Isn’t it amazing that sound public policy works a lot better to reduce teenage pregnancy than lecturing girls about keeping their virginity? Giving teenaged girls access to long-term reversible contraceptives is twenty times more effective at preventing pregnancy than giving them The Pill, and infinitely more successful than abstinence-only education. Teenage motherhood has plummeted in this country over the last twenty-five years or so, but it’s falling fastest in states like Colorado that are offering up free access to contraceptive implants.
It’s especially effective at preventing second pregnancies, as young women are given the option of having the implant done at the hospital after they give birth.
And this obviously reduces the costs of providing social services a great deal, so it ought to be supported by the party that hates taxes and opposes abortions.
But, is it?
NO! Those girls are enjoying sex without the consequence of a crappy marriage. That is the only thing worse than aborting a fetus.
Because most of all they shouldn’t enjoy sex.
30,000 patients, three contraception implant, $23 million. That works out to less than $300/year/patient. Who knew that accessible and free birth control could be such a thrifty alternative? (The same is true for all primary care clinics — cuts out all the middle-men such as the provider billing clerks, insurance clerks, insurance company executives, and insurance company investors. Plus it frees up the health care providers to provide health care instead of doing paperwork for insurance reimbursement. But nobody wants to hear that — we want health insurance cards.)
Speaking of insurance cards, I just turned 26 so I am no longer legally required to be covered by parents’ insurance. So I went home for birthday celebrations to see I got a letter (on Saturday) telling me I would be dropped this Tuesday. Now luckily with work I have access to insurance, but it’s not open season so you have to have a life changing event to buy it. Well losing insurance is a life changing event. However, unbeknownst to me, I needed that stupid letter to prove that. So I had to call the insurance people telling them I needed the letter. I also chastised them for not sending it, you know, a month or two in advance. They claimed to have done so but said “it got sent back to them,” but I don’t believe them because how did this letter make it but the one before not?
Anyway, now I’m waiting for a new copy of that stupid letter to be emailed to dad so I can print the copy off and show it to work to prove that I’m being dropped. A co-worker’s insurance gave him a 30 day grace period before dropping. I figured this would be SOP. Mine was immediate. Live and learn. I just hope I don’t get hurt between now and when that crap gets processed.
USians are into personal responsibility. Sometimes that becomes needlessly complicated. And guess it will take a while for people to figure out that age twenty-six is the cut-off for being a dependent on one’s parent’s health insurance policy.
Oh I knew the cut-off, I just didn’t think I could apply until I lost it. I also thought there would be a month of breathing room based on a co-worker’s experience.
But yep, stupid and needlessly complicated.
And you know what else is stupidly complicated? Picking a plan. Even though I know details and health policy far better than average American, it’s still hard to truly know which is the best. Where is the “take my tax dollars and if I go to the doctor or hospital it’s paid for” option?
And you’re intelligent and educated. Insane to think that most people are capable of beginning to understand the basic, much less fine print, offering of a health insurance policy.
In England.
If the plans were standardized like Medicare supplement plans it would be a lot easier. Just choose based on price and reputation. But the Insurance companies don’t want you to understand. they want confusion so they can bamboozle you.
No, it’s not supported by the Republican party because this party has been taken over by the right-wing religious groups. The Catholic hierarchy is primarily responsible for the anti-abortion and anti-birth control policies, but over time, Protestant fundamentalist groups joined the anti-abortionists.
http://billmoyers.com/2014/07/17/when-southern-baptists-were-pro-choice/
Now, the fundamentalist groups are becoming anti-birth control. However, these policies are incongruous with the old-style Republican philosophy, which still exists in pockets of the country and among the Republican establishment. Mix together the Republican establishment, the religious right, and the Tea party, and one has quite a concoction. There is some intersection among these 3 factions, but they are distinct.
In addition to opposing contraception, they all support heavily armed police, war, and low taxes. They are fiscally and socially irresponsible and project that onto individuals that weren’t born to or given the privileges the RWNJ received.
This.
Everyone is terrible because they are terrible.
Everyone should behave how they say, because they don’t behave how they think they should behave.
Conservatism is traditional authoritarianism built upon a bedrock of cognitive dissonance and projection.
Conservatism has always been kissing siblings with authoritarianism. The cognitive dissonance and projection are new, though. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not because conservatism has ‘degenerated’ in some fashion, it’s just because liberalism has become a lot more coherent and the social sciences have been contemptuously tearing down their cherished foundation myths. It’s survival, not decay.
Considerable overlap between the Tea Party and the Religious Right.
The Republican Establishment fits most closely with the Libertarians, but they have to be phony Libertarians, i.e.
Welfare should end, but not corporate welfare
Everyone should work, except trust fund babies
Government should be small, except for the police and military
Law and Order, except on Wall Street
Everyone should be free to smoke dope and have wild sex, but only at a frat party
Black people belong in the kitchen and Brown people in the garden, except — Uh No exceptions here
Not amazing just common sense, unfortunately half this country has forgotten common sense.