Bush’s funding cuts have severe repercussions

Adams is a fourth-year political science, policy studies and
women’s studies student.

By Jama Adams

Last week, in his first act as the de facto leader of the free
world, George W. Bush finally gave us proof of just how
compassionate a conservative he is. With the stroke of his newly
executive pen, he reinstated the Reagan- and Bush-era “global
gag rule.” Basically, no group receiving U.S. funding is
allowed to even mention the word “abortion” in family
planning counseling. Though this may seem like a harmless moral
stance, it makes a huge statement about what we can expect from
George W. Bush in the next few years.

Just like George Bush Sr., he made what I believe to be an
un-compassionate, very conservative move. But while both
characteristics are related, each is alarming on a different
count.

First of all, was this a compassionate move? It was solely a
political gesture. At least that’s what people who
don’t realize what its actual effect will be on millions of
women around the world would say. And yes, an executive order made
by the president of the United States can and will affect people
all over the world. Bush’s political posturing will serve to
silence international women’s rights movements and
effectively force much of the world back into ignorance.

This action could be an ominous foreshadowing of four years of
the national and global imposition of George W. Bush’s form
of morality. But even if this was just a political bone thrown to
conservatives, how is it that Bush dared make ethical compromises
at the expense of women and children all over the world? Because
neither he nor any important voting bloc in the United States will
have to experience the real effects of his “political
move.”

International family planning groups who could before at least
inform people of all their options when dealing with an unwanted
pregnancy, now cannot even mention the word
“abortion.”

By ending support for family planning in other countries, he
ties the hands of the people who know best what is appropriate to a
given situation: the family planning counselor and, ultimately, the
mother.

Besides being morally imperialistic, this policy simply will not
do what it is intended to do. It will not end abortions. It will
only make them more difficult for women to obtain, and therefore
more dangerous for the mother.

Furthermore, the elimination of information about reproductive
choices often forces families (and often single mothers) to condemn
their child to a life of suffering if they are not able to
adequately care for them. President Bush is not “saving
children” with this policy, but sacrificing them. I shudder
to think what other horrible repercussions this action will have on
people all around the globe.

Compassionate? Now, how about conservative? As stated before,
this particular policy has consequences that will be felt mostly in
developing countries that rely on this small chunk of the United
States’ budget. But personal liberties we all take for
granted, especially reproductive rights, hang in the balance should
George Bush try to further his repressive moral aims.

The standard he set last Monday should be unnerving for anyone
who values personal liberties. Both women and men should be
concerned about government interference with very personal choices
such as whether to bring another life into this world. The saddest
part is that almost no one noticed, because the plight of poor
women throughout the world largely fails to affect our everyday
consciousness in the United States. We still have access to
reproductive choices. That is, of course, until President Bush
decides this move wasn’t enough to please his buddies who
claim to have the moral high ground.

Imagine this chilling scenario: Ashcroft, Bush and the religious
right have won out, and Roe v. Wade has been overturned by
conservative justices. The pill is gone, and the government gets to
decide when you will create life. If that’s not a scary
example of the big government Republicans claim to fear, I
don’t know what is.

I find it disconcerting that Bush’s first act as president
is to appease his right-wing Christian conservative buddies. During
the campaign, he reassured us all that legal abortions and the Roe
v. Wade decision were not in jeopardy. But his first act as
president was to restrict reproductive options for women in other
countries. This trend of reneging on his promises during his first
day in office concerns me.

It is even more offensive that he tries to pretend that being
anti-abortion is part of a “culture of life.” The same
children you “saved” from abortions will likely starve
to death because you did nothing to help them survive once they are
born into this world. With this action, Bush falls into the
hypocrisy of advocating a so-called “culture of life”
and then allowing these “precious lives” to barely eke
out a pathetic existence that will lead to an untimely death.

What some would call a valiant effort to “save unborn
children,” I would call a condemnation to a harsh life of
suffering. It seems ironic to me that the same interests who see
overpopulation as the prominent issue for a globalizing world are
the ones who encourage it with policies such as this one.

The reasons conservatives like to call overpopulation the
biggest threat to human existence, naming it the “Population
Bomb” and other such violent characterizations, are that the
people having the most children are those least able to support
them. This is often true, especially in the countries in which Bush
ended support for abortions.

But in a rush to morally condemn these people, policy-makers in
the Bush mold do not stop to examine the reasons why these people
are unable to support a child. If the parents of the unwanted
children live in poverty, one can be sure the newborn child will
also be living in squalor.

Mr. Bush, if you really are a “compassionate
conservative,” then show us that you truly value human
life!