NOW-NYS President Marcia Pappas Says "Stop Stupak"

Women in Congess Should Make History and Walk Out!

ALBANY, NY (03/20/2010)(readMedia)-- According to NOW-NYS (National Organization For Women) President Marcia Pappas, President Barack Obama, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid "are making a deal with the devil." Pappas explained: "Through a nefarious parliamentary procedure, the extreme anti-choice "Stupak" language (forbidding even privately-funded abortion coverage) would be tied to the Health Care Bill, which already contains a funding prohibition which satisfies even thousands of Catholic nuns. What these Democrats don't know is that their quest to make health-reform history will not wash away the blood on their hands from women forced into illegal, unsafe abortions."

Pro-choice House members are reportedly in vehement revolt, threatening to kill the health care bill. And in an already widely-circulated article by Jane Hamsher in Firedog-3/19/19 http://fdlaction.firedoglake.com/author/Jane-2/, Pappas urges Congressional women to take immediate action:

March 19, 2010

Open letter to every woman in Congress:

Today, women in the United States are fighting for their lives. You must fight too! A woman's right to have safe and legal abortion is about to be traded away.

We are asking all of you fight like you have never fought before. Tonight, It has become clear that the our Democratic President Obama, Democratic Speaker of the House (Nancy Pelosi) and Democratic Leader (Harry Reid) are trading away women's lives.

Every woman in Congress should MAKE HISTORY AND WALK OUT! This is your chance to stand up for what is right! Forget politics, forget saving your seat! You must take a chance! If you sit back and allow the passage of the health care bill with "Stupak," women in America will not vote for another Democrat…..myself included. Because there will essentially be no difference between the Democrats and the Republicans.

What will it be? Will you all go down in history following the boys, or will you finally stand up for what is right? It's up to all of you. We elected you because we believed that having women at the table would make a difference. Don't let us down.

Marcia Pappas,President NOW-NYS

Of Obama's recent contention that legislation is "messy" Pappas wondered: "President Obama, I ask you, who is going clean up this mess when women cannot get safe and legal abortion? Who is going to help those women and how will their faith help them?"