How Would They View #Occupy #Planned Parenthood? A Proposed Paradigm For Protest Propriety
I thought this post by Matthew Knee at Legal Insurrection was most interesting:
How Would They View Occupy Planned Parenthood? A Proposed Paradigm For Protest Propriety
Posted by Matthew Knee Monday, November 14, 2011 at 11:30am
A recent post by Megan McArdle made some good points about how disturbing OWS’s views and behavior have become:
…this weekend, at the Americans for Prosperity dinner…Occupy DC decided that it would be a good idea to blockade the attendees into the DC convention center…
What’s more disturbing, however, is that my reading, and private conversations, have uncovered a number of people who think this is all right…
I am shocked that anyone would make this argument. This is outrageous. I don’t know any people on the left who would think that this behavior were “non-violent” if it were, say, aimed at abortion clinics. It’s bad enough that many of the occupiers seem to put as little thought as possible into the space they share with many fellow citizens. A sizeable number of them now seem to have decided that physical intimidation is a legitimate tactic with which to express their rage and frustration.
Occupy Wall Street and many other leftists tend to see their causes as the Vitally Important New Civil Rights Movement (TM) of the day, justifying the use of tactics from the tumultuous 1960′s and 1970′s in political movements in 2011. Sometimes, they make this point explicitly (such as how gay is the new black), but other times they seem to act like they can do whatever the want because their cause is just.
As I wrote back in September, my generation seems not ti realize that civil disobedience entails opposing an unjust law by breaking it. In doing so, the protester benefits his cause by taking the punishment to call attention to its injustice and gain sympathy. Civil disobedience does not mean, as Team OWS and many others of my generation believe, that you can do whatever you want as long as you are sufficiently self-righteous about it.
They also seem not to understand that sit-ins and similar forms of civil disobedience were particularly appropriate during the civil right movement because not being allowed to sit certain places was a key policy they were actually protesting. Simply asserting the right to “occupy” any space, disrupt any event, block traffic, or trespass, vandalize, or defecate on any home, business, or public place is either “civil disobedience” against property rights in general, or against the very idea that laws apply to them.
Combine this with their use of numbers and political power to partially protect them from the enforcement of the law, and what we have is not civil disobedience: it is low-grade political violence against order in general. This is not surprising coming from the anarchist OWS movement, but it should be surprising to those who believe that OWS is merely about the richest Americans having too much money.
It is vital that we as a society have views about political etiquette that treats political speech and acts the same regardless of their content. To manipulate the right to protest to allow certain views but not others is dangerous and un-American.
Liberals like the idea of putting themselves in others’ shoes. Popular redistributionist philosopher John Rawls proposed that everyone evaluate a distributional system as if they did not know where in the new order they would be, so I will adapt that strategy into a system for OWS-sympathizing liberals to determine which protest tactics are out of bounds.
McArdle makes an interesting point when comparing OWS to the more extreme branches of the anti-abortion movement, the most significant example of a rightist movement with a record of civil disobedience and other illegal tactics. The left is particularly interested in using the law against anti-abortion protesters. In 1994, the Democrats passed the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act (last seen on this blog demonstrating the hypocrisy of MSA 11 supporters), which made it a federal civil rights violation (in addition, typically, to state or local crimes such as trespassing) to interfere with abortion clinics by means of sit-ins and other obstructive tactics.
Thus, I propose to liberals the following paradigm for protest etiquette: If a hypothetical Occupy Planned Parenthood movement were to use the tactic in question, would you want them arrested? If so they should declare the OWS tactic in question to be out of bounds.
About: Matthew Knee
Matthew Knee, M.A., M.Phil. is a doctoral candidate in political science at Yale University, specializing in campaigns, elections, ethnic voting patterns, public opinion, and quantitative and experimental approaches to political science. Matt has conducted studies on the Jewish vote, the Hispanic vote, apportionment rules, voter registration laws, canvassing, religious minority voting in comparative context, policy implementation, and other topics. Matt graduated summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from UCLA, where he wrote his honors thesis on international public opinion regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. At Yale, Matt acquired field certifications in American Politics, Political Psychology, Comparative Politics, and Quantitative Methods. This past election cycle, Matt was Chairman of Jewish Voters for Carly, leading efforts for Carly Fiorina for Senate in California’s Jewish community. In College, he was Chairman of the UCLA chapter of College Republicans and active in student government. He also interned for the Heritage Foundation, the Republican Jewish Coalition, and the Office of Governor Schwarzenegger. Views expressed in this blog are his own, and do not necessarily represent the views of Yale University or any other entity. Email: Matthew.Knee.LI@nyms.net
__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
NOW – I will add that a #Occupy Planned Parenthood is within the #Occupy ideology of the greedy rich milking the taxpayer”
In an interview with the Willamette Week – Planned Parenthood’s President ( largest abortion clinic funded by billions of tax dollars), Cecile Richards, was asked about her 400K salary and she claimed it was a non-issue:
QUESTION: In the efforts to defund Planned Parenthood, a lot was made of your salary—close to $400,000 per year. Planned Parenthood declined to comment on it. Why?
Cecile Richards Answer: “It’s public record. It always has been. I work hard for my salary, and I think that’s a red herring. Planned Parenthood is the most cost-effective provider of family planning services in this country. The far right has done everything they can to undermine us and to create non-issues, which I think that is.”
Planned Parenthood received $349.6 million in tax dollars in the fiscal year ending on June 30, 2008, and $363.2 MILLION Dollars on Government Grants ( Tax Dollars) in 2009– that is ONE MILLION DOLLARS PER DAY of taxpayer money !!!
Planned Parenthood then took those hard earned dollars away from poor and middle class hard working people and and it paid its president, Cecile Richards, $385,163, plus another $11,876 in benefits and deferred compensation. ( View 2008 990 here )
Cecile Richards; Planned Parenthood President
The $385,163 in pay Planned Parenthood President Richards received in the organization’s fiscal year ending June 30, 2008 was recorded in the group’s publicly available Internal Revenue Service Form 990 filed for that year.
Richards also received $346,285 in total compensation from Planned Parenthood and $38,476 in total compensation from related groups in the organization’s fiscal year that ended on June 30, 2009, according to the organization’s Form 990 for that year.
Other Officers at the National Level received the following compensation:
CFO, MARIA ACOSTA received $89,691 from Planned Parenthood $5,725 from related organizations and $2,362 in estimated compensations
CHIEF OPERATING OFFICER MARYANA ISKANDER received $245,814 from Planned Parenthood and $23,696 in estimated compensations
VICE PRESIDENT OF DEVELOPMENT KIM MEREDITH received $220,427 from Planned Parenthood $24,492 from related organizations and $24,076 in estimated compensations. Before joining PPFA in 2006, Meredith spent nearly nine years as the chief operating officer at the now defunct and now disaffiliated Planned Parenthood Golden Gate, a Planned Parenthood clinic which sqandered tax dollars and will close and never repay their debtors .
NATIONAL POLITIC AND FIELD DIR, ELLEN GOLOMBEK received $203,843 from Planned Parenthood $10,729 from related organizations and $15,288 in estimated compensations, she has since left Planned Parenthood to work in the Colorado Governor’s Administration.
VP OF MEDICAL AFFAIR, VANESSA CULLINS received $248,251 from Planned Parenthood and $15,600 in estimated compensations
VP OF GENERAL COUNSEL , BARBARA E OTTEN received $219,210 from Planned Parenthood $11,537 from related organizations and $39,074 in estimated compensations
Just a Few More examples- and remember, they have 800 locations so…just imagine how many of these CORPORATE / GREEDY PHAT CATS of the RICH fill this organization !
In 2008- Planned Parenthood New England’s 2008 990 reports that
NANCY MOSHER CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER made $191,310
THOMAS FRANK CHIEF FINANCIAL OFFICER made $ 137,989
CHERYL GIBSON MEDICAL DIRECTOR Made $195,778
SUSAN SMITH STAFF PHYSICIAN Made $127,997
KIM BOYMAN STAFF PHYSICIAN Made $112,439
CAROLYN ERNST VP OF HEALTH SERVICES Made $96,370
BEVERLY ANN SHADLEY VP OF DEVELOPMENT Made $86,202
Planned Parenthood of New York City : Officers six digit salaries as reported on their 2009 990 tax form:
Joan Malin – made $229,064
Maureen E. Paul made $327,061
Louis K. Corso made $173,423
Gerald Zupnik made $257,929
Gillian Dean made $156,912
Anne M. Robinson made $168,767
What does Tax Dollars get Planned Parenthood of Illinois
Six Digit Pay Checks !!!! Paid for by you and me, according to their 2008 990 tax form.
Medical Director Caroline Hoke made $313,895
CEO Steve Trombley made $304,220 plus $58,000 bonus income = $362,220
Physician Jennifer Brown made $155,330
Physician Darwin Jackson made $111,525
CFO Cheryl Harris made $120,324
VP of development made $119,915
VP of clinic operations Julie Rabinovitz made $116,748
Assoc. Medical Director Kai Tao made $109,725
According to the report, the average hours they all worked was only 35 hours per week for their FAT CAT RICH SIX DIGIT PLANNED PARENTHOOD SALARIES !
President and CEO Claire Coleman made $154,437
Physician Raymond Burnett-Biglane made $104,749
VP Patient Services Kyra Carr made $93,426
VP Development Anne Matsui made $86,775
VP Finance Yvonne Van Tassel made $86,775
These figures do not account for each Planned Parenthood director – there are over 800 locations, making six digits in many cases as welll….
Planned Parenthood also PROFITED $64 million dollars in that same year ! Why do they need you and I to fund them?
But, Planned Parenthood’s profits are politicians gains. Just look at this analysis from Open Secrets which monitors 501C3 organizations and how they distribute and collect their funding:
The organization’s political action committee, for example, donated more than $148,000 to federal candidates — almost all Democrats –– during the 2010 election cycle. The PAC spent more than $443,000 overall.
Planned Parenthood also recorded $905,796 in independent expenditures during the 2010 cycle — money spent in support of, or in opposition to, federal political candidates, largely through advertisements. The top beneficiaries of this money were Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) and Patty Murray (D-Wash.).
In 2010 alone, Planned Parenthood and a California affiliate together spent more than $700,000 on federal lobbying efforts, a Center for Responsive Politics analysis of federal lobbying records finds. By comparison, all other organizations that primarily advocate for abortion rights collectively spent $247,280 on federal lobbying efforts during the same period.
So, not only does taxpayer money make Planned Parenthood officials RICH FAT CATS, they also expand the coffers of the politicians who support them- see how the cycle works?
Planned Parenthood also PROFITED $64 million dollars in that same year ! Why do they need you and I to fund them?
So..just how is Planned Parenthood spending YOUR money besides paying their staff Larger than Life Salaries????
They are building MEGA Centers around the country which are muti-million dollars abortion clinics:
Some argue that Planned Parenthood is a “good” organization despite the fact that they were founded by a RACIST KLAN speaker who was so connected with the Eugenics Movement that many of her Planned Parenthood board members were Eugenics members as well. Eugenics is the movement that forcefully sterilized thousands of Blacks in the US and Planned Parenthood’s founder, Margaret Sanger agreed with that ideology. For more on that history watch the documentary film: Maafa21
HERE: Planned Parenthood getting rich off the taxpayers
Leave a Reply