Looking for a Christmas Gift for that Someone Special?

So I saw this on the news this evening and thought that the United States has hit an all-time low.

From the Chicago Tribune:

Planned Parenthood offering gift certificates

Anti-abortion groups condemn their sale

December 3, 2008

What do you get the person who has everything—except adequate health insurance? If you live in Indiana, consider this offering from the state's Planned Parenthood affiliate: gift certificates in $25 increments.

The vouchers, available online and at 35 clinics statewide, can be used for health services or contraceptives. And yes, they can be used to pay for abortions.

Betty Cockrum, president and CEO of Planned Parenthood of Indiana, characterizes the response to the gift certificates as "pretty robust, and generally very favorable."

She estimates that "about a dozen" certificates have sold since they became available Nov. 25. Planned Parenthood of Illinois plans to sell similar gift certificates starting Monday.

PPIN's move has enraged various anti-abortion organizations—Indiana Right to Life and the Indiana Family Institute among them. Jim Sedlak, vice president of the American Life League and executive director of Stop Planned Parenthood, an anti-abortion group based in Stafford, Va., condemns the certificates as a continuation of Planned Parenthood's "annual attacks on the Christian community at Christmastime."

"We are talking about what can be done," Sedlak said. "Look, they [Planned Parenthood] could easily have said, 'these certificates are not to be used for abortions.' But they intentionally chose not to do that."

Those who criticize the gift certificates, said PPIN's Cockrum, are missing the forest for the trees. "We see 92,000 patients each year at Planned Parenthood of Indiana, and 5,000 of them opt for abortions," Cockrum said. "Ninety-five percent of what we do is provide basic health care."