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Paul Clement has been receiving rave reviews for his performance during the second day of oral arguments over health-care reform before the Supreme Court. (“[T]he best argument I’ve ever heard,” SCOTUSblog Tom Goldstein raved on Twitter). But Clement’s finest moment may have come when he was completely silent. A little more than two minutes into Solicitor General Donald Verilli’s turn at the bar, Justice Anthony Kennedy interrupted him: “Can you create commerce in order to regulate it?” Kennedy’s query was an almost verbatim recital of Clement’s own talking point, part of the fundamental argument he has made against the individual...

Obamacare Mandate in Deep Trouble PoliticsMarch 28th, 2012 Keith Koffler The Obamacare health insurance mandate appears to be teetering on the edge of being struck down by the Supreme Court, as the only potential swing justices – Anthony Kennedy and Chief Justice John Roberts – expressed deep skepticism that the government’s power to compel commerce could be limited once it can force you to purchase insurance.Kennedy appeared deeply skeptical until the end, when he gave proponents of the mandate some hope by suggesting health care may be a unique case.Here’s a concise analysis by Lyle Denniston, author of SCOTUSblog: If Justice...

As the United States Supreme Court wind down three days of hearings on the healthcare law of President Barack Hussein Obama or “Obamacare“ I am left to reflect that this whole law was, is, and will always be a complete and total MESS of a law that SHOULD NOT HAD EVER SEEN THE LIGHT OF DAY. Frankly, I would not be all that surprised if the Supreme Court justices are thinking in the same way too. After arguments both pro and con for this law are all set and done, do not be suprised if the justices are going send...

What should happen to the rest of the health care overhaul if the individual mandate is struck down? The whole law should be invalidated. And let us never return to health care reform again The whole law should be invalidated. But Congress should craft a better law to replace it The rest of the law should stand as is Only the parts most closely tied to the mandate should go

Earnest Calls Government Mandate 'Personal Responsibility Clause' ... The Obama administration is now referring to Obamacare as a “bi-partisan bill” and calling the unpopular individual mandate “a Republican idea,” following three days of tough questioning by the Supreme Court. “The Affordable Care Act is a bipartisan plan and one that we think is constitutional,” Deputy White House press Secretary Josh Earnest told reporters on Wednesday afternoon. No Republican voted for the Affordable Care Act on final passage. He also referred to the individual mandate as the “individual responsibility” clause of the bill, in an attempt to distance the administration from...

A defining moment in Mitt Romney's post-pro-life-conversion political career came in his third year as governor of Massachusetts, when he decided Catholic hospitals would be required under his interpretation of a new state law to give rape victims a drug that can induce abortions. Romney announced this decision — saying it was the "right thing for hospitals" to do — just two days after he had taken the opposite position. The story begins in 1975, when Massachusetts enacted a law that said, "No privately controlled hospital .. shall be required to permit any patient to have an abortion ... or...

Featured Term (selected at random):EUGENIC STERILIZATION Depriving people of their generative powers in order to eliminate offspring having allegedly undesirable traits and to develop an environment more advantageous for human beings having allegedly desirable traits. the Catholic Church forbids the procedure because "public magistrates have no direct power over the bodies of their subjects. therefore, where no crime has taken place and there is no cause for grave punishment, they can never directly harm or tamper with the integrity of the body, either for reasons of eugenics or for any other reason' (Pius XI, Casti Connubii, II, 68-70). All items...

JANET BAIRD writes: President Obama and the Department of Health and Inhuman Services, as you know, recently decreed that free sterilizations be available to all college-age women under Obamacare. But the truth is even more sinister. Note the wording of the HHS regulation. As reported at CNS news, ‘[a]ll Food and Drug Administration [(FDA)] approved contraceptive methods, sterilization procedures, and patient education and counseling for all women with reproductive capacity,’ as prescribed by a provider,” said the HHS description of the regulation. [emphasis added] This clause caught my eye, “for all women with reproductive capacity.” Have you thought about the...

They say what goes around comes around, or to paraphrase the Good Book, you reap what you sow. Nowhere is this more in evidence than in recent global data on abortion. For years, feminists have maintained that women will not be truly free or equal unless they are free to abort their unborn children. They have sought to elevate abortion to sacramental status. It has been the defining issue of the feminist movement for decades. Ironically, this ideology of “liberation” and the reckless disregard for innocent life that it engenders hurts females more than any other group. Turns out that...

NEW YORK, March 27, 2012 (LifeSiteNews.com) - In the midst of a pro-life boycott over PepsiCo’s use of aborted fetal cells in flavor research, a prestigious international think tank has designated the soft drink company one of the “world’s most ethical companies.” According to Ethisphere, the California based organization that produces the list, the ranking honors those companies that “go beyond making statements about doing business ‘ethically’ and translate those words into action,” and “demonstrate real and sustained ethical leadership within their industries.” The recently released 2011 list names 110 companies, including Pepsi. Several other pro-life boycott targets were also...

The Hunger Games” wasn’t the only film to hit box office paydirt this past weekend. Although it only opened in 390 theaters, the anti-abortion drama “October Baby,” starring John Schneider,earned the second-highest-per-screen average, bringing in almost $2 million in ticket sales. “I was shattered when I first learned about the story. I was moved and mesmerized. I wasn’t an activist, I was just someone who was shattered by the truth,” director Jon Erwin told FOX411’s Pop Tarts. “Here is our little film, small budget, in the top ten (at the box office). We are thrilled, blown away.” “October Baby” follows...

On the first day of health care reform arguments before the Supreme Court, two justices needled a top Obama lawyer for simultaneously calling the fine that will be paid under the law for not purchasing insurance a “penalty” and a “tax.” The confusion arises because of the administration’s argument that the power to enforce the individual mandate is rooted in Congress’ taxing power — but that the mechanism itself is designed to be a penalty, not a revenue-generating policy. The narrow but important distinction created a communication challenge for the lawyer representing the Obama administration. U.S. Solicitor General Donald Verrilli...

Overland Park, Kansas, March 27, 2012 (LifeSiteNews.com) — On a tip from a local woman, the Kansas City Star has recovered over 1,000 abortion medical records from 2001-2002 that were illegally dumped in a public recycling bin by the discredited abortionist Krishna Rajanna, who was infamously accused of engaging in cannibalism by a former staff member. The files contained names, addresses and other sensitive information about abortion patients at Rajanna’s now-closed Affordable Medical Center. The newspaper has since turned the documents over to the Kansas State Board of Healing Arts. The documents could be used as evidence in a possible...

The latest Human Rights Report on China (2010) from the Department of State links the One Child Policy with high female suicide rates in China: A high female suicide rate continued to be a serious problem. According to the World Bank and the World Health Organization, there were approximately 500 female suicides per day in 2009. The Beijing Suicide Research and Prevention Center reported in 2009 that the suicide rate for females was three times higher than for males. Many observers believed that violence against women and girls, discrimination in education and employment, the traditional preference for male children, birth-limitation...

March 26, 2012 (40DaysforLife.com) - Here we are — the final Monday of this 40 Days for Life campaign. And the stories of God’s miracles keep rolling in! In the first 33 days of prayer and fasting, there have been 496 babies saved from abortion — that we know of! Here are just a few stories from the sidewalk. INSIDE STORIES You may remember a story last week about an abortion center employee advising a young woman not to have an abortion after her ultrasound showed pictures of twins. Well — a campaign director in another location wrote me to...

HARRISBURG, March 27, 2012 (LifeSiteNews.com) - A Pennsylvania state lawmaker has called her female colleagues who co-sponsored a pro-life ultrasound bill “men with breasts.” Rep. Babette Josephs, D-Philadelphia, was speaking at a Democratic rally on Monday against the measure. http://www.legis.state.pa.us/cfdocs/legis/PN/Public/btCheck.cfm?txtType=HTM&sessYr=2011&sessInd=0&billBody=H&billTyp=B&billNbr=1077&pn=2511 which The bill requires that an ultrasound be performed 24 hours before an abortion in order to document the gestational age of the child to be aborted, and that women be given the option of viewing the ultrasound image or hearing the fetal heartbeat if they choose. Rep. Babette Josephs “They’re trying all these experiments on us,” said Josephs of...

This month of March, Pope Benedict XVI issued a prayer request which was intriguing – it was about women. It was all the more intriguing for me since my eldest child – Hannah-Marie – is fast approaching her 16th birthday and has often complained about not being able to serve Mass as do her many younger brothers. The Pope’s prayer intention for March was: “That the whole world may recognize the contribution of women to the development of society.” I thought it may be of benefit to ask some of the many prayerful and inspirational Catholic women I have been...

Sunday evening the local NBC newsreader had the story of the Supreme Court taking up the challenge to Obamacare. She just had to add 'President Obama signed an Executive Order in 2010 that abortion would only be covered in the case of rape, incest or the health of the mother'. Now, over the past few weeks we have been informed that all abortions will be covered and each taxpayer will be required to kick in a dollar a month to pay for abortions. Even the Catholic Church will be forced to have their health insurance cover the Morning-after pill. Why...

Undaunted by a forecast of heavy thunderstorms, 200 Christians gathered on the afternoon of March 25 to pray at the front steps of the US Supreme Court. The two-hour vigil, called "Encircle the Court in Prayer," took place the day before the high court began hearing arguments concerning the constitutionality of the Patient Protection and Affordability Act, widely referred to as “Obamacare.” The provisions of the president’s healthcare legislation of greatest concern to these believers are the “HHS mandates,” which compel religious entities to provide employees with insurance coverage for contraceptives, sterilization services, and abortifacient drugs. Roman Catholics, conservative Christians,...

On March 26, 2012, the United States Supreme Court will hear challenges to Obama's so-called "Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act", better known as "Obamacare". Despite it's passage two years ago, controversy continues to surround the issue and to make its future anywhere but certain, and rightly so. If there weren't a laundry list of other reasons NOT to vote for Obama in 2012, Obamacare would be enough.