Saintless

From the Feministing Blog:

We have just learned that Sen. David Vitter (R-LA) is expected to attack Planned Parenthood. He will offer an amendment to the Appropriations Act this afternoon that would block Planned Parenthood health centers from receiving federal funds from Title X, the nation’s family planning program.

The Title X program enables family planning health centers to provide basic health care, such as birth control, breast exams and Pap tests for early detection of cancer, blood pressure testing, testing and treatment for sexually transmitted infections, HIV screening, and adoption referrals. Vitter’s attack on Planned Parenthood is an anti-choice tactic to prevent women from accessing abortion, but Title X funds cannot be used to provide abortion services — in fact, a main goal of the Title X program is to prevent unintended pregnancies and reduce the need for abortion.

Read more here.

If you’re in Utah, here is the information you need:

Bennett, Robert F. – (R – UT)
(202) 224-5444
Web Form

Hatch, Orrin G. – (R – UT)
(202) 224-5251
Web Form

Please call both of them, if you can. Calls carry more weight than email, but if you can’t call, please do drop a note in their inbox using the links above. This is all you have to say:

Planned Parenthood’s health center is my community’s women’s health center, and I oppose Sen. David Vitter’s Amendment No. 601 to the Omnibus Appropriations Act of 2009 (H.R.1105). It is an unconstitutional, completely unfounded attack. Please don’t support it.

Update: I just wanted to add that this isn’t just about abortion, although that is what drives Vitter in this case. This would remove health care for women across the nation. Women without health care, or young women afraid to ask their parents for help, use Planned Parenthood for birth control (reducing the “need” for abortion in the first place!), annual exams, STD testing, and more. This organization is vital to women’s health. I used it before I got a “real job” with health care, and I know lots of people who would have no other way of getting basic healthcare, much less birth control to prevent unplanned pregnancies. Defunding this organization would create a new and greater health care crisis, at a time we can’t afford it. Please don’t let this happen.

Thanks to Widgetbox and Open Congress, I now have an easy way to keep an eye on what my representatives are doing.

Widgetbox allows you to submit the URL of any blog and create what’s called a Blidget. Open Congress has a feed for all of the Senators and Representatives, so all I had to do was join Widgetbox, which I’d already done. Then click “Submit Blidget”, and paste the RSS feed link from the representative’s page on OpenCongress. Out came this:
Get great free widgets at Widgetbox!

I’ve made Blidgets for
Senator Bennett,
Senator Hatch, and
Representative Matheson, or you can create your own. You can see mine on the right side of this blog, if you scroll down a bit, and there’s a link by each of them if you’d like to add them to your own blog.

If anyone wants to make one and needs more help, just let me know.