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Dr. Nancy Snyderman talks to NOW's President Terry O'Neill about how the Stupak amendment caught NOW off guard, but that the issue has galvanized young women. O'Neill said she felt the amendment essentially over rules Roe v Wade. And I agree completely with O'Neill when asked by Dr. Nancy if this was a 'most fundamental violation of church and state' that the Catholic bishops inserted themselves into this political debate.

O'Neill: You know that's the first thing that I said. I don't know where the Internal Revenue Service is, but I hope they're paying attention.

And as Dr. Nancy noted again, it's two white men making policy about women's reproductive decisions.

While we're on the subject, what Digby said...

I have a moral objection to paying for any kind of erectile dysfunction medicine in the new health reform bill and I think men who want to use it should just pay for it out of pocket. After all, I won't ever need such a pill. And anyway, it's no biggie. Just because most of them can get it under their insurance today doesn't mean they shouldn't have it stripped from their coverage in the future because of my moral objections. (I don't think there's even been a Supreme Court ruling making wood a constitutional right. I might be wrong about that.)

Many of the men who are prescribed this medication are on Medicare, so I think it should be stripped out of that coverage as well. And unlike the payments for abortion, which actually lower overall medical costs (pregnancy obviously costs much, much more) banning tax dollars from covering any kind of Viagra would result in a substantial savings.

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Here's something you don't see every day. One of these talking heads stopped in their tracks for lying on the air. MSNBC's Dylan Ratigan calls out The Family Research Council's Cathy Ruse (what a name for a spokesperson, huh?) for lying about what affect the Stupak amendment would have on private insurance if passed.

After noting that The Family Research Council called the Stupak amendment a “huge victory for women", Ratigan asked her this:

Ratigan: Cathy, what was the victory?

Ruse: Well the victory is that the question is elective abortion and who should be forced to pay for those, the individual or the government. Before the Stupak amendment passed, Americans would be forced to pay for other people’s elective abortions.

Ratigan: That’s not true.

Ruse: It is true, under both the public option plan and…

Ratigan: No, that’s not true…

Ruse: …and under the federal subsidies…absolutely true. That’s why…

Ratigan: The objection was to the use of the exchange. I’ll have this debate but you have to operate in the factual reality which is you’re saying that all the private insurance being sold on a publicly established exchange cannot fund elective abortion, and that is not federal dollars paying for abortion—that federal dollars paying for an exchange upon which private insurance is sold where elective abortions are provided.

Ruse: The Stupak amendment did two things. It prohibits federal funding for covering elective abortions, but it allows private insurance to carry coverage of elective abortions so long as no federal tax dollars are involved. And let me just…

Ratigan: Cathy, you’re not dealing with—you can’t—just coming on television and lying is not journalism, nor is it actually beneficial to the country. Let’s talk about what we’re discussing which is the establishment of an exchange upon which private insurance that we bought and sold establishes federal dollars. Nancy you were going to say?

Keenan: Yeah listen, we know that about 80-85% of private insurance companies today privately cover abortion care, and what the Stupak amendment does, is basically means that women will not be able to purchase insurance coverage that covers abortions with their own money, with their own money in this new healthcare system. That’s the reality of the Stupak amendment and it is outrageous that they are saying that this is good for women or that this is somehow the status quo. This goes far beyond the status quo.

Maybe Tony Perkins should get himself someone else go to up against Dylan Ratigan if his group wants to continue to try to spread misinformation about what the Stupak amendment does, although I don’t think Perkins himself would have faired much better against Ratigan. Both Ratigan and Keenan go on to point out what the real purpose of the amendment is, which is to prevent private insurance from paying for any abortions, get Roe v Wade overturned and to derail health care reform.

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Rachel Maddow runs down the list for us of C-Street family members who also voted for Bart Stupak’s anti-abortion amendment yesterday. Nothing like having what amounts to a secretive religious cult making health care policy for women in the United States. As Rachel noted that list includes:

Rep. Bart Stupak D-MI

Rep. Joe Pitts R-PA

Rep. Ike Skelton D-MO

Rep. Mike McIntyre D-NC

Rep. John Tanner D-TN

Rep. Lincoln Davis D-TN

Rep. Dan Boren D-OK

Rep. Heath Shuler D-NC

Jeff Sharlet joined Rachel to discuss The C-Street Family's ever growing influence within the Democratic Party.

Maddow: What are Congressman Stupak and Congressman Pitts’ connections to C-Street and The Family? Is one of them more deeply involved than the other?

Sharlet: Yeah, well Congressman Pitts has been involved with The Family since 1976 and in the 1980’s he was instrumental in bringing anti-abortion politics into this kind of elite fundamentalism that until that point had been focused on economics and foreign affairs. Bart Stupak meanwhile has been living at C-Street since at least 2002 when he told the Los Angeles Times “we kind of don’t talk about what happens here”.

Maddow: Are there signs that The Family had anything to do with the Stupak-Pitts amendment? I mean this is quite a legislative coup that they’ve pulled off.

Sharlet: Well, you have to consider that Congressman Pitts is what The Family calls a core member. This is a little like being on the board of directors. You can go on line and find video of him talking about the objectives of the group is to create a god led government. He has worked over the years to prevent not only abortion but AIDS education overseas and so this has been a life-long project for him going back years and years and years. Stupak is a little bit newer to this issue and I think what you really have to question here is Pitts who’s been active in this for a long time and was bringing up these amendments I think in Stupak and his brother in The Family as it was called, found a Democrat to carry the issue for him.

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November 09, 2009 ABC NIGHTLINE

President Obama said today that Congress needs to change abortion-related language in the health care bill passed by the House of Representatives this weekend.

"I laid out a very simple principle, which is this is a health care bill, not an abortion bill," Obama said. "And we're not looking to change what is the principle that has been in place for a very long time, which is federal dollars are not used to subsidize abortions."

Saying the bill cannot change the status quo regarding the ban on federally funded abortions, the president said, "There are strong feelings on both sides" about an amendment passed Saturday and added to the legislation, "and what that tells me is that there needs to be some more work before we get to the point where we're not changing the status quo."

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November 09, 2009 CNN THE JOY BEHAR SHOW

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: Moments like this are why they sent us here. To finally meet the challenges that Washington has put off for decades. To make their lives better and this nation stronger. To move America forward. That`s what the House did last night when it brought us closer than we have ever been to comprehensive health reform in America. Now it calls on the United States Senate to take the baton and bring this effort to the finish line on behalf of the American people. And I`m absolutely confident that they will.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BEHAR: Well the House bill may be historic but it doesn`t cover abortion for poor women so what good is it anyway? Here to help me make sense of all this, are Nancy Keenan president of NARAL Pro -- Choice America. California Congresswoman Maxine Waters who voted for the House bill. And Julie Menin, host of Give And Take and contributing blogger with the "Huffington Post."

I`m so agitated about this now. Maxine, Congresswoman, how you are you? Thank you for doing this

REP. MAXINE WATERS, (D), CALIFORNIA: I`m fine. Thank you.

BEHAR: OK, now we know that you`re pro-choice and that you`re pro female and you would you do the best for all of us. Why did you vote for a House bill that restricts abortion coverage?

WATERS: Oh Joy; let me tell you, I was absolutely torn. Absolutely undecided. All during this process, as you know, I was the 218th vote. That means I did not vote early. I thought about it. And in the final analysis, I reluctantly voted because it covers 36 million people who have either been refused health insurance or who cannot afford it. And when you look at a district like mine, where you have so many people who cannot afford health care insurance, I have to make a decision of whether or not I was going to literally hold up this bill for the entire nation or whether or not I was going to go with it and reluctantly, I relented. And I supplied the 218th vote.

BEHAR: I mean it is really kind of sad that we cannot get women`s rights in these bills. I mean can`t we -- you now I`m hearing from the A.P. a little while ago, that the public option is going to be dead in the Senate. What are we going to get?

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Clair McCaskill appeared on Morning Joe today to talk about the health care bill that just passed the House and what's next for the Senate. When asked to respond to Rachel Maddow’s comments on Meet the Press that the Stupak amendment is a poison pill that will lose a lot of support for Democrats by women if the amendment is not taken out in conference, Clair McCaskill said this.

McCaskill: Well, I am not sure that it is. Obviously, I have been a pro-choice candidate my entire political career, and obviously there is controversy always surrounding this issue. but we are talking about whether or not people that get public money can buy an insurance policy that has any coverage for abortion. And that is not the majority of America. The majority of America is not going to be getting subsidies from the government. The vast majority of America are going to continue to get their insurance at the workplace just like they do now.

And so, I am not sure that this is going to be enough to kill the bill, and frankly, once again, this is an example of having to govern with moderates. We can't just turn our back on the fact that the reason we are in majority, is because states like Indiana, and Arkansas, and Louisiana, and Missouri, and North Carolina, and Virginia sent Democrats to the Senate.

Since when does “moderate” have to mean anti-choice? Here’s McCaskill’s contact information if you’re as unhappy about this as I am.

Apparently some House progressives aren't going to stand for this as well as Sam Stein reports at the Huffington Post:

If, indeed, the Stupak language makes it into the Senate bill, it would be a major blow to pro-choice advocates. It would also seemingly ensure that the restrictions on abortion access would survive conference committee with the House and end up in the final piece of legislation. If that is the case it sets up a major showdown, once again, in the people's chamber. Rep. Diana DeGette (D-Colo.), for one, has insisted she and 40 additional colleagues will oppose any final bill that includes the Stupak amendment.

"There's going to be a firestorm here," DeGette told The Washington Post. "Women are going to realize that a Democratic-controlled House has passed legislation that would prohibit women paying for abortions with their own funds. . . . We're not going to let this into law."

Update: Well what do you know. Looks like Sen. McCaskill may be having a change of heart from this morning.

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Dr. Nancy Snyderman sums up how a lot of us feel about this absolutely horrid Stupak amendment. No, it's not fair and it is outrageous. It's bad enough we've got one party that wants to keep women living in the 1950's. We don't need two. And we don't need the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops writing legislation for Democrats.

Snyderman: Kelly I must admit this one caught me by surprise because I thought the public option was going to be the real rallying cry for Saturday. Because the Hyde amendment was in place over the summer we kept saying no federal money spent on abortions, and then the Stupak came in, really tightening the chance for a woman’s right to choose. Clarify for me.

O’Donnell: Yes, this issue has been bubbling under the surface for quite a while now and those who have strong views about abortion rights have been paying attention but you’re right, more generally we’ve been focused on the public option. What this would do is restrict the ability to have insurance coverage pay for abortion services. Now looking at the House plan it would create a public option and a market place that they call the exchange which would basically be a menu of insurance plans that people could choose from and if any of those plans take federal money or if as an individual you receive federal subsidies you would not be able to get abortion coverage. One alternative is to be able to purchase what they call a rider, an extra sort of mini-insurance plan specifically targeted for covering abortion services. But women, especially on the progressive side really stood up against that and said that would really require women to anticipate someday having the need for an abortion and they really strongly oppose that. But this amendment passed.

Why? Well certainly it had Republican support because you have a stronger abortion opposition on the Republicans side, but among Democrats there is a group that really feels strongly about abortion rights as well and they wanted to make very clear that no federal money could in any way be traced to abortion services and they had a lot of pressure from the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops who wanted to see health care pass but wanted to be certain that no federal money would be in any way connected with to the potential for abortion services. So this really became a hot-button issue over the weekend and as you mentioned the Hyde amendment which goes back thirty years, which prohibits federal money being used for abortion with the exception of rape, incest or life of the mother, this now brings it into the issue of insurance coverage and even private plans if people get help from the government to pay for that insurance, they would be subject to this new rule.

Snyderman: Kelly, you know what I find so infuriating about this? I mean, absolutely infuriating? And this isn't about being pro-choice or pro-abortion or any of the hot button lingo. We know women pay more for insurance than men. We know women are restricted in the states. And now it's basically, if you're a 50 year old woman and you're in a monogamous relationship you suddenly find yourself pregnant, you better know that have an abortion rider in order to access health care that you thought you had? It is one more pressure on women. I mean, I'm surprised that frankly there isn't more outrage over the fact that ...this isn't fair!

O'Donnell: What you're voicing is what woman after woman on the Democrat side, the progressive side of the party, said on the House floor. They came out one after another, speaking in very strong terms against this amendment. The amendment did pass despite their objections. And they really said it puts, as you describe it so pressure on women to anticipate a need for something that is a very difficult personal experience—there are a lot moral implications. It's not an easy situation for any woman and to now ask them to plan ahead for the potential and to buy an extra policy, those who oppose this amendment say that is simply too much. Nancy.

Snyderman: A white man deciding a woman's…… a woman's responsibility in her own procreation. I mean I ... I find it infuriating. I mean, I really think it doesn't matter what side of the abortion issue or pro-choice issue you're on, the fact that they are now making health care harder and harder for women to navigate the system. I think it's outrageous—just outrageous. Kelly O'Donnell, thank you so much.

And folks it's not about abortion. It really is about one more burden for women navigating the health care system. Before I blow my top, time to turn to Monica Novotny at the news desk. Monica, get me out of here.