Mitt Romney’s birth control fake-out

Give Rick Santorum this much credit for influencing the debate: His open hostility to contraception has managed to reframe things such that in Saturday night’s debate, George Stephanopoulos took the unusual step of asking Mitt Romney if he thought states should be able to ban contraception. Romney responded first by playing dumb and hedging, then by not answering the question at all.

“George, this is an unusual topic that you’re raising,” Romney responded, as if he didn’t know that Santorum’s re-stated opposition to Griswold put contraception policies back on the table. “States have the right to ban contraception? I can’t imagine that states would want to ban contraception. If I were a governor or a legislator in a state, I would totally oppose any effort to ban contraception.  So you’re asking — given the fact that there’s no state that wants to do so — you are asking could it constitutionally be done? We could ask our constitutionalist here,” at which point he punted to Ron Paul. (Paul, of course, is anti-choice and wanted to talk about the Patriot Act instead.)…

Apple's Siri Won't Tell You Where To Find Emergency Contraception, But Will Find Viagra

Want to use Apple’s new interactive “Siri” on your iPhone?  “She” has tons of information — just as long as you don’t ask about birth control, abortion, emergency contraception, or even mammograms. 

After experimenting with a few easy reproductive health questions, it was discovered that Siri appears to have a blind spot when it comes to women’s health.

Via the Abortioneers:

Q: I am pregnant and do not want to be. Where can I go to get an abortion?

“I’m really sorry about this, but I can’t take any requests right now. Please try again in a little while.”

“Sorry, [my name], I can’t look for places in Tanzania.”

“I don’t see any abortion clinics. Sorry about that.”

Q: I had unprotected sex. Where can I go for emergency contraception?

“Sorry, I couldn’t find any adult retail stores.” This was repeated every time.

Q: I need birth control. Where can I go for birth control?

“I didn’t find any birth control clinics.” [This was repeated every time I asked about birth control, all three times. This is also the answer given when I asked, “What is birth control?”]

That Siri seems completely “uninformed” about women’s health is utterly frustrating to me. How is THIS her main “knowledge” gap, despite her knowledge of Crisis Pregnancy Centers (CPCs)? Ugh!

Number Of Unwanted Pregnancies Increases Dramatically For Poor Women

According to a new Guttmacher analysis of government data from the National Survey of Family Growth and other sources, in 2006, poor women were five times more likely to have an unintended pregnancy when compared to higher-income women:

In 1994, the unintended pregnancy rate among women with incomes below the federal poverty line was 88 per 1,000 women aged 15–44; it increased to 120 in 2001 and 132 in 2006-a 50% rise over the period. At the same time, the rate among higher-income women (those with incomes at or above 200% of the poverty line) fell from 34 in 1994 to 28 in 2001 and 24 in 2006-a 29% decrease. Poor women’s high rate of unintended pregnancy results in their also having high-and increasing-rates of both abortions (52 per 1,000) and unplanned births (66 per 1,000).

The rates were also higher for women who are 18-24, those who cohabitate, and minorities. However low-income women had higher rates of unplanned pregnancies regardless of other factors, including marital status. A poor married woman’s chance of having an unintended pregnancy is more than twice as high as that of a well-off single woman.