Caught on videotape, Planned Parenthood tries to spin out of trouble again

By Phil Lawler ( bio - articles - email ) | May 30, 2012

How do you go about claiming your innocence, after you’ve been caught red-handed on videotape? It ain’t easy. But if you’re a PR flak for Planned Parenthood, at least you have some experience, since—thanks to Live Action undercover work—Planned Parenthood has been caught red-handed on videotape so frequently.

The now-standard PP line goes something like this: We didn’t do it. Or maybe the Live Action actor tricked us into doing it. Anyway, we fired the person who did it. Although it was perfectly OK to do it. And remember, it wasn’t done.

So that curlicue line of thought was applied to the latest exposé by Live Action, in which a PP counselor was captured on videotape encouraging a young woman with her plans for a sex-selection abortion. A PP flak-catcher said that the counselor had been dismissed, and everyone else at the clinic had been “immediately scheduled for retraining” to make sure that they would not do the same thing. In other words, the woman was fired for not following PP policy, and then PP told the other staff members what the policy was.

And what is that policy?

This spokeswoman for Planned Parenthood Federation of America also told The Huffington Post that the organization condemns seeking abortions on the basis of gender, but its policy is to provide “high quality, confidential, nonjudgmental care to all who come into” its health centers.

You understand, I’m sure. They condemn sex-selection abortion. But they condemn it in a nonjudgmental sort of way. Anyone who wants a sex-selection abortion should receive “high quality, confidential” help at PP clinics. But if the counselors help those women, they’ll be fired for violating the PP policy, which is to help women do whatever they want. Because PP condemns sex-selection abortions, while helping women obtain them, in violation of PP policy. All perfectly clear?