Demonstrations are on at the state Capitol, busy intersections are lined with people holding up and waving placards to protest the proposed cuts to education and other services. All the while, the legislators are trying to find a way to make up a multi-billion-dollar budget deficit.
It is true that Washington pays roughly $25 million for birth control and other services to Planned Parenthood. Every year for the past 10 years, the state spends over $7 million directly to Planned Parenthood to pay for abortions through the state Medicaid program. These facts are definitively stated by the Washington State Health and Recovery Services Administration in its report dated April 8, 2010. How many of our residents know this fact? How does it happen that this expenditure goes overlooked repeatedly while there are continuous threats to cut education, which are projected to reduce the number of teachers and raise class sizes, and cut other services?
Rep. Hans Dunshee has stated that the budget has already been cut to “lean and mean” to “the bone and blood.” Seriously, Mr. Dunshee? He also says: “There’s no secret source of fat to trim…” My, oh, my, when are we going to be honest and tell the truth?
Washington is just one of a handful of states that uses taxpayer money to pay for abortions. Almost half of all the abortions in our state are now paid for with taxpayer money. In light of this, here are some questions to ponder:
1) With a multi-billion-dollar deficit, how can Olympia spend $7 million annually to subsidize the abortion industry?
2) Why is Olympia cutting education funding while not touching the abortion industry subsidies?
Don’t you think it is time the citizens of Washington held legislators accountable for such irresponsibility? For the services offered at Planned Parenthood, let that organization operate on donations only, like other nonprofit pregnancy-help organizations do.
Kenneth D. Oliver
Lynnwood
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