Here comes the soft sell. The ‘moderate’ Republican show horses — Arnold, Rudy, Bloomie, and ‘First Lady’ Laura — have successfully signaled the false GOP move to the center, where support for women’s rights, gay rights and other socially liberal policies are more popular and palatable. Now strap in for the hardcore political porn of Dick and W.

Meanwhile, here in London, at a parallel convention of hundreds of leaders and activists in the reproductive health and rights field, the gloves are coming off as well.

People like Steve Sinding, Director-General of the International Planned Parenthood Federation, Frances Kissling of Catholics for a Free Choice, and former Senator and current UN Foundation head Timothy Wirth have begun pointing the finger back at the Bush Administration’s ‘criminal’ policies toward women that are killing thousands around the world.

Kissling above all has been the most forceful in her denunciations. A human quote machine, she told me yesterday that “The President and the Pope have entered into an ‘unholy alliance’” and that their “criminal behaviour” is devastating the lives of women, children and families throughout the developing world.

Kissling also recalled the first time she was ever interviewed on television. When she was twelve, she was interviewed on the Today Show by J. Fred Muggs, a monkey who was co-host at the time. “He sat on my lap and peed all over me,” Kissling remembered.

That says about all you need to know about the modern mainstream media — first you’re interviewed by a monkey and then you get pissed on! Would it be the case for this conference? We’ll never know as it is getting next to no attention from an American media more obsessed with mouthing GOP bromides straight from the podium in Madison Square Garden.

Tim Wirth also gave me a strong interview, and was impressive in the scope of his understanding and involvement in the issues here at the Countdown 2015 conference — for more, www.countdown2015.org. (Video of the conference sessions, and Globalvision-produced news packages, are viewable at planetwire.org.) Wirth recalled the positive impact of the Cairo Conference of 1994, when the US government, under then President Bill Clinton, took a leadership role in advancing women’s reproductive health and rights. And he too used strong words against the current president, also calling Bush’s actions in this regard “criminal.”

Steve Sinding was equally pointed and eloquent on the subject of the Bush Administration. IPPF, the organization he heads, is one of the leaders in the field of reproductive health and rights the world over. IPPF’s vital work has been severely hampered by one of George W. Bush’s first acts upon taking office — the re-imposition of the Reagan-era ‘Global Gag Rule,’ which takes away all funding for any group that even mentions the word abortion.

Needless to say, IPPF is receiving zero US government dollars now to support its vital efforts.

Also hard-hit is the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) which has lost nearly one hundred million dollars in American funding, appropriated by Congress but held back by Bush on totally specious grounds. The Administration maintains that UNFPA is complicit with the Chinese government is forcing women to be sterilized and have abortions — even though four separate investigations, including one by the State Department, have shown conclusively that these allegations are false.

Nonetheless, the President and his lackey, Secretary of State Colin Powell, continue to maintain that the UNFPA — by virtue of giving computers to the Chinese government — is cooperating with the Chinese in oppressive practices.

The reality is that the Bush Administration — through its injection of domestic anti-abortion politics into the international development field — is the government that is most oppressing women.

Another sad and ironic reality is that — under the guise of opposing abortions — the Bush Administration is holding back much-needed family planning funding to groups like UNFPA and IPPF, and as a result, illegal and unsafe abortions are skyrocketing, killing women in Asia, Africa and Latin America, and leaving others alive but suffering from debilitating conditions like fistula.

But Republican strategists seemed to have determined that, if that’s what it takes to get re-elected, so be it. After all, there’s a war going on!

The real war, of course, is the war against women. For some reason the moderates chose not to mention it. Maybe Dick Cheney will tonight. And if not, maybe George W. Bush will — after all, he says the ‘W’ in his name stands for women.