This morning, David Brody of the Christian Broadcasting Network posted a video of California Democratic Rep. Zoe Lofgren being questioned at a public meeting about coverage of abortions in the health-care-reform legislation. As many town-hall meetings have illustrated this week, there’s much misinformation circulating about the reform bills, and it's seriously hindering rational debate over health care. Many of the crazier myths─like the one about death panels─are easy to dispel. But the question of whether the government will fund abortion is a little trickier. Why? Mainly because we’re still not sure what the final legislation will look like, but also because the answer is convoluted.

The House bill (H.R. 3200) doesn't mention abortion at all, prompting opponents of abortion in both parties to worry that federal funds could used to pay for the procedure. Twenty House Democrats signed a letter to their leadership emphasizing this concern. Their worries aren't entirely unfounded, but they are misleading. This issue isn't new, however─it was the impetus for a 1976 provision, the Hyde amendment, which prohibits Medicaid funds from being used for elective abortions. That won't change. Medicaid still won't be able to fund elective abortions. Rep. Lois Capps (D-Calif.) offered a Hyde-like amendment that was approved by the House Energy and Commerce Committee and has a good chance of ending up in the final legislation. (It is critical to remember here that we do not have a finalized piece of legislation yet, so both the concerns and their solutions are still somewhat speculative.) The Capps amendment bars the public option from using federal funds to cover abortion, but allows for private plans in the exchange to cover them. It does not require private plans to cover abortion, nor does it prohibit them from doing so. Abortions provided under a public plan could only be funded by premiums, not by federal subsidies. It's an attempt at a middle ground.

Robert Mackey, writing for the New York Times's Lede Blog, has a really interesting take on Hillary Clinton's testy answer to a question posed by a young man at a Congolese town-hall meeting this week. By now, no doubt, Gaggle readers have seen many times the clip of Clinton smarting over being asked to "channel" her husband's opinion. And you've also probably heard the cable-news rationale that the question was misinterpreted, and the questioner was actually asking for insight into Obama's opinion. Mackey's not buying that excuse:

It always seemed unlikely to The Lede that a translator working for Mrs. Clinton would make such a large error with a question asked in French—or that an African university student would say “Mr. Clinton” when he meant “Mr. Obama”—and my colleague Jeffrey Gettleman reports in Thursday’s New York Times that “further inspection of the audio recording of the event indicated that the translation was fine; the student had indeed said ‘Mr. Clinton.’ ” A second reporter traveling with Mrs. Clinton, a friend of your Lede blogger’s who is a magazine journalist, said the same thing in an e-mail exchange on Wednesday night, that a French-speaking colleague who was in the room confirmed that the student “did ask the question that way: ‘the mind of Mr. from the lips of Mrs.’ ”

Eleanor Clift has escaped D.C.'s infamous August mugginess to unwind at an undisclosed beach. But like most political junkies, she couldn't help but start thinking about health reform. Here's a quick insight she kicked in last night: