That's not swaying good ol' pro-lifer Bart Stupak:
Congressman Bart Stupak, D-Mich, responded sharply to White House officials touting a letter representing 59,000 nuns that was sent to lawmakers urging them to pass the health care bill.
The conservative Democrat dismissed the action by the White House saying, “When I’m drafting right to life language, I don’t call up the nuns.” He says he instead confers with other groups including “leading bishops, Focus on the Family, and The National Right to Life Committee.”
So, he listens to bishops but not nuns, and values the advice of far right social conservatives. Nice.
If you haven't been following the Stupak saga, he's been holding health care reform hostage based on lies. Like Lieberman, he seems to crave attention, and feels screwing over his own party and constituents is the way to get it. If Stupak is personally pro-life, fine, but that doesn't justify lying about the bills or trying to do a end-run around the law. Abortion is legal in the U.S. and federal funds for it are already restricted under the Hyde amendment. Stupak knows this. Additionally, his constituents, and the roughly one in six Americans without health insurance (let alone actual care), badly need health care reform to pass.
At least Stupak has at least one primary challenger now. Serving one's constituents, honoring one's promises, and standing up for women - what a novel idea!
3 comments:
You can't imagine how this is from inside the church. Talk about waiting to exhale... this is big.
I laud Sister Carol Keehan, DC of the CHA and all the other women religious who are speaking out.
As for the bishops, this is a watershed moment. A smaller number of louder and more powerful bishops are at the helm; I wish that the other bishops would speak up, but that is not likely.
Applause for the Sisters, booo to Stupak. Suprising to me to learn he listens to anyone from the Catholic Church since he is part of the Christian organized crime syndicate at C Street, "The Family" run by a man named Cole. Many of Cole's 'sermons', I've read, rail against Catholics and their teachings.
Fran, I wish your cohort was running things! I'm glad the nuns and some others are speaking out, though. I assumed most people are familiar with Focus on the Family, but they're very authoritarian and patriarchal, as in their belief that " God's design for marriage is that husbands lead and wives submit to that leadership."
Tincanman, that's an interesting point. IIRC, Rachel Maddow touches on that in the segment linked by "feels screwing..." in the post. I think for Stupak, his motivations mostly center power versus principle or faith. The C Street group has the same mentality, and tells its members they don't need to play by the usual rules (of honesty, fidelity...).
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