Why Women Should Never Vote Republican: Reason 1,326

It was once said by a great comedian that the very people who think the United States is indisputably the greatest nation on Earth have probably never traveled outside of the country. Most people who make that argument are not drawing from any significant statistical fact, but rather from the same emotion and blind faith rendered by telling your classmate on the bus that your dad could beat up his dad.

After all, if the measure of a great Democracy includes how free its press is, the quality of public education, how it treats its minority populations, its poor, its incarcerated, and access to health care, Canada, Europe and parts of Asia are surging ahead in this pointless water cooler debate.

We’re one of the few 1st world nations actually rolling back, not expanding sex education, reproductive and abortion rights for women. We’re one of the few 1st world nations to have prison over crowding to the extent that we do. Our public school children are lagging behind in science, math, and social studies, while our citizens storm out of Bill Nye the Science Guy lectures due to offensive content about the moon’s light.

Oh, and take a look at whose company we keep in terms of Death penalty advocation.

We need to make changes if we’re going to remain reclaim the title of best nation on Earth. Perhaps we could start with some changes in health care:

…the United States has the second worst newborn mortality rate in the developed world, according to a new report. American babies are three times more likely to die in their first month as children born in Japan, and newborn mortality is 2.5 times higher in the United States than in Finland, Iceland or Norway, Save the Children researchers found.

Only Latvia, with six deaths per 1,000 live births, has a higher death rate for newborns than the United States.

For African-Americans, the mortality rate is nearly double that of the United States as a whole, with 9.3 deaths per 1,000 births. Only 17 percent of all U.S. births were to African-American families, but 33 percent of all low-birthweight babies were African-American, according to the report.

Charles MacCormack, president and CEO of Save the Children, said the report card "illustrates the direct line between the status of mothers and the status of their children.” Tinker said Japan was among a number of nations highly ranked mainly because they offer free health services for pregnant women and babies, while the United States suffers from disparities in access to health care.

The report highlights the three areas it says have the most influence on child well-being: female education, presence of a trained attendant at birth and use of family planning services.

The report said that family planning and increased contraception use leads to lower maternal and infant death rates. Many women and children in developing nations, it said, die as a result of births that come at the wrong time -- too close together, too early or too late in the mother's life.

So keeping the above information in mind, let’s read between the lines, and look at the Conservative agenda, dancing a sick Waltz of ignorance with today’s Republican leadership:

Decrease financial aid to those living below the poverty line while increasing aid to corporations

Continually vote against the universal health care plans for which Democrats and most of the country are a fighting to instate.

Stand in direct opposition of Planned Parenthood services, denying women access to health care, sexual and relationship health-related information.

Draft legislation chipping away at the opportunity for higher education among minorities.

Provide funding for abstinence only instruction, completely disregarding sex education, contraception, and teen gay & lesbian relationships.

Lobby against Title IX, passed by liberals in Congress in the early 1970’s which has had a direct effect in increasing women’s education at the collegiate level.

And so it is, one of the great hypocrisies of conservatives and the majority of the Republican party. How many times have these people rallied their troops around the theme of “saving” or helping children? How often have they bolstered their votes by targeting mothers, children, and the sanctity of life? These are the representatives of God, of Christianity, of children, and the culture of life?

Their political values are in stark opposition with reports such as these, and the standards with which we measure our success as a nation and a society. Their answer to the value of human society is not to educate and empower; it’s to shove feeding tubes down the throats of incoherent, brain damaged vegetables.

Conservatives therefore have two choices. Start adopting liberal philosophy in order to improve the health of children and mothers…OR…stop saying you care about children and mothers. You have to choose one, you cannot have both.

We’ll await your response.