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In Friday's Washington Post, Melinda Hennberger had a great piece on how Romney's European tour was targeted less at foreign heads of state than at U.S. heads of religious organizations.
I think Henneberger is right that the White House's political calculations may be off. But, there is something worse about the administration's unwillingness to find a fix to the mandate mess they created. Obama could have had a Sister Souljah moment with the pro-choice crowd which, in this instance, is not defending a woman's right to have an abortion, nor even a woman's right to access to contraception. There were plenty of policy remedies for the issue of guaranteeing access. No, in this instance, women's groups just decided they wanted to sock it to the bishops, and the White House timidly went along, after conducting polls and focus groups to be sure. Lost in this was not only the possibility of a better working relationship with the USCCB, but a loss of vision about what makes a society good and great. To quote from the concurring opinion of Justices Alito and Kagan in the Hosanna-Tabor case:
