Tuesday, July 28, 2009

Obamacare Pushes Abortion


Michael S. Steele is Chairman of the Republican National Committee

Freedom Matters for Honduras



The Obama administration and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton can no longer be considered a “neutral broker” in the current state of affairs in Honduras. Here’s why.

For the past few days, the Administration and Secretary Clinton have cautiously opted out of the negotiations in Costa Rica. In fact, the State Department hammered the point that “we need to support the Arias mediation effort because it’s the best way to go forward.”

Day after day, the message from the State Department has been that we should let the negotiators negotiate and ultimately accept the outcome from the Arias talks. But in what seems to be Secretary Clinton’s first conversation with Honduran President Roberto Micheletti since the removal of Mr. Manuel Zelaya, Secretary Clinton joined the likes of Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez and other leaders in the region and warned President Micheletti of serious consequences if he did not back down and allow Mr. Zelaya to return to power.

A party who calls itself a neutral broker does not make phone calls in the heat of negotiations and place ultimatums on one of the negotiating sides. It is increasingly apparent that the Administration is really not a neutral broker, but instead a friend of the “thugocrats,” or caudillos, in the region who seek nothing more than to be leaders for life.

Our nation’s legitimacy as the leader of the free world comes into question when we accept the Administration’s argument that by joining the thugocrats, we neutralize their anti-American rhetoric and leave them deflated and without an enemy to fight.

What is more alarming is that the Organization of American States (OAS), the sole organization in the hemisphere that should have helped avoid this crisis, has been hijacked not only by these cowardly caudillos, but also by a man who, by all accounts, seeks to only prolong his political career. I am speaking, of course, of Secretary General José Insulza.

Secretary General Insulza was the first one to come out of the gates claiming that Mr. Zelaya’s removal was a “military coup.” Secretary General Insulza is the same man who applauded Cuba’s entrance to the OAS – despite a democracy clause – and who also fought for and ensured Honduras’ expulsion from the organization. He not only embraced the leftist strongmen of Latin America, but joined them as they attempted to override the constitution of Honduras and the will of the Honduran people.

Most of us have seen the images of Mr. Zelaya’s Venezuelan jet flying over the airport in Tegucigalpa. What most of us do not know is that Secretary General Insulza’s jet was right behind it, circling and cheering on a man who broke several laws and stood against every branch of the Honduran government.

There is an inconceivable amount of pressure being exerted against the people of Honduras at this time. The European Union cut all of its budgetary spending for Honduras. The United States has paused its spending in the country. And the countries that answer to Mr. Chavez have stopped all trade with Honduras.

Instead of punishing the people of Honduras for following their constitution, the United States should restart all of its aid. Honduras has been a steadfast ally of the United States, exemplified by the fact that it sent troops to Iraq. We should not treat our friends in this manner.

The trouble with the Obama Administration’s past actions is how it patronized a sovereign nation that did nothing more than follow its own constitution and laws. There will be plenty of time to debate whether flying Mr. Zelaya out of Honduras actually saved lives or not, but the fact is that the people of Honduras did exactly what their constitution mandates. For the Administration to immediately call this a “coup” was both irresponsible and reckless.

Secretary Clinton and the Administration should have taken more time to analyze the facts and get a better understanding of Honduran law before it joined with the likes of Mr. Chavez and demanded Mr. Zelaya’s reinstatement. The people of Honduras should be the ones who make that decision.

One option would be a coalition-form of government that would administer the inner-workings of Honduras until early elections are called, when a new president would be elected.

As for the United States, we should restart all aid to Honduras immediately.

I believe that Mr. Zelaya should return to Honduras – in handcuffs. Mr. Zelaya broke the law, and unless the Obama Administration believes Mr. Zelaya is above the law, he should face a judge and the people of Honduras as any normal citizen would.

I plan to travel to Honduras this weekend to find a peaceful, democratic resolution to the crisis. The people of Honduras deserve our support more than ever right now.


Mr. Mack, a Republican, represents the 14th District of Florida.

Health Care Questions Obama Can’t Answer

By Herman Cain

During President Obama’s primetime press conference last Wednesday, he made the usual promises about Obamacare, which have no resemblance to what Congress is working on. The president continues to promise more choices, better health care, fewer costs and less government intervention. The “Health Care De-form” legislation working its way through Congress is just the opposite.


Rather than the lapdog mainstream media doing its job and challenging the president on his assumptions and assertions, they play “run and fetch” with whatever the president says. Since they didn’t do their jobs, here are a few real questions for starters.


Mr. President, since government mandates have never produced the desired results in the history of this country, why do you believe they will work this time?


When the government mandated a salary and wage freeze during World War II, businesses still had to compete for the best people in the workforce. As a result, businesses started offering health insurance benefits as an employment incentive and the practice has intensified over time. So much so, many politicians now proclaim that health care is a “right”.


Mr. President, is food a similar “right”? (No response)


Mr. President, since persistent problems have been reported about Medicare, Medicaid and veterans’ health care, why do you believe that this time the government bureaucracy will perform much better than ever before?


I can’t imagine that he really believes that, but he has to keep saying it because that’s what the “sheeple” want to hear, and it provides cover for what the Democrats in Congress are working on to get us on the road to health care rationing.


Mr. President, if the real objective is to provide health insurance for the “uninsured” in this country, then why not allow people the opportunity to pay a small fee to participate in Medicare? In fact, why not offer free Medicare to those that are really, really poor?


According to my calculations the costs would be only a fraction of $1.5 trillion if you use the real number of 8 million chronically uninsured people instead of the misleading 46 million. Alternatively, why not provide a “health insurance voucher” for those who are chronically uninsured?


Mr. President, have you considered changing the law to allow association health plans, along with allowing health insurance premiums to be tax deductible regardless of who paid for them?


History has shown that free market forces are better than government mandates to curb the rapid rise in costs.


At that point, President Obama would pull a “Clinton”. In 1994, when I asked President Bill Clinton a question during a televised town hall meeting he did not want to answer, he said, “Send me your information and I will get back to you, next question.”


I’m still waiting.


Mr. President, since no country with government-controlled health care has been able to avoid health care rationing to control costs, what evidence do you have that suggests we will be able to do what no other country has been able to do?


Oops! The president’s staff might call security on that one.


If the last question of the night about a “racial” incident in Boston involving a friend of the president was not a plant, then it was a brilliant accidental distraction to throw to the media. “Run and fetch” worked again, because that was the main story by many news outlets the next day.


Here’s my last question: Mr. President, do you really know what’s in the “Health Care De-form” legislation?


Sorry, we are out of time.


CNN wrong once again – birth record not destroyed




WND Exclusive

BORN IN THE USA?


Hawaii contradicts network boss' claim that Obama certificate no longer exists

By Jerome R. Corsi
© 2009 WorldNetDaily


CNN's Jon Klein
Directly contradicting CNN chief Jon Klein – who ordered host Lou Dobbs to quit discussing President Obama's birth certificate – the Hawaii Department of Health affirmed that no paper birth certificates were destroyed when the department moved to electronic record-keeping.


"I am not aware of any birth certificate records that have been destroyed by the department," Janice Okubo, public information officer for the Hawaii DOH, told WND. "When the department went electronic in 2001, vital records, whether in paper form or any other form, [were] maintained. We don't destroy records."



Okubo affirmed that beginning in 2001, all vital records, including birth records, moved to electronic formats.


"Any records that we had in paper or any other form before 2001 are still in file within the department," she insisted. "We have not destroyed any vital statistics records that we have."


Last Thursday, Klein, CNN's U.S. president, told staffers of "Lou Dobbs Tonight" the issue of Obama's birth certificate and his eligibility to be president is a "dead" story.


1st eligibility movie debuts on Obama's birthday! Order the DVD that probes this unprecedented presidential mystery!


According to MediaBistro.com, Klein wrote in an e-mail that CNN researchers found Hawaiian records were discarded in 2001 when the state's records system went electronic. Therefore, Klein said, Obama's original long-form birth certificate no longer exists. A computer-generated abbreviated version that has been promoted on the Internet is the official record, he said.


"It seems to definitively answer the question," Klein wrote. "Since the show's mission is for Lou to be the explainer and enlightener, he should be sure to cite this during your segment tonite. And then it seems this story is dead – because anyone who still is not convinced doesn't really have a legitimate beef."

Sotomayor: Fundamental Right To Abortion, Not to Bear Arms



Of all the generalities and evasions that Judge Sonia Sotomayor offered the Senate Judiciary Committee during her confirmation hearing, surely the strangest was one she made when describing her role in the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund.

Sotomayor was on the PRLDEF’s board of directors for twelve years during the 1980s and early 1990s, a period when the fund issued no less than six briefs to the Supreme Court in abortion cases. Those briefs argued, among other things, that abortion was a “fundamental right” and that, contrary to scientific evidence, “the belief that life begins at conception is religious.” In them, the PRLDEF called upon the high court to strike down every common-sense state law regulating abortion, including ones supported by the overwhelming majority of Americans -- such as parental-notification and informed-consent laws.

During the hearings, Sotomayor characterized her role in the PRLDEF simply as that of a fund-raising board member, unaware of details of its legal work. Until Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) raised the issue, she failed to even acknowledge that she in fact chaired the board’s litigation committee for four years. Instead, she told Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) that the board looked at the PRLDEF’s legal work only to ensure it was consistent with the Fund’s mission statement.

It was then that she made her most bizarre, and perhaps unintentionally telling, statement:
“Our mission statement,” Sotomayor explained, “was broad, like the Constitution.”

Broad, like the Constitution. Broad enough for someone who had spent many years as a political activist to read anything into -- or out of -- that she might choose.

It was quite a revealing statement for a judge who, just this past April, praised international and foreign law for providing judges with “ideas [that] set our creative juices flowing.” If one defines the Constitution by its broadness, one can easily read foreign nations’ “ideas” into it.

Texas Republican Sen. John Cornyn, in his statement last Friday on his decision to oppose the nominee’s confirmation, observed that, when confronted with her controversial past statements about judging, she claimed “she doesn’t really believe any of these radical ideas after all -- her views on the law are right in line with Chief Justice John Roberts.” Given the apparent disparity between her past statements and her statements to the Committee, Cornyn found himself asking, “Will the real Judge Sotomayor please stand up?”

The truth is that, in the midst of all her contradictions, the real Judge Sotomayor did stand up. In that offhand comment about the PRLDEF’s mission statement, she told the committee that she views the Constitution as “broad.” And in case anyone wondered just how broadly she saw the Constitution, she made it clear in her other answers that she saw it as containing a “right to privacy” broad enough to include a “woman's right to terminate her pregnancy.”

Sotomayor also told the Committee that PRLDEF lawyers had an “ethical obligation” to litigate “public health issues as [they] affected the Latino community” -- and that the fund, like “a number of civil-rights organizations at the time,” considered abortion a public health issue. Hence, she said, “the fund had a health-care docket that included challenges to certain limitations on a woman's right to terminate her pregnancy under certain circumstances.”

So, despite claiming ignorance of the content of particular PRLDEF briefs -- ignorance which, in light of records of the fund’s litigation-committee meetings, strains credulity -- she was well aware that the fund’s “broad” mission included challenges to common-sense laws. As I told the Senate Judiciary Committee when I testified as President of Americans United for Life, given that she was aware of those challenges, it again strains credibility to believe she was unaware that those challenges were based on the argument that abortion was a “fundamental right.”

How ironic that Sotomayor, in her answers to the Judiciary Committee, failed to recognize the Second Amendment right to bear arms as a fundamental right, even as she praised the “broad” mission of the advocacy organization that, on her watch, claimed rights not enumerated in the Constitution were “fundamental.” When called on this by Sessions, who said, “but you say [abortion’s] the fundamental right” and the Second Amendment is not, she did not deny it. Instead, she said, “Fundamental is a legal term that I didn’t make up.”

Such a contradiction is deeply troubling in a Supreme Court nominee whose job, if confirmed, will be to apply, not reinvent or “broaden” our written Constitution.

Americans want Justices on the Court who apply the law, not make policy. That is why Americans United for Life respectfully urges the members of the U.S. Senate to vote against Judge Sotomayor’s nomination.

Dr. Yoest was the principal pro-life leader asked to testify at the Sotomayor hearings. For more, see www.sotomayor411.com.



Dr. Yoest is President & CEO of Americans United for Life and AUL Action.