Family Planning and the American Right

14 October 2004

Over the last few days we have had an American staying in B&B. A John Kerry supporter. He says the Bush camp – the American right – complain, “Kerry is not being Catholic enough.” (i.e. Not strong enough on divorce, abortion, homosexuality, stem cell research etc.) This is a major change from Kennedy’s days when the anxiety was that he was controlled by the Vatican.

We now have three major influential groups which have hesitations about family planning – not just Catholics and Muslims, but the American Right, who have got religion in a big way and in huge numbers. The catch is that this last group have the cash and they are withdrawing it from family planning schemes across the world. They do not want the cash to be used for abortion, but inevitably it will affect the availability of contraception. The outlook for the world gets gloomier. We will soon be the only species left on the planet at this rate of knots.

But there is good news about Zambia. The American left behind a World Report on Zambia. It is amazingly upbeat. I’ll try to get copies and send them on.

Gerry