As nearly everyone has heard, President Obama extended the Hyde Amendment, which limits federal funding for abortion to only cases that involve rape, incest, or pregnancies that endanger the mother, by way of an executive order. Many have spoken out against this, saying it was merely a way for President Obama to coax the healthcare reform opposition to the other side. While there is no denying the sole purpose of this order was to pass healthcare reform, the executive order has eliminated the fear that we’ll soon be funding abortions, right? Well, not exactly.
Here’s some background: An executive order cannot make law, only Congress can do that. What an executive order can do, however, is clarify an existing law or a part or section of a law. Congress has the ability to overturn such orders, though this has only been done twice before during the terms of Presidents Truman and Clinton.
Obama’s executive was successful in passing healthcare, but not in restricting abortion funding. This executive order, by all accounts, does nothing but enforce the “law” (more on that below) and continue vague abortion language in the healthcare bill. As it stands today, with or without the order, taxpayers will soon be indirectly funding abortion.
Here’s the breakdown by someone who knows a lot more than I do, Professor Robert Destro of Catholic University:
CHCs and other federally funded primary health care providers such as migrant, tribal, rural, and public housing health centers are required by law to provide “comprehensive” primary care services. The statutory term “comprehensive health care services” is broad enough to include reproductive health services, family planning services, and gynecology services. And the courts are unanimous in holding that – in the absence of the Hyde Amendment – this statutory term necessarily includes federal funding for elective abortions.
Basically, the money given to the Community Health Centers can go toward any service covered under their umbrella of services- an umbrella that just opened a little wider with the passage of this bill. That means that some of the $9 billion headed their way could go toward abortion procedures (since these procedures are now under the umbrella). Even if the executive order were to remain valid and extend the Hyde Amendment, that would still accomplish nothing; the Hyde Amendment restricts abortion funding appropriated by the HHS and since the use of the money is up to the CHC’s discretion- as long it goes toward their ‘primary care services’- it could still make its way toward an abortion without actually violating the Hyde Amendment.
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Well, I hope that the executive order means something because I would rather move to a different country than have any of my tax money go for abortions.
Well Susan, I’d pull out your globe because it’s looking more and more likely by the second. Even yesterday when I wrote the Healthcare overview I didn’t realize all of the details of this. I haven’t gotten any work done today because I’ve spend hours scouring the internet reading up on this, and nearly everything I’ve read, from the left and the right, comes back to what I’ve said above: unless something radical happens, federal funding will soon be used in paying for abortions.
Thanks for stopping by and continually supporting the site! Hope to see you again.
Rick
Maybe the IRS should add some options to our income tax form, letting us choose whether our tax dollars should pay for abortions or pay for the care of unwanted, abused and neglected children. The worst thing that ever happened in this country was when we stopped stigmatizing single mothers and made divorce for “irreconcilable differences” acceptable. I may be liberal on some issues, but I am over-the-top hardcore conservative on others. People should think twice — no, make that at least six times — before they engage in activities that can make a baby. Children should only be born in loving and financially stable households. Having children is a privilege, not a right. Caring for them is the lifelong responsibility of the parents, not the state, and not “the taxpayers.”
I’m sickened by the reports I hear of infants and children being abused, injured or killed by “the mother’s boyfriend” or by the foster parents or by the adoptive parents.
Maybe the pregnant, unwed women who choose to have an abortion are saving that child from a worse fate.
I do not agree with abortion saving babies from a worse fate. Abortion should never be used as a birth control in my opinion, except to save the mother’s life, incest or rape. Any woman who has sex should know the outcome could be a pregnancy. If you were going to die if you had sex, would you take the chance? Why kill the fetus that you make? Take birth control BEFORE sex, or the Plan B after sex. Plan B doesn’t kill a baby, it prevents an egg and sperm from connecting, which is much cheaper than an abortion and won’t have any long term affects on fertility.
Once that little heart starts beating, I believe you are committing murder by stopping it.
I totally agree, Susan. Anyone of capable of bearing a child should know that unless proper measures are taken, there is a chance of pregnancy. There is no excuse for ending a future life due to two people’s carelessness, especially not when there are numerous measures that can be taken to prevent a pregnancy in the first place. It’s inexcusable.
Also worth noting: America needs to get on the same page with itself; if an expectant mother is killed in a car accident, the other driver is charged with two counts of manslaughter. If the other driver “murders” the child, so does a mother when she aborts it. Simple as that.
Thanks for leaving a great comment! Hope to see you again!
Rick
I would just like to say that millions of girls have no idea what they are getting themselves into then they have sex because the sex education in our country is awful. Some girls believe that the fertility method of birth control is a viable method and I even heard one girl ask if it was alright if her boyfriend took her birthcontrol. Many young girls are pressured into sex every year because it is glorified by our media and girls who are 14 and in public schools buy into the propaganda that popular culture sells because they are uneducated and their brains are not even near finished developing. Also, I think we can all agree that none of us are qualified as to say when a life “starts.” Many women have an abortion before the baby even forms a heart or a spinal chord that has feeling. I think that it is interesting that conservatives don’t support abortion most of the time because usually teen mothers are the ones who end up surviving on welfare, something that conservatives don’t agree with generally.
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