An Update on Health Care
"Reform" as We Head into the
Weekend
Part One of
Two
By Dave Andrusko
Part Two tells of a big win
in New Hampshire. Please send
your comments on either Part One
or Part Two to
daveandrusko@gmail.com. If
you'd like, follow me at
www.twitter.com/daveha.
By the time you read this
edition of TN&V, there may be a
slew of additional developments.
The battle over health care
"reform" in which pro-lifers
took Round One last Saturday
(with the invaluable assistance
of House pro-life Democrats and
every House Republican but one)
has turned into a real
donnybrook--as we all know it
would--and is changing almost
hourly. Let me list just a few
items.
--
Senate Majority Leader Harry
Reid (D-Nv.), who just weeks
ago was telling us that the
Senate would not take up a
health care bill until after
Thanksgiving (and perhaps
not until next year), has
now told colleagues the
discussion begins next week!
Some are suggesting that
there won't be abortion
funding in the Senate bill,
but that is patently absurd.
The measure is being crafted
stealthily, with input from
only a handful of senior
leadership types. While all
the particulars are not
known, it is certain that
the Reid bill will contain
pro-abortion components,
including a "public plan" --
a health plan run directly
by the federal government,
which will fund elective
abortions with federal funds
(which are the only kind of
funds that the government
can spend).
 |
|
Pro-abortion Rep. Nita
Lowey |
-- Pro-abortion advocacy groups
are funding big-time ad
campaigns. But we always
knew they never lacked for
money.
-- The usual suspects are
howling betrayal because the
House adopted the NRLC-backed
Stupak-Pitts Amendment,
240-194. (The Amendment
removed two major
pro-abortion components from
H.R. 3962.) They have far
less faith in the
dyed-in-the-wool
pro-abortion leadership in
the House and Senate than we
do. We are fully aware that
having failed to get it the
front door, pro-abortion
Democrats will try to slide
abortion funding in through
the skylight, over the
transom, or around in the
back. We will be alert to
any and all maneuvers. (See
more below.)
--
A very important component
of the pro-abortion
counteroffensive is to
insist that it is pro-lifers
who are attempting to upset
the status quo, not the
legion of pro-abortionists.
This misdirection takes the
uninitiated down many a
rabbit trail. One of the
most deceptive is the
assertion that the amendment
"puts new restrictions on
women's access to abortion
coverage in the private
health insurance market even
when they would pay premiums
with their own money," as
Rep. Nita Lowey (among many
pro-abortionists)put it. The
non-partisan PolitiFact.com
analyzed Lowey's broadside
and rated it "false." Lowey
"is wrong on two points," it
concluded. "First, she
suggests the amendment
applies to everyone in the
private insurance market
when it just applies to
those in the health care
exchange. Second, her
statement that the
restrictions would affect
women "even when they would
pay premiums with their own
money" is incorrect." (See
www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2009/nov/09/nita-lowey/lowey-says-stupak-amendment-restricts-abortion-cov)
 |
Kate Michelman,
former NARAL
President
|
--
One other item. On Thursday,
the New York Times ran an
op-ed from two lionesses of
days gone by. Under the
headlines "Trading Women's
Rights for Political Power,"
former NARAL President Kate
Michelman and former
Catholics for a Free Choice
President Frances Kissling
tore into the Democrats for
a number of sins against
pro-abortion orthodoxy. They
warned, "If Democrats do not
commit themselves to
defeating the amendment,
then they will face an
uncompromising effort by
Democratic women to defeat
them, regardless of the cost
to the party's precious
majority." The worst offense
(from their point of view)
was that the Democrats had
achieved their "precious
majority" in the House by
the equivalent of allowing
the foxes in to help guard
the chickens: running
pro-life Democrats, many of
whom won. (You can read
their op-ed at (www.nytimes.com/2009/11/12/opinion/12michelman.html)
Have a great weekend. Keep track
of developments by visiting TN&V
each day and, of course, by
reading both
http://nrlactioncenter.com
and
http://powellcenterformedicalethics.blogspot.com
Please send your thoughts and
comments to
daveandrusko@gmail.com.
Part Two |
