Ruben Navarrette Jr. had an apoplectic fit over increased funding for birth control in the stimulus bill. He takes issue particularly with a comment by Speaker Nancy Pelosi about how funding for birth control helps the economy:
“The family planning services reduce cost. They reduce cost. The states are in terrible fiscal budget crises now, and part of what we do for children's health, education and some of those elements are to help the states meet their financial needs. One of those -- one of the initiatives you mentioned, the contraception, will reduce costs to the states and to the federal government.”
Navarrette squeals about how this implies Pelosi support eugenics just like Margaret Sanger. But is Pelosi saying anything incorrect?
Children cost money. Maybe in Navarrette’s world they don’t but here in real world they do. They cost money to the parent for food, clothing, etc and to the government for education, health care, food stamps, etc. More children = more expenses. Pelosi is not advocating forcible sterilization like eugenicists; she’s saying kids cost money and if people have less kids, we don’t have to spend as much. It’s common fucking sense.
Navarrette seems to think there’s something racist about what Pelosi said but perhaps Dr. Martin Luther King would disagree. From his acceptance speech winning the Margaret Sanger Award from Planned Parenthood:
“The Negro constitutes half the poor of the nation. Like all poor, Negro and white, they have many unwanted children. This is a cruel evil they urgently need to control. There is scarcely anything more tragic in human life than a child who is not wanted. That which should be a blessing becomes a curse for parent and child. There is nothing inherent in the Negro mentality which creates this condition. Their poverty causes it. When Negroes have been able to ascend economically, statistics reveal they plan their families with even greater care than whites. Negroes of higher economic and educational status actually have fewer children than white families in the same circumstances.”
