Bush: Attacking the Family, Again

Anti-family forces have long been in control at the Bush Department of Health and Human Services. But the irony of Bush's latest appointment to lead the Office of Population Affairs could have been lost on no one except those who felt that John Bolton was an inspired choice to be U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations. As Deputy Assistant Secretary for Population Affairs, Dr. Eric Keroack will be in charge of the Title X program, which has provided confidential and unbiased contraceptive services to women in need, without regard to age or income, for more than three decades. (That Title X was originally signed into law by President Richard M. Nixon and was called an urgent "public health matter" by George H.W. Bush in 1969 shows how far the anti-family Republican Party of today has strayed from its roots.) Dr. Keroack is an obstetrician-gynecologist who serves as the medical director of A Woman’s Concern, a so-called "crisis pregnancy center" which counsels women not to have abortions. AWC calls the distribution of birth control, for which Dr. Keroack will now be responsible in his new role at HHS, "demeaning to women, degrading of human sexuality and adverse to human health and happiness." To the patriot-haters in control of the Executive Branch of our government, it seems, forced unplanned child-bearing honors women and celebrates human sexuality.

--Dr. Carole Fisher-Ford, MD, MPH, Margaret Sanger Fellow