PrintJanuary 26, 2009
Bizarre Pelosi claim that $100 million for contraception will 'stimulate' the economy
Nancy Pelosi started it. She's the one who opened the door to all the double entendres you can come up with by actually making the bizarre claim that spending $100 million for contraceptives is good for the economy because it will reduce the "burden" on state governments.
Pelosi on ABC's "This Week" (courtesy of Drudge):
STEPHANOPOULOS: Hundreds of millions of dollars to expand family planning services. How is that stimulus?
PELOSI: Well, the family planning services reduce cost. They reduce cost. The states are in terrible fiscal budget crises now and part of what we do for children's health, education and some of those elements are to help the states meet their financial needs. One of those - one of the initiatives you mentioned, the contraception, will reduce costs to the states and to the federal government.
STEPHANOPOULOS: So no apologies for that?
PELOSI: No apologies. No. we have to deal with the consequences of the downturn in our economy.
The millions of mothers with babies throughout the country will be surprised to learn that their children are now considered a burden on state budgets by the liberals. No doubt the next step is a massive ad campaign shaming people into not having babies in this time of economic pain.
Pelosi has no idea if giving hundreds of millions to family planning will reduce the birth rate. There are no studies, no evidence whatsoever that passing out birth control pills will lower the birth rate. In fact, studies done on birth rates during recessions are mixed with some groups having more babies while others, less. The net result is probably close to zero difference as most people have children for other reasons than economics.
At least normal people approach the question of family planning in that manner. For liberals like Pelosi, babies have a cost/benefit ratio like any other commodity. Each new life is not a bundle of joy but rather a millstone around the neck of the state. Better to destroy it or prevent it from happening.
That stimulus bill is a gigantic payoff to Democratic constituencies or, as AT's political correspondent Rich Baehr has said,, "[W]e are witnessing the biggest transfer of wealth and
employment from private to public sector in history." The Democrats are putting the government in the economic driver's seat with consequences that will resonate for decades.
