Susan G Komen ends Planned Parenthood grants

**czb** · February 2nd, 2012, 01:22 PM

thanks, all, for posting your comments here.

i emailed SGK and signed the petition that was mentioned in this thread.

i have never liked SGK, i always thought they were too 'corporate', but felt a lot of family pressure to contribute as another family member does the annual walk. it's pretty sad since this family member is a total sweetheart and she takes the foundation pretty seriously, she has been to a lot of their fundraisers and has even appeared in a commerical and print ads of theirs. not sure what to do . . . .

**McJag** · February 2nd, 2012, 01:38 PM

Top Komen Official resigns over Planned Parenthood cavein

Thanks,Brookie. That whole article just confirms the new no investigation rule was just strictly aimed at PP. As if we didn't guess!

I am aware some of you have very strict budgets.

If anyone cannot afford a donation to PP and wants to anyway, let me know.
I will donate $5 in your name and have a thank you sent to that Bitch Karen Handel, given an opportunity.

**Sasha** · February 2nd, 2012, 01:46 PM

**Brookie** · February 2nd, 2012, 01:52 PM

Love the "new ad". I think they should "run" with it.

**Butterfly** · February 2nd, 2012, 03:27 PM

Bloomberg to donate $250k to Planned Parenthood* - NY Daily News

Mayor Bloomberg plans to give Planned Parenthood $250,000 to make up for money it lost when a breast cancer group cut its funding.

“Politics have no place in health care,” Bloomberg said in a statement on Thursday. “Breast cancer screening saves lives and hundreds of thousands of women rely on Planned Parenthood for access to care. We should be helping women access that care, not placing barriers in their way.”

The controversy erupted this week after the Susan G. Komen for the Cure foundation said it would not renew most of the grants it made to Planned Parenthood for breast cancer screenings -- about $700,000 annually.

The foundation said its decision was based on a new policy against funding organizations under government investigation.

And a Republican congressman from Florida recently launched an inquiry into whether Planned Parenthood was using public funds for abortions.

Critics, though, say the funds were cut because of a new anti-abortion chief at Komen, Senior Vice President Karen Handel, a conservative who made an unsuccessful bid to be Georgia’s governor.

Cecile Richards, the president of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, issued a statement saying that it was “enormously grateful to Mayor Bloomberg.”

“This contribution will help ensure that politics don’t interfere with women having access to health care,” the statement said. “People all across the country have stepped forward in the last 48 hours to offer help and support, and the mayor’s donation will help ensure that no woman is denied breast cancer services because of right-wing political pressure campaigns.”

Bloomberg will donate a dollar for every new dollar that Planned Parenthood brings in, up to $250,000.

tmoore@nydailynews.com

**BBDSP** · February 2nd, 2012, 03:33 PM

^^ That's awesome.

**sluce** · February 2nd, 2012, 03:34 PM

That gave me shivers. May all those who have that level of wealth step to the plate today.

**Butterfly** · February 2nd, 2012, 04:03 PM

Komen Also Stops Funding Embryonic Stem Cell Research Centers | LifeNews.com

In addition to stopping funding for the Planned Parenthood abortion business, Komen for the Cure has also quietly stopped funding embryonic stem cell research centers, another concern for pro-life advocates.

As LifeNews reported last July, Karen Malec of the Coalition on Abortion/Breast Cancer spent time examining Komen’s 990 Forms for the IRS for 2010 and she found that Komen has active relationships with at least five research groups or educational facilities that engage in embryonic stem cell research, which requires the destruction of unborn children in their earliest days for stem cells that have yet to help any patients.

The return showed donations from Komen totaling $3.75 million to Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, $4.5 million to the University of Kansas Medical Center, $1 million to the U.S. National Cancer Institute, $1 million to the Society for Women’s Health Research, and $600,000 to Yale University. All of them have embryonic stem cell research programs.

On November 30, 2011, Komen quietly added a new statement to its web site stating that it does not support embryonic stem cell research but supports the kinds that do not involve the destruction of human life.

“Komen supports research on the isolation, derivation, production, and testing of stem cells that are capable of producing all or almost all of the cell types of the developing body and may result in improved understanding of or treatments for breast cancer, but are derived without creating a human embryo or destroying a human embryo,” Komen says. “A priority in our research funding is to quickly find and deliver effective treatments, especially for the most lethal forms of breast cancer, while seeking effective preventive strategies, enhanced screening methodologies, and solutions to disparities in breast cancer outcomes for diverse women.”

**greysfang** · February 2nd, 2012, 04:10 PM

Yeah, because those research centers hunt women down and rip fetuses out of their wombs to obtain their raw materials.

**Butterfly** · February 2nd, 2012, 04:14 PM

I think they are "under investigation" and it had nothing to do with politics at all.

They must all think we are a bunch of fucking morons.

**twitchy2.0** · February 2nd, 2012, 04:14 PM

Originally Posted by greysfang

Yeah, because those research centers hunt women down and rip fetuses out of their wombs to obtain their raw materials.

Those weren't fetuses, those were "unborn children"!!!

---------------------------------------------

Susan G. Komen Planned Parenthood funding decision sparks donation spike, strong reactions

JOSHUA ROBERTS/REUTERS - Members of Planned Parenthood, NARAL Pro-Choice America and more than 20 other organizations hold a "Stand Up for Women's Health" rally in support of preventive health care and family planning services, including abortion.

Thursday, February 2, 1:46 PM

The Susan G Komen for the Cure foundation’s decision to defund Planned Parenthood has sparked reactions from people across the political spectrum, and a spike in Planned Parenthood donations. As Sarah Kliff and Lena H. Sun reported:

Donors reacting to the Susan G. Komen Foundation’s decision to cut off funding to Planned Parenthood contributed $650,000 in 24 hours, nearly enough to replace last year’s Komen funding, Planned Parenthood executives said Wednesday.

The organization had raised more than $400,000 from more than 6,000 online donors as of Wednesday afternoon, compared with the 100 to 200 donations it receives on an average day, said Tait Sye, a spokesman for the Planned Parenthood Federation of America. He said donations were still coming in.

The group also launched a Breast Health Emergency Fund to ensure funding to affiliates that will lose their Komen grants. That fund received a $250,000 gift from the family foundation of Dallas philanthropist Lee Fikes and his wife, Amy.

“People respond powerfully when they see politics interfering with women’s health,” Sye said. “That’s why we’ve seen a tremendous outpouring of support.”

Komen officials told the Associated Press on Tuesday that they had decided to stop funding Planned Parenthood, saying a new national policy barred support for organizations under government investigation. A House committee began a probe in September into Planned Parenthood’s compliance with federal restrictions on funding abortions.

Planned Parenthood said the fund cutoff is the result of Komen bowing to pressure from anti-abortion activists. Komen also hired a vice president last year, Karen Handel, who had previously advocated for the group’s defunding in her run for Georgia governor.

Some analysts credit Americans United for Life as a major factor in the decision of the House subcommittee to investigate Planned Parenthood. As Sarah Kliff explained:

In the aftermath of the Susan G. Komen Foundation for the Cure’s decision to defund Planned Parenthood, a lot of attention has been paid to the role of its Vice President for Policy, Karen Handel. She joined the group last January, after a failed run for governor in Georgia, where she had advocated for Planned Parenthood’s defunding.

But there’s another woman who deserves equal credit: Americans United for Life President Charmaine Yoest. It’s her group that issued a report last fall, “The Case for Investigating Planned Parenthood,” that led to a probe by the Energy and Commerce Committee. And it’s that investigation that puts Planned Parenthood in violation of Komen’s new policy that bars funding of groups under investigation.

Yoest has run Americans United for Life for three years. She came to the group from former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee’s presidential campaign, and before that, served as the Family Research Council’s vice president for communications. She moved to Washington in the 1980s to work in the Reagan administration. But she counts this as perhaps her biggest victory.

“I have to say, it was some of the best news of my entire life,” Yoest told me in an interview this morning about the Komen decision. She saw the news yesterday afternoon, sitting in her driveway and checking Twitter.

“We’re so used to seeing Planned Parenthood succeed at defining themselves as the trendy place to be, and for Komen to make such a smart decision in recognizing the reality behind Planned Parenthood spin,” she adds. “As a breast cancer survivor, I was always troubled with this whole idea that the nation’s largest abortion provider was enmeshed in the breast cancer fight when they weren’t actually doing mammograms. I look at this as smart stewardship.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/politi...okQ_story.html

**Butterfly** · February 2nd, 2012, 04:26 PM

Susan G. Komen Top Officials Resign As Backlash Gains Steam

Dr. Kathy Plesser, a Manhattan radiologist on the medical advisory board of Susan G. Komen for the Cure's New York chapter, said she plans to resign from her position unless Komen reverses its decision to pull grant money from Planned Parenthood.

"I’m a physician and my interest is women’s health, and I am disturbed by Komen’s decision because I am a very strong advocate for serving under-served women," Plesser told The Huffington Post. "Eliminating this funding will mean there’s no place for these women to go. Where are these women to go to have a mammography? Do they not deserve to have mammography?"

With her decision, Plesser joins Komen's top public health official, Mollie Williams, and the executive director of Komen's Los Angeles County chapter, Deb Anthony, both of whom also resigned in protest.

Susan G. Komen, the nation's largest breast cancer charity, announced on Tuesday that it had adopted a new rule against partnering with organizations that are under investigation, and that it would therefore sever ties with Planned Parenthood, which is currently under investigation in Congress. The groups that prompted that investigation are anti-abortion advocacy organizations that have long criticized Planned Parenthood, primarily a women's health and family planning organization, over the fact that some of its clinics offer abortions.

Komen has faced an increasing amount of pressure from the public, women's health groups, lawmakers and even some of its own regional affiliates to reverse the decision and continue its five-year partnership with Planned Parenthood. The $600,000 that Komen donated annually to the organization provided underserved women with free and low-cost breast exams.

Planned Parenthood announced Wednesday that it had received $400,000 in donations in the 24 hours following Komen's announcement. In addition, New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg said on Thursday that he would give $250,000 to Planned Parenthood to help make up for the loss.

“Politics have no place in health care,” he said in a statement. “Breast cancer screening saves lives and hundreds of thousands of women rely on Planned Parenthood for access to care. We should be helping women access that care, not placing barriers in their way."

A spokesperson for Rep. Mike Honda (D-Calif.) said that he personally called Komen founder Nancy Brinker to complain when he heard the news on Tuesday, and he and 22 other members of the House of Representatives have signed onto a letter asking her to reverse her decision.

"This is an alarming development resulting from political pressure from anti-women’s health organizations," the letter says. "We ask – in the strongest possible terms – that Susan G. Komen reconsider its decision, as the health of millions of brave women everywhere demands the same kind of bravery exhibited the Komen Foundation."

A similar letter was signed by two dozen senators.

Komen maintains that pressure from anti-abortion groups and the recent hiring of vice president Karen Handel, who ran for governor of Georgia on an anti-Planned Parenthood platform as a Republican in 2010, had nothing to do with the decision. Founder Nancy Brinker went on the defensive Thursday during an appearance on MSNBC, saying that the decision was a result of a number of congressional and state investigations into Planned Parenthood, and that most people actually applauded the decision to defund the family planning provider.

"All I can tell you is that the responses we're getting are very, very favorable," she told host Andrea Mitchell. "People who have bothered to read the material, who have bothered to understand the issues-- again, we work for a mission every day of our lives."

Honda, whose chief of staff is a breast cancer survivor, said he is concerned that Komen's decision will set a precedent, in which any politician can simply open an investigation into a group they disagree with now in order to jeopardize that group's funding.

"We know that breast cancer does not discriminate, nor should our support to vanquish the disease," he said.

**McJag** · February 2nd, 2012, 05:00 PM

Karen Handel should resign immediately. She has lost them a lot of money and support, now good people are leaving instead of her. Better yet, fire her.

**lurkur** · February 2nd, 2012, 05:12 PM

Just chiming in to say, I love all y'all bitches up in he-ah!!! Don't mess with the coterie!!!

**greysfang** · February 2nd, 2012, 05:22 PM

Originally Posted by greysfang

Oh, so SGK's statement was that their decision was NOT politically motivated but because PP was under investigation, yet their VP, Karen Handel, retweets this comment:

JadeMorey Jade Morey
Just like a pro-abortion group to turn a cancer orgs decision into a political bomb to throw. Cry me a freaking river.
2 hours ago Favorite Retweet Reply
Retweeted by karenhandel

https://twitter.com/#!/karenhandel

Fuck all those dumb motherfuckers. Bet that bitch is out of a job by the end of this week.

What a shock! The dumb skunt deleted all her tweets yesterday. Deleted all her tweets for months. There's now only one from january and the next batch is from September. Imagine that.