Family Research Council’s Washington Update on Health Care

 Ok, so I lack originality in these last three days of blogs, but believe me when I tell you that (1) I don’t trust myself to be completely respectful and loving in how I phrase things right now due to my saddness and discouragement over what has happened in the health care vote, and (2) these guys at FRC say it MUCH better than I ever could.  So with that, I give you an email I received from Family Research Council entitled “Haunted by the Passed,” in part below, and in its entirety here.

 

Washington Update 

Haunted by the Passed

He was the one none of us expected to be talking about today. For five months, Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) stood guard on the wall between Americans and his party’s army–a stubborn sentinel for life in a chamber of abortion-hungry Democrats. Without him there would have been no Stupak coalition, no Stupak language to ban taxpayer-funded abortion. In the end, conservatives couldn’t live without him. Now, neither can the unborn. In the last moments, when members tried to incorporate Stupak’s language into the bill, 21 pro-life Democrats voted for it. And for the first time in this Congress, Bart Stupak wasn’t one of them. Instead, the bill–completely devoid of pro-life protections–passed with his help, 219-212*.

With the clock ticking down, the Democrat from Michigan stunned everyone by trading away five agonizing months for a meaningless piece of White House paper. With one-sixth of the economy in his grasp, the President agreed to Stupak’s deal: an executive order that would somehow negate the abortion funding in the Senate bill. It was meant to reassure wobbly Democrats that the administration would protect taxpayers from any involvement in the abortion industry. Unfortunately, it does nothing of the sort. Just ask Planned Parenthood. In an email to supporters (subject: “VICTORY!”), the organization brags, “We were able to keep the Stupak abortion ban out of the final legislation and President Obama did not include the Stupak language in his executive order.” For once, FRC agrees with pro-abortionists like Rep. Diana DeGette (D-Colo.) who told the press that the executive order “doesn’t change anything.” . . .

Even the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) appealed to Rep. Stupak to reject the compromise. Its legal experts were unanimously opposed. ” The statutory mandate construed by the courts would override any executive order… only a change in the law enacted by Congress can… address this very serious problem.” The Wall Street Journal seemed surprised with the deal. “…[O]f course,” the editors write, “such an order can be revoked whenever it is politically convenient to do so.” As an attorney, Bart Stupak would have known that this was an empty gesture on the President’s part. More importantly, he turned away from beliefs and put that trust in the most pro-abortion President in U.S. history. Americans have come to expect this kind of betrayal from this White House–but they never expected it from the man fighting for life in his party. . .

If House and Senate leaders believed the American people would forgive and forget by Election Day, they were mistaken. Right now, the bill’s new taxes and mandates are scheduled to start hitting homes in the heat of the campaign season. Meanwhile, nine state attorneys general will do their best to fend off the federal invasion at their borders. In Alabama, North Dakota, Nebraska, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, Virginia, and Washington, a collective lawsuit will launch the moment ObamaCare becomes law. . .

America is radically shifting in its opinion of the unborn–so much so that the only way Democrats could pass this bill was by putting a pro-life veneer on it. Those who ignore the people on this issue do so at their own peril. During his victory lap, President Obama said smugly, “This is what change looks like.” With all due respect, he hasn’t seen anything yet.

Please read the rest of this article here.  And then join me here later in the week as I return to non-political blog writing.  I’ve had enough of it all right now–not that I’m apathetic or will not be “standing on truth” with the voice that God gave me, but for now, I don’t have the stomach for it, and will be writing more along the lines of what you, my readers, voted for–Culture Through a Biblical Lens, Parenting, and Nutrition.  Join me!

Heritage Foundation’s Morning Bell on Health Care

I haven’t written on politics in quite a while, months maybe.  And that has been intentional.  My heart is too heavy and my frustration too overwhelming at what I am seeing happen to this great country that I love so dearly, that I can’t find the words, or the effort, to write about it as often as I did.  But today I would be remiss if I did not speak my outrage once or twice on what happened last night; the historic vote that House Minority Leader John Boehner called “armageddon” because it would “ruin our country” (source).  And  then I received this email from The Heritage Foundation’s president, concerned about the vote as well; a vote that some (including myself) would say is the biggest step towards socialism we may have ever seen in this country, and thereby the biggest step away from freedom.  I’ve included much of it here, but please follow the link to read the rest.

Fellow Americans,

Late last night, in a narrow and partisan vote, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the most significant piece of social legislation in over seven decades. It did so in the face of overwhelming and principled opposition from the American people. Large majorities of Americans oppose this legislation because it offends the historic American dedication to the principle of self-government. They understand that this new law will accelerate Washington’s intrusion into our most personal and private decisions.

This is why opposition to this bill will only grow. Supporters of this bill argue that popular hostility will recede upon its passage. But, rather than cementing our descent into a European-style welfare state, last night’s passage of Obamacare is best seen as a historic turning point, a true catalyst for real change. . .

Those who supported this bill are our fellow Americans, and we do not question their good will or patriotism. In public policy, however, good intentions alone do not suffice. And let there be no mistake, our philosophical differences with supporters of this bill are profound. The reason government-run health care has been the holy grail of the left for decades is that liberals realize as much as we do that it is a giant step toward the creation of a European-style welfare state. This is an evolution Americans have always resisted because it is alien to our national character.

If there is one good thing about the past year-one in which we have witnessed unprecedented horse-trading, press stunts, midnight votes and political manipulation in both houses of the U.S. Congress-it is that the American people have come away educated as never before about the differences between these two visions for America. Americans are strongly opposed to this bill not because they have been hoodwinked but because they understand this bill both in its particulars and at an instinctive, gut level.

They understand this health care bill forces individuals and employers to buy insurance policies designed by government bureaucrats. This intrusion is intended to follow us from cradle to grave.

Instead of empowering families and individuals to make their own choices, Obamacare empowers the bureaucracy to make those decisions for them. It is this unelected bureaucracy, unanswerable to the electorate, that will determine the content of health benefits packages, including medical treatment and procedures, and how much will be paid for those services. Yesterday’s legislation brings us one step closer to fully government-run medicine, with expanded government power over the financing and delivery of medical services that is sure to ration care in the name of cost control.

You will hear the left say this new entitlement will be popular with the American people. Do not believe them for a second. Yes, 32 million people will gain the theoretical right to health insurance. But over half of that coverage comes from placing at least 16 million more Americans into Medicaid, an unpopular and overextended welfare program that already rations care.

Americans will not stand for it. The American love for liberty prevailed in our founding, and will prevail once again. . .

Our health care system requires reform, and we have long advocated measures to improve our system. We can and should strengthen the ability of American families to choose the coverage they want, rather than giving that power to Congress and its agency bureaucrats. We can also spur competition and choice to bring efficiency and lower costs to the health system, in place of the bill’s deadening regulation and damaging price controls. And, above all, we should foster state innovation rather than Washington-based central planning.

Read the rest of this email from Edwin J. Feulner, Ph.D., President, The Heritage Foundation here.

Hand Over Your Health

These past nine days I’ve had a never-ending, pain-in-my-backside cold.  I’ve been in and out of bed, on and off of supplements, and through more cups of hot green tea with honey than I’ve had in my entire lifetime.  As minor as this cold is in comparison to many of the health care issues other Americans are facing, I’m grateful that I was able to treat my cold the way I wanted to, and the way my doctor advised.  I can’t imagine having a much bigger health concern and having a government appointed task force deciding for me what was best for me.  But isn’t this what we are headed for?  Here has what has happened in the last week:

New mammogram guidelines for women between the ages of 40-49.  The Associated Press writes last week, “A government task force said Monday that most women don’t need mammograms in their 40s and should get one every two years starting at 50 - a stunning reversal and a break with the American Cancer Society’s long-standing position. What’s more, the panel said breast self-exams do no good, and women shouldn’t be taught to do them.”

This immediately caused me suspicion, and I mean immediately.  But ok, maybe that’s just my “conspiracy theory” mindset (read my sarcasm).  Then another guideline came out later in the week regarding cervical cancer screening:

“In what some see as further attack on women’s health care, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists recommended Thursday that women delay cervical cancer exams, also called Pap smears, until the age of 21 and that women younger than 30 undergo cervical cancer screening once every two years instead of an annual exam. The organization also said that women age 30 and older can be screened once every three years.  The recommendations, the college said, are based on scientific evidence that suggests more frequent testing leads to overtreatment of irregular Pap smears, which can harm a young woman’s chances of carrying a child full term.  Reaction to the recommendation has been mixed.

“I think it’s bad timing with the whole health-care reform effort going on and the mammogram recommendations that came out earlier this week,” said FoxNews.com managing editor of health Dr. Manny Alvarez, who opposes the new mammogram recommendations. “But these particular guidelines don’t fall into the criteria of saving money. These guidelines have to do with minimizing injuries to women that are of reproductive age.”

But Dr. Elizabeth Eden, an obstetrician/gynecologist and professor of obstetrics and gynecology at New York University School of Medicine in New York City, disagrees and says it’s another attempt by the government to cut costs on preventative medicine” (source).

Ok, but to all you cynics out there, maybe these decisions are really for our best interest and not about money.  You think?  Then I see a news segment that prices for prescription medicines have been on the rise this year, and again, I wonder why.  Yes, the economy is in a recession, but is there more to it?

“Financial analysts have attributed some of the increases to drug makers attempting to boost profits amid an economic downturn as they confront the prospect of congressional action on health care that could change the marketplace” (source).

Nooo!  Could it be that drug makers are reacting to the possibility of Obamacare passing, and now it’s being taken out on patients?  Surely we are just Obama haters.  We really won’t be that affected by the health care plan, will we?  After all, what kind of influence do these new recommendations really have on our choices in health care?  These are just recommendations, aren’t they?  The Heritage Foundation sets us straight:

“Section 2713 of the Senate Health Bill would give the recommendations of the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force the force of law by requiring all health insurance plans to provide coverage (with no patient co-pays) for “items or services that have in effect a rating of “A” or “B” [recommended] in the current recommendations of the United States Preventive Services Task Force.  Conversely, under Obamacare, last week’s Task Force decision to give annual mammograms a “C” rating (not recommended) will henceforth be viewed by insurers and employers as a justification for discontinuing coverage.”

So if Obamacare passes, these task forces have considerable weight in what will or will not be covered by insurers?  So potentially life-saving tests (beyond just mammograms or pap smears) could be withheld from me (if I cannot pay out of my own pocket for them) because a panel of 16 (including no oncologists) says so?  And again, why was Sarah Palin impaled and labeled a fear-mongering liar for her Facebook comment about “death panels”?  Seems to me this sort of scenario is developing right before our eyes.

Should we hand over our health then?  Should we throw debt on our children and grandchildren for a bill that the majority of Americans still do not want?  In an excellent article by David Broder of The Washington Post, he says that according to a Quinnipiac poll, only 19% of us trust Obama when he promises he will not sign a bill that will add to the national debt.  That’s a very telling number.  But yet, the Senate Health Care bill was given the go-ahead for debate over the weekend.  Are the people we’ve elected not listening to us? 

Maybe they are being bribed:

Senator Mary Landrieu from Louisiana reportedly has been offered $100 million for her state if the plan passes.

The AMA?  The AARP?  The drug industry?  According to Dick Morris in a Newsmax article, yes, they were bribed too for their support.

If you are not convinced by now that you cannot trust the government, what will it take?  And yet, we should hand over our health to them?

Newt Gingrich says it best on his webpage Center for Health Transformation:  “Health reform or ‘health insurance reform’ should not be a political wedge, pushed to satisfy political allies at the expense of the American people. Healthcare is too important and the stakes are too high. The American people deserve and have demanded better. With an honest process, the right priorities, and the right solutions, we can and will succeed.”

Government Healthcare Proponents Attack Whole Foods

Well, the Left is at it again.  It seems that when opposition to one of their ideas surfaces, all of Hades breaks loose.  It is no secret that President Obama and the Democrat’s proposition of health care reform (that includes a public option) is not going well.  The latest Rasmussen poll shows that only 42% of Americans support the government-run health care reform option, but yet we are seeing hatred spring up all over the place because of the Left’s inability to allow dissenting views without uprising in a loud and potentially destructive way.

Carrie Prejean was vilified back in June over her honest answer to a same-sex marriage question.

Consider the number of times conservatives are called “racist” when they oppose a policy of our African-America president.

The Tax Day Tea Parties in April. . .protestors were call names with sexual innuendos and attempts were made all over the media to discredit them–pointing out the very, very small percentage of signs that were personal attacks on the president, when in reality, the vast majority of these protests have been civil and respectful.

The Town Hall Meetings over the last month. . .again, the overwhelming majority of the town hall attendees are respectful (albeit passionate) and are genuinely concerned about the direction that the Democrat’s health care plan would take them and their families, yet what gets covered?  The one or two who are completely without class who bring signs of swastikas or Obama-as-Hitler.  I oppose any personal attacks from any party or group.  But at the same time, the thousands of people who are at these town halls across America voicing a valid opinion with their Constitutional right of free speech are being discredited as “Astroturf” or “un-American.” 

And now Whole Foods CEO John Mackey is taking a hit.  Why?  Because he voiced opposition to the Left’s plan. . .not any one person in particulr, not by personally attacking our president, but by writing an op-ed piece that outlined why, as a very successful business man, he held the opinion that a public-option in health-care reform is absolutely not the answer.  He says in this Wall Street Journal piece, “A careful reading of both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution will not reveal any intrinsic right to health care, food or shelter. That’s because there isn’t any. This ‘right’ has never existed in America.”

Why does Mr. Mackey not have a right to say this?  And if he does, why should he be penalized for respectfully voicing his opinion?  He did not personally attack the president.  He did not use disrespectful language, signs or imagery.  He spoke with a well-informed voice as a man with a business-mind and a history of success in the business world.  And now, his company and his employees (not Mr. Mackey, as we will see) stand to suffer because of a boycott of Whole Foods that is gaining ground (at least according to the liberal media).  Mr. Mackey takes a salary of $1 annually and donates his stock option proceeds to charity.  He employs 50,000 people, many of whom might be in danger of losing their job if the Left continues with this nonsense. (source)  It is a sad day when more jobs of innocent employees are threatened because the Left believes that free speech is only a right for those whose speech matches theirs. 

Now I know what kind of comments I might receive.  “But what about the boycott of the Dixie Chicks back in 2003 when all they were doing was expressing their opinion?” they will say.  First of all, if you can honestly tell me that what the Dixie Chicks said and where they said it is the same as John Mackey, I will question your judgment and ability to be rational.  The Dixie Chicks made a personal attack against President George Bush in London (outside the United States).  They took their right to free speech into the gutter and made it personal, just as the protestor holding the Obama-as-Hitler sign did.

I will defend anyone’s right to free speech even if I don’t agree with what they are saying.  Why won’t the Left afford conservatives that same right?

I will be writing Mr. Mackey later today because I respect the stand that he took and that he took it respectfully.  I will also be supporting him in his right to free speech and although I already frequent Whole Foods, I will do so now with the knowledge that my money is going to a company that has at its helm a man not afraid to stand for truth.  I urge you, if you believe in Mr. Mackey’s right to express his opinion without vicious backlash, to support him and his company by following the link below.

http://www2.wholefoodsmarket.com/blogs/jmackey/2009/08/14/health-care-reform-full-article/

The Left isn’t the only voice demanding to be heard lately, thank God.

Health Care or Child Care?

My intentions were to write something about my son’s spiritual curiosity as of late, but then I dared to open my emails and found this waiting there.  It is a piece written by Chuck Norris. . .yes, “Walker, Texas Ranger,” and it exposes a “dirty little secret” in the Obama healthcare bill that should be of utmost importance to parents especially.

“Health care reforms are turning into health care revolts. Americans are turning up the heat on congressmen in town hall meetings across the U.S.

While watching these political hot August nights, I decided to research the reasons so many are opposed to Obamacare to separate the facts from the fantasy. What I discovered is that there are indeed dirty little secrets buried deep within the 1,000-plus page health care bill.

Dirty secret No. 1 in Obamacare is about the government’s coming into homes and usurping parental rights over child care and development.

It’s outlined in sections 440 and 1904 of the House bill (Page 838), under the heading “home visitation programs for families with young children and families expecting children.” The programs (provided via grants to states) would educate parents on child behavior and parenting skills.

The bill says that the government agents, “well-trained and competent staff,” would “provide parents with knowledge of age-appropriate child development in cognitive, language, social, emotional, and motor domains … modeling, consulting, and coaching on parenting practices,” and “skills to interact with their child to enhance age-appropriate development.”

Are you kidding me?! With whose parental principles and values? Their own? Certain experts’? From what field and theory of childhood development? As if there are one-size-fits-all parenting techniques! Do we really believe they would contextualize and personalize every form of parenting in their education, or would they merely universally indoctrinate with their own?

Are we to assume the state’s mediators would understand every parent’s social or religious core values on parenting? Or would they teach some secular-progressive and religiously neutered version of parental values and wisdom? And if they were to consult and coach those who expect babies, would they ever decide circumstances to be not beneficial for the children and encourage abortions?

One government rebuttal is that this program would be “voluntary.” Is that right? Does that imply that this agency would just sit back passively until some parent needing parenting skills said, “I don’t think I’ll call my parents, priest or friends or read a plethora of books, but I’ll go down to the local government offices”? To the contrary, the bill points to specific targeted groups and problems, on Page 840: The state “shall identify and prioritize serving communities that are in high need of such services, especially communities with a high proportion of low-income families.”

Are we further to conclude by those words that low-income families know less about parenting? Are middle- and upper-class parents really better parents? Less neglectful of their children? Less needful of parental help and training? Is this “prioritized” training not a biased, discriminatory and even prejudicial stereotype and generalization that has no place in federal government, law or practice?

Bottom line: Is all this what you want or expect in a universal health care bill being rushed through Congress? Do you want government agents coming into your home and telling you how to parent your children? When did government health care turn into government child care?

Government needs less of a role in running our children’s lives and more of a role in supporting parents’ decisions for their children. Children belong to their parents, not the government. And the parents ought to have the right — and government support — to parent them without the fed’s mandates, education or intervention in our homes.”

Feel free to continue reading the entire article here.  Or see the 1000+ page bill from the government’s website here.  In addition, read up on the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child.  Could this move by the Obama administration be a back-door way of reaching this ultimate end?

When I think of what is important to me as a wife, mother, Christian, and parent (things that are in play with myself and my family on a daily basis), these things come to mind:  my freedom to worship God, the sacred union of my marriage to my husband, my health and the health of my family, the choices I have in how to raise my son as a God-fearing young man, my schooling choices for him, the financial choices my husband and I make in order to have a worry-free retirement or send our son to a college of our (and his) choosing, and what we do with our hard-earned money. 

Then when I think of the ways that President Obama has threatened, weakened and in some ways destroyed some of those exact things (those things most important to me) in a matter of 6 months, I have all I can do to not be physically sick.  He’s threatening the union between husbands and wives all across the U.S., he is reversing the life-saving efforts others have put in place to save innocent babies from physical torture through abortion, he is squeezing God out of any and every public place he can get his hands on, he is driving my son so far into debt he will likely be owned by the government (think Orwellian) before he even graduates, he is tampering with health care in such radical ways that I can scratch my health and that of my family off my list as something I will have any control over anymore, and now he’s trying to mess with my son. 

Let me tell you, I’ll be darned before I let the government and their meddling hands, their anti-God values, and their bottom-line power-driven greed come into my home and take away those very things that I treasure so much–those things promised to me by our Founding Fathers, the Constitution of the United States, and my Heavenly Father Himself!

Go ahead and try, President Obama, but you will find that this otherwise shy and reserved housewife and mom will become a fierce lioness who has been backed into a corner one too many times by your socialistic agenda, and I will fight (legally and respectfully), but I will fight.  And based on all the town hall meetings across the country in which more people than expected are rising up and voicing opposition, I have a feeling I won’t be the only one.

“After a Government Health Care Takeover”

This video has been placed on You Tube by the Family Research Council. . .it’s a picture of life (yours and mine) if President Obama has his way with government-run health care.

onclick="javascript:pageTracker._trackPageview('/outbound/article/www.youtube.com');">watch?v=JxFC9Af3W1U