I told you all two years ago

[fpb]

As for President Obama:
1) he has broken his own promise on Don't Ask Don't Tell, something to which few reasonable people would have seen an objection. (That at least one right-wing columnist broke Godwin's Law in trying to find an argument against accepting homosexual soldiers just shows how poor the arguments for this really are.)
2) He has broken his promise on torture and even let into his administration a couple of people whose hands are dirty in the matter, such as Robert Gates.
3) He is wrecking his own proposals for health reform rather than give up a sneaky and unprincipled attempt to break the consensus on abortion (no federal monies for), and he is lying about it.
4) He is guilty of deliberately stirring up trouble against Israel, with the miserable Quartet all too happy to follow his lead.
5) He has ignored both the hideous threat of an Iranian atom bomb and, more disgracefully, the desperate struggle of the Iranian people against a bloodthirsty and disastrous tyranny. He has repeatedly spoken as though the mullah's government were the legitimate leadership of that unhappy country.

Oh, and strictly for Catholics:
6) According to Life Site News International, he has deliberately egged on Catholic Health Association, and possibly the Leadership Conference of Religious Women (although that lot don't need much egging) to revolt against the Bishops. I quote: White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs revealed to reporters today that President Barack Obama actively promoted the Catholic Health Association's public break with the American Catholic bishops to support his health care legislation.
Gibbs also suggested that the CHA and the Leadership Conference of Women Religious' (LCWR) break with the U.S. Bishops has provided legitimate political cover for pro-life Democrats to switch their votes from "no" to "yes."
(...)
Gibbs said that the president had been engaged on the issue, and a reporter asked if he had reached out personally to the groups.
"The President met earlier this week with Sr. Keehan of the CHA," said Gibbs, saying the meeting took place in the Roosevelt Room, but that he "did not get a detailed run-down of the pitch that [Obama] made."
"I do know that he was effusive about her support and her as a person for making the courageous statements that she has," he said.
Well, at least he was not shameless enough to tell his own spokesman what he had done with or offered to this rebel nun.
During the Paris negotiations of 1782-3, the reigning Pope offered Franklin and Adams that the USA government could have a veto over the nomination of Catholic bishops (something that many European governments had at the time). In keeping with their principles, the Founders - few of whom had any sympathy for the Catholic Church as such - nonetheless refused this offer and allowed the Church to organize itself in the new nation as it saw fit. Since then, I know of no President who has ever, for any reason whatever, thought to meddle in the Church's internal affairs and organization.

Hope? Change? Change, all right; hope - that he does not get re-elected.

Comments

[redcoast.livejournal.com]

Are you saying without the Stupak amendment that federal money would have gone to cover abortions because that's not true

[dustthouart.livejournal.com]

Here's what I keep asking: if it's NOT true, THEN WHY NOT JUST LET THE STUPAK AMENDMENT LANGUAGE IN?

Speaking as someone who WANTS universal health care, this is making me crazy.

[redcoast.livejournal.com]

B/c those who oppose it believe it will have the affect of eliminating all health insurance coverage of abortion, which is, after all, a legal medical procedure.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

Those who oppose it tell you so. The truth is the opposite. Without the Stupak amendment, your tax dollars will flow into the pockets of Planned Parenthood and the other heroes of baby-murder in even richer flows than they already do.

[redcoast.livejournal.com]

Sounds good to me!

[fpb.livejournal.com]

So, in the name of baby-murder, you would not mind if your President and political leadership had told you a pack of lies to whip up hatred against opponents of it (such as, uh, me)? Incidentally, pay atttention to the other points in which the President has been shown to break his own word in matters of high principle such as torture.

[redcoast.livejournal.com]

Lol whut?

[fpb.livejournal.com]

I am no lover of "gay rights" continuously extended and reinvented, and I was happy to see the failure of "gay marriage" in every open vote ever held. But there is no reason whatsoever to exclude homosexual men and women from the military, and Obama had a mandate to reform that. Indeed, it really is difficult to see what stops him. It would take little effort and change practically nothing (if anyone was worried about the disruptive effects of sexual attraction between messmates, they should never have allowed women to enlist) and it is simply and purely a concession to macho nonsense. A man who cannot keep his word even to this extent is dangerous as well as dishonourable.

[redcoast.livejournal.com]

And so you're mad at Obama for calling for the end of Don't Ask, Don't Tell?

[fpb.livejournal.com]

I'm mad at Obama for doing the exact opposite. Sheesh, pay attention! Reading this - http://expectare.livejournal.com/349295.html - is exactly what set me off in the first place, although I had to type fast to keep up with all the stuff that was coming to me.

My favourite Barry

[shezan.livejournal.com]

It was Barry Goldwater who said "You don't need to be straight to shoot straight." So it's not even a recent debate.

Also, FAIL CUBED when the military fired gay Farsi and Arabic translators - who probably were the very few whose security clearance should have been obvious, on the grounds that the other side wants them stoned.

Re: My favourite Barry

[fpb.livejournal.com]

They did WHAT?????
Well, doesn't that just prove the old saw that military intelligence is a contradiction in terms.

Re: My favourite Barry

[fpb.livejournal.com]

One thing I have to wonder is whether Barack himself is not, when in the closet, a bit of a homophobe. Certainly, other things being equal, one would not expect the long-term member of the Reverend Wright's black nationalist church to have too instinctive a liking for homosexuals; black separatists are among the groups where homophobia in the strict sense and queer-bashing are most widespread. And his curious unwillingness to fix an injustice that much of his party feels very keenly, that is not important enough for opponents to make a fuss, and that was an indubitable part of his party's platform, really does suggest that he feels some inner shrinking.

[dustthouart.livejournal.com]

Nothing in this section shall be construed as prohibiting any nonfederal entity (including an individual or a State or local government) from purchasing separate or supplemental coverage for abortions for which funding is prohibited under this section, or a plan that includes such abortions, so long as-

(1) Such coverage or plan is paid for entirely using funds not authorized or appropriated by this Act; and
(2) Such coverage or plan is not purchased using-
(a) individual premium payments required for an Exchange-participating health benefits pan towards which an affordability credit is applied; or
(b) other nonfederal funds required to receive a federal payment, including State's or locality's contribution of Medicaid matching funds.

(c) OPTION TO OFFER SUPPLEMENTAL COVERAGE OR PLAN -

Notwithstanding section 303(b), nothing in this section shall restrict any nonfederal QHBP offering entity from offering separate supplemental coverage for abortions for which funding is prohibited under this section, or a plan that includes such abortions, so long as-

(1) premiums for such separate supplemental coverage or plan are paid for entirely with funds not authorized or appropriated by this Act;

(2) administrative costs and all services offered through such supplemental coverage or plan are paid for using only premiums collected for such coverage or plan; and

(3) any nonfederal QHBP offering entity that offers an Exchange-participating health benefits plan that includes coverage for abortions for which funding is prohibited under this section also offers an Exchange-participating health benefits plan that is identical in every respect except that it does not cover abortions for which funding is prohibited under this section.

Please explain how this will eliminate all health insurance coverage of abortion. I honestly would like to know.

[redcoast.livejournal.com]

Well here's a whole 14 page analysis (http://www.gwumc.edu/sphhs/departments/healthpolicy/dhp_publications/pub_uploads/dhpPublication_FED314C4-5056-9D20-3DBE77EF6ABF0FED.pdf) for you to read (PDF).

[fpb.livejournal.com]

When you have to misinterpret, it takes time and effort.

[dustthouart.livejournal.com]

You can't summarize it at all? I force myself to read 14 page articles for class, I'm not going to read one in my spare time on a subject that makes me stressed out and crazy.

[redcoast.livejournal.com]

Basically, it's about the affect the amendment might have because of the way the insurance business works. The restrictions requiring the abortion coverage to be a supplemental plan administered and paid for separately would be such a pain that the easier thing to do would be to not offer abortion coverage at all. And because there is nothing requiring them to offer abortion coverage, they won't.

The idea is that because of the affects that state and federal requirements have on demand and because it's cheapest to make the basic structure of the plan the same across the board, this might lead to companies dropping all abortion coverage from all their plans.

I guess you can buy it or not. As far as I can tell, the original bill said that if you got federal subsidies for insurance coverage, you could buy a plan with abortion coverage but you had to pay for the abortion coverage yourself, separately. The Stupak amendment says it can't be a part of the plan, it has to be a supplemental plan administered completely separately. The big difference, then, is not who pays for it but how the insurance companies would have to deal with it.

It's a difficult issue for me to understand because it deals in legalese and I am not a lawyer.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

So, it's an organizational issue. And the insurance companies and other bodies involved would not have enough brain cells between them to change the organizational features to get rid of any problem? Really, I kind of expected better.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

Speaking as someone who WANTS universal health care, this is making me crazy.
Ditto with bells and whistles and knobs on. I spent months before the election arguing that a national basic health cover was both a right and a duty and that all the conservative arguments against it were so much hot air and dangerous macho nonsense; and now this guy comes along and identifies health reform with the most horrendous ideological issue of them, the one which, according to my analysis, is ultimately responsible for all the hostility in modern politics. This is wrecking; it amounts to adding another one to the list of failed national health cover proposals - Truman, Nixon, Clinton - that come with depresssing regularity once a generation and are squashed, while American citizens continue to set up pathetic websites to gather funds for friends and relations who have been let down by private insurance.

[goreism.livejournal.com]

Speaking as someone who didn't support the health care bill, the answer is that the CBO scored replacing the Stupak language with the Senate provision as having zero budgetary impact, meaning that it couldn't be modified through reconciliation.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

Well, what is done is done. I have a very bad feeling about the whole process; I feel that everything has gone wrong, been done badly for bad reasons, and that there will be Hell to pay for it well beyond the mid-term elections.

On the other hand, is it only my impression that you haven't appeared in these pages for a long time? You have been badly missed, and if I am not wrong, please don't let it wait till another national drama.

[goreism.livejournal.com]

Watch out, the day of my return to LJ fast approaches.

I admit I did surf over to your journal after the bill passed in hopes of finding a good rant or two to make me feel better. :-)

[fpb.livejournal.com]

Well, get ready. I have something in mind which, if I complete it, will displease both sides. Is that the sort of thing you had in mind?

[fpb.livejournal.com]

You shouldn't believe everything you read in the papers. Especially since what the papers are saying is nothing more than a repeat of the same lies. If the Stupak Amendment did not matter, there would be no reason to mobilize the whole armoury of political war to stop it at all costs. And, incidentally, to break with 230 years of constitutional precedent and actually try to split the Catholic Church. (I have just edited in a paragraph about that.)