Posted on 03/16/2012 1:00:59 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
When the Texas state administration first considered a rule to ban Planned Parenthood and other abortion providers from participating in the Texas’ Women’s Health Program, which is jointly funded by the state of Texas and the federal government, the Obama administration retaliated by threatening to cut funding to the program entirely. Texas Health and Human Services Commissioner Thomas Suehs signed the rule anyway — and the ball was back in the Obama administration’s court. I wrote at the time:
Does Obama want to actually cut funding and potentially jeopardize the Texas Women’s Health program, which might not be able to survive without federal funding? That sends the message that Obama cares less that women have access to health care than that they receive health care from certain providers — namely, providers that also offer abortions.
Either Rick Perry just called Obama’s bluff or this is about to be an interesting issue. Planned Parenthood has already retorted with its typical demagoguery: “No one’s politics should interfere with a woman’s access to health care,” Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast President and CEO Peter J. Durkin said in a statement. “It is shameful that Governor Perry and Commissioner Suehs continue to politicize lifesaving breast cancer screenings and birth control access for low-income women.”
Would Planned Parenthood stand by that statement as it applies to President Obama, too? Surely other providers in the Texas Women’s Health Exchange provide breast cancer screenings and birth control access. Eliminating abortion providers from the exchange doesn’t jeopardize women’s health access — but eliminating the exchange altogether would.
The answer to my original question is: Yes, the Obama administration actually does want to cut funding and jeopardize the Texas’ Women’s Health Program entirely. He cares more to protect Planned Parenthood than he does to protect women’s health, in general. Fortunately for low-income women in Texas, Rick Perry won’t stand for it. Via Guy Benson:
Perry, who slammed the federal government constantly during his short-lived bid for the Republican presidential nomination, has directed state health officials to find the funding to keep the program going from other parts of the budget, but he has promised not to raise revenues to cover the costs.
Incidentally, this is one of the things I most respect about Rick Perry: He is willing to forgo federal funds, recognizing that federal dollars always come with strings attached. He rejected Race to the Top funds, for example, and now he’s saying “no” to federal control of another state-level program. The business-friendly atmosphere he created in Texas has ensured a thriving economy there, such that Texas doesn’t have need of federal funds, either. No wonder so many Californians have migrated there.
That may have been the case on their original admission in 1845, but on readmission after The Late Unpleasantness I'm pretty sure no such clause was extant.
Yo, O:
Kiss
My
Texas
A&&
Texas COULD set up an account and intercept all earmarked federal funds in escrow for review.. from all Texas companies and individuals..
No doubt Texas sends far more funds to D.C. than D.C. sends to them..
Don’t worry, Texas is as statist as the rest. They will cave quickly, as with the TSA banning fiasco.
Womens health care is typically PC code for abortion so get rid of the abortion and there isn’t much else left to fund. Besides, I’m tired of all this BS “womens” programs that are being funded, where’s the men’s health programs or the transgendered health program or the land whale health program or the health program for rednecks? Most all “women” based program are simply back door funding for liberal man hating dikes and the Democratic party that they support so just kill the funding and we’ll all be a lot better off.
And then use the funds to pay for legal fees when the dictator in chief tries to sue them for exercising their sovereign rights under the Constitution.
At least we get another chance to point out that when the Federal gubmint "gives" you anything, they think they own you. And here I thought it was illegal to buy slaves...
Fine — then there is much less Federal control. All states should try to get defunded.
That is right. States need to ban Federal tax withholding so that they can appropriate tax money themselves. Let the showdown begin.
Leni
States are being held hostage by a federal government that has corrupted the concept of federalism and the importance of the 10th Amendment. Taxes of every kind pass through Washington DC ^FIRST^ and government rules are used to re-distribute them.
Consider that your property taxes (that are said to fund local education) are collected and passed to the federal government for distribution according to the USDoEd rules.
Think about that.
Start a tax deductible organization which does the work for the agency, send the state money to it, and then start some very public fundraisers for the private sector to replace the federal money . Have a telethon during the trials of Planned Parenthood for Medicare fraud and the indecency trial of the CEO. Have marathons, bicycle races. Do a “Hands Across Texas.” All publicity is good when you’re saving women from the Federal Government.
I haven't looked at what was said when Texas was "readmitted," but I once saw a doctoral study of various proposals to divide Texas into five states, and they went on long after 1865.
If secession were illegal then technically no state seceded. And no state may form another state within it’s own boundaries. Using this reasoning the entire state of West Virginia is illegal and Virginia would be within the law to take it back. Does that sound correct?
Time to start de-funding the feds - Texas shuld stop sending all funds to the idiots in Washington!
As a Virginia native I see maps of Virginia before 1861 and think "that's what Virginia should look like," but they were probably better off without the western counties.
Besides, it would have been hard for John Denver to squeeze "almost heaven, western Virginia," into a line of that song.
The only way we are going to get any of our state rights back is by confronting the federal government, and letting them know they can't push the states around unless they want to do it by force. We have to take a risk to ever get back to what our Constitution. This isn't the 1860’s, and the federal government wouldn't be as willing to escalate something like this to using force. They also couldn't be sure if any order to use force would be obeyed. The unconstitutional ATF would be happy to kill American citizens though.
My point is these are different times, and we aren't going to get back the rights our constitution gives us unless we are willing to confront the federal government, and resisting if they did escalate it to civil war. I don't think they would do that, but you have to be ready to go all the way if you start to let it be known it will come at a cost. I don't think they would dare do that, but if they did and it cost lives it would immediately wake people up. States and individuals can't spend endless amounts of money in courts trying to get laws that are obviously constitutional on the books.
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