foundation's decision to cut future grants to Planned Parenthood. PP currently is one of the largest organizations providing breast cancer screenings. SGK's reasons are -- shall we call them "flimsy" and let it go at that? I have a feeling that the foundation's not going to like the amount of light generated by this one, even less than they're going to like the heat.
Maha has a good summary of the origins of this. Key point:
According to Sarah Kliff, the Komen Foundation says it is de-funding Planned Parenthood because it is under congressional investigation. Of course, the only reason it is under congressional investigation is that wingnuts in Congress are subjecting it to a witch hunt.
Here's the story from NYT. The Grey Lady also had a bit of editorial commentary on the whole thing.
Mr. Stearns’s “investigation” is nothing more than a political witch hunt, stirred up by Republican leaders and by a right-wing antichoice group, Americans United for Life, which now displays the pink ribbon on its Web site as part of a fund-raising campaign for Komen. The inquiry is part of the Republican campaign to stigmatize Planned Parenthood and end financial support for its invaluable network of clinics. Abortions make up only about 3 percent of its work, but most of this crowd also objects to its leading role in providing access to contraceptives.
Digby has a few words about SGK's initial attempts at damage control:
Look, at this point it's quite clear that the Komen Foundation has gone over to the dark side. This isn't a result of bullying. This woman agrees with this decision and is simply dancing as fast as she can to tamp down the reaction. The willing hire of a forced childbirth zealot was the first clue.
Watch the video at the link, and see if you agree with me: Nancy Brinker is a) lying through her teeth, and b) desperately trying to get out of the shitstorm.
Read the article by Jeffrey Goldberg that Digby links to. Nothing like a little inside information to clarify things.
[T]hree sources with direct knowledge of the Komen decision-making process told me that the rule was adopted in order to create an excuse to cut off Planned Parenthood. (Komen gives out grants to roughly 2,000 organizations, and the new "no investigations" rule applies to only one so far.)
Funny how that worked out, isn't it?
Charles Pierce points out that the "investigation itself is nothing more than part of a campaign to pull an ACORN on Planned Parenthood:
Of course, the real reason is a politically motivated audit undertaken a part of a general jihad against Planned Parenthood undertaken by Florida congresscritter Cliff Stearns, the chairman of an oversight subcommittee and a real freaking prize in his own right. Stearns is the guy who added to the Zadroga bill, which provided for federal relief to the first responders who worked on the pile at Ground Zero in New York, the ludicrous requirement that the names of all applicants for such relief first be checked against all terrorist watch-list. He also once attacked PBS because the South African version of Sesame Street introduced a character who was HIV-positive.
The prime catalyst for this seems to have been Karen Handel, SGK's new Senior Vice President for Public Policy. She's a Georgia wingnut. Ed Kilgore has the dirt on her.
(OK -- how bad is the backlash? Even rock bands are piling on.)
People are on to them now. (And I confess I didn't see this coming -- at least, not this fast.) Komen appears to have done a 180, which is being greeted with no little amount of scepticism.
Greg Sargent of the Washington Post got a Komen board member on the phone, and he said that “it would be highly unfair to ask us to commit to any organization that doesn’t go through a grant process that shows that the money we raise is used to carry out our mission. … Tell me you can help carry out our mission and we will sit down at the table.”
By the way, about SGK's "mission" -- 24% of their outlays go to research on a cure for breast cancer. This is the Susan G. Komer for the Cure foundation. 24%. Do the math.
The mantra, of course, is that Planned Parenthood is using SGK money for abortions. That's bullshit. It's become a McArdleism: "Money is fungible." No, it's not. I've worked for not-for-profits, specifically with grant writing and accounting. You have to account for every penny and show that it was spent in support of the program it was intended for. You don't move money from breast cancer screenings to abortion services. You can't. As for the idea that giving money for one program frees up money for another, that's also bullshit. If you don't give money for a particular program, it doesn't happen. That's the not-for-profit universe.
Does anyone see the pattern here? It's not just the so-called "pro-life" contingent. The right wing is going after everything that might actually do some people (read "those" people) some good. Remember ACORN? Gaius Publius has some good observations on the strategy here.
As my old Uncle Straight Talk used to say (who's much more direct than yours truly) — "Do they care about blacks? They care about winning. Do they care about gays? They care about winning. Do they care about women? They care about winning. Got that, son?"
Got that?
(Footnote: One source claims that Planned Parenthood raised $3 million in three days after SGK's announcement that PP was being de-funded.)
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