Do We Still Need Planned Parenthood?

The way Congress has been arguing over the "manufactured controversy" over Planned Parenthood, is it possible that we've hit a new low? According to Katy Sorenson, a former Miami-Dade County Commissioner and president and CEO of The Good Government Initiative, we have.

In an op-ed piece in The Miami Herald ("Why we continue to need Planned Parenthood:), Sorenson writes, "It was shameful for members of Congress to threaten to shut down the government over funding for Planned Parenthood. And yet attempts to slash federal funding for Planned Parenthood health centers across the country are lurking."

She goes on to write that while, yes, Planned Parenthood performs abortions for women who need them, they provide more than that.

"Defunding Planned Parenthood is more than an attack on reproductive rights," she writes. "It’s an attack on women, men and families, the one in five who have been to Planned Parenthood during their lifetime...Planned Parenthood has provided a full range of healthcare services — including life-saving cancer screenings, breast exams, contraception, testing and treatment for sexually transmitted infections (STIs)."

To read more, go to http://www.miamiherald.com/opinion/op-ed/article38010636.html.

Ted Cruz and the GOP Nomination

George F. Will discusses Ted Cruz's "audacious 'base plus' strategy" for the Republican nomination in his Washington Post opinion column.

In it, Will discusses how voter turnout affects national elections: non-Hispanic white turnout increased by 10 million between George W. Bush's 2000 election and his 2004 reelection; Barack Obama's election produced a surge of African American voters with a decline of white voters, with a higher African-American voting rate in Obama's 2012 reelection over white voters. Will states that turnout may very well put Cruz and Florida's Marco Rubio as the top two Republican contenders.

To read Will's entire piece, click here.