Thursday, December 24, 2009

The Manager's Amendment

I would like to write a happier post on Christmas Eve, but the Senate, with their 4 am vote, changed the tone of today's post. While there are certain spineless Senator's out there who would like us all to believe that the "Manager's Amendment" limits abortion and abortion funding, the reality is something much darker (perhaps why their vote was made in the middle of the night). Here's what the Catholic Bishops have to say:
“The abortion provisions in the Manager’s Amendment to the Senate bill do not maintain this commitment to the legal status quo on abortion funding. Federal funds will help subsidize, and in some cases a federal agency will facilitate and promote, health plans that cover elective abortions. All purchasers of such plans will be required to pay for other people’s abortions in a very direct and explicit way, through a separate premium payment designed solely to pay for abortion. There is no provision for individuals to opt out of this abortion payment in federally subsidized plans, so people will be required by law to pay for other people’s abortions. States may opt out of this system only by passing legislation to prohibit abortion coverage. In this way the longstanding and current federal policy universally reflected in all federal health programs, including the program for providing health coverage to Senators and other federal employees, will be reversed. That policy will only prevail in states that take the initiative of passing their own legislation to maintain it.”
Read the entire Catholic Online story here.
I know quite a few people have been willfully blind to the abortion funding that is proposed in this bill. They are the same people who voted for Obama and shook their heads whenever his views on abortion were brought up. They are often Catholics who try to pretend that the horrors of abortion do not exist and hide behind the term "social justice."

Social justice is incredibly important. Yet we can't consider any bill that funds the murder of innocent children to be a step in the direction of "social justice."

2 comments:

  1. There may be a silver lining to this if the electorate would "vote the bums out" next fall.

    Personally, I don't see how health care could ever be provided in an affordable manner outside of a charitable paradigm.

    I hope you all have a blessed & happy Christmas! Most of the family here went to the vigil, and I will be singing (choir) at the Midnight Mass. Kay is home right now, but the plan is to go back to Nita tomorrow after lunch. Kids have been really helpful & understanding these last few weeks. I'm a lucky daddy.

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  2. I hope that happens (voting the bums out). Unfortunately in California we never see that happen (at least not in the senate... we do have a good congressman here in far Northern California... it's because people tend to be a little saner up here far from the bay).

    You guys are in our prayers.

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