The New York Times published a news article on Nancy Pelosi’s decision to allow the Stupak amendment to come up for a vote. Their phraseology leads to a few questions.
In the end, Ms. Pelosi decided that abortion opponents would be allowed to offer an amendment to the health care bill that would impose tight restrictions on abortions that could be offered through a new government-run insurance plan and through private insurance that is bought using government subsidies that the legislation would provide to moderate-Americans to help them afford health coverage.
I’m seriously stumped. What does “moderate American” even mean there?
Are just the people who would use the abortion coverage “moderate-Americans.” I need to know this because I am not a moderate-American? Will I be covered under this plan if I’m not moderate?
Do they mean “moderate income Americans?” If so, are we really so politically correct that we can’t call them “low income” or how about good ol’ “poor?”
Question number two (and an even weirder turn of phrase) is the part where they describe the Stupak amendement as one that would “impose tight restrictions on abortions.” Doesn’t Stupak ban federal money going to abortion?
Tight restrictions is different than a ban, isn’t it? Is this just the Times hoping that it’s not a real ban? Just bad editing? Or does a “ban” sometimes not mean a “ban?”
November 11, 2009 at 4:46 pm
OK – first, I had to read that run-on sentence about 3 times to even comprehend it. Second, it's neither tight restrictions nor a ban on actual abortion. At the end of the day, abortion is still legal (tragically). The ban is on taxpayers paying for abortion. I take issue with the NYT making this out to be some sort of restriction on a woman's right to choose, as if the horrible pro-lifers are using the health-care legislation to go around Roe v wade. We are talking about my right to not pay for what I deem immoral. It is the pro-abortion lobby that is making this important moment in American life, a crisis in health care availablity and affordability, all about abortion. If the powers-that-be were really interested in making a difference in the lives of regular Americans, it seems to me that they would save the subjects that cause so much ire for another day and make the other things better right now. To put a fine point on it: what does abortion have to do with my high insurance premiums and the coverage of pre-existing conditions? Nada.
November 11, 2009 at 5:00 pm
As far as "tight restrictions", my understanding was that it allowed for funding coverage in the case of rape or incest. Sounds like a compromise, but aren't a lot of people just going to start saying, yes, it was a rape? Just a thought.
November 11, 2009 at 5:43 pm
I didn't know abou the rape and incest clause. Thanks for the clarification.
November 11, 2009 at 7:59 pm
… and for the life of the mother too.
November 11, 2009 at 8:38 pm
A "moderate-American" is someone who only abides by only one objective moral value: that there are no objective morals.
November 11, 2009 at 11:11 pm
The actual amendment:
http://docs.house.gov/rules/3962/Stupak3962_108.pdf
November 13, 2009 at 3:32 am
The the Church teaches that abortion is still wrong even in cases of rape and incest. There is no exception to the rule of not killing a child in the womb deliberately. There is an age old doctrine of double effect as in the case when there is a cancerous uterus that needs to be removed. If there happens to be a fetus attached to it, then it is still moral to remove the uterus even if the fetus is affected. The difference is that one did not go in there to kill the fetus but to remove the cancer.