The Senate Health Care Reform Bill: Some Persistent Problems

By Andy Lewis and Doug Carlson

Edited by Barrett Duke, Ph.D.

The Senate’s proposed health care reform bill is certain to undergo numerous changes as Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) tries to attract enough votes to secure its passage. Some things will not change, though. After performing thorough analyses of current proposals and probable amendments, the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission concludes that a number of unacceptable problems will persist. Of greatest concern are funding for abortions, high costs, and government-run health care.

Abortion. Recent Senate actions indicate that reform will include government funding of elective abortions. Consider the following:

• The Senate voted 54-45 on Dec. 8 to kill an amendment that would have prohibited federal funding of most abortions under health care reform.
• Federal funds will be used to pay directly for elective abortions in the government’s public option.
• Federal funds will be used to pay indirectly for elective abortions in private health care plans through government-provided premium subsidies for people in low income brackets.

High Cost. The Senate health care reform bill will impose significantly higher costs on everyone.

• Free preventive care, while desirable, will drive up insurance premiums. If it were cheaper to provide this than to only cover illness, the insurance companies would already be doing it.
• Every proposal to date results in higher premiums, higher taxes, mandate penalties, and cuts to Medicare. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates that the current Senate bill will cost approximately $2.5 trillion once fully implemented in 2014 and will require a nearly $500 billion tax increase.
• The CBO also estimates that, based on the current Senate bill, an average family will pay $2,000 more in health insurance premiums.

Government-run Health Care. The Senate is determined to expand the role of government in health care. Whether the Senate creates a public option or expands Medicaid and Medicare, the following is certain.

• As health care costs increase, the government will resort to rationing.
• Private insurers will be gradually squeezed out as their ability to compete is destroyed.
• Some people will lose their current health care plans.
• Medical services will be less available and quality of care will be diminished as fewer men and women go into the medical profession.

Current Senate proposals signal severe problems for the future of health care in our nation. While we need health care reform, the options currently being presented in Congress are unacceptable solutions.

Opt-outs and Triggers: Government-run Health Care by Stealth

Liberals have nearly achieved their decades-long goal of taking over health care in the United States. The House passed its plan by a vote of 220-215. The vote was close, but close was all the liberals needed.

The Senate vote on government-run health care will also be close. In fact, it is likely that liberals will need some kind of stealth plan in order to gain the 60 votes they need. They are working on so-called compromises right now that will essentially give us a government-run health care system without it looking like it. Two plans are being floated that could very possibly garner the last couple of votes Senate liberals need to pass their own version of a massive government takeover of health care.

The Opt-out Plan

The first plan is known as an Opt-out plan. Under this proposal, each state would get to decide whether or not it wanted to allow a government-run plan to be offered within their borders. While it sounds like a nice nod to states rights principles, the truth of the matter is that it is highly unlikely that any states would opt-out of the plan. For one thing, it is simply a political non-starter. There are several reasons. First, the government-run plan will promise lower health insurance premiums. Citizens will not tolerate the prospect of paying higher premiums for the same coverage available in other states that offer the government-run plan. Second, health insurance subsidies for low income people will likely be tied to the government-run plan rate. So, the subsidies may not cover as much of the gap between the cost of health insurance and what people can afford in opt-out states. This will not be received well by the citizens of those states. It is even possible that subsidies will not even be available to states that opt-out. Third, uninsured/underinsured citizens and businesses in opt-out states will be forced to pay taxes and penalties that will be used to help pay for the government-run plan for people in other states, with no benefit for themselves. They will certainly resent this inequity.

The other problem is purely economic. The states are looking at serious financial shortfalls as soon as the stimulus funds run out. They call this event ominously “the funding cliff.” If the states think they can close their impending gaping budget holes by moving their employees into what they are told is a cheaper government-run plan, they will likely feel compelled to grab any rope thrown their way, and then, so much for states opting out. Of course, all of the currently proposed government-run plans will lead to increased rates for everyone, but this will not be evident until the government-run plan is introduced in the states. Then the states’ health insurance dilemmas will be even more perilous. But it will be too late.

The Trigger Plan

The second plan is called a Trigger option. In this scenario, the government-run health plan would be included in the bill, but would only be activated if insurance companies fail to achieve certain benchmarks set by the health care reform legislation. If this option passes, one thing seems quite certain—the trigger will be pulled. It is easy enough to imagine that liberals, who are determined to create a government-run plan, could simply create a set of goals that are nearly impossible to meet. For example, they could require that health insurance premiums decline by a certain percentage—which is certainly a reasonable gauge—but fail to do anything to help drive down costs.

The stage for higher health care premiums has already been set. Consider these facts. The bills liberals have put forward do not allow for interstate competition among private health insurers, without which it will be hard to drive down costs. The bills require free preventive care, which people will appreciate, but which will make health care costs go up. Everyone knows this. The reform proposals prevent insurance companies from denying coverage based on pre-existing conditions. Again, this is an important reform measure, but it will not make insurance premiums decline. It will cause them to go up. There is no tort reform in any of these bills, which means that doctors will be forced to continue to engage in defensive medicine to protect themselves from lawsuits, once again, driving up the cost of health care and consequently driving up premiums. So, when the lower premium benchmark is not reached, the government-run plan will be triggered.

Government-run Health Care Must Be Stopped

Whether one includes a state opt-out or a trigger in the Senate’s health care reform bill, the same result is assured—government-run health care, which will certainly lead to higher costs, rationed care, and poorer service. The only way to prevent this is to insist that the Senate not pass any bill with a government-run plan in it, regardless of when or how that plan might be implemented. The time to insist on this is now. Every person who cares about their and their children’s health care must contact their senators immediately and often and insist that they vote against any health care reform plan that includes a government-run health care option.

Federal Funds for Abortion in the Reid Health Bill

Senator Harry Reid unveiled his “Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act” this week. It will be a while before we know all that he is proposing to do in the name of health care reform in his 2,000+ page bill. However, it is already clear that he intends to greatly expand the use of federal dollars to help pay for abortion in our nation. Section 1303 (a)(1)(D)(i) of his bill actually requires every health insurance exchange to have at least one plan that pays for abortion-on-demand for any reason.

Direct Funding in the Public Option

Senator Reid’s bill uses federal funds to help pay for abortion in two ways, directly and indirectly. Federal funds will pay directly for abortion through the so-called “Community Health Insurance Option,” which is the Reid bill’s name for the public option, Section 1323 (b). To help achieve this, the bill divides abortion into two categories. The first category consists of abortions related to rape, incest, or threats to the mother’s life. According to Section 1303 (a)(1)(C)(i)(III), federal funds will help pay for abortion in these instances for all people, regardless of their income level. Currently, the Hyde Amendment restricts federal money for abortions in these instances to low-income people on Medicaid.

The second category consists of abortions that are typically referred to as elective abortions. These are abortions due to other factors, like economic, personal, emotional, etc. These account for the vast majority of all abortions performed in the United States. Most Americans rightly find these abortions unacceptable, and they do not want their tax dollars to be used to pay for them.

The Reid bill allows for the public plan to pay for these abortions as well, so long as the HHS Secretary can certify that no federal dollars are used to pay for them, Section 1303 (a)(1)(C). In order to skirt this limitation, the Reid bill intends to establish a fund that will collect money to pay for elective abortions that will not qualify as federal money. The bill actually sets up a system, Section 1303 (a)(2)(C), that assesses every enrollee in the public option at least $1 per month to pay for elective abortions.

It is clear that Senator Reid intends to pay for elective abortion in the public plan if he can find a way to do it. However, even this sleight of hand does not de-federalize the dollars he collects. Regardless of how the United States Treasury collects the money, it is still federal money. Any funds the government receives to pay for health services in the government-run plan are automatically federal funds. Some people are trying to argue that these funds are segregated insurance premiums and therefore not federal dollars, but there are no non-federal dollars in the United States Treasury. They are all federal dollars.

Just ask these same people if they support using money in the U.S. Treasury for education vouchers to religiously-affiliated schools, and they’ll argue that every penny in the Treasury is federal money, regardless of its source. Even if the federal government funds its health plan through a third party, it is still merely passing along federal dollars for the express purpose of paying for abortion. So, if the government-run health plan pays for abortions, which it certainly will do, it will be using federal funds to pay for them. Other plans in the health insurance exchange will also be allowed to assess their members to pay for elective abortions in their plans.

Direct Funding in All Health Insurance Plans

Federal funds will also help pay directly for abortions in the cases of rape, incest, or threats to the mother’s life for all women in households earning up to 400% of the poverty level, or approximately $88,000 per year for a family of four. Section 402 (c) instructs the government to limit the out-of-pocket expenses people in this range have to pay. The federal government will pay the insurance plan the difference between the actual out-of-pocket expense and the reduced amount the low-income person is required to pay. These federal subsidies for out-of-pocket expenses will apply to any health plan offered through the insurance exchanges.

Indirect Funding in All Health Insurance Plans

In addition, federal funds will pay indirectly for elective abortion through other insurance plans. While Section 1303 (a)(2)(A) of the Reid plan prohibits the direct use of tax credits and federal subsidies for abortions not related to rape, incest, or threats to the mother’s life, these sources of federal funds will still help pay for elective abortions indirectly. This will be accomplished through the premium assistance tax credits and cost-sharing provisions in the bill.

Section 1401 of the Reid bill instructs the federal government to pay for a certain portion of the premiums of low-income individuals. In these instances, federal dollars will be helping to pay peoples’ insurance premiums, including premiums for insurance plans that offer full abortion coverage. According to Section 1402 (c), the federal government will pay the insurance provider part of the out-of-pocket health care expenses lower income individuals incur for their health care. In both of these instances, the insurance provider must simply demonstrate that none of that federal assistance money is being used to pay for elective abortions.

While the government is not paying for elective abortion costs in these situations, it is helping to fund an insurer’s overall expenses. In these instances, federal dollars will help fund the administrative and other costs of the insurer, thereby freeing up other funds available to the insurer to pay for elective abortions.

This relationship between federal dollars and private dollars is referred to as fungibility. Federal funds are being used to offset other costs, thereby freeing up non-government funds for abortion. While technically federal funds are not being used to pay for elective abortion, practically they are supporting the infrastructure so that non-federal dollars can be used to pay for elective abortion.

Essentially, the Reid bill applies the federal government’s arrangement with Planned Parenthood to the entire health care industry. Currently, the federal government gives Planned Parenthood about $300 million a year for their activities. While this money may not be used to pay for abortions except in the cases of rape, incest, or threats to the mother’s life, they are used to help pay for the administrative costs and other activities of Planned Parenthood, thereby freeing up other Planned Parenthood funds to pay for more than 300,000 abortions every year.

Limiting Language Solution

Explicit restricting language is necessary to prevent the use of federal funds from paying for the massive expansion of abortion in the Reid bill. Some very good language is available in the Stupak-Pitts Amendment. The amendment states, “No funds authorized or appropriated by this act may be used to pay for any abortion or to cover any part of the costs of any health plan that includes coverage of abortion” except in cases of rape, incest, or threats to the physical life of the mother. We should even be concerned about the breadth of this language since it allows for abortion in the cases of rape and incest, but it is only repeating the current exceptions in the Hyde Amendment, and is probably as good of a restriction as can be obtained. Certainly, this must be the limit. Anything less would undoubtedly be too weak to protect most innocent human life.

Until the Reid bill includes the Stupak-Pitts Amendment, at the very least, all pro-life people should oppose its passage for the sake of millions of unborn children in our nation. The Senate should not even proceed to debate on this disastrous bill until it includes the language of the Stupak-Pitts Amendment or language even more protective of innocent, unborn human life.


Blessings,

Barrett

EPA Moves to Regulate CO2, Afghanistan Becomes Political

Dear Friends,

Here are a couple items I thought you would want to follow.

Blessings,

Barrett

--------------------------------------------
EPA Moves to Regulate CO2

The EPA has announced it is moving forward with plans to regulate CO2 emissions. This threat has been held over our heads to put pressure on Congress to pass a CO2 control bill. Now that it looks like that isn’t going to happen any time soon, the EPA is starting to move forward with its Supreme Court-granted authority to regulate so-called greenhouse gases (GHG) through the Clean Air Act.

They announced their first move last week. They are requiring the auto industry to implement changes that will reduce GHG emissions in future cars and light trucks. They state:

“The standards proposed would apply to passenger cars, light-duty trucks, and medium-duty passenger vehicles, covering model years 2012 through 2016. They require these vehicles to meet an estimated combined average emissions level of 250 grams of carbon dioxide (CO2) per mile in model year 2016, equivalent to 35.5 miles per gallon (mpg) if the automotive industry were to meet this CO2 level all through fuel economy improvements.”

And yes, this is going to cost everyone some money. The EPA claims that their rules will add about $1,100 to the cost of a 2016 year vehicle. They say this is negligible compared to their estimate that a consumer will save $3,000 a year in fuel costs over the lifetime of the vehicle. Somewhere in one of their files one could probably find how they arrived at their calculation, but you can be sure they based it in part on their expectation that gasoline is going to be more expensive and that using less of it will result in savings for the driver. If we just drilled for our own oil, this would never be the case, but of course such thinking is not even part of the process in these circles.

Furthermore, this average cost/benefit calculation is an average. Those who drive less will not experience the same benefit, but their cars are still going to cost $1,100 more. So, who gets hit the worst? The poor, who will have to pay more for their cars, but who will drive less, and senior citizens, who no longer must commute to work and tend to use their cars less. In other words, the very people with the least disposable income will bear more of the cost and experience less of the benefit.

Also, you can be sure that the EPA didn’t calculate other costs that will result. For example, we already know that municipalities are feeling the effects of lower gasoline prices and less gas consumption. Their tax revenue on gas sales is down so badly that they are looking for alternative ways to raise money off of car drivers. One of the more popular ideas is to start taxing people for the miles they drive. Such a proposal will hit people who use their cars the most, which will reduce the benefit they are supposed to be getting through the EPA’s calculation, but they will still be paying $1,100 more for their cars. It will also add costs to the poor and senior citizens. While they are likely to drive fewer miles, they will still have to pay for the miles they will drive, adding more costs against the supposed savings.

Afghanistan Becomes Political

This week, President Obama decided to hold off on any decision to send more U.S. troops to Afghanistan. Why? Liberal members on the Hill are questioning the wisdom of sending more troops.

Our commanders aren’t questioning it. The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen has called for more troops. General Stanley McChrystal, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, is reportedly asking for 30,000 to 40,000 more troops.

Of course, there are a lot of factors to consider. Afghanistan has a history of bringing nations to their knees, but the crowd now fighting the call to send more troops to Afghanistan also fought the surge in Iraq. They can hardly be considered objective counselors in this issue.

Meanwhile, the insurgency is growing every day, and American and NATO troops are dying at higher rates. General David Petraeus recently called for patience in dealing with Afghanistan, which included a call for increased security, which I interpret, in part, to mean, more troops. He said,

“In Afghanistan, security is the principal concern, although there are numerous other challenges as well, with governmental legitimacy prominent among them. Clearly, the security trend in Afghanistan has been a downward spiral, with levels of violence at record highs in recent weeks.”

General Petraeus has proven he knows what he is doing. As far as I am concerned, his voice outweighs all the negative attitudes on Capitol Hill. We will soon find out if Afghanistan is going to be a political issue, or if President Obama will follow President Bush’s strategy of letting the experts fight our wars, and win them.

Where Is the President’s Health Care Reform Bill?

In his speech Wednesday night President Obama delivered a broad outline of key components he says are in his health care reform package. The President declared, “The plan I’m announcing tonight would meet three basic goals.” He went on to give some “details that every American needs to know about this plan.” He called it “my plan” and “my health care proposal.” He said “the plan that I’m proposing will cost around $900 billion over ten years.” Evidently, President Obama has a health care reform plan.

The main problem with what I heard Wednesday night is that I don’t know what plan the President is talking about. Many of the features the President described do not exist in any of the bills Congress is working on. They aren’t in the liberal Democrats’ bills. They aren’t in any bill from the Blue Dog Democrats. They haven’t written one. They aren’t in the Republicans’ bills, and they have at least five they are trying to get people to notice.

For example, I found myself wondering what insurance exchange the President was talking about. Is it like Henry Waxman’s bill, H.R. 3200, which mandates what coverages must be in every policy in the exchange? And does it follow H.R. 3200 in preventing insurance companies from selling new policies that don’t offer the government-mandated coverages? Does he have something entirely different in mind? I’d like to know.

I also wonder about the President’s not-for-profit option. None of the bills under consideration include this. But since it’s in the President’s plan, I wonder how this option will “keep pressure on private insurers to keep their policies affordable.” He says the public option will be able to eliminate some overhead that “gets eaten up at private companies by profits, excessive administrative costs and executive salaries.” Are we looking at something like Fannie Mae or the Post Office? If so, I am skeptical. Neither of these government-supported programs has managed to operate efficiently or responsibly. And we certainly can’t look to them as models of restraint when it comes to executive salaries and benefits. The Postmaster General of the Post Office received $800,000 in salary and benefits in 2008. The former CEO of Fannie Mae received over $90 million in pay and bonuses during his six years at Fannie Mae. Lower level employees have also been paid very well in these organizations.

The President also said “under our plan, no federal dollars will be used to fund abortions, and federal conscience laws will remain in place.” I haven’t seen this in any of the bills the Democrats are working on. In fact, most of them have resisted every effort to put language in their bills guaranteeing that no federal funds would be spent on abortion. I was more surprised by the President’s affirmation that conscience laws will remain in place since he has already ordered the HHS to start weakening conscience protections for health care practitioners. I would really like to see this language in the President’s plan.

And then there is material that the President is still thinking about whether or not to add to his plan, like tort reform. He can’t possibly be talking about any of the bills currently under consideration. None of the Democrat bills even come close to addressing the problems caused by predatory lawsuits and the defensive medicine doctors must practice to protect themselves from lawsuits. Yet, the President admitted that “defensive medicine may be contributing to unnecessary costs.” He said he was ordering the HHS to develop demonstration projects to help develop some data on it. If the president will not back tort reform until he has some numbers to look at, then health care reform should be delayed until we know what conclusion he reaches and whether or not that will be included in his health care reform bill.

The President’s target date for implementing his exchange interested me as well. He plans to wait four years, which he says will “give us time to do it right.” Surely, if the plan will not even help a single person for the next four years, Congress can take more than the next couple of weeks or months to arrive at a compromise bill that the American people will support. In fact, if the President actually has his own plan, we should give him the time to write it, including those pesky “significant details” that need “to be ironed out,” and send it over to Congress so they don’t have to keep trying to guess at what the President wants.

Obviously, the President has a health care reform plan, but where is it? Much of what he said Wednesday night doesn't square with anything I've seen in Congress so far. Senator Tom Coburn made the same observation. He remarked, “It was a good speech, the problem is that what he wants and what they've written are two totally different things.” I agree. So, I am looking for a bill to come from the White House that we can read. And here’s hoping that it doesn’t arrive DOA, just like all the current Democrat proposals.

Health Care Reform's Bloated Bureaucracy, China-Cuba-Honduras, Obama Loses Popular Support

Dear Friends:

Here are some items I thought would interest you.

Blessings,

Barrett

-------------------------------------------------

Health Care Reform’s Bloated Bureaucracy


The more we learn about Congress’ vision of health care reform, the more we should become alarmed. Henry Waxman’s bill, HR 3200, proposes no less than 53 distinct oversight bodies, programs, and positions to empower his committee’s health care monstrosity. Here is a list being circulated. It includes page numbers so you can verify it for yourself.

1. Health Benefits Advisory Committee (Section 123, p. 30)
2. Health Choices Administration (Section 141, p. 41)
3. Qualified Health Benefits Plan Ombudsman (Section 144, p. 47)
4. Program of administrative simplification (Section 163, p. 57)
5. Retiree Reserve Trust Fund (Section 164(d), p. 70)
6. Health Insurance Exchange (Section 201, p. 72)
7. Mechanism for insurance risk pooling to be established by Health Choices Administration Commissioner (Section 206(b), p. 106)
8. Special Inspector General for the Health Insurance Exchange (Section 206(c), p. 107)
9. Health Insurance Exchange Trust Fund (Section 207, p. 109)
10. State-based Health Insurance Exchanges (Section 208, p. 111)
11. “Public Health Insurance Option” (Section 221, p. 116)
12. Ombudsman for “Public Health Insurance Option” (Section 221(d), p. 117)
13. Account for receipts and disbursements for “Public Health Insurance Option” (Section 222(b), p. 119)
14. Telehealth Advisory Committee (Section 1191, p. 380)
15. Demonstration program providing reimbursement for “culturally and linguistically appropriate services” (Section 1222, p. 405)
16. Demonstration program for shared decision making using patient decision aids (Section 1236, p. 438)
17. Accountable Care Organization pilot program (Section 1301, p. 443)
18. Independent patient-centered medical home pilot program under Medicare (Section 1302, p. 462)
19. Community-based medical home pilot program under Medicare (Section 1302(d), p. 468)
20. Center for Comparative Effectiveness Research (Section 1401(a), p. 502)
21. Comparative Effectiveness Research Commission (Section 1401(a), p. 505)
22. Patient ombudsman for comparative effectiveness research (Section 1401(a), p. 519)
23. Quality assurance and performance improvement program for skilled nursing facilities (Section 1412(b)(1), p. 546)
24. Quality assurance and performance improvement program for nursing facilities (Section 1412 (b)(2), p. 548)
25. Special focus facility program for skilled nursing facilities (Section 1413(a)(3), p. 559)
26. Special focus facility program for nursing facilities (Section 1413(b)(3), p. 565)
27. National independent monitor pilot program for skilled nursing facilities and nursing facilities (Section 1422, p. 607)
28. Demonstration program for approved teaching health centers with respect to Medicare GME (Section 1502(d), p. 674)
29. Pilot program to develop anti-fraud compliance systems for Medicare providers (Section 1635, p. 716)
30. Medical home pilot program under Medicaid (Section 1722, p. 780)
31. Comparative Effectiveness Research Trust Fund (Section 1802, p. 824)
32. “Identifiable office or program” within CMS to “provide for improved coordination between Medicare and Medicaid in the case of dual eligibles” (Section 1905, p. 852)
33. Public Health Investment Fund (Section 2002, p. 859)
34. Scholarships for service in health professional needs areas (Section 2211, p. 870)
35. Loan repayment program for service in health professional needs areas (Section 2211, p. 873)
36. Program for training medical residents in community-based settings (Section 2214, p. 882)
37. Grant program for training in dentistry programs (Section 2215, p. 887)
38. Public Health Workforce Corps (Section 2231, p. 898)
39. Public health workforce scholarship program (Section 2231, p. 900)
40. Public health workforce loan forgiveness program (Section 2231, p. 904)
41. Grant program for innovations in interdisciplinary care (Section 2252, p. 917)
42. Advisory Committee on Health Workforce Evaluation and Assessment (Section 2261, p. 920)
43. Prevention and Wellness Trust (Section 2301, p. 932)
44. Clinical Prevention Stakeholders Board (Section 2301, p. 941)
45. Community Prevention Stakeholders Board (Section 2301, p. 947)
46. Grant program for community prevention and wellness research (Section 2301, p. 950)
47. Grant program for community prevention and wellness services (Section 2301, p. 951)
48. Grant program for public health infrastructure (Section 2301, p. 955)
49. Center for Quality Improvement (Section 2401, p. 965)
50. Assistant Secretary for Health Information (Section 2402, p. 972)
51. Grant program to support the operation of school-based health clinics (Section 2511, p. 993)
52. National Medical Device Registry (Section 2521, p. 1001)
53. Grants for labor-management programs for nursing training (Section 2531, p. 1008)

We shouldn’t be surprised by HR 3200’s $1.5 trillion price tag when we see this kind of bureaucracy set up to empower it. Even if the liberals actually drop the public option, no one should think that this health care take-over will actually work. It’s just another liberal, bureaucratic, utopian vision that ignores reality. Surely, we can do better than this.

Strengthening Communism and Weakening Democracy

It is being reported, http://www.jbs.org/jbs-news-feed/5302; http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2009-07/13/content_8422505.htm, that the White House has granted the request of a Chinese group to have the national flag of China flown on the White House South Lawn on September 20 in honor of the communist nation’s 60th anniversary. No one remembers a time when a nation’s flag has been flown at the White House for such an event. It is normal to fly the flag of another country when its dignitaries are visiting, but not otherwise. There are no dignitaries visiting during this celebration. The sponsors of the event expect about 1,000 people to turn out for the celebration, but no official delegation from China. So, on September 20, our nation will help celebrate the rise of communism over the world’s most populous nation, and its ongoing subjugation of its people. This is no way to promote democracy!

This isn’t the Obama administration’s only recent bow to communism. This week the Obama administration announced major changes in the U.S. stance toward Cuba. Cuban Americans will now be able to enjoy unlimited travel to family members in Cuba. They will be able to send unlimited money and certain other items to them as well. And communication companies are going to be given the right to set up more communication channels between Cuba and the United States.

While campaigning in May 2007, President Obama said, “It's time for more than tough talk that never yields results. It's time for a new strategy. There are no better ambassadors for freedom than Cuban Americans. That's why I will immediately allow unlimited family travel and remittances to the island. It's time to let Cuban Americans see their mothers and fathers, their sisters and brothers. It's time to let Cuban American money make their families less dependent upon the Castro regime.”

He is now following through with that pledge. I’m glad that separated Cuban families will be able to spend more time together and that some of Cuba’s suffering masses will have a little extra money. I’m sure they need it. Unfortunately, the decision is likely going to have a much more negative impact on the country by strengthening the Castro brothers’ hands. You can be sure that much of the money sent will end up in the Castros’ coffers.

The Cuban people are not poor because they are cut off from the world. All the rest of the world trades freely with Cuba, and numerous U.S. companies trade regularly with Cuba to supply the country with “humanitarian” agricultural products. If sending more money into the country would make the people less dependent on the Castro regime, they would already be free. More money for Cuba simply means more money and power for the Castros. In fact, Cuba has been in the midst of a major restructuring of its economy due to the worldwide financial decline. Raul Castro has already started to dismantle some of the nation’s massive bureaucracy as he recognizes that the communist system cannot be sustained. More money poured into the country at this time will weaken the incentive to continue to loosen government control over the nation’s business sector.

These sympathetic actions toward two communist nations are even more disturbing when contrasted with the way our country is treating Honduras simply because it is trying to prevent a despot from turning their nation into another Venezuela. It was reported on Thursday that the State Department, under Hillary Clinton’s leadership, has decided to cut off non-humanitarian aid to Honduras in response to that nation’s refusal to restore the deposed former president Zelaya to power. Zelaya was in the midst of illegal efforts to consolidate his power base in that nation when the Honduran legislative branch and its Supreme Court ordered the military to remove him from power for seeking to subvert Honduras’ democratic principles.

It is shocking that the Obama administration has chosen to honor a nation that drove tanks over students who insisted that their nation should be more responsive to the will of the people and to punish a nation for removing from office a man who sought to subvert the will of the people. The New York Times, http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2009/09/04/us/politics/AP-US-US-Honduras.html, includes this paragraph in their story about the State Department’s disgraceful treatment of a friend of democracy: "Honduras' interim government sent a letter to Clinton vowing it would withstand any price to defend democracy in the Central American country. 'Whether you wish us well or not, we will pay any price, we will bear any burden, we will take on any difficulty, we will support any friend and oppose any enemy to ensure the survival and the success of liberty and democracy in our country,' interim Interior Minister Oscar Raul Matute said in the letter, echoing President John F. Kennedy's 1961 inaugural address."

I wish them well in their efforts to withstand the pressure of communist dictators and our own misguided leaders in this country.

President Obama Loses Popular Support

The latest polling shows that less than half the country supports President Obama’s policies. Two recent pieces are worth reading for a good take on why things have gone so badly for him. Steve Chapman, http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/08/30/what_voters_meant.html, makes a good case for the primary cause. He opens, “Barack Obama came into office championing change, and he apparently assumed that if Americans voted for him, it was because they wanted the future to be different from what went before. Actually, what they wanted was a future much like the not-so-distant past -- before the financial crisis, before the recession, before the Iraq war, before the most unpopular president since the invention of polling.” (Remember, Chapman is an Obama supporter.) Chapman argues that the nation is turning on President Obama because it is rejecting his plans to increase government encroachment in their lives.

No doubt, the vast majority of Americans have rejected Obama’s policies. However, it isn’t clear that Obama came into office with the belief that he had a mandate from the American people to make radical changes. What is clear is that the person many millions of people thought they were electing isn’t really who they thought he was. Obama the candidate moved to the center on practically every major issue as the campaign progressed. In other words, he knew what most of the country wanted, and he told them what he needed to tell them to get elected.

The reason most people didn’t pay attention to the transformation of his message is because the major media outlets didn’t point it out, and much of the public seemed perfectly willing to be oblivious. In the end, many people thought Obama was a centrist. In the same article, Chapman quotes Mike Duncan, then Chairman of the Republican National Committee, “Barack Obama just ran the most successful moderate Republican presidential campaign since Dwight Eisenhower.” Now that he won, he is showing his true colors, and most of the nation is repulsed.

A major case of buyer’s remorse is now setting in across the country as millions who voted for President Obama see what he is doing. David Brooks, who has moved further left since becoming a regular contributor at the New York Times, makes much the same argument as Chapman. At one point in his article, http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/01/opinion/01brooks.html?emc=eta1, he says, “The public has soured on Obama’s policy proposals. Voters often have only a fuzzy sense of what each individual proposal actually does, but more and more have a growing conviction that if the president is proposing it, it must involve big spending, big government and a fundamental departure from the traditional American approach.”

Yes, President Obama is a liberal ideologue and the nation is not interested in living under his vision of America. That’s what has the country in an uproar now. But that is only the beginning of President Obama’s troubles. The President looks less and less in control with each passing week. He is now responding to criticism and setbacks rather than leading. His political appointees are now making decisions on their own that are outside of the mainstream of American convictions. Ultra-liberals in congress are running the legislative process. Soon, it is likely that the vast center of the populace will begin feeling like no one in Washington is looking out for their interests and that the ultra-liberal wing of the Democrat party is running things. Once that feeling sets in, things are going to get even more tense.

Mexico Surrenders Drug War Ground, CIA under Liberal Assault, Catholic Opposition to Health Care Reform

Friends,

Here are some items I thought you would want to know about.

Blessings,

Barrett

Mexico Surrenders Ground in the War on Drugs

With Mexico’s decision to decriminalize the possession of small amounts of marijuana, cocaine, and heroin, the war on drugs in the United States has been dealt a serious setback. We now have an entire country on our southern border that is a haven for drug abuse. Our southwestern states will suffer first from this tragic surrender as more drug-addicted people come across the border. Then the rest of the country will feel it as they move inland. Inspections at the border will become more difficult as well as more people attempt to cross into the country with their “legal” drug amounts. You can be sure that U.S. relations with Mexico are going to be more strained as a result of this decision.

Investor’s Business Daily, http://www.ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=335748953038743, has a superb editorial on why this surrender will not help Mexico defeat drug traffickers. They make five irrefutable arguments:

1.Consumption will increase.
2.Addiction will increase.
3.Treatment costs for addicts will increase.
4.Drug traffickers will profit.
5.The law-abiding population will be demoralized.

You can also expect Mexico’s decision to lead to increased calls for decriminalization of drugs in the U.S. This week, Denver's marijuana policy review panel agreed to send a letter to the presiding judge of Denver County Court urging a $1 fine as penalty for possession of less than an ounce of marijuana, http://www.denverpost.com/headlines/ci_13212872. Such actions will be more common as our cities feel the added weight of Mexico’s drug problem spilling over the border. Earlier this year, I wrote an opinion piece on my opposition to decriminalization of marijuana. You can read it here, http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/apr/26/solutionsduke-should-us-decriminalize-marijuana/.

Liberals Seek to Dismantle the CIA

As you know, the CIA is coming under increased attack from liberals. A crippling blow was struck last week when a group formed by President Obama recommended that future interrogation efforts be run out of the Justice Department rather than the CIA. The Special Task Force on Interrogations and Transfer Policies has recommended the formation of “a specialized interrogation group to bring together officials from law enforcement, the U.S. Intelligence Community and the Department of Defense to conduct interrogations in a manner that will strengthen national security consistent with the rule of law” (http://www.usdoj.gov/opa/pr/2009/August/09-ag-835.html). This group will be administered by the FBI rather than the CIA.

Of course, this is just the next step in the liberals’ decades-long goal to destroy the CIA. In order to help bring down the CIA for good, the President has green-lighted the effort by Attorney General Holder to prosecute CIA agents for performing their duty and keeping us safe by interrogating some of the most vile terrorists in the world. You can be sure that this witch hunt is intended to weaken one of our most important lines of defense against a murderous, demented death cult that is determined to subjugate all of us under their medieval vision of Islam.

Some people are understandably troubled by a number of the CIA’s methods, especially waterboarding, but there is no evidence that the agency ever sought to hide from Congress what they were doing. They had legal opinion that told them they were clear to engage in their tactics, and no one they reported to in Congress raised any objections. To prosecute these people now for their extraordinary efforts to keep us safe is a cowardly act that will certainly weaken the CIA and put everyone in this nation at risk.

Make no mistake, the CIA was effective in its efforts to protect us from these lawless murderers. The Wall Street Journal, http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB10001424052970203706604574375012840827276-lMyQjAxMDA5MDIwNzEyNDcyWj.html, has an opinion piece about the CIA’s interrogation program. In it, they reference a report by former CIA Inspector General John Helgerson. The Journal article includes this very significant summary from Helgerson’s report:

“The most revealing portion of the IG report
documents the program's results. The CIA's
‘detention and interrogation of terrorists has
provided intelligence that has enabled the
identification and apprehension of other
terrorists and warned of terrorist plots planned
for the United States and around the world.’
That included the identification of Jose Padilla
and Binyam Muhammed, who planned to
detonate a dirty bomb, and the arrest of previously
unknown members of an al Qaeda cell in Karachi,
Pakistan, designated to pilot an aircraft attack in the
U.S. The information also made the CIA aware of
plots to attack the U.S. consulate in Karachi, hijack
aircraft to fly into Heathrow, loosen track spikes to
derail a U.S. train, blow up U.S. gas stations, fly an
airplane into a California building, and cut the lines
of suspension bridges in New York.”

The CIA’s own director, Leon Panetta, has made a mess of things and greatly aided the liberal agenda to declaw the CIA. Perhaps you remember when he ran to Congress to expose a secret CIA terrorist-assassination plan. It turns out that Mr. Panetta was more worried about protecting himself than he was about getting all the facts right. This story, http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-08-18/spy-agency-fiasco/, by Joseph Finder is well worth the read. Finder concludes the following:

•The secret assassination ‘program’ wasn’t much more than a PowerPoint presentation, a task force and a collection of schemes—it never got off the ground.
•Panetta’s three immediate predecessors—George Tenet, Porter Goss, and Michael Hayden—have spoken to him, and that he now sees that no laws were broken.
•Panetta has frantically tried to rectify his gaffe, but now faces increased Congressional oversight.

Now, rumor has it, Panetta will likely be resigning his position in the wake of AG Holder’s successful bid to take over part of the agency’s portfolio and to seek the prosecution of CIA agents. From Ms. Pelosi’s false claim that she was never briefed on the CIA’s enhanced interrogation tactics to Leon Panetta’s chicken little moment, the stage has been set for Eric Holder to crush the life from the CIA.

Opposition to Government-Run Health Care Increases

A number of very prominent Catholic bishops are becoming more vocal in their opposition to the Dems’ health care reform proposals. David Kirkpatrick has a very important article in the New York Times about their growing opposition, http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/28/health/policy/28catholics.html?emc=eta1. The main points of contention are concerns about abortion mandates and rationing. He includes this paragraph:

“As recently as July, the bishops’ conference
had largely embraced the president’s goals,
although with the caveat that any health care
overhaul avoid new federal financing of
abortions. But in the last two weeks some
leaders of the conference, like Cardinal Justin
Rigali, have concluded that Democrats’ efforts
to carve out abortion coverage are so inadequate
that lawmakers should block the entire effort.”

Cardinal Rigali’s opposition is a significant development. He is the Chairman of the Committee for Pro-Life Activities for the US Conference of Catholic Bishops. The liberal health care reformers in Congress and the White House can say what they want to, but now a growing body of very influential Catholic Bishops is opposing their plans because they know that abortion will be provided through the bills liberals are trying to advance.

And on the rationing front, the role of Ezekiel Emanuel is getting more scrutiny. Ezekiel Emanuel, the brother of White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, is a health care advisor to President Obama. He has been involved for many years in calling for a health care rationing regime. His plan for prioritizing who should be favored in a rationing scheme is very disturbing. According to Emanuel people on the ends of the age spectrum should not get the same level of care as people in the middle. Emanuel’s reasoning: People between ages 15 and 40 have had the most invested in them by society and have the most to give back to society. The further removed one is from that ideal age range, the less valuable he or she is! Here is a very helpful story in the Wall Street Journal by Betsy McCaughey, http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB10001424052970203706604574374463280098676-lMyQjAxMDA5MDIwNzEyNDcyWj.html, about Ezekiel Emanuel’s philosophy on health care rationing. Richard Land Live!, http://richardlandlive.com/, has posted a link to his journal article. You can read it here, http://www.ncpa.org/pdfs/PIIS0140673609601379.pdf. It’s frightening to think that this man is advising the President on health care.

Preventive Care Savings Myth, Nuclear-Armed Iran, Global Warming Round Two, Mounting Financial Fear

Friends,

Here are some items I came across this week that I thought you would want to know about.

Blessings,

Barrett

The Preventive Care Savings Myth

President Obama has been talking lately about the need to force health insurance companies to provide free preventive health services. He claims that this strategy will save lives and money. Everyone is agreed that it will save lives, and that is certainly a worthwhile goal, but it will not save money. If preventive care saved money, every insurance company would be offering it. One thing you can be sure of, the insurance companies are in business to make money. They have crunched the numbers and they know that it is cheaper to treat the small percentage of people who develop diseases than to try to protect their entire customer base from potentially contracting them. I have no sympathy for insurance companies. They will always make their money. But for that very same reason, I know I can count on them to do whatever they can to control their costs. If preventive care saved them money, they would make it available. Since they don’t, it can only mean one thing—forcing insurance companies to offer preventive care FREE OF CHARGE will increase the costs of health insurance. Charles Krauthammer makes that very point, http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/08/14/the_preventive_care_myth_97889.html. Here’s a paragraph from his article:

“A study in the journal Circulation found that
for cardiovascular diseases and diabetes, "if
all the recommended prevention activities were
applied with 100 percent success," the prevention
would cost almost 10 times as much as the savings,
increasing the country's total medical bill by 162
percent. Elmendorf additionally cites a definitive
assessment in the New England Journal of Medicine
that reviewed hundreds of studies on preventive
care and found that more than 80 percent of
preventive measures added to medical costs.”

Get Ready for a Nuclear-Armed Iran

Despite the tough talk, the Administration has already accepted the fact of a nuclear-armed Iran and developed its response—a nuclear umbrella for Israel. In other words, if Iran nukes Israel, the U.S. supposedly would nuke Iran. Hillary Clinton promoted this option in April 2008 while she was a presidential candidate. This article in the Guardian, http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/aug/13/iran-nuclear-arms-israel-obama, sums up things very well. Here is the author’s concluding statement:

“No one should want a nuclear-armed Iran and
new sanctions should certainly be tried. But
if we calculate correctly that the prospect of
an Iranian bomb ultimately comes down to a
question of Iranian willpower, then a mature
debate needs to be had about how we manage that
risk. Instead of threatening military action
that will only increase Iran's desire for nuclear
weapons while undermining opportunities for
democratic change, western powers should focus on
developing a robust deterrence framework that
provides security guarantees to vulnerable countries
and reminds Iran's leaders of what they stand to lose
by abusing their nuclear potential. Proliferation is
always a risk, but we can live with a nuclear Iran if
we have to.”

This is precisely where our Administration is on this issue. The international community will be revisiting the Iran problem in September when the G20 group of industrialized and developing countries meets in Pittsburgh. Don’t expect any more from that meeting except some more meaningless saber-rattling. Iran already knows Obama’s bottom line, and it will hold out until he gets there.

The Next Round of Global Warming Legislation

Now that the UN has declared the world has only 4 months to avert a worldwide climate disaster, the pressure will mount to resume the legislative push for U.S. restrictions on greenhouse gas emissions. This isn’t a dead deal. Remember that the EPA has been given the authority by the Supreme Court to regulate CO2 as a pollutant and a mandate from the White House to do it if Congress fails to act.

If you want a glance at the future that lies ahead if our country turns down this road, I recommend a new book entitled Green Hell by Steve Milloy. He describes in excruciating detail the intrusive nature of a government that believes it has a mandate to reduce the amount of CO2 every person and company emits. For me, the picture comes into sharp focus with the simple little incandescent light bulb. In their inquisitorial environmental fervor the liberals in Congress have mandated an efficiency standard for them by 2012 that likely cannot be met. They want everyone to use compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFL) instead. Milloy has a section in his book about these little wonders. If you break one in your home, look out. They contain mercury vapor. This stuff is so dangerous that these bulbs cannot even be manufactured in the U.S.

Milloy includes the cleanup instructions provided by Maine’s Department of Environmental Protection if someone is unfortunate enough to break one of these things. It has fourteen steps! If you don’t believe him—I was curious myself—here’s the link to the U.S. government’s Energy Star web page that describes what you need to do if you break a CFL in your house, http://www.energystar.gov/ia/partners/promotions/change_light/downloads/Fact_Sheet_Mercury.pdf:
How should I clean up a broken fluorescent bulb?

Because CFLs contain a small amount of mercury, EPA recommends the following clean-up and disposal guidelines:

1. Before Clean-up: Air Out the Room

Have people and pets leave the room, and don't let anyone walk through the breakage area on their way out.

Open a window and leave the room for 15 minutes or more.

Shut off the central forced-air heating/air conditioning system, if you have one.

2. Clean-Up Steps for Hard Surfaces

• Carefully scoop up glass fragments and powder using stiff paper or cardboard and place them in a glass jar with metal lid (such as a canning jar) or in a sealed plastic bag.

• Use sticky tape, such as duct tape, to pick up any remaining small glass pieces and powder.

• Wipe the area clean with damp paper towels or disposable wet wipes. Place towels in the glass jar or plastic bag.

• Do not use a vacuum or broom to clean up the broken bulb on hard surfaces.

3. Clean-up Steps for Carpeting or Rug:

• Carefully pick up glass fragments and place them in a glass jar with metal lid (such as a canning jar) or in a sealed plastic bag.

• Use sticky tape, such as duct tape, to pick up any remaining small glass fragments and powder.

• If vacuuming is needed after all visible materials are removed, vacuum the area where the bulb was broken.

• Remove the vacuum bag (or empty and wipe the canister), and put the bag or vacuum debris in a sealed plastic bag.

4. Clean-up Steps for Clothing, Bedding, etc.:

• If clothing or bedding materials come in direct contact with broken glass or mercury-containing powder from inside the bulb that may stick to the fabric, the clothing or bedding should be thrown away. Do not wash such clothing or bedding because mercury fragments in the clothing may contaminate the machine and/or pollute sewage.

• You can, however, wash clothing or other materials that have been exposed to the mercury vapor from a broken CFL, such as the clothing you are wearing when you cleaned up the broken CFL, as long as that clothing has not come into direct contact with the materials from the broken bulb.

• If shoes come into direct contact with broken glass or mercury-containing powder from the bulb, wipe them off with damp paper towels or disposable wet wipes. Place the towels or wipes in a glass jar or plastic bag for disposal.

5. Disposal of Clean-up Materials

• Immediately place all clean-up materials outdoors in a trash container or protected area for the next normal trash pickup.

• Wash your hands after disposing of the jars or plastic bags containing clean-up materials.

• Check with your local or state government about disposal requirements in your specific area. Some states do not allow such trash disposal. Instead, they require that broken and unbroken mercury-containing bulbs be taken to a local recycling center.

6. Future Cleaning of Carpeting or Rug: Air Out the Room During and After Vacuuming

• The next several times you vacuum, shut off the central forced-air heating/air conditioning system and open a window before vacuuming.

If the simple little light bulb has been turned into such a problem, imagine what will happen when the radical environmentalists get their hands on the rest of our lives.

Fears Mount Over Our Financial Future

Stories are becoming more numerous about the coming financial meltdown being precipitated by our country’s uncontrolled spending. Here are two stories worth taking the time to read. Mort Zuckerman’s article, http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2009/08/09/2009-08-09_drowning_in_debt_obamas_spending_and_borrowing_leaves_us_gasping_for_air.html, “Drowning in Debt” includes these scary facts:

“The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office reckons
that the deficit will run for a decade and will still
exceed $1.2 trillion in 2019. By that time, the United
States will have virtually doubled its national debt,
to over $17 trillion. Then, after 2019, we get another
turn of the screw as the peak waves of baby boomers
move into their retirement years and costs soar for
the major entitlements, Social Security and Medicare.
At 41% of GDP in 2008, the accumulated federal debt
will rise to 82% by 2019. One out of every six dollars
spent then by the feds will go to interest, compared
with 1 in 12 dollars last year. These out-year budgets
will require an increase in everyone's income taxes,
raising federal income taxes an average of $11,000
for families, a hike of 55% per household - a political
impossibility. The Government Accountability Office
estimates that by 2040, interest payments will absorb
30% of all revenues and entitlements will consume the
rest, leaving nothing for defense, education or veterans'
pensions.”

In his article “Public Spending’s Day of Reckoning” Desmond Lachman, http://www.forbes.com/2009/08/12/public-spending-finances-economy-debt-opinions-contributors-desmond-lachman.html?partner=email, writes,

“In principle, there are only three
possible end-games for an unsustainable
fiscal position. The first and optimal end-game
is for the government to adopt bold expenditure-
reducing and revenue-enhancing measures that
might return the public finances to a sustainable
path…The second end-game, to which the U.S.
effectively resorted in 1931 when it devalued the
dollar against gold, is for the government to
default directly on its debt obligations…This
leaves the third option for the government:
resorting to the monetary printing press to
inflate away its debt obligations.”

In the current political environment, which response do you think we are likely to adopt?

Not Promoting a Single-Payer Plan…Yet!

Listen closely to what the President says when he isn’t reading the script from his teleprompter and it’s possible, occasionally, to get a glimpse of the action he is planning. His town hall meeting yesterday in Portsmouth, NH is a good example. During the Q&A, he hinted at what he really has in mind for the country’s health care system. Here is his answer to whether or not he intends to move the U.S. to a single-payer health care plan:

“I have not said that I was a single-payer supporter

because, frankly, we historically have had a employer-

based system in this country with private insurers,

and for us to transition to a system like that I believe

would be too disruptive. So what would end up

happening would be, a lot of people who currently

have employer-based health care would suddenly find

themselves dropped, and they would have to go into an

entirely new system that had not been fully set up yet.

And I would be concerned about the potential

destructiveness of that kind of transition. All right? So

I'm not promoting a single-payer plan.”

Twice, the President reveals his hand. He says, “So what would end up happening would be, a lot of people who currently have employer-based health care would suddenly find themselves dropped, and they would have to go into an entirely new system that had not been fully set up yet.” Why would he say those people who would be dropped from their employer-based health care would be forced into a system that “had not been fully set up yet”? This answer suggests that there is a lot more to come after the initial introduction of the program. After all, no one would lose their insurance until a plan is set up that they could be moved to. Why wouldn’t they be able to move directly into the government plan at that point? There are only two possible ways to understand this answer: 1. The President is prepared to introduce a health plan that is not entirely workable, and then work out the bugs on-the-fly until it is “fully set up”; or 2. The President intends for the initial introduction of the plan to be only the first step in a broader, more comprehensive approach—a “fully” set up plan.

The first possible answer is very scary, but it seems to me that the second understanding of his words is more likely. His next slip points to this. He says, “And I would be concerned about the potential destructiveness of that kind of transition.” Why would he say that he would be concerned about “that kind of transition”? Is there a “kind of” transition that he wouldn’t be concerned about? Like one that takes longer and is less “disruptive”? Probably so. It seems clear that the President is open to the idea of a transition from private health insurance to a single-payer plan—as long as it is the right “kind of transition.”

Why am I being so sensitive to the President’s language? Because I know what he has said in the past about his desire to have a single-payer health care system in this country. Here are his own words: “I happen to be a proponent of a single-payer universal health care plan…That’s what I’d like to see.” And on the transition issue, he said this, “I don’t think we’re going to be able to eliminate employer coverage immediately, there’s going to be potentially some transition process.” You can see him say it himself on this Youtube clip, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-bY92mcOdk.

So, what did the President mean when he said, “I'm not promoting a single-payer plan”? He meant that “right now” he isn’t promoting a single-payer health care plan. Right now, he’s promoting this “public option” plan. The single-payer step will come later. He isn’t lying when he says that. He just isn’t telling you everything he has planned. But if you listen to him carefully, you can hear the future.

We know where the President wants to take the country with his health care reform, and we have seen what the liberals in Congress want to do. They are on the same page—a single-payer universal health care plan.

False Pro-Life bill, Collapsing Obama Bubble, Health Care Horrors, Shifting Political Scene

Friends,

I really had to work to reduce the number of items from this past week that I think you need to pay close attention to. I hope you find these helpful.

Blessings,

Barrett

The Ryan-DeLauro False Pro-Life Bill

The pressure to accept the bill by Tim Ryan (D-OH) and Rosa DeLauro (D-CT) as a compromise pro-life bill is mounting. Don’t be fooled by all the talk. The bill is not a compromise bill. The only people compromising on this bill are people with pro-life values. The only “compromise” pro-abortion supporters made was not to make the bill all about abortion. But make no mistake, there are abortion provisions in this bill. The remarkable group Democrats for Life of America is so irritated with Tim Ryan's ongoing support of pro-abortion policies, including his aggressive support of this bill, that they recently removed him from their board.

Earlier, I gave you some information about this bill. Below is my expanded assessment of it. You can download the assessment, which includes the actual language in the bill, at http://erlc.com/documents/pdf/ryan-deLauro-hr3312-abortion-connection.pdf.

The Ryan-DeLauro (H.R. 3312) Abortion Connection

The Ryan-Delauro bill (H.R. 3312), referred to as the “Preventing Unintended Pregnancies, Reducing the Need for Abortion, and Supporting Parents Act,” is being promoted as “common ground” legislation in the abortion wars. In reality, the bill is woefully misguided. While it does provide some helpful safety net services for women who find themselves in a difficult pregnancy, there is no doubt that H.R. 3312 will result in more abortions.

H.R. 3312 will facilitate more use of the abortion-inducing Plan B “morning after” pill, increase the number of “family planning” clinics on college campuses, and provide increased funding for Planned Parenthood. The following evidence from the bill is undeniable.

I. The Plan B “Morning after Pill” Connection

·Sec. 102 of the bill includes funding for teaching teenagers about all forms of contraception and encouraging its increased use.
·Section 301 of the bill says those who use federal funds for teen pregnancy prevention programs must “increase contraceptive use among sexually active teens” and can offer “preventive health services” as a means to reduce teen pregnancy.
·Because Plan B is referred to in the medical literature as a contraceptive, the Ryan-DeLauro bill will include teaching teenagers about it and encouraging its use. Plan B is more than a contraceptive. It also causes abortion of a young embryo by preventing implantation in the uterine wall.

II. The Family Planning Connection

·Sec. 602 of the bill specifically calls for establishing “campus-based family planning services” among community college students.
·Sec. 701 of the bill mandates that states include family planning services for all Medicaid patients.
·It is established fact that “family planning services” include abortion services and contraception distribution.

III. The Planned Parenthood Connection

·Sec. 1002 more than doubles current Title X funding to $700 million, and additional funds as needed in future years.
·Planned Parenthood is a primary recipient of these funds. In their 2007-2008 fiscal year, Planned Parenthood received nearly $350 million dollars from the government for their “family planning” services. In that same year, their clinics performed more than 305,000 abortions, more than 1/4 of all the abortions performed in the United States.
·While federal funds cannot be used for abortion, Planned Parenthood is able to use these funds for their other activities and administrative costs, freeing up money from other sources, including from the states, to fund their abortion and abortion-related activities.

IV. Conclusion

The Ryan-DeLauro bill (H.R. 3312) is an abortion bill. It provides federal funding and stipulations that will result in more abortions. Plan B is an abortion-inducing drug. Family planning services often include abortion and abortion-related offerings among their services. Planned Parenthood, the nation’s largest abortion provider, will receive funding under this bill.

If someone is looking for a legitimate abortion-neutral bill, they should support the Pregnant Women Support Act, (S. 1032, H.R. 2035). The Pregnant Women Support Act offers nearly all of the safety-net features for pregnant women contained in the Ryan-DeLauro bill plus many others, without any of the pro-abortion compromise. Those who are truly interested in reducing abortions in this country should support the Pregnant Women Support Act and oppose the Ryan-DeLauro bill.

The Collapsing Obama Bubble

While President Obama continues to enjoy high personal ratings, the country is becoming more nervous about his policies. The Tea Parties were the first evidence of eroding public confidence. The conflict at congressional town hall meetings is the next. These meetings are becoming very confrontational. People are worried about what is going to happen to their health care, and rightly so. Two trends are responsible for raising the level of public angst that is now being focused on Obama and the liberal congress. The first is the growing list of unpopular policies they are pushing. Just consider this sampling:

+Misspent stimulus, to date only $80 billion of the $800 billion has been spent, and most of the money is to be spent on liberal pet projects,
+Unemployment now officially at least 9.4%, but maybe as high as 16.3%,
+Bloated $3.6 trillion budget that drives up the national debt to $9.3 trillion in 10years,
+Cap and Trade global warming legislation, that creates less energy and higher costs,
+Erosions of pro-life protections, including loss of conscience protections for pro-life medical professionals, no abstinence education funding, and increases for Planned Parenthood,
+Government take-over of huge swaths of the economy, including insurance, banking, and GM,
+Government take-over of health care.

People can only take so much stress at one time. The more anxiety producing events (APE) they experience, the more resistant and fearful they become. It’s called going APE. Well, the country is going APE over all these anxiety producing events President Obama and the liberal congress are throwing at them. And there is no end in sight. The radical homosexual community continues to push their agenda. Liberals are about to pass their Hate Crimes bill, providing special DOJ protections for homosexuals, and last week they introduced the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, which provides special workplace protections for homosexuals.

The other trend that is working against public confidence in the policies President Obama is pushing through with the help of liberals in congress is the growing list of discrepancies between what the President says and what he does. People are increasingly commenting that it is more important to watch what he does, because you cannot count on anything he says to have the meaning you think it has. He is being perceived by a growing number of people as deliberately deceptive with his words. This recent Commentary article by Peter Wehner, http://www.commentarymagazine.com/viewarticle.cfm/decoding-obama-15181, catalogues some of the worst examples:

+He said he would create 150,000 American jobs, but claimed success for saving or creating 150,000 jobs,
+He said he saved $2 trillion in the budget, but the money was never going to be spent,
+He said he opposes borrowing and spending, but then he engaged in massive borrowing and spending,
+He said he doesn’t want to run GM, but he controls everything it does,
+He said he doesn’t want to meddle in the private sector, but he constantly meddles in it,
+He said he wants bipartisan governance, but none of his policies have bipartisan involvement,
+He said he is against indefinite detention of terror suspects, but then he detains them indefinitely,
+He said he deplores Bush’s anti-terror tactics, but then he continues to use them,
+He said he would bring transparency to government, but then he obstructs efforts to get information,
+He said lobbyists are off limits, but then he hires the ones he likes,
+He said he wants to turn the page, but then he keeps going back to deflect criticism.

Here is how Wehner concludes this article:

"It is hardly unprecedented for a politician to rely on contradictory, misleading, and intellectually dishonest statements. But in only five months, Barack Obama – the man who campaigned on a new kind of politics, who ran on hope and against cynicism, and who insisted ‘words mean something’ – has set a pace that is going to be hard to match, and hopefully hard to sustain.

“'I have always had a sort of mania about words,' Malcolm Muggeridge said in a speech he delivered more than three decades ago. 'Words can be polluted even more dramatically and drastically than rivers and land and sea. There has been a terrible destruction of words in our time.' It is an irony that Barack Obama, a politician as gifted in both the written and spoken word as we have seen in decades, has contributed to the cheapening of them."

Health Care Horror Stories

You don’t want to miss this description, http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2009/08/07/government_medicine_should_horrify_americans_97810.html, of the health care horrors people in England and Canada live with every day. Murdock includes these recently uncovered public comments by Obama in his pre-president days:

With these comments, it’s pretty clear where the President is headed with his health care plan. Where is this likely to lead? Murdock gives some very disturbing statistics from England and Canada that tell us precisely where:

+Breast cancer kills 25 percent of its American victims and 46 percent of its targets in the U.K.
+Prostate cancer is fatal to 19 percent of its American patients and 57 percent of Britons it strikes.
+The U.K.'s 2005 heart-attack fatality rate was 19.5 percent higher than America's.
+In Canada, some towns address the shortage of doctors with lotteries in which citizens compete for rare medical appointments.
+In 2008, the average Canadian waited 17.3 weeks from the time his general practitioner referred him to a specialist until he actually received treatment, 86 percent longer than the wait in 1993.
+Such sloth includes a median 9.7-week wait for an MRI exam, 31.7 weeks to see a neurosurgeon, and 36.7 weeks - nearly nine months - to visit an orthopedic surgeon.

The Shifting Political Scene

If you are wondering what people are talking about on the national political scene, I think this article, http://spectator.org/archives/2009/07/30/the-republican-recovery, from the American Spectator is the best summary of the current thinking that you could read. This article, http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/Terrible-new-poll-numbers-for-Obama-Democrats-52062972.html, from the Washington Examiner does a good job discussing the most recent polling data on the popularity of the Democrats and Republicans. Here is a key paragraph from that article:

"The poll has other bad news for Democrats and President Obama. The percentage of people who believe the country is on the wrong track has risen six points since April. The percentage of people who approve of the way Obama is handling the economy has dipped below 50 percent for the first time. The percentage of people who approve of his handling of the health care issue is 41 percent, with 46 percent disapproving. The percentage of people who have a positive opinion of Obama is down nine points since April. The percentage of people who say the president has strong leadership qualities, can be trusted to keep his word, will work with people of different viewpoints, is likable -- all those numbers are down."

The Republicans are recruiting many very prominent candidates to run in historically conservative districts. If the economy is still in the tank in 2010, there is a strong likelihood that many of them will win. When you add in the national mood on the health care issue, cap and trade global warming legislation, the Sotomayor confirmation, and many other issues that I list above, the stage is being set for a repeat of 1994.

Health Care Follies, Misguided Foreign Policy, and Justice Subverted

Friends:

It's been a busy week. Here are three issues that have me very concerned.

Health Care Follies

As you know, health care reform is still the major issue. The Senate has put the brakes on their bill for now, but the House finished up their committee work before recessing for August. Late Friday night, the last House committee with jurisdiction, Henry Waxman’s Energy and Commerce Committee, passed the bill. It’s been a real see-saw in that committee. The Energy and Commerce Committee was our last hope to stop this monstrosity before the August recess. It looked for a while like the Blue Dog Democrats on that committee were going to hold out, but Waxman brought them on board with a deal to reduce the cost of the bill and some weakening of the public health component.

That’s right, while some of the Blue Dogs expressed concern about abortion, there never was any serious pushback by the majority of the Blue Dogs over sanctity of human life issues. The real exception was Bart Stupak (D-MI). He has been a true Blue Dog champion for pro-life values through all of this. The greatest disappointment in the whole affair was the other Bart on the committee—Bart Gordon (D-TN). Gordon, a Blue Dog Democrat, was the swing vote that defeated the Pitts/Stupak amendment that would have prevented the House health care plan from mandating abortion. On the first vote, Gordon voted yes, and the amendment passed, 31-27. Waxman voted for the amendment so he could bring it back up for a revote. When he brought it back up for the revote, Bart Gordon switched his vote and voted against the amendment, and it failed, 29-30. Bart Gordon’s vote was the deciding vote.

The bill the House will be voting on is very troubling. The ERLC recently completed a fact sheet on it that I think you’ll find very helpful. You can get it here, http://erlc.com/documents/pdf/20090731-affordable-health-choices-act-exposed.pdf. Here is the summary statement from the fact sheet:

“The House health care bill, H.R. 3200, is 1018 pages in length. The magnitude of the bill along with the innumerous citations to other legislation makes it nearly impossible to figure out what everything in the bill actually means. The information in this document is a compilation of what we have determined to be the most dangerous language in the bill and our analysis of what that language could potentially mean. The simple fact is that if passed, no one can say for certain how badly this will all play out in practice. However, what we can say with absolute certainty is that this legislation will lead to diminished health care for most Americans, less choice, higher taxes, and unprecedented government intrusion into every level and aspect of society, from business, to education, to marriage, to individual liberty.”

I encourage you to visit with your congressman and senators while they are back home during the August recess to raise your concerns about health care reform before they return in September to try to finish this job.

Misguided Foreign Policy

You should also be concerned about ongoing developments with Honduras. The Administration is on the wrong side of this issue. Yet, they seem determined to dig themselves in deeper. They continue to persist in their refusal to recognize the new Honduran government. Last week the State Department reinforced its error by revoking the diplomatic visas of four Hondurans working in the interim Honduran government. If you want a good quick read on the situation and what the U.S. should be doing, I recommend this article, http://www.insideronline.org/summary.cfm?id=10547, from the Heritage Foundation. The writer concludes,

“In the July 5 flight over Honduras, Zelaya announced that failure to force his return would constitute 'the death of democracy in Latin America.' There is an ironic truth in his statement: An internationally coerced and unconditional return of Zelaya to the Honduran presidency will weaken the fundamentals of liberal democracy (limited government, checks and balances, and executive accountability) in the Western Hemisphere and hand Hugo Chávez and his ALBA alliance another propaganda scalp.”

Now contrast the Administration’s attitude toward Honduras with its complete caving to Sudan. Jamie Dean wrote an important article, http://www.worldmag.com/articles/15481, on the Obama administration’s failure to act on behalf of Darfur. Here is part of what she had to say:

“When Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir ruthlessly expelled 13 foreign aid groups delivering at least half of the life-sustaining aid to millions of people in Darfur in March, Obama called the action 'unacceptable.' A few weeks later, Obama renewed his call for Bashir to allow aid workers to stay, saying he would otherwise have to 'find another mechanism' for delivering aid. But by late May, no new mechanism existed. Obama's new special envoy to Sudan, Major General Scott Gration, had even softer words when he visited the African nation for the first time in April. Gration, a retired Air Force officer, told officials in Sudan's northern capital city of Khartoum, 'I come here with my hands open,' and said he hoped Sudan would respond 'with a hand of friendship.' The envoy didn't mention genocide. Indeed, he didn't mention Darfur.”

Contrasting the Administration’s response in these two situations reveals some very troubling foreign policy shifts. Human rights and freedom are no longer U. S. priorities. The Administration’s ideology of political equivalence has rendered it incapable of distinguishing the good guys from the bad guys. You see that with Sudan, Iran, Cuba, North Korea, Palestine, China, Venezuela, and now Honduras.

Justice Subverted

And while you’re thinking about the Obama administration, the recent decision by the Department of Justice to drop the charges against those New Black Panthers who stood at the entrance to the polling place in Philadelphia should give you reason to be very concerned about the Administration’s commitment to equal justice under the law. It would seem that President Obama’s twisted empathy standard is well-represented at DOJ. Here is a video clip of the New Black Panthers activity at that polling booth, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=neGbKHyGuHU. This news report helps to fill in some of the details of what was going on, http://beltwayblips.dailyradar.com/video/voting_intimidation_by_black_panthers_in_philadelphia/. This sure looks like voter intimidation to me.

The ERLC raised concerns about Eric Holder’s nomination as Attorney General. His decision to not pursue charges against these three men, especially the one wielding a nightstick, reinforces those concerns. In fact, this is just one in a growing string of troubling developments at DOJ. This Weekly Standard article, http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/016/799hlime.asp?pg=1, makes the point.

Blessings,

Barrett

Health Care Reform, Ryan-DeLauro Abortion-Plus Bill, Sotomayor

The last couple of weeks have been spent setting up the battlefield for the next round of fights on Capitol Hill. We’ve had a number of skirmishes. Next week some of the biggest battles will be engaged. Here are three that conservatives must engage.

HEALTH CARE REFORM

Health care reform has taken up practically all the oxygen inside the beltway. And for good reason—we need health care reform. Unfortunately, the people in charge of that debate have a much different idea about what that reform ought to look like than most of the people in the country. The main points of contention are:

1. The determination of liberals to include abortion as a covered benefit.
2. Their insistence that all health insurance plans in America must provide a government-approved set of minimum benefits.
3. Their insistence on including a public health component for all Americans.

Liberals believe that abortion should naturally be covered in health plans. They think of it as an essential part of “women’s reproductive health.” Just think about these quotes:

“We [the Obama Administration] happen to think that family planning is an important part of women’s health and reproductive health includes access to abortion …”
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Testimony Before House Foreign Affairs Committee, May 20, 2009

“In my mind, reproductive care is essential care, basic care, so it is at the center, the heart of the plan that I propose… Insurers are going to have to abide by the same rules in terms of providing comprehensive care, including reproductive care … that’s going to be absolutely vital.” President Obama’s statement to the Planned Parenthood Action Fund.

Conservatives tried numerous times in the House and Senate to introduce language that would prohibit abortion except in the cases of danger to the life of the mother, rape and incest, but were defeated every time.

But the liberals aren’t content to simply provide abortion in some insurance plans. They intend to force every insurance plan to cover it. In the House bill, HR 3200, you run across this language:

LIMITATION ON NEW ENROLLMENT-
(A) IN GENERAL- Except as provided in this paragraph, the individual health insurance issuer offering such coverage does not enroll any individual in such coverage if the first effective date of coverage is on or after the first day of Y1.

Some are saying this language means that no insurance company will be able to write new policies once the government system goes into effect. Investor’s Business Daily, http://ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=332548165656854, first raised that concern. It’s possible to interpret it that way. What I am absolutely convinced the language means is that no insurance company will be able to write new policies that do not meet the government’s set of minimum benefits. And while you’re thinking about this, think about the fact that it probably won’t be only minimum benefits they must comply with but also maximum benefits. A mainstay of the liberal answer to run-away health care costs is to ration health care services. So, it is likely that all health insurance policies will also be required to follow the government’s review board policies on acceptable health care options.

The liberals are also insistent on including a public health care plan for all Americans. They will tax businesses, upper-income people, and anybody else they need to in order to fund this plan. In case you missed it in the President’s press conference on Wednesday, http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/News-Conference-by-the-President-July-22-2009/, here is what he said about all the rest of us:

“The one commitment that I've been clear about is I don't want that final one-third of the cost of health care to be completely shouldered on the backs of middle-class families who are already struggling in a difficult economy. And so if I see a proposal that is primarily funded through taxing middle-class families, I'm going to be opposed to that because I think there are better ideas to do it.”

Now, contrary to the President’s campaign promise, taxing everyone to pay for his plan is acceptable, just so long as the middle-class isn’t the “primary” source of the funds.

So, what’s standing in their way? Conservative Democrats. We are witnessing the most unexpected display of Democrat pushback I have ever seen. Most of the Republicans are standing firm in their opposition, but the Democrats can pass anything they want without them. However the liberal Democrat leadership doesn’t even have the support of all the Democrats. In the Senate things have come to a complete standstill. They are wrestling with runaway costs, http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0709/25331.html.

In the House, things are more contentious. All attention is on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, which is chaired by Henry Waxman. The hold-up? Blue Dog Democrats! They are insisting on changes in the health care plans government will offer. Here is a story on their stand, http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/house-healthcare-talks-break-down-in-anger-2009-07-24.html.

It’s important to note that they are holding out primarily over costs and various impacts of the health care proposals, not over the principle of government take-over of health care, http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/07/10/house.health.care/index.html. I know this because one of the most conservative Blue Dog Democrats spent 40 minutes last week telling me that we needed a public health plan. You can read this letter they sent to Speaker Pelosi, http://thehill.com/images/stories/news/2009/july/polis%20health%20care%20reform%20surcharge%20letter.pdf .

How this turns out is in the hands of these Democrats. They are under tremendous pressure. If one of them is your representative, I encourage you to get in touch with his office and let him know where you stand.

If these Blue Dog Dems don’t get with the liberal program soon, Speaker Pelosi has a plan B. She will take the bill from the committee and bring it directly to the floor for a vote. She has the power to do this. Here is a story on where that stands http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/07/10/house.health.care/index.html. It should be a fight like nothing you’ve ever seen if she does that, but she’s up to it. The rest of us had better be up to it as well.

The Ryan-DeLauro False Compromise

The press is telling us that there is a new movement afoot on the abortion wars—a compromise position around which everyone can rally. They claim that Tim Ryan (D-OH) and Rosa DeLauro (D-CT) have fashioned a bill that represents true middle ground on the contentious abortion battlefield. Here’s what they are saying, http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/20090723/us_time/08599191228400.

The only problem is that most pro-life people haven’t joined this grand compromise. And for good reason. The Ryan-DeLauro bill is hardly a compromise. Granted, it has many good components that will encourage pregnant women to keep their babies and provide them the safety net services they need, but it also includes many provisions that are certain to result in more pregnancies and more abortions.

1. The bill provides more money for Planned Parenthood. Planned Parenthood is the nation's largest abortion provider. They aborted 300,000 babies last year. Federal law prohibits the use of taxpayer dollars for abortion, but that doesn't mean very much. Planned Parenthood simply uses the federal dollars for the rest of their operation, which frees up more of their other money to perform abortions.
2. The bill includes support for Plan B contraception, which is a misnomer. Plan B is an over-the-counter abortion drug. It is taken by women and girls after they have sex and are worried that they might be pregnant. The drug aborts the fertilized egg if one exists. It is not a pregancy prevention plan, but an early abortion plan.
3. The bill provides funding for sex education classes, which, I'm sure you are aware, are used to teach kids how to have "safe sex" and how to engage in many different forms of sex with so-called minimal harm. In other words, these sex education programs are more about harm reduction in sexual activity than anything else.
4. The bill will also increase the distribution of contraceptives, including condoms, to school age children.
5. The Ryan-DeLauro bill will result in more abortions.

If the grand compromise means we must accept more liberal intrusion in the lives of children, more teen pregnancy, and more abortions in order to get some help for pregnant women, that’s more than I’m ready to give. I can understand why NARAL and Planned Parenthood are enthusiastic about the bill. They don’t give up anything. On the other hand pro-life people must give up plenty. Think of it as an abortion-plus bill.

If you are looking for a positive, pro-life approach to the dilemma of unintended or challenging pregnancy, the Pregnant Women Support Act (S. 1032, H.R. 2035) is the right choice. The bill provides safety nets for women who find themselves pregnant and unsure if they can care for their babies. It provides everything from prenatal care, to assistance with continuing education, to childcare assistance. It is supported by most of the pro-life groups, and has bipartisan backing. Democrat Bob Casey is the lead Senate sponsor, and Democrat Lincoln Davis is the lead house sponsor.

SONIA SOTOMAYOR’S CONFIRMATION

I watched practically all of the hearings with Sonia Sotomayor. Some people have deathbed conversions. Judge Sotomayor had an armchair conversion. In a matter of hours, while seated in that armchair before the Senate Judiciary Committee, she renounced all her worldly ideals and kissed the Constitution. Gone was the wise Latina, the policy-making judge, the empathetic champion of the little person.

If words alone were all we had to guide us, we would have to say Judge Sotomayor passed the test. But we also have the pesky decisions she made, which just cannot be scrubbed or revised. Despite all that she has said, her decisions reveal that she does not possess the commitment to the Constitution that is required of a Supreme Court justice. Here are the most prominent decisions that should be cause to deny her confirmation:

On Religious Speech, Okwedy v. Molinari (2003)—She ruled against a man who rented a billboard to post a Bible verse against homosexuality because local leaders thought it was offensive and had it removed.

On Private Property, Didden v. Village of Port Chester (2006)—She ruled against a man who wanted to build a pharmacy on his property. The city had taken his property under eminent domain and gave the exact same piece of property to a developer who built his own pharmacy on the same piece of land.

On the Right to Bear Arms, Maloney v. Cuomo (2009)—She ruled that the 2nd amendment is not a fundamental right and that the state’s have the power to restrict the right to bear arms.

On Racial Discrimination, Ricci v. DeStefano (2008)—She ruled that New Haven had acted properly when it nullified the results of a promotion test a group of firefighters had passed because no African-Americans had passed it.

On Enviromentalism, Riverkeeper v. EPA (2004)—She ruled that the EPA should not consider cost in requiring businesses to adopt the most effective means of controlling environmental hazards.

When you add her 12 years with the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund, where she helped advocate for unrestricted abortion rights, and her numerous reversals by the U.S. Supreme Court, it is clear that Judge Sotomayor should not be confirmed as a Justice on the nation’s highest court.

The Senate Judiciary Committee will vote on her confirmation next week. The full Senate vote will follow shortly after.

The battles are engaged. May the Lord grant us wisdom and strength as we all seek to bring His values into public policy.

Blessings,

Barrett