States Might Protect Contraception Access

[executrix]

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-obamacare-contraception-idUSKBN14W1CD

Summary if the link doesn't work for you: There are state laws in California, Maryland, Vermont, and Illinois to back-stop the PPACA requirement that health insurance plans cover contraception, and similar bills may be introduced in New York, Minnesota, Colorado, and Massachusetts. In 28 states, insurance companies have to include coverage of contraception in policies, but not all of the statutes require contraceptives to be available to insured women *without copayments.*

Comments

[sathari]

THANK YOU for this! States' rights: cuts both ways. (I'm now thinking that it might be worthwhile for all of us to check into county/municipality-level protections/supports for various programs as well--- thinking of all those blue cities in red states in particular, but also whether we can influence local officials and elections even more effectively. We're all Charlie Wilson now, maybe.)

[executrix]

There was an article yesterday in the legal press about what state Attorneys General are planning to do.

What really fries my ice is that several states have passed laws forbidding municipalities to enact higher minimum wage laws--but there are some recent court decisions upholding local Right to Work laws. So it's just peachy for local governments to impair workers' rights, but not OK to uphold them.

[sathari]

I am intrigued by the first part.

And--- well, frankly, as far as both the responses of the state Attorneys General AND that double standard on workers' rights, if you have any suggestions about steps to take around that (obviously right now at the federal level there are a lot of large-scale ISSUES, but this sounds like something on a more local scale), I am listening.

[executrix]

What we need is a society that does not believe that bloated profits going to a small elite are more important than the well-being of the entire population or the viability of human life on earth. I don't have a path from here to there, though.

[sathari]

Eeesh, yeah, that one. So much that.

[executrix]

A lot of planning I've been seeing is about "let's go knock on doors and elect more Democrats downticket!" but, apart from my utter lack of desire to go knock on doors, I really wonder if "more Democrats in Congress" is good ENOUGH. I mean, an undoubted improvement over the Republicans' platform of "let's hunt poor people for sport." But I'm not sure whether there *could* be a viable leftist third party.

[sathari]

Yeah, I think right now I'm closer to the "elect more Democrats nao" place at least in terms of an immediate response, just because I think we've got to preserve a) the social safety net we've got and b) the ability, in terms of things like civil liberties, even to be able to have the damned vital conversations about how best to... well, anything at all, really.

[tassosss]

Definitely. States and local politics have a huge role in how federal policy actually gets implemented.

[sathari]

I'm liking this. I'm liking this a lot. I'm seeing this as a thing to be leveraged like crazy, in fact.