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The Answer to the Stupak? Overturn Hyde Now
Sorting through feelings as well as strategies in the face of the enormous defeat that the passage of a health care reform bill that so severely and punishingly restricts access to abortion will take time and hard political decisions. One wants to punish those who voted for the Stupak amendment and especially Stupak as much as they have punished women. At some point in time one has to put women first and above all else for no else will.
But the immediate take away is the cold hard fact that our biggest and most costly defeat since 1973 was the enactment of the Hyde Amendment and our lack of a total, uncompromising commitment to overturning it. If nothing else happens as a result of this defeat, complete and total dedication to overturning Hyde must be the centerpiece, indeed the single objective of our movement. It is not clear if the effect of the Stupak Amendment will be that the door will close on ever restoring federal funds for abortion, but every effort to make sure that does not happen must be made. We must convince enough people that the only immorality is using poor women as a way of expressing one's moral outrage. Either we all have the right to choose or none of us has it.
President Obama has always supported overturning Hyde and we now need to insist that having achieved his political objective with strong support from the women's movement, he must take up the true moral cause - giving women with no or low resources the same right of conscience as those with sufficient money to pay for their own abortions have always had.
Joe Biden and any pro-choice Democrat who has not been for over turning Hyde needs to change their mind - and we need to insist they do so.
I have great sympathy for the dilemma our friends on the Hill faced and in many ways I don't want to come down hard on them. I know they are hurting and these votes will trouble them for years to come. The Catholic in me says the next step is restitution- all is never lost. That restitution is their unswerving commitment and tireless work to overturn the Hyde Amendment.
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16 Comments so far
Show AllSorry--but what the hell is the Hyde Amendment? Does it occur to writers that not everyone knows what they are talking about?
drosera,the Hyde amendment bans Federal Funds for abortion,except in the case of rape, incest or the threat of death for the mother.No ,that is not the exact language,but the gist of it.Stupak goes farther than that,bans any insurance company receiving federal (public option) funds from providing abortion at all.Requires the patient to go to a private clinic or buy a separate policy to cover complete reproductive health care ,or pay for it out of pocket . Be well in peace.
Thanx
In Section 265 the "Stupak Amendment" there is an exception. On page 1 line 6,7 and page 2 lines 1-5 do clearly state that federal funds will allow an abortion if the women is raped or incest has occured,has a life threatening illness etc.
http://www.docstoc.com/docs/15284081/Stupak-Amendment-to-HR-3962-Rev-108
I never cease to be amazed that people who obviously know how to use a computer have not yet heard of "the google". Even George W. achieved that level of awareness.
google it drosera.
The Stupid,,, um, er, Stupak ammendment goes a lot farther than preventing Public funds from paying for abortions. It prevents private insurance companies from paying for them even if the premiums are paid antirely by the patient. Basically, it means that all abortions in this country will have to be paid out of pocket.
This should get chopped out in the reconcile but if it doesn't, it must be challenged in the courts. It clearly discriminates against women, it clearly represents Government meddling in the medical aspect of healthcare delivery. And since the Catholic Bishops were so heavily involved, there's a First Ammendment issue here as well.
Time for the churches of America to pay their fair share in taxes, since they insist on violating the church-state separation.
I was not aware of the Hyde amendment, much less Stupak. After I read the explanation I am in favor of both. When abortion, paid for by the taxpayer, is the answer to a burden with feet and a dirty diaper, life will no longer be holy.
But it cheaper than raising a rugrat on welfare until he is eighteen.
Life is NOT holy. Life, ultimately, is chemistry, physics, totally natural, and came about unaided by ANY supernatural force. You are clearly a believer in fantasy, that there are talking snakes only known to an obscure tribe of Hebrews who treated women no better than today's Taliban.
When wars and executions are paid by the taxpayer, as the answer to fear and satisfying greed, life will no longer be holy. Are you with me, brother, or are you just another 'right to life'er who believes that right to life ends at birth, especially if you are Iraqi, a 'bad' person, or some one in the way?
In Peace
Last night I was reading an article about how Mary Daly's seven steps of patriarchal sado-ritual can be seen in Margaret Atwood's dystopia The Handmaids Tale. And then I noticed on a blog this morning: Stupak (D-Gilead). Scary coincidence or geography is destiny? Stupak will go on to become a word meaning a type of sepsis caused by back alley abortion. I hope women will go on to remember the Democratic party is not their friend and they should not give their allegiance to any party only work them to further an agenda supportive of women's civil rights.
If this gets women to remember that we live in a woman hating world where the only thing that has ever made life better for women is an active and confrontational women's movement
it will be the only possible redeeming feature of a bad compromise on an already badly compromised bill.
"And then I noticed on a blog this morning: Stupak (D-Gilead)."
The blogger was relating his action to Atwood's fiction. His district is Michigan's 1st congressional district. There is no Gilead in the US.
Most of the same people such as Hyde were, are, against welfare for single mothers. These are the same people who have destroyed our economy with wasteful spending on wars that either were unnecessary or unwinnable, killing innocent people including pregnant women. It is true that the Catholic Church should lose their tax exempt status. They have been meddling into our government legislation with their obsession against a woman's rights and helping conservatives get elected to deny women human dignity for many years. They lie about the reasons women and girls need abortions and actually are against the Hyde Amendment because it allows abortion to save the life of the women/girls and in cases of rape and incest, which the Catholic Church is against. How can any self respecting woman support the Catholic church? Do they really think that God is that cruel as to force a gang raped tortured girl/woman or a destitute poor, or sick woman to give birth against her will? What kind of evil God do they worship? If they believe in the spiritual dimension of life, the soul, which according to Catholic doctrine can only be created and infused into a body by God then the embryo does not have a soul and is not a human life just cell structures forming a human body to receive a soul when it is born, the sperm does not contain the soul.The woman's body already has a soul. One body-one soul, not multiple souls in one body. That would be a great injustice against girls/women. The Church teaches that God is all Just. They cannot teach that God is Just then make up unjust Divine laws like The Pharisees and Sadducees did, who were rebuked by Jesus, for demanding obedience to religious laws that were cruel and unjust.
Bart? Bart Stupak?
I know his street, in Michigan!
His daughters are so cute.
Oh Bart, where are you now? In some sexy bistro off K street?
Can you be everywhere? Oh Bart. They kill gynacologists in the heartland, they kill children in the golden east, oh Bart I am just an embroyo an embroglio an embarrassment.
Oh Bart, silly silly Bart
Fine, leave the women-hating amendments in place.
But how about we insist that federal money not be used to fund other things that are against other people's conscience, like war or the death penalty? Our own "pro-life" amendment.