Politics Makes Strange Bedfellows

[Mr. Right-of-Center]

There now seems to be quite a dust-up in the House of Representatives about provisions governing abortion in the health care reform legislation.

I just listened to a woman Representative decrying the fact that "white men" would want a provision in the law that would specifically limit a woman having insurance coverage for the procedure if Federal funds were directly involved in funding the policy. (My immediate thought was that a lot of women of every race object to medically terminating a pregnancy.)

The remedy being proposed: provide a "mini-insurance policy" known as a rider that an individual would pay for directly from their own pocket to cover the possibility of needing the procedure.

But there are quite a few Representatives who are contending that having to purchase this rider in advance (which would not cost very much) is asking women to contemplate a medical procedure fraught with great emotional and moral anxiety.

Maybe I am a white, male chauvinist pig who knows nothing about women's health care issues.

But surprisingly, I am a pro-choice Republican...

So it's amazing that I think having a rider provision to cover a medical procedure that so many Americans object strongly to is a perfectly acceptable compromise.

I'll take that one step further: I think having a pregnancy terminated should take a great deal of emotional and moral soul searching...even if I think that is a decision individuals should be able to make in consultation with a health care professional and perhaps their respective clergy member.

And finally, asking people to pay for certain medical procedures does not seem to be an irrational limitation.

I wouldn't want to be paying for some one's liposuction or an expensive, unproved new cancer treatment.

Purely on economic grounds, SOME medical procedures are going to have to be outside the coverage of health insurance, even if we include all pre-existing conditions and prohibit dropping anyone from coverage who becomes sick.

If I want something like that, I should be able to pay for it. (I guess that's a pretty old fashioned notion.)

Now being very political about this, I think holding every one in the United State hostage to a provision funding abortions
with Federal health insurance dollars makes very little sense.

There is sufficient objection to abortion to warrant maintaining and even extending "the Hyde ammendment" absolutely restricting public funds from underwriting this procedure...

So now all the pro life people hate me and all the pro choice people hate me.

Is there anyone else left after that????

[Vek]

If you can vote for the pro-life party even though you are for abortion is all right, we need your vote.

[Mr. Right-of-Center]

"The Hyde amendment" has been the law of the land for, I think, 36 years.

It stipulates $0 of Federal tax funds can be used to finance one specific procedure.

It is a law passed by the legislature, not a ruling on the law by a court.

$0 means no dollars whatsoever...it does not mean some dollars but not others, or all dollars except these dollars, or all the dollars in these programs, but if other moneys come from sources other than the Federal government, maybe yes.

I would not vote for the Hyde amendment myself...but I think it is a completely seperate issue as to whether a Federal law should be in compiance with existing Federal law.

What is being accomplished by what might be viewed as clever means is subverting both the spirit and intent of a clearly established and long standing law "through the back door"...without directly challenging the Hyde amendment but by allowing exceptions that make it moot or ineffective in other legislation that has nothing to do directly with the Hyde amendment.

When it comes to law making and government policy, I prefer the "front door", not trickery of such a convoluted manner. I also believe that the law is there to be upheld...especially but other lawmakers.

At heart, I think my impulses are conservative...although I have some flexibility on certain issues. I think I just barely reconcile being "pro choice" because I cannot believe any moral person could be "pro abortion".

And I don't think our laws should be encouraging of any medical procedure that has such profound opposition. The law should clearly regulate the procedure and make sure it is done within legal procedures, and as the law is written and long established, without Federal funds to pay for it.

$0 = $0 - That's the law.

[Whitehorse (Robin Ray)]

Not bad there, Mr. ROC! ;)

I'm pro-life - no abortion unless it's a septic pregnancy which will kill the mother. No abortion for birth control or eugenics, & definitely no public funding of abortions for anything but the physical life of the mother. I realize others will want exceptions for rape & incest. In my perfect world, abortion laws would be unnecessary - but we're not in any kind of perfect world.