House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer has telegraphed the
strategy House Democrats are considering to shove ObamaCare down the throat of a resistant American public:
• Both Houses pass separate legislation that can be portrayed as sufficiently “anti-abortion” to satisfy Congressman Bart Stupak and his supporters; which will
• Mousetrap Republican Members of Congress and pro-life groups into supporting the bills; which in turn will make it possible to
• Pass the Senate Bill in the House; with the promise that
• The Senate Bill’s abortion language will be struck from the bill in a reconciliation package and justified as reducing federal outlays.
The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops already has instant messaged their
willingness not just to acquiesce in such shenanigans but also to actually mobilize the faithful to oppose any point of order in the Senate in order to lubricate passage of ObamaCare through the Senate:
“The Roman Catholic bishops signaled Thursday that if agreement is reached with House leaders on anti-abortion language, the church would work to get the votes needed to protect the provisions in the Senate — and thereby advance the shared goal with Democrats of health care reform.”
Now is the time for opponents of ObamaCare to focus, focus, focus on preventing Hoyer from maneuvering them into this corner. The only way for opponents of a government takeover of healthcare to prevent getting mouse trapped by a Separate Stupak is to recognize that the Stupak language and all Stupak lookalikes are a snare and a delusion.
NO legislative language will prevent ObamaCare once enacted into law from transforming very quickly into a federal abortion mill that provides abortion on demand. Given the obscure language inserted into the Senate Bill by Senator Barbara Mikulski (D-MD), which is being totally ignored by anti-abortion groups, even the strongest Stupak-like language will fail to stem a tide of transformative interpretations of bureaucrats and judges, which are sure to produce federally subsidized abortion on demand.
The Mikulski language gives plenary authority to the Secretary of Health and Human Services to require every public and private healthcare plan in the nation to include “preventative services,” which is defined to include “abortion care.” Even without the Mikulski provision, both the House and Senate bills are shot through with provisions that will lead inevitably to federally subsidized abortion on demand.
There is simply no way cleanse the final bill of this authority without starting over. Hence, what anti-abortion Members of Congress and the pro-life groups must understand is that
the only route to protecting the unborn from the effects of this bill is to defeat the entire bill. As long as Members of Congress and pro-life groups labor under the delusion that they can make ObamaCare safe for the unborn, they will actually serve as the President’s useful idiots and facilitate federal abortion on demand.
The political problem is there are many libertarians and moderate Republicans who oppose anti-abortion laws. This fact unnerves many Republican Members of Congress who therefore attempt to straddle the abortion issue so as not to offend moderate Republicans who agree with their libertarian constituents on abortion.
Stupak is a perfect straddle, which has the unfortunate by product of removing the last remaining block preventing enactment of ObamaCare into law. Unless Republicans refuse to take a pass on Stupak-like language, i.e., vote present on any Stupak vehicle however it is presented to them in the parliamentary chaos likely to ensue once the legislative bum’s rush begins—they will actually set the stage for enactment of ObamaCare into law.
The reluctance of Republican Members of Congress to help defeat Stupak language on strategic grounds is a huge political miscalculation. This miscalculation results from failing to comprehend the coincidence of interests on ObamaCare among libertarians/moderate Republicans and anti-abortion conservatives. Because of this blind spot, Senate Republicans are poised to make the same fatal mistake they made the first time around when they failed to comprehend the necessity of
strategic voting on abortion language.
The vast majority of libertarians and moderate Republicans who oppose anti-abortion laws also oppose laws that force taxpayers to subsidize abortion. Consequently, where it comes to ObamaCare, there is a coincidence of interests between the so-called “social conservatives” who want to outlaw abortion and libertarians and moderate Republicans who want to outlaw forcing those who oppose abortion as a matter of conscience from being forced to subsidize it.
Given the fact that there is no practical way to prevent forced taxpayer subsidization of abortion once the government takeover of healthcare is a reality, the only way to satisfy the interests of all three groups is to prevent a government takeover of healthcare in the first place. And, the only way to prevent President Obama and congressional Democrats from succeeding with a government takeover of healthcare is to prevent a cosmetic “fix” to the abortion problem, i.e., Stupak, which would give sufficient political cover to Stupak Democrats to vote for the Senate Bill. As long as Republican Members of Congress fail to grasp this fact, they will be unable to oppose or at least walk away from any cosmetic “fix” to the abortion problem such as a Separate Stupak would offer. In other words, by voting for a Separate Stupak, Republicans would actually grease the skids for ObamaCare to be enacted into law.
Therefore, the common ground among social conservatives, libertarians and moderate Republicans is to oppose any legislative provision, including a Separate Stupak, that requires or ultimately leads to government subsidization of abortion.
It may sound harsh but the truth often is harsh: If ObamaCare passes into law it will be the fault of Republicans and the pro-life groups who have the power, without even breaking a sweat, to stop this monstrosity in its tracks.
No Separate Stupak, Stupid.
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