I support this 100%. Family planning in Third World countries is just as important, if not more important, than her in the US. We should support those less fortunate in this endeavor by giving some of our wealth to help alleviate their suffering and overpopulation.

I support this 100%. Family planning in Third World countries is just as important, if not more important, than here in the US. We should support those less fortunate by giving some of our wealth to help alleviate their suffering and overpopulation.

I oppose this 39%. While family planning overseas is important, pro-lifers should not be forced to pay for abortions or the promotion of abortions overseas. As we all know, boycotting the government gets you into some pretty serious ****.

Unsafe illegal abortion kills thousands of womans every year. This can be lowered with legalization and funding. Who want/need to do abortion, do it anyway.

But abortion is the last resort. We must first and foremost prevent unwanted pregnancies.

Legal abortion kills thousands of babies each day. Hmmm... thousands of innocent babies or one thirtieth as many guilty women... 

Though we do need preventive care. I suggest less demonizing of CPCs if this is to happen.

You should also post this idea under the 'global health' category.

Wow. We are weighing the right to life? If it weren't for the woman, the baby would never exist. An not all circumstances are from mismanagement of her uterus. It is no place for the federal government to tell a woman what to do with her body.

I am sorry this is aside from the voting point. But I saw Cupcake's comment and was disgusted. Cupcake. You are no one's judge but for yourself.

Cupcake, you are disgusting. How dare you judge other women. Forcing us to be incubators for unwanted fetuses is a violation of our human rights.

I hope to see the Global Gag Rule repealed. Women's health should always be prioritized over extreme right-wing ideology.

i completly agree. even if u are prolife, this is important. if woman turn to illegal abortions their lives are at risk. people die. life is being ended. because abortion is legal here we have to reason not to try and help.

The whole problem with the abortion debate is the definition of human life.  For the pro-life side, life begins at conception.  But the other side does not have a clear definition of when human life begins; does cutting the umbilical cord make the baby human?  Or brain activity, heart activity, or the ability to communicate?  Or should someone's test for "viability" (itself another slippery, undefined term) proclaim who is human and who isn't? (And what does this say for adults and children who are not considered "viable" by the same definition? 

Historically, differing definitions of what constitutes a human being have allowed some groups, like slaveowners and Nazis, to oppress and kill other groups (like Blacks and Jews).

I don't think that U.S. taxpayer money should pay for abortions overseas.  You can spend your money any way you want, but don't presume to spend mine or anyone else's for them. 

Do you really think that abortion is about women's rights in third world countries?  I mean, really???  It's not about women's rights at all.  Women are still treated like cattle in most of these countries, and abortion is just another way to oppress them.  Abortion is all about population control in these places.  It's part of a eugenic plan to limit the population of poor countries so they don't "pollute the planet" and "consume valuable resources."  Obama is on the record as saying that he is in favor of population control.  Wake up, people.  This is nothing less than what the Third Reich was doing to promote the master race.

["i completly agree. even if u are prolife, this is important. if woman turn to illegal abortions their lives are at risk. people die. life is being ended. because abortion is legal here we have to reason not to try and help."] Posted by alex urmom on 12/11/2008 @ 04:37PM PM

No, I'm pro-life, and I still disagree.  Everytime a woman has an abortion, someone dies.  This is what the pro-choice crowd doesn't seem to realize.  Everyone started out the same way.  If your mother aborted you when you were just a zygote, then you would not exist today.  You would be dead.  What part of this do you not understand?  And if you do understand this, then why do you support the willful extinguishing of individual human lives?  Zygotes are individual in nature, after all.  If you destroy one, then you've destoyed the entire future of one individual human being.   

1) Global Gag rule doesn't prevent US $ from paying for abortion, it keeps it out of the hands of organizations that use their own money to pay for abortions, or consel women that its an option, and in some countries it is.

2) Our rights end when another person's rights begin. That means a fetus doesn't have rights so long as it needs another person to survive. The law doesn't require anybody to give up their bodily autonomy to help anyone else: no mandated kidney transplated, blood transfusions, or anything else. So abortion has to be legal too. No woman should have to carry a pregnancy to term--with all the pain and risk that means--any more than any man should be legally required to donate one of his kidneys if someone else needed it.

This was Bush's first act, and it was a worldwide attack against women, children, and those in countries without choices. It has since been reflected in Bush's policies at home.
To overturn this immediately would be a sign of positive change indeed by Mr. Obama.

The title of this idea seems misleading to me.  Why is this being called "Global Gag Rule"?  Are people being prevented from speaking or from funding these services with their own money?

I have no problem with people donating money for any worthy cause. The question is not whether or not this is a worthy cause but rather whether or not everyone should have to pay for it, regardless of their beliefs. 

I have some things I beleive strongly in and I feel privileged to be able to speak freely about them and to fund them if I care to.  

You don't have to fund them for me.  If I want you to join me in funding them, I will talk with you about it and try to have you see why it's so important, so that you want to fund it too.  If you still don't, it's okay, I am still willing to fund it.  I won't try to manipulate you into paying for something you don't want to pay for.

Why is this different?

Psalm 139
1 O Lord, you have searched me and known me!
2 You know when I sit down and when I rise up;
you discern my thoughts from afar.
3 You search out my path and my lying down
and are acquainted with all my ways.
4 Even before a word is on my tongue,
behold, O Lord, you know it altogether.

13 For you formed my inward parts;
you knitted me together in my mother's womb.
14 I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. 
Wonderful are your works;
my soul knows it very well.
15 My frame was not hidden from you,
when I was being made in secret,
intricately woven in the depths of the earth.
16 Your eyes saw my unformed substance;
in your book were written, every one of them,
the days that were formed for me,
when as yet there was none of them

President-elect Obama, fellow voters, if you agree our constitutional laws make it permissible for the U.S. government to use your tax dollars to distribute as a means of bribery Viagra to Afghani warlords and chieftains encouraging and/or enabling them into sexual activities with multiple wives, or other sexual partners, provided they become CIA informants, then doesn't the same logic or laws permit the Mexico City Policy, aka the "global gag rule", to use your tax dollars to distribute as a means of bribery U.S. aid to foreign family-planning organizations provided they give up their right to use their own non-U.S. funds to provide legal abortion or counsel, or even to refer to abortion or to lobby for the legalization of abortion; provided they give up their right to provide people with all the medical facts about protection from sexual disease transmission, effective contraception, and pregnancy management?

Amen!

"Our rights end when another person's rights begin. That means a fetus doesn't have rights so long as it needs another person to survive."

New borns still require another person to survive.  Humans are pretty dependant in fact.  At what age do we stop requiring another person to survive?  How is abortion any different that a mother drowing her 3 month old?  Why are parents who starve their children prosecuted?  Same idea, right? 

The major difference between pregnancy and a kidney transplant (besides the obvious fact that kidney transplant's leave the giver reduced for life) is that the pregnant woman is responsible for the baby being in the situation of needing her in 99% of the cases.  Not so for the person donating their kidney.

If you want to end the Global Gag Rule, check out the video from EngenderHealth -- then sign their petition -- at http://www.engenderhealth.org/globalgag/.  They've also got more background on it.

I think people are misinformed on this issue. This is not an issue about whether or not our tax payer dollars are being used to pay for abortions. This policy is used to manipulate and force other countries to conform to the US governments ideologies. The funding the country or organization is seeking might not have anything to do with abortion, but the government can refuse the aid if they are not pro life. This is exactly the point of adding "hot topics" such as abortion, and gay marriage, and whatever, it distracts people from what is really going on. Also the people concerned about our tax dollars going to women's health planning... really? do you have any idea what our tax dollars are going to?? You might be surprised at the amount of killing we pay for. All i can say is... really?? 

This gag rule is not even about the morality of abortion, it is about limiting much needed funding for very basic education and medical treatment. These programs are meant to prevent widespread AIDS epidemics that are decimating the populations of many countries, and in order to get any funding, they have to lose 1/3 of it to "abstinance" education and keep information regarding abortion from women in desperate poor areas, often victims of rape, in cultures that will blame the woman for having been raped. Please Mr. Obama, remove these "morality" clauses from this funding so people in the field can use it in the most effective ways.

AIDS IS KILLING TOO MANY PEOPLE AND SO IS THE GAG RULE. In Africa this is a big problem. We can help stop that simply by ending the Global Gag Rule. Condoms are a simple solution that will save countless lives. Twisted morals that ignore facts are killing people. My Congressman refused to accept this view because of his Catholic faith. I was not promoting abortion; I just wanted to save lives and stop unnecessary suffering. It is simple. Teach the people about sexual health, give them options to choose from, and make those options available to them (condoms). Save lives!

SEX EDUCATION SAVES LIVES AND SAVES MONEY.  do you know how many AIDS babies are born every day?   health care costs and over-population cripple low-income economies.  CONTINUED DENIAL of sex education and birth control is CONTINUED ECONOMIC OPPRESSION.  we can help Africans help themselves.

Let's end the Bush administration's obsession with abstinence. People need birth control and protection from AIDS.

It is terrible to murder babies. And it is terrible to pay for murdering babies. And it is terrible to force tax payers to pay for murdering babies. And it is terrible that there are people who vote for forcing tax payers to pay for murdering babies.

Can it be a task for a government to help und pay for murdering babies? It is terrible that some people obviously think so. But I am glad that there are more votes for the other ideas than for this crazy one.

Folks, this is NOT about whether abortion is right or wrong.  It's about whether it's OK to completely stop funding any clinic -- even those serving children, moms, dads, families, HIV patients, etc. -- if they even mention abortion or refer someone to another clinic.  Funding will be cut even if abortion is legal in that country.  Even those of us against abortion must realize that this rule is too broad and its benefits are vastly outweighed by the problems it causes.  Most clinics in Africa are multi-service clinics; these are not abortion centers!!!  Many of them don't even provide abortions, but they want to be able to refer a woman to a safe abortion center if she asks because it's legal in their country.  Instead of more specific rules about funding, abortions, etc., we get the Gag Rule: a blunt law that prevents kids from getting malaria medication, moms from getting prenatal and postnatal checkups, and couples from getting contraceptives. 

If we don't want to fund abortions, fine.  But let's find a more nuanced, targeted way of doing it.  The Gag Rule has got to go!!!

WELL SAID, Dek Ortage!

In this country, we have freedom of religion.  The controversy over abortion comes down to the definition of when life begins.  Many honorable folks believe strongly that life begins at conception.  Many other honorable folks believe it begins at the point the fetus is viable outside the mother's body.  Others believe life begins at birth or hold beliefs between these.  But: THESE ARE BELIEFS, NOT FACTS, NOT SUBJECT TO LOGIC AND NOT PROVABLE.  Like religious beliefs, honest, intelligent, good people disagree.  Therefore, the government should not pass laws promoting any of these beliefs; just as government should not legislate particular religious beliefs.  
Freedom of abortion should be protected like we protect freedom of religion, and freedom of speech.

Abortion is a moral issue; a grave moral issue. As everyone here knows; there are many facets to issues of this intensity. But it cannot be solved legally. For abortions to stop from taking place either legally or illegally, women and men have to embrace their own sexuality and treat it as a right first. We're a long way from that becoming a reality.

I believe a fetus becomes an unborn child when woman accepts the pregnancy. Each circumstance different, since it's a private decision. We should help pregnant women who want and need help, so they are not harmed by feeling they can only choose abortion. However, unwanted pregnancies also harm women. I would not presume to intrude into another person or families reproductive choices (many people are opposed to both contraception and abortion), and I wish governments should not make intrusive policy, and the "gag rule" should be ended.