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The struggle to get Canadian women a good non-surgical option for abortion received little attention for years

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Before 2017, nearly all Canadian women seeking abortions had to undergo surgery, while women elsewhere could choose medication to induce a miscarriage.

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For decades, Canada didnt have the gold standard abortion pill, mifepristone (also known as RU-486, or Mifegymiso). After being used in France for 30 years and the United States for 15, the abortion pill was finally approved in Canada in 2015 under Stephen Harpers Conservatives, becoming available to the public in 2017. Among progressive politicians, only Thomas Mulcairs New Democratic Party had pressed the issue. The Liberals did nothing. On the last major front for Canadian abortion rights, progressive politicians were largely silent.

Many are now professing commitments to abortion rights now that the U.S. Supreme Court has overruled Roe v. Wade and with it, federally protected abortion rights. The Dobbs v. Jacksondecision means individual states can now decide whether to permit or ban abortions.

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Beware the fairweather activism. The struggle to get Canadian women a good non-surgical option for abortion received less news coverage and parliamentary attention in 20 years than Roe v. Wade did in the past two months.

Beware the fairweather activism

While surgery was used for nearly all abortions in Canada before mifepristone was easily available, thats now down to about two-thirds as a result of usage of the medication. About 100,000 abortions are performed per year in Canada. If the abortion pill had been approved at the same time as it was in the U.S., it would have prevented roughly 510,000 surgeries (30,000 per year for 17 years). Notably, access to abortion medication doesnt increase the overall abortion rate it simply reduces the proportion of surgeries.

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In France, women could use the abortion pill starting in the late 1980s. When the United States approved mifepristone in 2000, there was hope it might soon come to Canada the manufacturer said it wouldnt try until approval was secured in the U.S. to prevent any black markets. A 2001 article in the Canadian Medical Journal of Health said Health Canada would fast-track approval when a submission was made. Physicians were urged in 2006 to ask Health Canada to consider the drug.

Nearly a decade went by and nothing happened. The NDP began to publicly push for mifepristone in November 2013, when then-MP Libby Davies asked the deputy minister of health, George Da Pont, why the drug wasnt available in Canada. He said he hadnt received an application. This was wrong an application was first submitted to Health Canada in December 2011, and was resubmitted in 2012.

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In early 2014, the Canadian Medical Journal of Health published a scathing editorial outlining literally, with a map how Canada was an outlier in the developed world. Delays in mifepristones approval were reported by CBC, which cited longtime activists and the NDPs health critic Davies. Nicki Ashton, another NDP MP, questioned the government once more about the delays. A Conservative MP in mid-2014 presented a petition asking the then minister of health, Rona Ambrose, to reject mifepristone. The next day, the NDP pressed Ambrose about whether political intervention was holding up the drugs approval. She said it was all in Health Canadas hands. Mulcair, leading the NDP, warned against political interference; Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau simply said he trusted the scientists to go through the proper procedures.

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Ambrose, in fact, had statutory powers under the Food and Drugs Act that could have expedited or added hurdles to the process. Both the NDP and the Liberals could have asked more about this they just didnt. In December 2014, Health Canada said it would decide whether to approve the drug by mid-January 2015; when that rolled around, it was delayed without explanation. Approval was finally stamped in July 2015 permitting use starting in July 2016. Conservative cabinet ministers and even big-tent progressives like Michelle Rempel Garner declined to comment; a pro-life MP voiced disappointment. The drugs market debut was pushed back to January 2017. Rollout at the provincial level was slow.

Heavy restrictions limited use to the first seven weeks of pregnancy following an ultrasound, and required a doctor to dispense it (not a pharmacist, which doctors thought was pointless). By mid-2017, regulatory bodies for physicians and pharmacists advised members to ignore certain strict requirements. Facing a mutiny, in late 2017 Health Canada bumped the use cap to nine weeks and permitted pharmacists to dispense it. Mandatory ultrasounds were dropped in 2019.

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Mifepristone took years to approve

A column by the Globe and Mails Andr Picard called the medications long road to approval shameful. It was a fair assessment. Mifepristone took years to approve, while the norm was 300 days.

Libertarian, socially-progressive Conservatives had little to say about this the least they could have done was ask for a progress report. Liberals were equally silent in the House of Commons. Only the NDP can say they pressed for access to abortion medication on the public record, and they only did this 13 years after the U.S. approval.

Its hard to tell if the problem was a lack of answers, because there was a profound lack of questions in the first place. Regardless, the cone of political silence on mifepristone imposed 510,000 unnecessary surgeries on women who would have chosen otherwise.

Keep those women in mind when opportunistic politicians ride the media wave of Roe v. Wade.

National Post

Email: sarkonakj@protonmail.com | Twitter: Twitter.com/sarkonakj

Jamie Sarkonak is an Edmonton writer.

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Jamie Sarkonak: Progressives failed Canadian women on the abortion pill - National Post

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Link:
Beverage presenting water plan to Union County Progressives at 6 p.m. June 30 - La Grande Observer

Its time to state the obvious: The Republican Party has gone bull goose bonkers. Its leaders have turned the GOP brand into an unprincipled gaggle of corporate profiteers, hatemongers, and screwball conspiracy theorists. Theyre so far out that even the Hubble Space Telescope cant find them!

But where is the Democratic Party? Heres a prime opportunity to forge a solid political coalitiona multiracial, urban-rural, farm-labor alliance based on fundamental principles of fairness and opportunity for all. Isnt that what the party says it stands for? This is the time to prove it, to reach out and unite ordinary Americans behind a national agenda of lasting progressive change.

Its not like the party elders would have to start from scratch. An energized, feisty movement of grassroots battlers against corporate greed and government injustice is already organizing, winning, and growing in popular support all across the country. But the national partys old-line clique of big funders, paid consultants, and corporate politicos shun less traditionally established Democrats as unruly outsiders.

Rather than welcoming and building on the exciting advances of these popular movements, Democratic insiders keep hoping that the GOPs goofiness and nastiness will turn off enough voters that Democrats can win by default.

Meanwhile, they only push modest, incremental reforms so as not to offend corporate funders or spook moderate Republicans. Hellooooo, brilliant strategists: A primary function of the Democratic Party is to offend the corporate powers! Also, there are only about six moderate Republicans left in the United States, so appeasing them is not a big winespecially when it costs you the support of grassroots voters eager for a politics that is bold enough and big enough to end business-as-usual economics.

It takes intentional gutsiness to create a politics that actually advances Americas historic democratic promise. Republicans wont do that. Will Democrats?

The opposite of courage is not cowardiceits conformity. And right there lies the problem with the Big Money that now controls the Democratic Party.

This group certainly wants Democrats to be the majority party, but for what purpose? Based on the policies they actually push, they seek progress without real change. Go slow and go small, they urge, only offering policy tweaks that conform to the existing corporate structure. Their watered down idea of change is what near beer is to beer, only less satisfying.

Worse, when grassroots progressives put real, FDR-style, Big D Democratic ideas on the national agenda, the Dem hierarchy turns into a bunch of fraidy cat Democrats, mewling that a federal living wage, a tax on billionaires, health care for all, breaking up monopoly power, strengthening unions, a nationwide child care program, and other fundamental changes are too extreme. Such boldness, they cry, will frighten voters!

They are wrong, of course, and politically inept. Such direct-benefit, were-on-your-side changes in todays corporate-run system are the Democrats most popular proposals. Polls confirm that this is especially true among working-class voters in small and medium-sized manufacturing towns, where Democrats have been getting creamed.

In 2021, Jacobin magazine partnered with YouGov and the Center for Working-Class Politics to conduct a survey of 2,000 working-class voters in five swing states. The results showed a preference for candidates that focus on bread-and-butter economic issues and use populist, class-based progressive campaign messagingalbeit with language avoiding divisive or woke terms.

If anything, Democrats who are moderate in challenging corporate elitism and hesitant to invoke class are the partys greatest liabilities in winning over working people. After all, theyve seen CEOs move their decent-paying jobs out of the country, watched monopolies and Wall Street squeeze the lifeblood out of family farm opportunities, and witnessed Amazon and Walmart eating Main Street alive.

Where, they ask, is the Democratic Party that once stood up for us?

Contrary to the contrived wisdom of party elites, these people despise big corporations, love unions, and have minimal interest in the GOPs culture war issues. They yearn for a party thatll join the grassroots in battling the bastards and fighting for a no-bullshit agenda of economic fairness.

The question they have for Democrats is basic: Do you just intend to hold office . . . or use it?

Link:
Vox Populist: Democrats, Rise to This Occasion - Progressive.org

Last year, the Pew Research Center conducted a study on the current state of religious affiliation in America. Its polling suggests that the COVID-19 pandemic accelerated a trend of a country becoming more secular. In its findings, 20 percent of respondents described their religion as nothing in particular, up from 14 percent 10 years ago. According to last years Gallup poll, Americans who said they belonged to a church, synagogue, or mosque fell to 47 percent, and, for the first time in history, church membership in the U.S. fell below 50 percent.

Surprisingly, the pandemics role in shifting Americans away from religious observance did not extend to education. Sensing an advantage over self-serving teachers unions that kept public schools shut during the pandemic, religious schools spent considerable financial resources to reopen schools safely. By acknowledging that children learn better by attending school in person, Catholic and Jewish schools benefited from the Lefts misguided COVID policies by welcoming more students into their classrooms.

And while matriculating more children is a positive development, schools that serve families who choose them based on the convenience of in-person education rather than religious conviction will inevitably face new problems. More specifically, by appealing to a broader swath of Americans, religious schools risk succumbing to progressive pedagogies that are pervasive in contemporary society, such as the infamous CRT.

Today, Americas Catholic schools are emerging as a viable alternative to public institutions, reversing a decades-long drop in enrollment. Efforts to continue in-person learning resulted in Catholic schools welcoming an additional 62,000 students during the 202122 academic year, reflecting a 3.8 percent increase in registration.

Yet some of those Catholic schools are introducing into their curricula Critical Race Theory (CRT), an ideology whose precepts state that racism is systemic in American institutions and that individuals are either oppressors or victims. This despite the fact that upholding values consistent with dignity and respect for humankind is central to Catholicism.

Last year, the Conference of Sacred Heart Education, representing a consortium of 25 Catholic schools in North America, issued a statement affirming its commitment to work towards racial equity and the end to systemic racism. National Review also noted the appointment of Belkise Dallam, who will serve as the first director of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) at Regis High School, an all-boys Catholic school. In her role, Dallam will work closely with and report to the newly formed DEI committee and school president.

Florida also is not immune to controversy surrounding questionable Catholic school practices. In Tampa, Anthony and Barbara Scarpo alleged that the Academy of the Holy Names was distancing itself from mainstream Catholicism and embracing the new, politically correct, divisive, and woke culture. In November, their lawsuit requesting that the school return their $1.35 million gift and grant them a tuition refund was dismissed. The courts decision was preceded by an open letter signed by over 500 Academy of the Holy Names graduates supporting the school and refuting the Scarpos criticism.

In Jewish education, attempts to repackage Judaism to fit within liberal doctrine are occurring at several Jewish schools. Educational mission statements often emphasize social justice above Torah values. At the same time, anti-Semitism is increasingly presented only as a product of the extreme right rather than emanating from the intersectional left, where its center of gravity lies. Rather than focus on biblical texts, schools are redefining the daily morning prayer service to include options such as creative expression, where students are taught to be open-minded and reflective. Within the classroom, instruction at schools like the Abraham Joshua Heschel School highlights CRT and gender ideology, with former Heschel parent Harvey Goldman telling the New York Post last year that instructors were teaching inappropriate lessons on race and gender, including asking fourth-graders, If they were transgender, what would their pronoun be?(READ MORE from Irit Tratt: Radical Gender Ideology Is Still Spreading in Schools)

A natural outgrowth of promulgating such intersectional myths, beyond the damage to the children themselves, is that support for Israel is inevitably compromised. During the COVID pandemic, when travel to Israel was scarce and large-scale advocacy was on hold, anti-Israel politicians, like Democrat Congressman Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.), were invitedto address Jewish students. Bowman, who recently co-sponsored a resolutionwith fellow Squad members calling Israels founding a catastrophe, spoke to children at Salanter Akiba Riverdale Academy (SAR), a Modern Orthodox Jewish day school. He was given a warm reception by the schools Rabbi, who told Bowman SAR was blessed to have had him as a recent visitor to the school.

And at other academic establishments, diversity statements are supplanting any mention of Israel, its bolstering no longer presented as a core value to the progressive leanings of many Jewish schools.

Rather than confront these challenges alone, parents across the religious spectrum should cultivate relationships, establish after-school partnerships, and respond to the evolving landscape in Americas religious day schools. Successfully committing to an education rooted in tradition and free of politicization requires collaboration. Advocating for our childrens future is an issue that, by uniting parents, will also transcend religious boundaries.

Irit Tratt is a writer who resides in New York. The authors work has been published in the Jerusalem Post, the Algemeiner, JNS, and Israel Hayom.

More:
Religious Schools Are Progressives Next Target - The American ...

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In the face of disasterbecause thats exactly what the overturning of Roe is for countless families, caretakers, future generations, all of usPresident Biden seems to have his hands tied. The looming battle ahead, he believes, will fall on voters to fight. You can have the final word, the president told Americans in a somber address on Friday. This is not over.

But for many of us watching, Bidens attempt to galvanize amid tragedy had something of an opposite effect. It felt demoralizing. After all, Roe and reproductive rights were on the ballot the last go-around, and this is where weve landedand thats with (albeit extremely slim) control of Congress. So when Biden, along with Democratic leaders, claims that Roe is on the ballot this November, Ive got to wonder, is it really?

For me, what is on the ballot will largely depend on how far this White House will be willing to go amid an unprecedented attack that foretells a bigger war on so much else. Lacking filibuster-proof votes in the Senate, the president has already signaled that his executive options are highly constrained. But in the exceedingly rare chance that he changes his mind, here are some neat ideas he could take on, from his fellow Dems, including Sen. Elizabeth Warren who kicked off the Sunday morning news circuit with a booming call to expand the Supreme Court.

I believe we need to get some confidence back in our court, and that means we need more justices on the United States Supreme Court, Warren told ABC News. Its happened before, weve done it before. We need to do it again.

It looks like a bunch of other popular Democrats want the same thing.

Okay. Biden has expressly rejected that one. What about the filibuster? Could it finally be time to ditch the senatorial tool in order to codify Roe? Doesnt look like it to Joe. But for a growing number of Democrats, the urgency of the moment has well and truly arrived.

In the coming months, well see if Biden is willing to go beyond please vote.

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Progressives Turn Up the Heat on Biden to Do Literally Anything About the Supreme Court Mother Jones - Mother Jones