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Obama on health care encourages Catholic officials
Bishops' official: 'We look forward to working with Obama'
Sep. 11, 2009
U.S. President Barack Obama speaks about health care reform before a joint session of Congress Sept. 9. (CNS/Reuters)
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PDF versionWASHINGTON -- President Barack Obama's pledge to continue the ban on the use of federal funds for abortion and to maintain conscience protections for health care workers in any health reform legislation was welcomed by two officials of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and the president of the Catholic Health Association.
Speaking with Catholic News Service Sept. 10, hours after Obama addressed a joint session of Congress and a nationwide television audience, Kathy Saile, director of domestic social development in the USCCB Department of Justice, Peace and Human Development, said the president's address offered an encouraging sign that the administration has been listening to concerns raised by the bishops and pro-life organizations about abortion funding in any reform legislation.
Citing the bishops' long-standing belief that all Americans must have access to quality, affordable health care, Saile said the president's speech must be followed up with the appropriate changes in legislation currently pending in both houses of Congress.
As currently written, the leading piece of legislation in the House, America's Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009, known as H.R. 3200, allows for federal funding of abortion. Language continues to be worked on in Senate reform measures.
Acknowledging that "serious significant details need to be ironed out," Saile said that "we need to look at actual language that fixes provisions that are in existing bills."
"We look forward to working with (Obama) to ensure that what is in the final bill, that there is no federal funding (of abortion), no mandates (to pay for abortion) and no requirement of people to pay for other people's abortions," Saile said.
Richard Doerflinger, associate director of the bishops' Secretariat of Pro-Life Activities, echoed Saile in a statement released Sept. 10.
"We believe that incorporating essential and long-standing federal laws on these issues into any new proposal will strengthen support for health care reform," Doerflinger said, pledging to work with Congress and the White House to ensure that current legislation is amended.
Sr. Carol Keehan, a Daughter of Charity who is president and CEO of the Catholic Health Association, told CNS that while much work remains on amending the legislation she was pleased by Obama's stance.
"We were gratified to hear that federal funds would not be used for abortions and that conscience protections would be maintained," she said. "We were pleased to hear him say we were going to move on now.
"There are too many people ... who need this kind of (health care) assistance. We believe it is long overdue. It is a moral and economic imperative and we were pleased to hear him put it in those terms," Keehan said.
Meanwhile, a group of pro-life legislators and organizations, led by Rep. Chris Smith, R-N.J., challenged the president's position that health care reform legislation would not include abortion funding.
Calling Obama's statements to Congress misleading, Smith said during a Sept. 10 Capitol Hill news conference that an analysis of H.R. 3200 shows that funding for abortion remains in place.
"Despite what Obama said, the House bill would allow abortions to be covered by a federal plan and by federally subsidized private (insurance) plans," Smith said.
"President Obama must be held accountable for his words," Smith added. "If he intends to support the pro-life amendments that have thus far been deleted by pro-abortion members of his party, we will welcome that. But the truth is that he seeks to cover up his intention to use the government-run public plan to send checks from the U.S. Treasury to abortionists around the country."
Joining Smith was Rep. Joe Pitts, R-Pa., one of the authors of an amendment that would have ensured the federal ban on abortion funding would remain in place. The amendment was defeated in committee, however.
"Such an explicit exclusion is missing from this bill," Pitts said, pledging to reintroduce his amendment when the bill comes up for debate in the House.
"This is not about the legality or the illegality of abortion. It is about keeping the government out of the business of promoting abortion as health care," Pitts said.
Joining the press conference were representatives of the National Right to Life Committee, Democrats for Life, Students for Life of America, 40 Days for Life and the Susan B. Anthony List, which promotes pro-life women for elective office.
Part of a coalition called Stop the Abortion Mandate, the organizations pledged to undertake a massive lobbying effort of members of Congress to prevent the expansion of federal funding for abortion.
A second coalition made up primarily of faith-based groups also pledged to "flood Congress" for 48 hours, starting Sept. 15, with messages supporting health care reform.
The 40 Days of Health Reform campaign, coordinated by the group Faith in Public Life, is conducting a nationwide call-in to Congress. Simultaneously, television ads urging people to call their members of Congress will be broadcast in key media markets in Arkansas, Colorado, Indiana, Louisiana, Missouri and North Dakota.
The group also plans a lobbying day in Congress Sept. 16.
I look forward to a
I look forward to a thoughtful, unrushed, approach to heath reform as well. I am concerned that the Dems are till pushing to do it this year. This is not a small decision and needs to be well thought out. part of the whole reason congress is the one with legislative power is that they are the branch that should be moving slowly and meticulously.
However, ultimately, if President Obama and the Congressional leaders are lying through their teeth (as that one rep pointed out, though it an unacceptably inappropriate way), the reform will ultimately not be a force for good, which is unfortunate given how much we need it. "Lets do this fast" from any party translates in our day, unfortunately, as "quick before anyone figures out what we put in it."
I thought we were suppose to
I thought we were suppose to be guided by the callin Mattew 24 - Don't we have an oblgation to support coverage of all? I do not see from what I have read that there is funding for abortion in the current bills. Calling the Presdent a liar is neither true no helpful in the debate. As for doing this fast - we have been debating healtcare since Truman - That is not my definition of fast. The idea that Congress is doing it fast before anyone finds out is false gien the amount of media coverage and town hall meeting that have happened. It sound like a prescription for doing nothing
"However, ultimately, if
"However, ultimately, if President Obama and the Congressional leaders are lying through their teeth (as that one rep pointed out, though it an unacceptably inappropriate way), the reform will ultimately not be a force for good, which is unfortunate given how much we need it."
Brian, this nation has been debating universal health care since Teddy Roosevelt proposed it a century ago. The time for talk is over. Now is the time for action. It is Obama's critics, including Joe Wilson, Ssrah Palin, Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh, who are lying through their teeth. With these mendacious nihilists, who will stop at nothing to stop health care, there can be no discussion, thoughtful or otherwise.
you can't just rush it
you can't just rush it through....and it is really necessary? I don't want socialism. I want to be able to choose my own doctor. I don't want governent making choices that a doctor and me should make. does any government program actually work. NO. it is going to cost a lot of money and it will cost us our freedoms... Abortions and Euthanasia are in there also..We are Catholic and and Americans....i don't understand you guys
You don't understand because
You don't understand because you swallow the insurance industry and right wing talking points, hook, line and sinker. There is no socialism in the current health bills, just an option for affordable health care. You can choose your doctor and the government does not interfere at all. As far as no government programs working, I guess that you think that the interstate highways were a total failure as our armed services are also. The current proposals will actually reduce the deficit. The status quo will reduce our country to a third world country. And what freedoms will you lose? Oh yeah the freedom to let the insurance companies to make obscene profits. What Catholic or American lets 48,000 Americans die because they have no insurance?
Yes, let's slow it up, wait
Yes, let's slow it up, wait another 40 or 50 years. What's the hurry? Put it off another couple years and more Republicans will be in the House to oppose it. Better yet, forget about it altogether. The Bible doesn't say anything about health insurance so why should we care?
Perhaps it is time to return
Perhaps it is time to return to fundamentals?
We in America currently wade hip deep into truly socialized medicine with both the veterans administration and medicare because we feel it is so important to provide health care to vets and seniors that we will take federal money and guarantee it for them because when the rubber hits the road no one really trusts "the market". Either that or we really don't want our seniors and vets to have that really superior health care that only the market can provide.
What about children? Do they not deserve guaranteed care too? Were they somehow too "lazy"? Do they need to earn it some way in advance?
Ok. So we can't muster the courage to provide guaranteed care for innocent children because that would make us socialists. Eeek! Fine. Well, no. Not fine.
But let's look at the reforms on the table.
Under the current system of health care in America a child can die from both an abortion or from a lack of health care for a treatable disease. Both of these can be prevented, but in both cases - regardless of which side of the birth canal the child was - we still end up with a tragic death. Reforming the system so that the treatable illness is treated would save those children.
It is true that HR3200 has no explicit language against abortion. But neither does it have any explicit language supporting abortion. That kind of makes it abortion-neutral. The Hyde amendment still stands and cannot be circumvented with anything out there now.
So under the current reform proposal we wouldn't expect an increase in abortions, but we would expect a decrease in deaths from treatable illness. In the end more kids would be saved. Isn't this the most important end that we are after?
The biggest abortion-related
The biggest abortion-related concerns with H.R. 3200 pertain to (1) a proposed insurance program that would be run entirely by the federal government (the "public option"); and (2) a proposed new premium-subsidy program ("affordability credits") to help tens of millions of people buy health insurance. Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, and the White House have spent many weeks claiming that any elective abortions subsidized by these two programs would occur with "private" funds, but those claims collapse under scrutiny. In fact, the bill would put the federal government into the business both of funding abortions directly, and of subsidizing the purchase of private health policies that cover elective abortions -- all with federal funds.
Unfortunately, everything we have seen so far would suggest that President Obama's so-called "pledge" not to provide "federal funds" for abortion, articulated in the joint session speech on September 9, was just the latest in a series of highly misleading statements on the subject -- statements that employ a distorted and contrived terminology, or that rely on misdirection and evasion.
H.R. 3200, as amended by the Capps-Waxman Amendment, explicitly authorizes the Administration to cover elective abortions in the public fund. The White House and congressional Democratic leaders claim that the abortions will be paid for by "private funds." The claim that a federal agency would be spending private funds on abortion, not federal funds, is absurd on its face -- a political hoax.
The funds in a citizen's bank account are "private," but once he or she writes a check to the IRS to pay income taxes, the funds become federal government funds, public funds, deposited in a U.S. Treasury account. The same would be true of the money collected by the Department of Health and Human Services to run the public fund. Once an enrollee made a "premium" payment to DHHS, the funds would no longer be "private" -- they would be federal government funds, as truly and completely as the funds that are collected by the IRS.
It is really pretty simple: abortionists would send their bills to the DHHS, and they would receive payments drawn on the U.S. Treasury. This would be direct federal government funding of elective abortion, using federal funds (which are, in reality, the only kind of funds that the government can spend). It would be impossible to enroll in the public fund without paying a premium that was increased specifically to cover the cost of elective abortions.
A September 8 NRLC media advisory that summarizes these issues is posted here:
http://www.nrlc.org/AHC/Advisory090809.html
While running for president, Barack Obama promised Planned Parenthood that "reproductive services" (which includes abortion) would be "at the heart" of his health plan, and that his public plan would cover them. H.R. 3200 contains the fulfillment of that commitment, which he now seeks to smuggle into law behind a smokescreen of misleading rhetoric.
Douglas Johnson
Legislative Director
National Right to Life Committee
Washington, D.C.
http://www.nrlc.org
legfederal--at--aol,dot,com
Mr. Johnson's point seems to
Mr. Johnson's point seems to be that the possibility of federal dollars being used for abortions trumps any good that any bill could accomplish. In order for this trump to hold it would seem to me that the use of federal dollars would have to somehow increase the number of abortions and that withholding it would reduce them. Or that am increase in abortions would far outshadow any reduction in other innocent deaths.
History does not support this. Despite characterizations, abortion is not a profit-driven industry; at least not any more than any other branch of medicine. There is no data to support the notion that providing federal funding will increase the number of abortions performed or that it will somehow promote the idea because women will suddenly be able to afford it or afford it more easily.
Real, concrete gains in saving lives are on the table before us. Obstructing healthcare reform - federally funded abortion or not - will not save a single unborn child. Money is not part of the abortion problem. Obstructing healthcare reform will doom countless children - born and unborn. Money is one of the roots of that problem.
You would think that all of the "small government" people would understand that the government doesn't have that big or a role to play in ending abortion. Experience has shown that we cannot legislate this away; it keeps happening anyway.
It is no surrender to accept the fact that this is not the way to combat the problem. Instead it is up to us to heed our Catholic tradition and inspire change. Teach, educate, give. Love.
Mr. Johnson, Eliminating the
Mr. Johnson,
Eliminating the concern that one cannot afford another child should go a long way toward reducing abortion, should it not? Is it not now phenomenally cheaper to have an abortion than it is to risk loss of income due to pregnancy complications and to bear the cost of prenatal care, delivery, post natal care, and one's child's medical care?
Even if abortion as a medical necessity is covered, making health care affordable will reduce abortions. This is because most people do not take abortion so lightly as your organization would have everyone believe. You can stop trying to obstruct this reform or you can propose taxing abortions at 5000%. In either case, I would be willing to bet that rates of abortion would decline.
Prove that the NRLC cares about abortion by no longer mentioning Obama and focusing on the whys of abortion and how to address them.
Mr. Johnson, We need health
Mr. Johnson,
We need health insurance reform now - please stop standing in the way of this reform. I am a single mother - my daughter just graduated from college - she can no longer be covered under my insurance and on top of that she has preexisting conditions. i cant afford her health care after paying for college for four years - the only job she could find is parttime with no benefits. she makes $250 a week - too much for medicaid
do you want to give me the money for my daughter's cobra payments? or should i let her die if she gets sick? or perhaps i should go into bankruptcy.
what about my daughter's right to life?
Mr. Johnson, I would like to
Mr. Johnson,
I would like to suggest that you change the name of your group to the National Right to BIRTH Committee. If you truly were concerned with LIFE, you would care about the quality of the life that the unborn children you claim to protect will have once they are born.
20,000 Americans a year die
20,000 Americans a year die because they don't have health insurance. These are the casualties of the Republicans war on the middle class.
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