title:  Republican Candidate Signs Bill Defunding Planned Parenthood While Calling Himself ‘Moderate’
text: Attacking women s health is not a  moderate  position.So, it s pretty easy to call bullshit on Ohio Governor John Kasich s insistence that he is the only moderate Republican left in the GOP field.On Sunday, Kasich signed a bill stripping Planned Parenthood of millions of dollars for performing what Republicans call  nontherapeutic  abortions which are defined as any abortion that isn t in the case of rape, incest, or saving the life of the mother.In other words, Kasich and his conservative supporters in the state legislature are telling Planned Parenthood that if they want to continue being funded, they must deny women their constitutional right to obtain an abortion unless they meet one of the three criteria listed above.The problem with this conservative logic is that only 3 percent of services Planned Parenthood provides are abortion-related. Plus, state and federal funding is not used by Planned Parenthood to pay for abortion.What state and federal funds are used for, however, are crucial medical services that women will no longer have access to because Republicans don t care about collateral damage in their war on a woman s right to choose.According to Huffington Post, Planned Parenthood is about to lose $1.3 million that would have been spent on  HIV testing, cancer screenings and programs that help prevent domestic violence and infant mortality. This isn t even the first time Kasich has attacked women s health since becoming governor.He has also signed bills banning abortion after 20 weeks of pregnancy, banning public hospitals from accepting transfer patients from clinics, and stripping rape crisis centers from funding if they refer patients to an abortion provider.As for the current bill Kasich signed, Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards denounced it and the man who signed it. John Kasich is proudly eliminating care for expectant mothers and newborns; he is leaving thousands without vital STD and HIV testing, slashing a program to fight domestic violence, and cutting access to essential, basic health care. It s clear Kasich has no regard for women s health or lives, and will stop at nothing to block health care for the tens of thousands of Ohioans who rely on Planned Parenthood. And Kasich signed this bill, now one of the most extreme anti-women laws in the nation, as he parades across the country trying to convince everyone, especially women, that he is a  moderate  Republican deserving of their support in his bid to become President of the United States, a position he would absolutely use to ban abortion entirely and eliminate Planned Parenthood.Kasich is not a moderate. He s just another conservative extremist like Ted Cruz.Featured image from Flickr