Posted on 02/10/2012 10:36:19 AM PST by Qbert
UPDATE, 12:14p: More evidence the compromise stinks: Planned Parenthood likes it.
UPDATE, 12:02p: From a House source:
This new policy is a distinction without a difference. The services the religious organization opposes wont be listed in the contract, but the insurance companies will give it the employees anyway. Insurance companies will justify providing the coverage that the religious charity opposes by swearing that birth control coverage doesnt actually cost anything because its cheaper than pregnancy services, so its just a free perk. The administration will argue that people of faith should be fine with this arrangement, because they can tell their conscience that they arent really paying for the objectionable coverage and they didnt really sign up for it anyway.
The way the gimmick works might be best understood the way it is described on the radically pro-abortion website, RHRealityCheck [JLS note: Tweet from which referred to below] .
Under this plan, every insurance company will be obligated to provide contraceptive coverage. Administration officials stated that a womans insurance company will be required to reach out directly and offer her contraceptive care free of charge. The religious institutions will not have to pay for it.Moreover, women will not have to opt in or out; contraceptive care will be part of the basic package of benefits offered to everyone. Contraceptive care will simply be part of the bundle of services that all insurance companies are required to offer, said a White House official.
We are actually more comfortable having the insurance industry offer and market this to women than religious institutions, said the White House official because they understand how contraception works to prevent unintended pregnancy and reduce health care costs. This makes sense financially.
The way it works is this: Insurers will create policy not including contraceptive coverage in the contract for religious organizations that object. Second, the same insurance company must simultaneously offer contraceptive coverage to all employees, and can not charge an additional premium. This provides free contraceptive coverage to women. The reason this works for insurance companies is because offering contraception is cost-neutral; companies realize the tremendous cost benefits of spacing pregnancies, and limiting unintended pregnancies, planned pregnancies and health benefits of contraception.
UPDATE, 11:53a: Email from Eric Scheidler of Pro-Life Action League, posted with permission:
At the end of the day, religious employers are still required to provide health plans that offer free contraceptives, sterilizations and abortifacients.And the cost of those free free services ostensibly now to be born by the insurer rather than the employer has got to come from somewhere. From where? The premiums paid for those plans. Insurance companies arent stupid. Theyll quote employers a premium for their plans that takes into account the number of employees likely to demand these free services.
11:48a: All you need to know is that the abortion lobby likes Obamas contraception mandate compromise:
Heres a link to that RH Reality Check post.
More from Reuters:
The White House announced a compromise on birth control coverage on Friday to respond to religious groups objections, saying it would shift the costs of providing contraceptives to health insurers when religious employers object to it.Under the new policy announced today, women will have free preventive care that includes contraceptive services no matter where she works, the White House said in a statement.
If a woman works for religious employers with objections to providing contraceptive services as part of its health plan, the religious employer will not be required to provide contraception coverage but her insurance company will be required to offer contraceptive care free of charge, it said.
A senior Obama administration official said the change would ensure women get access to preventive health care while also protecting religious liberty.
No it doesnt. Now Obama is forcing religious institutions to purchase group insurance policies that include contraception. Its a shell game. Now NO employer can provide a plan that does not cover contraception.
Furthermore, and just as importantly, it isnt enough to (supposedly) exempt religious institutions from the contraception mandate. That is to say only people of faith are allowed to have, or are capable of, consciences. What about secular conscientious objectors?
REJECT ALL OF OBAMACARE!!
That’s demonic.
“State AGs threaten to sue over birth-control mandate”
“Three state attorneys general say theyll sue the Obama administration over its controversial birth-control mandate unless the White House backs down on its own...The threat came from the attorneys general of Nebraska, Texas and South Carolina.”
Compromise, in the sense that the Constitution will only be ignored in some ways and not others.
It’s like a contraceptive shell game.
What a scam.
There are those here and elsewhere who recognize that this is not about "women's health," or "contraception," or any other semantic terms used by the President and his surrogates. So-called "health care reform" itself was the Trojan Horse used by Obama and his fellow "progressives" to bypass and subvert the United States Constitution's limitations on coercive power.
". . . every word of [the Constitution] decides a question between power and liberty. . . ." - James Madison, National Gazette, January 19, 1792
Ours is a "People's" Constitution structuring and limiting the powers of our government, including that of any elected President.
That Constitution has not been amended to grant this President, or any other President, the right to violate its First Amendment's protections. Those provisions are not within the purview of the President, nor any other branch of the government.
The time has come for "the People," to assert their sovereign will and to reject all efforts to bypass or ignore the Constitution.
§ 1907. If these Commentaries shall but inspire in the rising generation a more ardent love of their country, an unquenchable thirst for liberty, and a profound reverence for the constitution and the Union, then they will have accomplished all, that their author ought to desire. Let the American youth never forget, that they possess a noble inheritance, bought by the toils, and sufferings, and blood of their ancestors; and capable, if wisely improved, and faithfully guarded, of transmitting to their latest posterity all the substantial blessings of fife, the peaceful enjoyment of liberty, property, religion, and independence. The structure has been erected by architects of consummate skill and fidelity; its foundations are solid; its compartments are beautiful, as well as useful; its arrangements are full of wisdom and order; and its defences are impregnable from without. It has been reared for immortality, if the work of man may justly aspire to such a title. It may, nevertheless, perish in an hour by the folly, or corruption, or negligence of its only keepers, THE PEOPLE. Republics are created by the virtue, public spirit, and intelligence of the citizens. They fall, when the wise are banished from the public councils, because they dare to be honest, and the profligate are rewarded, because they flatter the people, in order to betray them."
Perhaps they have tipped their hand too soon? There was a reason that Obamacare was scheduled to go into effect only after this election.
1. Plan to seize an extra-Constitutional power.
2. Denigrate objectors as extremists, and dismiss their objections as motivated by greed, or worse.
3. Once the opposition has coalesced, loudly claim "compromise", while changing only the proposed means of implementing the original power grab.
4. Depend on the news media to treat Obama's plans uncritically, to criticize his opposition, and to confuse the public as to what is really happening.
Any person of faith, regardless of their specific religion, who votes for Obozo is COMPLETELY brain dead if you ask me!!
Islam emphasizes that procreation within the family is a religious duty, so there is unanimous rejection of sterilization and abortion.
They also believe that birth control is forbidden as the Quran contains the command to procreate and abound in number. These scholars argue that only God can decide the number of children that a couple will have.
I GUARANTEE YOU THAT MUSLIMS ARE EXEMPT FROM THIS LAW
This Face saving symbolic gesture is very clever.
OK practicing Catholics, your move!
Guess what Obamalamadingdong, if the insurance companies, and you, claim this is going to be FREE, then even those without insurance of any kind will get the services FREE?
Most every state has laws that provide that any offer of free products or services can not require a purchase of any kind to be eligible for said free product or service.
“Muslims Exempt from ObamaCare?”
By David Horowitz:
“...The law is vague on this point. Presumably, they will be exempt from the requirement to purchase Obamacare, under the religious exemption. Should this happen, the scenario of American Muslims being exempt from the requirement to purchase Obamacare, while the great majority of Americans labor under this requirement; will bring dhimmitude a big step closer to reality. In addition, what if the PPACA is amended in some way, to exempt those who purchase private Takaful health insurance? The health-sharing ministry loophole is one reason, among many, why Obamacare is unacceptable for Americans; and must be removed from H.R. 3590.”
http://www.horowitzfreedomcenter.org/2011/10/13/muslims-exempt-from-obamacare/
In my old hometown, Rochester NY, they are giving out condoms in high school. The board just voted for it last week.
I BELIEVE Planned Parenthood will set up bases in every school, in every dorm, in every hospital in the country.
They will of course pass on the costs but it just wont turn up on a receipt. As yahoo points out, the costs of the BC are up front but the savings of less pregnancies are long term so they will be paying for it.
Being a man I am still urked that they spread those costs (women's BC and other reproductive benefits) across the male pool when they/we cant use them, intention was to get female support.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.