I don’t stand with Planned Parenthood because… okay, I DO stand with Planned Parenthood, but my point is I don’t NEED to because I don’t see a serious threat to Planned Parenthood’s existence or funding.

Some might consider this naive.  After all, there are these videos and congressional hearings and threats to shut down the government… all over the issues of abortions by Planned Parenthood.

And I get that.  But as I wrote early last month, this is all theater. I wrote that the Republicans would never dare shut down the government in order to defund Planned Parenthood, because they lack the political will of the people.  And indeed, there is and will be no government shutdown (at least this year) over Planned Parenthood.

The videos themselves have riled the anti-choice base, but all they have managed to do is solidify the previously-held views about abortion on both sides.  And those views were pretty solid to begin with.  The pro-choice has noted repeatedly that the videos are edited and deceptive (a good summary is here at Media Matters), and the pro-life side has repeatedly not cared.  Ultimately, no matter what you believe about the “truthiness” that PP is “harvesting babies” as shown in these videos, every debate I’ve seen involving those videos ends up the same — it’s still about abortion and when life begins… and the videos themselves are almost irrelevant.

Well, not really.  The video are intended to make some people think that these are what ALL abortions look like, in order to get people to switch their views on abortion.  And perhaps some low-information people will switch.  But In fact, very few abortions look like the ones in the heavily-edited Planned Parenthood video (and in fact, some of what is in the video aren’t abortions at all, but rather, stillborn babies being born).

The videos are also important only as a pretext to grill Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards by the GOP lawmakers on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, which they did yesterday.  It is part of the latest congressional effort to strip funding from the women’s health organization.

The big problem is that despite all the argle bargle from the pro-life side, there’s no evidence Planned Parenthood has broken any law.  Interestingly, as Richards was getting grilled yesterday, the Missouri attorney general issued a report confirming there’s no evidence of misconduct at the state’s only Planned Parenthood clinic in St. Louis. The state official reached that conclusion after reviewing more than 3,500 pages of documents and conducting multiple interviews with the clinic’s employees.

In reaching its findings, Missouri joined five other states — Georgia, Indiana, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and South Dakota — that have also cleared Planned Parenthood of wrongdoing after launching investigations following the release of the inflammatory videos. An additional seven states considered investigating the group, but decided there wasn’t enough information suggesting Planned Parenthood has broken the law to justify a statewide probe.

The hearings yesterday, to be sure, were ugly, as Ms Richard was brow-beaten, and constantly interrupted, by the mansplaining Committee.  For her part, Richards maintained an admirable calmness, although it was clear that was a challenge. She nailed the whole exercise, however.

“The latest smear campaign is based on efforts by our opponents to entrap our doctors and clinicians into breaking the law—and once again our opponents failed,” Ms. Richards said.

House Republicans have promised there won’t be any end any time soon to the smear campaign. They’re launching a select committee to supposedly investigate the information in the videos. Just like Benghazi. Another committee spending oodles of taxpayer dollars investigating nothing, but designed to attack the frontrunner in the presidential race, who just happens to be a woman, and an organization devoted to providing healthcare to women.

The latest “gotcha” seems to be the “revelation” that PP does not perform mammograms.  Over and over again at the hearing yesterday, the fact that Planned Parenthood doesn’t offer mammograms was held out as some kind of proof that the organization doesn’t provide women’s health care. The GOP seems obsessed with mammograms, as if that and abortions are the only aspects of womens’ health.  Since PP does not perform mammograms, they MUST be doing abortions full-time.  Which of course is nonsense.

Let’s get a few things clear:

Planned Parenthood never hid the fact that it doesn’t do mammograms.  It’s right there on its website (“Where Can I Get A Mammogram?”)

In fact (MEN of the Congressional committee), there’s no reason for them to have mammogram machines on premises. Most gynecologists don’t do them on premises, but refer women out to another location for a mammogram, because mammogram facilities are accredited by the American College of Radiology.  Also, Planned Parenthood is, as its name suggests, a family planning clinic and therefore has much to do with sexual health.  Most women don’t start getting mammograms until they are past child-bearing years.  Therefore, it would be a waste of resources for Planned Parenthood facilities to have those machines (and licensed radiology staff) on premises.  So while PP screens for cancer and other womens’ health issues, it doesn’t actually perform the actual mammograms.

It is interesting, from a tactical perspective, that a lot of the focus was on mammograms yesterday.  Oddly enough, that isn’t going to endear the GOP to women voters.  And that is ultimately why I don’t feel there is much threat to Planned Parenthood….

Because a nationwide USA TODAY/Suffolk University Poll finds Americans back government support for the group by more than 2-1.  Two-thirds of those surveyed, 65%, say funding should continue for the group, which provides contraception, cancer screening and other health services to women; 29% say it should be cut off.  91% of Democrats support PP funding, but even 59% of Republicans.

Like I said, this is a battle with high emotions.  But the war has already been won.  PP is not going anywhere and they don’t need me to stand with them (although of course, I do)

It doesn’t help PP opponents that they lie so brazenly.  The blue ribbon goes to Rep. Jason Chaffetz, who tried to ambush Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards with a bizarre “chart” that purported to show that Planned Parenthood had nearly ceased providing breast exams and cancer screenings, while the number of abortions radically increased.

Here’s the exchange:

Here’s a clear image of that “chart”, which Chaffetz says (lying) that it was pulled from a PP corporate website.  Notice that 1) it starts in 2006, and 2) the numbers are ridiculously out of whack because the chart lacks a Y axis. “Cancer screening and prevention services” actually have declined while abortions have increased; cancer screenings end up at more than 935,000, while the number of abortions ends at 327,000. But the chart is presented in a deceptive way to make it look like there are now three times as many abortions as cancer screenings, which is ludicrously false. The truth is exactly the opposite.

At Mother Jones, Kevin Drum replotted the data for this chart, but added a Y axis (which we all learned in grade school math, right?)

And if you add in the other services Planned Parenthood provides, specifically STD screening and contraception, the chart looks even more real.

But…. these are facts and numbers, something the GOP (and PP haters) have no use for.  Well, except to create lies.