Today President Obama became the first standing president to speak at a national Planned Parenthood conference. Not that you would necessarily know it from his remarks, which were not much more political than his campaign speeches.
"As long as we've got to fight to protect a woman's right to make her own choices about her own health," he pledged, "you've got a president who's going to be right there with you fighting every step of the way." The president condemned the slew of state laws aimed at regulating abortion out of existence as an "assault on women's rights," singling out Mississippi and North Dakota, but quickly segued. They reminded him how important the Affordable Care Act is, and would the health-care providers in the room to mind helping him educate people about accessing benefits?
Obama did not mention the ongoing trial of Philadelphia abortion provider Kermit Gosnell, whose dangerous and illegal late-term procedures have been used by pro-life groups as a proof of abortion's inherent gruesomeness and a liberal media conspiracy. Pro-choice groups counter that the case shows the desperate measures women will go to when there are legal or financial barriers to the safe contraception and abortions provided by people like, say, Planned Parenthood. His twelve-minute speech did not include the word "abortion."
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