Posted on 02/12/2012 7:59:57 PM PST by Qbert
White House Chief of Staff Jack Lew on Sunday defended President Barack Obama’s decision to relax a requirement that religious employers cover contraception in health plans, saying the president struck an appropriate balance and wasn’t open to further compromise.
“I have to say that the solution that we came up with puts no religious institution in a position where it either has to pay for or facilitate the provision of benefits they find objectionable,” Mr. Lew said on CNN’s State of the Union with Candy Crowley.
Mr. Lew said the president put out a solid plan, and when asked whether there is more room for compromising said, “No. This is our plan.”
In an appearance on CBS’s “Face the Nation,” Mr. Lew said, “We’re going to go ahead and implement it.” He said the White House has “broad consensus – not universal consensus – that this is an approach that’s right.”
The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops said Friday it wanted the entire birth-control mandate rescinded. “The only complete solution to this religious liberty problem is for [Health and Human Services] to rescind the mandate of these objectionable services,” the bishops said in a statement issued late Friday.
“We note that today’s proposal continues to involve needless government intrusion in the internal governance of religious institutions, and to threaten government coercion of religious people and groups to violate their most deeply held convictions,” the bishops said, while also urging Catholics to write to their representatives in opposition to the policy.
A long fight could damage the president’s support among Catholics who favored him in the last presidential election.
(Excerpt) Read more at blogs.wsj.com ...
I won’t pay for my kids to get cigarettes.
Obama: No problem, we will simply require the supermarket to give them to him free. Then they will raise the prices of all groceries to cover the cost. That way you won’t be paying for it.
BRILLIANT!
The bishops and priests are taking their own souls in their hands if they do not follow Gods law. Their judgement will be severe.
Obama probably figures he loses some Catholics over this but gains a larger number of women who will be grateful for "free" birth control mandated by him. Freedom of religion is our birthright but they will sell it out for a mess of pottage.
But at least people may be reminded of the fact they didn't want Obamacare to begin with or to have the federal government controlling all the little details of their lives.
When I heard that Lee guy on Fox News Sunday talking about the Catholic Organizations that support Obama’s “compromise” I was screaming at the TV.
Lee is the American (Obamaville) version of Goebbels (along with the Media of course).
"I hope the bishops will manage to make their opposition to the "compromise" heard. So far all Obama has speaking out on his side is that useful-idiot nun who was gung-ho for Obamacare all along, and the president of Notre Dame University."
Yep. I hope he will hear it loud and clear, not only from the bishops, but from the pro-Constitution Tea Parties and religious rallies a few months from now.
This is because the libs look upon pregnancy and motherhood as an affliction, not a blessing, as per Margaret Sanger, the lib's patron saint of radical feminism and founder of Planned Parenthood.
She has said that motherhood was the greatest evil a woman could commit, and that women would radically change the world via birth control.
Free abortion on demand. Abortion will be considered preventative medicine.
ic - I am surprised you are the first to point this out: of course the insurance co will have to increase costs on everything (at a net win for them) in order to cover the cost of abortions, which will be a largely new cost, due to the fact that I am not sure there are a lot of people having children because they can’t afford or can’t find a subsidized one at a “family planning” clinic. They are getting them anyway, the payor is now shifting from Planned Parenthood to the insurance company, who will pass this on, freeing PP to spend more funds elsewhere. No doubt they will go to securing more votes and more funding from Uncle Sam (the taxpayer), resulting in an essentially double taxation for a procedure that violates the deepest tenets of faith for many people, even those who are only quasi-religious at best.
This redoubles my determination that anyone who wants to work with me does so as a subcontractor. It also makes me wonder - if we can’t arrest the downward slide toward socialism by voting, if we shouldn’t all save up enough to live on for a while and go on strike and on the dole. Better perhaps to crash it to the bottom and pick up the pieces than let it drag on into deeper tyranny?
It actually is already free on demand. Just go to Planned Parenthood.
Only a little dictator like this would call a ‘lessening’ of an already un-Constitutional act, a compromise. And only the fools in the US media would be stupid enough to report it that way.
It’s a shell game: what has changed is that no one will be allowed to buy health insurance that doesn’t pay for chemical contraceptives and abortifactant pills.
It’s ingeneous to say the insurance company is paying for these things, as if they were donating the money. They aren’t. They are using the money of those who buy insurance. So even those of us who buy our own health insurance and who in the past declined this on our policy will now have to pay for it.
This is merely a way to have the press spin it differently and let the pro abort catholic left cave in.
Time you little people start learning who’s boss.
Excellent - now the battle lines are drawn
Fine! Wait until November.
Contrary to what many think, he and his thugs are not good at politics. They have no idea how to even pretend how to relate to normal people, let alone Americans. This is so stupid on their part, but they may think that most Catholics will go along with it. That remains to be seen.
Thanks but, I was being sarcastic.
>:)
The Dems say they help prevent health issues, and even if they are lying, people won’t know who to believe.
Two can play that game...
The morning-after pill is potentially an abortion (if there is a fertilized egg). The morning-after pill would be particularly attractive after a one-night stand...for the media, the Catholic Church is also unreasonable in disapproving of those too.
Maybe a good analogy for the morning-after pill would be someone backpacking who finds a really nice place to camp for the night but sees a sleeping bag already stretched out. He doesn't want to share the spot, so he shoots the sleeping bag full of bullets without knowing if someone is in it. If there is, he has committed murder, but not if it's empty. The person using the morning-after pill has only aborted a baby if there was a fertilized egg inside her body.
Margaret Sanger, "WOMAN AND THE NEW RACE" - Chapter V
I urge all fellow Freepers to read the words of this vile woman whose philosophy is a pillar of all Modern American Liberalism, which is that life itself must be regulated by the State.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.