On election night, you might remember FOX News Channel anchor Megyn Kelly asking Karl Rove after he said Ohio was still in play for the GOP: “Is this just math you do as a Republican to make yourself feel better?”

Well, here’s another example of the Christian Right distorting numbers to suit their own agenda. Take a look at the Christian Post headline:

Wha…?

Here’s what they did.

Planned Parenthood just released their annual financial report and it said they received $542,400,000 from the government last year.

They also performed 333,964 abortions.

$542,400,000 divided by 333,964 = $1624.13 (or $1622 if you practice Christian math. Actually, it looks like they just rounded the first number to $542,000,000 in their calculation, but even that number would result in an answer of $1623 when rounded).

“While government subsidies to Planned Parenthood have reached an all-time high, so too has the number of lives ended by this profit-driven abortion business,” said Susan B. Anthony List President Marjorie Dannenfelser. “Destroying nearly one million children in three years is not health care and does not reflect a concern for vulnerable women and girls. As Planned Parenthood’s funding goes up, abortions increase and real health services for women go down.”

There are just a few problems with all that.

None of the government funding goes toward abortion services.

Furthermore, of the procedures Planned Parenthood provides, only 3% of them are abortions:

The government funding is going toward cancer screenings, contraception, STD/STI testing, etc. Not abortions.

You wouldn’t know that from the misleading headline, though.

Even some of the Christian Post‘s Christian readers are disgusted by the blatant lie and say as much in the comments.

CP was quick to let go of Rev. Austin Miles after he was caught lying and covering it up.

They should fire Paul Stanley, the writer of this piece, too. Good reporters tell a story that gets to the truth. This article distorts the facts to fit an agenda.

…

***Edit***: It looks like FOX News Channel is also spreading the lies (“In fiscal year 2011, they got $542,000,000. That is a lot of abortions!”).

As if you expected anything different:

***Edit***: I love this analogy to the Christian Post‘s way of thinking on Reddit:

(Thanks to Brian for the link)



