The Nightmare Before Christmas – Obamacare

Barack Obama? Beaming. Harry Reid? Rejoicing.  Nancy Pelosi? Pleased-as-punch.

After working overtime in D.C. (trophies expected) Friday and Saturday (Dec 18^th and 19^th), Democrats have enough backing to set in motion procedural votes necessary to pass Obama’s health care bill.

After all the brawling and bawling, who was holding up the health care take-over party? Senator Ben Nelson (D- Nebraska), an opponent of taxpayer funded abortion, was the wet blanket playing hard-to-get with fellow Democrats and withholding THE magical 60^th vote. It was no surprise that at the end of the day, after bribes and benefits (picked from our pockets) were laid at Nelson’s baulking feet, a call for “hankies on the house” arose as Nelson caved, tears were shed, and all were gathered in the Obama/Reid/Pelosi group hug.

Assured that federal monies will not be used to pay for abortions, Nelson’s goodie bag for Nebraska also includes extra Medicaid funds for his home state.  Here’s how Senator Nelson justifies his about-face:

Nelson said the agreement would allow states to prohibit abortion coverage in the new insurance exchanges created under the bill and mandate that every state exchange include an insurance plan that does not cover abortion. It would require payments for abortion coverage be made separately with private funds.

“The plan that we’ve put together here, that we have agreement on, in fact walls off that money in an effective manner,” Nelson told reporters. “I would not have voted for this bill without these provisions.”

Really? House Republican Leader John Boehner posted this on his GOP blog yesterday:

Fixed it is not. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s (D-NV) latest health care “manager’s amendment” would STILL levy a new “abortion premium” fee on Americans under the Democrats’ health care plan. Just like the original 2,032-page, government-run health care plan from Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D-CA) and the last version of Senator Reid’s 2,074-page bill, this latest 383-page amendment levies an abortion premium and does not fix the problem of government funds being used to subsidize elective abortions.

Under Reid’s “manager’s amendment,” there is no prohibition on abortion coverage in federally subsidized plans participating in the Exchange. Instead the amendment includes layers of accounting gimmicks that demand that plans participating in the Exchange or the new government-run plan that will be managed by the Office of Personnel Management must establish “allocation accounts” when elective abortion is a covered benefit (p. 41). Everyone enrolled in these plans must pay a monthly abortion premium (p. 41, lines 5-8), and these funds will be used to pay for the elective abortion services. The Reid amendment directs insurance companies to assess the cost of elective abortion coverage (p. 43), and charge a minimum of $1 per enrollee per month (p. 43, lines 20-22).

Read more here.

Douglas Johnson, National Right to Life Committee legislative director released this statement:

“The new abortion language solves none of the fundamental abortion-related problems with the Senate bill, and it actually creates some new abortion-related problems.”

1.2 million babies are aborted in America every year. Middle of the night moves, arm-twisting and bribery, 2500 pages of legal-speak, and hush-rush tactics hiding abortion funding to pass a health care bill most Americans don’t want is an affront to democracy and decency. Another insult, the push by Democrats to vote for this bill during the week that Christians prepare to celebrate the miracle of a wondrous birth, is deplorable.

There is still time to let your senators and representatives know how you feel. Take a moment from your Christmas preparations to contact your elected officials here.

Our seventh installment of Twelve Days of Christmas was created as a result of a young missionary working in the 1970’s in a Serbian children’s hospital during that country’s civil war. Loving and serving the injured children, the young man left for a day to seek medical supplies for the severely under-supplied hospital. Upon his return, he found the hospital completely gone. It had been bombed. All the children he loved, including doctors and nurses, were killed. In his grief, he composed the lyrics and melody to this song as tribute to their memory. At this special time of year, may we remember suffering children everywhere and do all we can to protect those who are waiting to be born. That missionary’s name is Kurt Bestor. Here he is, with friends, singing The Prayer of the Children:

“Christmas is most truly Christmas when we celebrate it by giving the light of love to those who need it most.” ~ Ruth Carter Stapleton