Friday, February 17, 2012

Contraceptive Mandate


Contraceptive Mandate
Al Ritter

There are so many facets to this issue that it begs further scrutiny. First you have an Administration that thought they would extend to female citizens the economic advantage of not having to pay for contraceptives out of their pocket. The administration knew that the largest portion of Catholic women defy the church and use contraceptives anyway, so this could be a feather in their hat if they supplied them with something for “free.”

Unfortunately nothing in this world is “free,” someone always has to bear the cost, especially when it involves a product produced by a private company. This is no debate on this, it is a fact of life. Let’s look at an actuarial chart of all insurance companies. All insurance companies supply a service based on mandates by governments whether they be federal or state. The rates are based on what services the government deems necessary. When you add a mandate or a service, that service is figured into the entire pool which the annual rate is determined from. More services or mandates equal higher cost. This is not up for debate either it is a fact of life.

Mandates are voted on by congress, not demanded by Presidents. There is no legal precedence for President Obama to keep demanding services and decisions based on his social guilt. This is a country of laws, and Obama constantly denies and ignores them based on some sort of idea of social injustice.

It is my opinion that this is one major issue that the Obama Administration has misjudged. He is now being attacked by both sides on his waffling of the issue. Sebelius has already told Obama that the issuance of contraceptives will be a major cost to health insurance, but Obama has ignored that advice.

Now let’s consider the religious side of it for a moment. Religious leaders from all religions and backgrounds testified on Capitol Hill yesterday to put their support behind the Catholic Church, that this mandate violates the first amendment, whether they believe the same way about contraceptives or not.

Not only is this a first amendment violation, it violates the Supreme Court ruling of the separation of church and state. You may view this from many different angles, but the underlying argument from the left is that a “woman has a right to choose.” That is all well and good and the law is on their side with that for now.

This mandate is strictly about “who pays” and the answer is we all do through increased health care costs at a time when they are increasing at a rate faster than our salaries.

4 comments:

barb p said...

Obama is a "bad book"

with each chapter getting worse. I pray his 'followers' do not

get him back in there. It seems many who were finally seeing

what he is really doing are starting to believe any positive

things that are happening (not many) are all because of him;

not remembering how we got there!!! I HATE WHAT THIS MAN STANDS FOR!!!

kevin bryant said...

The two most haunting phrases spoken probably in my entire lifetime is “We Are 5 Days Away From Fundamentally Transforming The United States Of America” & “We have To Pass The Bill To Know What Is In It”. Time to go a little Glenn Beck “ish” here and tie these two statements together. America knew he wanted a government controlled healthcare system during the 2008 campaign. Many voted for him because they thought they would get “FREE” healthcare, disregarding the facts that someone has to work and pay taxes to pay for their “FREE” healthcare. Healthcare effects so many lives and is so broad a subject that it touches almost everything in our lives and what it doesn’t touch, the Dept of Health & Human Services does. What better way for a socialist driven administration to achieve “Fundamental Transformation” than this.



Now let’s look at “We have To Pass The Bill To Know What Is In It”. The reason no one knew everything that was in it is because the bill itself is so broadly written that it really all it did was mandate "who else" but the Secretary of HHS to write the rules governing almost every part of the bill.



This bill still isn’t even half way written yet and can be changed in an instant with the stroke of a pen. This part of an illegal Obamacare bill allows the government to dictate to insurance agencies because the HHS secretary says it’s OK. Notice the Obama Administration is calling this “Preventive Care”, thus justifying the mandate. If the government can do this, then what is stopping them from mandating any female age 13 or older has the right to get an abortion without parental consent and what is to stop them from mandating that all hospitals & clinics must comply. All they have to do is declare the stress of child birth can cause mental depression (which it can), thus abortions are now recognized as an acceptable preventative treatment to depression.



I heard the most stupid comment on the radio this morning on my drive into work. A caller to the talk show I listened to justified this contraceptive mandate as a “responsibility of the government to FORCE churches to addend and modernize their doctrines”. Um…….. I’m still am amazed by liberals as to just how stupid they are to the constitution.

kathy o said...

This is a 1st amendment right argument and I think Obama again is pushing his socialist ideas where he has no right to do. However, the comments about Catholic women???? How do you (or does anyone else) know that the 'largest portion' of Catholic women defy the church and use contraceptives?? How do you define 'largest portion' and how are these 'numbers' obtained? I'm sure there are many others who are not included in what you all are calling 'largest portion' - I personally take this as an insult actually!

republican patriot said...

Don't shoot the messenger Kathy.......lol......http://www.guttmacher.org/pubs/Religion-and-Contraceptive-Use.pdf

page 8 at the bottom is what i was referring to