By JAMES K. FITZPATRICK
We are all taught early in our education that it is unacceptable to act as if we can read the minds of those who disagree with us on an issue. The formal term for it is “imputing motives.” We are told that we should deal with what our opponents actually say, not charge them without proof of dishonest intentions or “ulterior motives”; that we should not attack their character with an “ad hominem” argument, but the quality of their evidence, since even lowlifes can have the facts on their side at times.
Fair enough. But there are instances when circumstantial evidence of a hidden agenda can be too overwhelming to ignore. I submit that just such a situation exists when dealing with “pro-choice” groups and proponents of Obamacare who insist that they have no intention of pushing for taxpayer-funded abortion. Sorry: I find it hard to believe them. I submit that they are biding their time, waiting for the right moment to push for the goal of government subsidized abortion on demand.
That is why there is little reason for pro-life Americans to be pleased by the latest proposal by the Obama administration to exempt employers with religious objections from providing coverage for contraceptives and abortifacients in their company-provided health care insurance. It is a “compromise” that opens the door for government-financed abortion on demand.
Consider the implications in the offer made by the president’s team in mid-August. They proposed that employers with religious objections to providing the contraceptive coverage mandated by Obamacare will be able to inform the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) of the reasons for their objections and that, unless their case is flimsy or fraudulent, these businesses will be permitted to offer a health-care package that does not provide for contraception for female employees.
What will happen to these women? HHS will contact insurers and set up taxpayer subsidized insurance coverage for contraceptives for them.
The Obama administration tells us this a reasonable compromise: Employers with religious objectives will no longer be paying for contraceptive services; their female employees seeking insurance for birth control will get their coverage independently, from an insurer working in cooperation with HHS.
HHS Secretary Sylvia Burwell released a prepared statement outlining the rationale: “Women across the country deserve access to recommended preventive services that are important to their health, no matter where they work. Today’s announcement reinforces our commitment to providing women with access to coverage for contraception, while respecting religious considerations raised by nonprofit organizations and closely held for-profit companies.”
It is a ruse. The administration’s compromise releases employers with religious objections from the obligation to provide coverage for contraceptives and abortifacients, but requires the taxpayers to subsidize the coverage instead. If the Obama administration succeeds in selling the public on the reasonableness of this proposal it will go a long way toward opening the door for taxpayer-funded abortions for all American women.
As things stand now taxpayer-funded abortions are illegal. The Hyde Amendment, passed in 1976, bars the use of federal funds to pay for abortions, with exceptions for rape and incest. The new proposal by the Obama administration is the wedge to overturn this law. Once the proposal is law, it will be difficult for anyone to make the case that it is reasonable and just for the taxpayers to pay for abortifacients for women denied free access to them by their employers, but that women in other circumstances — perhaps unemployed or on Medicaid — should be required to pay for their abortions on their own.
You can see how the argument will go: “Why should a lawyer or an accountant who does not get coverage for her morning-after pills from her employer be entitled to taxpayer money to end her pregnancy, but not a woman on welfare who seeks to end her pregnancy, perhaps at a stage where these pills are no longer effective and other forms of abortion are required?”
I contend that supporters of Obamacare and other advocates for legal abortions — who insist that they are not looking for a way to provide taxpayer-funded abortions — in their private discussions sound just like Tara Culp-Ressler in her August 27 article on website ThinkProgress.org. Culp-Ressler writes openly of how unfortunate it is that an abortion provider such as Planned Parenthood is constantly forced “to reiterate that it doesn’t use federal dollars to fund abortion procedures” and that women who can’t afford to pay for their abortions are required to “rely on friends and family members to help raise the money they need,” while others “are forced to divert money that’s intended to cover living expenses — like rent, groceries, or utility bills — to scrape together the money for the procedure. If they’re really desperate, they’ll seek out illegal and potentially dangerous abortion options.”
Culp-Ressler argues the Hyde Amendment “is a policy that dramatically impact millions of women’s lives,” “the poorest and most vulnerable women.” It is a policy with “dire consequences for women and their families.” Moreover, “Abortion procedures become more expensive the longer you wait. Many low-income women run out of time while they’re trying to save up the money for it.”
Culp-Ressler quotes a representative of the pro-abortion advocacy group the Guttmacher Institute: “The whole purpose of health insurance is to ensure that individuals can afford unexpected medical bills in the case of an unplanned event” and “an unintended pregnancy is the very definition of an unplanned event.” Culp-Ressler adds that the denial of taxpayer funding for abortions “is a denial of disadvantaged women’s basic constitutional rights. And it means that reproductive rights are ultimately transformed into an issue of economic justice.”
What supporters of Obamacare are asking us to accept is that they do not share Culp-Ressler’s case for taxpayer-funded abortion; that their position is that taxpayers who oppose abortion should not be expected to pay for it. I don’t believe them. Those who say this are being dishonest with us, keeping the endgame of taxpayer-funded abortion under wraps until Obamacare has been established so solidly that there is little chance it can ever be reversed. When that happens Culp-Ressler’s arguments will be heard from every liberal talking head in the media and the government.
There is a track record for such maneuvering by the American left. Remember when every prominent liberal in the country and homosexual activist acted as if it was preposterous to think that anyone would ever call for same-sex marriage? It was only a few decades back when we were assured that all that homosexual activists wanted was an end to “gay-bashing” and discrimination against homosexuals in housing and employment. That was the camel’s nose under the tent that brought us to the current drive for same-sex marriage as a constitutional and human right.
The Obama administration’s offer to pay for insurance coverage for abortifacients for women denied that coverage by their employers under Obamacare is meant to serve the same purpose.
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