LifeNews reports that the panel that recommended the government mandate “free” contraceptive, sterilization and abortifacient coverage included zero pro-life advocates. It was dominated by abortion advocates and Democratic donors.
According to HLA, the members of the panel leading to the Obama mandate included:
Claire Brindis is a member of the Board of Directors of the NARAL Pro-Choice America Foundation, as well as a member of NARAL’s Pro-Choice California “1969 Society,” which has been called by NARAL “a group of our most steadfast and generous donors.”
Angela Diaz is a former board member of “Physicians for Reproductive Choice and Health,” an advocacy group that “work[s] to improve access to comprehensive reproductive health care, including contraception and abortion.” Until just a few weeks ago she served as the senior vice president of the International Women’s Health Coalition and was on the board of directors from 2007-2010. Her biography on the IWHC’s website (which was recently removed) stated that she “has a deep and long commitment to IWHC’s mission and to the organization.” The IWHC is a pro-choice advocacy group that declares that “access to safe abortion is a human right” and that abortion and contraception are “universal and inalienable” rights.
Francisco Garcia has donated between $11,750 and $13,000 to candidates that support abortion since 2004. These pro-choice candidates include Raul Grijava and Barack Obama.
Kimberly Gregory, as indicated by public records, has donated $35,200 to the California Victory 2010 of the Democratic National Committee in support of Barbara Boxer.
Paula A. Johnson is the Chairwoman of Planned Parenthood League of Massachusetts and is affiliated with the pro-abortion National Organization of Women (NOW). This year she will be the winner of NARAL’s 2011 “Champion for Choice” award. Public records indicate that since 2003 she has given between $9,550 and $11,000 each to the political campaigns of Pro-Choice candidates including Martha Coakley, John Kerry, and Hillary Clinton. She also has made contributions to Emily’s List, an organization dedicated to “electing pro-choice Democratic women.”
Roberta Ness has donated at least $2,500 to pro-abortion candidate John Kerry and to the Democratic National Committee.
Magda G. Peck is associated with a host of organizations that advocate for abortion and free access to contraception, and was on the board of directors of Planned Parenthood of Nebraska and Council Bluffs and served as both vice chair and chair of the board.
E. Albert Reece donated $1000 in 2010 to the campaign of pro-abortion politician Barbara Mikulski, the sponsor of the amendment that paved the way for recommendation 5.5.
Linda Rosenstock, committee chairwoman, has since October 2004 donated over $40,000 to pro-choice political candidates including Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Barbara Boxer, and the Democratic National Committee.
Alina Salganicoff is the Vice President and Director of Women’s Health Policy at the Kaiser Family Foundation, a major proponent of abortion and contraception on demand. She donated $950 to the Barack Obama and Judy Feder campaigns in 2008.
Carol Weisman has made $4,500 in political donations to pro-abortion candidates including Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, John Kerry and Judy Feder since 2000.
The Obama administration also did not consult with any objectors to the policy before announcing its “accommodation” last week, an accommodation that actually did not change the policy at all.
In testimony before Congress Wednesday, HHS Secretary Sebelius made a separate, but startling, admission: Her department didn’t even check to see whether the mandate was legal under the US Constitution.
Catholics, by the way, would be wise to stop casting this issue as one of bishops or the Catholic Church versus the Obama administration. The fact is, one, there are millions of Americans who aren’t Catholic but are offended by this mandate. The Southern Baptists, for instance, are standing up in opposition to it, but the Catholics in the conservative press haven’t noted that fact. They keep referring to the bishops’ objections, which plays right into the Obama administration’s hands of marginalizing this dispute as just one between the administration and one branch of the church. Two, the fact is, Catholic bishops have seriously harmed their credibility in recent years both in the disgraceful pederasty scandal that many church officials turned their blind eyes to, and in how many church officials have polluted the real Gospel with the “social Gospel” that advances liberal policies including ObamaCare, which many bishops supported as long as they didn’t see the mandate against their interests coming. Many of us not in the Catholic church long ago recognized the “social Gospel” for what it is: A leftist wolf in sheep’s clothing. It’s a tragedy that today’s protesting bishops lacked such discernment when it could have made a difference. ObamaCare and this mandate are but the latest evidence that the left will stop at nothing to destroy every institution that competes for power and loyalty with the state.
Certainly the panel was dominated by abortion advocates; that was to be expected. As to opposition to the mandate, many Catholics oppose it as do many Protestants and members of other religious groups. An Agnostic, I very much oppose it on constitutional grounds. It purports to override the First Amendment guarantee of the right to free exercise of religion in furtherance of “rights” to have others pay for lifestyle choices nowhere guaranteed or even mentioned in the Constitution.
A gaggle of the Margaret Sanger legacy. Frankly, I’m surprised the She Woman Manhater’s Club of Anti Establishment didn’t adopt the Communist China policy of the One Child policy, with only girls allowed.
George Tiller was there in spirit.
If the contraception issue is truly about “Women’s Health” then the Feds should require women to become Mainline Protestants.
From Mortality Differentials by Religion in the U.S. ( http://paa2009.princeton.edu/download.aspx?submissionId=91183 )
Table 1: Life Expectancy by Religious Affiliation at Age 55, HRS Affiliation
None/No Preference 24.11
Black Protestant 25.00
Catholic 25.35
Jew 26.86
Evangelical Protestant 27.85
Mainline Protestant 29.70
So a Mainline Protestant will live about 3 years longer than a Jew, 4 years longer than a Catholic, and 5 years longer than non-practitioners. Shouldn’t we all then be required to become Mainline Protestants in the interests of Public Health?
Absolutely right that the Catholic church is making a mistake to react as if the mandate is aimed only at them. It’s about the constitution, not the Roman Catholic church. Obama’s narrative is “Old white guys in funny hats want to oppress poor women,” and the mainstream media are all to happy to run with that. People need to contact Cardinal-designate Dolan to make the point that the church should frame this as a battle for the constitution, thus for all Americans. Also, what about American Muslim organizations? Are they cool with the idea that any health insurance they offer must contain “free” coverage for birth control and abortion? Is that in the Koran? Someone should ask the head of the big mosque outside DC. Something tells me “free abortion on demand” isn’t available in Saudi Arabia.
Speaking of the mandate, it’s the closest the O admin could come to granting free abortion on demand, a plank of the Dem party for 40 years now.
Sebelius didn’t check the constitution before making the ruling? Why would she? The progressives don’t need no stinkin’ parchment from a bunch of dead white slaveholders to know what to do.
“Panel Behind ObamaCare Abortifacient Mandate Dominated by Abortion Advocates”
What a surprising headline? Who would have guessed?
I have one for you.
“Wannsee conference on Final Solution Dominated by Nazis”
Sheesh…
All that matters here is that they succeeded in creating a new narrative -Democrats for Women’s Health /Republicans the party of barefoot and pregnant. End of story. Until the Republican party starts using Orwellian tactics the Republic is dead.
It was beautifully orchestrated, they have some war room don’t they.
The Repubs need a Goebbels like head of propaganda,. Until they realize that America is a WAR with itself all is lost
In the lunatic Hitlers own words:
As to the methods to be employed, he explains:
“Propaganda must not investigate the truth objectively and, in so far as it is favourable to the other side, present it according to the theoretical rules of justice; yet it must present only that aspect of the truth which is favourable to its own side. (…) The receptive powers of the masses are very restricted, and their understanding is feeble. On the other hand, they quickly forget. Such being the case, all effective propaganda must be confined to a few bare essentials and those must be expressed as far as possible in stereotyped formulas. These slogans should be persistently repeated until the very last individual has come to grasp the idea that has been put forward. (…) Every change that is made in the subject of a propagandist message must always emphasize the same conclusion. The leading slogan must of course be illustrated in many ways and from several angles, but in the end one must always return to the assertion of the same formula.”