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.
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