White House Religion Adviser Trying to Hijack Health Care For Anti-Choice Cause
Rev. Jim Wallis says he's progressive. That got him a seat on a White House council despite his opposition to abortion— which he's using to monkey-wrench health-care reform.
Thu Oct. 8, 2009 1:31 PM PDT
This story first appeared at Alternet.
The Rev. Jim Wallis is sitting pretty these days. He's the evangelist the media love—so much so that Democrats kow-tow before him. He says he's progressive, and has some credentials to back up the claim: anti-poverty work and opposition to the Vietnam War. But he's opposed to legal abortion and same-sex marriage. Nonetheless, eager for an evangelical partner, President Obama named Wallis to the President's Council on Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships, giving Wallis the ideal platform from which to try to subvert the debate over health-care reform for his anti-choice cause.
Today, Wallis, in his sanctimonious style, offers "A Faith Declaration for Health-Care Reform" that declares this:
Life and liberty must both be protected. The health care system should protect the sanctity and dignity of life in accordance with existing law and the current rules; and the prohibition on federal funding of abortions should be consistently and diligently applied to any legislation. Strong "conscience" protections should be enacted for health care workers to ensure they have the liberty to exercise their moral and religious beliefs in their profession. Evidence suggests that supporting low-income and pregnant women with adequate health care increases the number of women who chose to carry their child to term, so if we do reform right, we can reduce abortion in America. While religious people don't all agree on all the issues of abortion, we should agree that it must not be allowed to derail the crucial need for comprehensive health care reform.
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Depite his talk about not allowing abortion issues to "derail" health reform, that seems to be exactly what Wallis is up to. As Frances Kissling reported in Salon, after winning a major point when Rep. Lois Capps, D-Calif., amended the House bill with a conscience clause exempting anti-choice health-care providers from having to cover or perform abortions, as well as an explicit prohibition on the use of federal funds to pay for abortions in accordance with the Hyde amendment and a prohibition on the use of federal subsidy dollars by private plans in the coverag of abortion, Wallis continued his crusade:
This, it now seems, is not enough for Wallis and company. They now want to be sure that if an anti-choice person chooses a plan that does cover abortion, the minuscule part of his premium that is allocated to abortion coverage for all subscribers is not used for abortion.
Get it? It's a chip-away strategy, a nuisance plan on Wallis' part to gum up the health-care works.
Wallis often fancies himself to be the spokesman for "the faith community," as he did in his response to Obama's big health-care speech before a joint session of Congress, as Sarah Posner reported on TAPPED:
After last night's presidential speech, the Rev. Jim Wallis of Sojourners issued a statement that claimed to speak for "the faith community." He declares, "In his speech this evening, President Barack Obama made the commitments that a broad coalition in the faith community had asked for—reform as a moral issue, affordable coverage for all, and no federal funding of abortion."
Really? The "faith community"—whatever that is—has demanded no federal funding for abortion?
Indeed, you won't hear rhetoric about no federal funding for abortion coming from the mainline Protestant denominations.
Wallis contends that he's never advocated the criminalization of abortion, but he makes plenty of common cause with those who do, like James Dobson of Focus on the Family. Posner explains:
[T]he recent discovery and dissection of a 1996 pro-life statement, "The America We Seek: A Statement of Pro-Life Principle and Concern," by the journalist Frederick Clarkson, suggests otherwise.
Clarkson traces the connection between the statement, signed by Wallis, among others, aimed at making abortions more difficult to procure and current "common ground" strategies for "abortion reduction." The statement, signed by major religious-right figures like James Dobson, was also signed by proponents of the Come Let Us Reason Together abortion-reduction strategy, including Wallis and Mercer University Christian ethics professor David Gushee. In it, they proposed a program of action, which called for the criminalization of doctors who perform abortions (but not of "women in crisis"), an increase in "crisis pregnancy centers," and a constitutional amendment overruling Roe v. Wade and identifying the fetus as a person. The manifesto laid out virtually every anti-choice method of restricting abortion short of changing the composition of the Supreme Court to reverse Roe, the legal strategy Wallis and others see as unlikely.
The question, then, is what the heck is Wallis doing advising the White House, when he appears to be working against the president's health-care agenda? And why do Democrats hold open the door for this pompous, condescending man whose out for a quick and easy power-grab of the Democratic Party? Where is Wallis' Democratic constituency?
One thing you can say about the religious right—when they took over the Republican Party, they did it the hard way, the old-fashioned way: they got their delegates seated after years of stealthily taking over the local-level machinery of the party. Wallis doesn't have time for that kind of work, and apparently does need to do it. The party leaders have just ushered him in, caught in a spell, believing that the party's salvation is bound in right-wing religion.
Even in his claim to work against poverty, Wallis leaves women out of the equation. And the whole matter of the anti-choice position as a matter of theological orthodoxy is a fallacy. As I wrote two years ago:
[H]ere's where I really get queasy with the Jim Wallis model of the "religious left." For him, it's all about poverty, but not about justice for women. Because if you believe in equal justice for women, then you have to concede that abortion must remain a woman's option. A fetus is not a person. No religious tradition, before the onset of women's emancipation, asserted that it was. A fetus can never, with any objective sense of justice, be given rights that trump those of the woman in which it resides. Religious leaders like Wallis say they have a religious mandate to alleviate poverty, but self-actualization is apparently quite another matter.
Most of the poor people in America are women and children, and without the self-actualization of women, their poverty will never be alleviated. If you want to give them food, shelter, and (limited) health care, but deny them their full panoply of rights, you're just maintaining a class of poor people who will be beholden to your particular religious movement. And, somehow, I don't think that's what Jesus had in mind.
It's time to send Jim Wallis packing.
Comments
THE RELIGIOUS RIGHT AND ITS HATRED
Submitted by stevador39 on Thu Oct. 8, 2009 4:36 PM PDT.
THE DICTIONARY DEFINITION OF ABORTION: EXPULSION OF THE FETUS FROM THE WOMB BEFORE IT IS VIABLE. HIGH AND ANNUALLY RISING INFANT MORTALITY IN THE U.S. IS A FULLY RECOGNIZED FORM OF 'ABORTION.' IN 1940, JUST BEFORE WWII, THIS COUNTRY WAS NUMBER FOUR IN THE WORLD IN INFANT MORTALITY. TODAY, 2009, THE U.S. IS NUMBER 29 AND FALLING. THE NATIONAL INFANT MORTALITY RATE IS THE DIRECT RESULT OF THE LACK OF HEALTH CARE FOR WOMEN. HEALTH CARE COMES TOO LATE TO PREVENT ABORTION ONCE THE WOMAN IS PREGNANT. THE ONLY NATIONS WITH LOW INFANT MORTALITY ARE NATIONS WITH NATIONAL HEALTH PROGRAMS FOR THEIR OWN PEOPLE.
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Enabling our children to be
Submitted by deow (not verified) on Fri Oct. 9, 2009 12:15 AM PDT.
Enabling our children to be aware of the life of others beyond themselves, developing empathy and altruistic behaviour towards others is an important part of a child’s growth
Wallis
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri Oct. 9, 2009 4:55 AM PDT.
Abortion is not health care.
Rights of Minds and Bodies
Submitted by femtobeam on Fri Oct. 9, 2009 5:18 PM PDT.
If a woman does not maintain the rights to her own body, does she have the rights to her own mind and her own thoughts? What about scientists? Do they have the rights to their own time, research and inventions for start up companies?
During the Bush administration, Rev. Sun Myong Moon was in charge of abstinence programs under the NIH involving teenage girls and women. Israel Zerhouni said during the hearings with Congress that he was pursuing programs of "preventative health care". Holding up neural interface devices, he said excitedly, "This is the way scientists talk to one another". He also said, "It is easier to steal from scientists than to pay them". About women he said, "We want to find out what makes them, untoward". Laura Bush's red dressed women in heart care were just down the table.
Later, GW Bush was missing his National Security Advisor, Fran Townsend and his Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeldt It was during this time that he tried to find out the names of persons in the "mind control" studies on abstinence within the NIH and was refused the information for "privacy reasons". He was refused even though it was a direct Presidential Executive Order.
It appears now that Cheney may have classified it all for over 50 to 75 years, but here's the problem. If the persons on the program have embedded devices and Rev. Moon and his associates have access to their minds, do they still have access to their minds? The NIH documents say that study group participants do not ever have to unveil their "patients privacy", records or details. There is no oversight.
This is a prime example of what can go wrong in legislating physical rights of people. Enslaved women, girls and scientists all in an abstinence program with a former incarcerated money launderer and former philanderer. Further research shows his affiliations with Japanese gangs associated with Yakuza, Chinese gangs, associations with Starz/Encore founder John J. Sie, Ogilvy, the Israeli owned advertising agency and PR firm who handled the WH communications system at the White House. Anyone who wants access, anytime, anywhere to find out why an anonymous person might be untoward.
What a convenient excuse to steal technology secrets or be untoward themselves with anonymous people! This way there is no need to fully explain the new Trade Agreements or even understand them. It's only science. The problem with that is a long list of scientists, soldiers, actresses and children with "electronic harassment" problems. Some of them died of mysterious causes. For example, 89 virolologists. EIGHTY NINE!
Rev. Moon was in charge of something at 61 schools in Chicago before they were cancelled, at least on paper. Interactive games were online with Howard Stern of Sirius with Richard E. Wiley of Wiley Rein, who was in charge along with colleagues of the NSA Spy program as well as Internet Security system, eTrust.
But how would anyone know if they are untoward, toward the ones they "study" for whatever reason? No doubt, they won't want to talk about it because they know the "study subjects" have no choices whatsoever over their "accessibility".
Now, recently, Slate showed a photo of a book cover with a perfect full term baby with wires all over the head and attached to the skin on the baby's head. The subject? Taking baby mind vacations. That's right!
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AT&T was selling one on one time with scientists according to online information when they were in hearings about it and have since refused to disclose their re-routing, filtering and network businesses. Remember the AT&T building in San Francisco that was such an important part of the NSA spy program?
Without realizing it, US citizens are slowly being enslaved in a brain interfaced environment and legislation by so-called Religious leaders planning to enforce their vision of right and wrong upon your children, AFTER they are born is in play. And it is real time interaction.
You better think twice about imposing your will over others bodies. We must have the rights to our own bodies despite the scare words associated with the debate. Otherwise, you might find that you will be next, scrutinized by networked evangelists, psychiatrists, or just curiosity seekers to find out any way they want to whether you are "untoward" or not. By the way, what is your pin? There goes your money. Too bad you won't know who they are but that is the way it is with unidentified open sources.
Individual human rights over our own bodies, minds and sovereign decisions about how we choose to interact with others are at stake and much, much more. Think clearly about a persons rights to make their own decisions, before it is too late and your baby girl becomes a favorite vacation destination or worse, just doesn't want to be born into the outside World of mind control. Or was that a hacker? Nope... The sound is very faint but you can't help but hear it, "One day left on all mattresses. Pick up the phone and call this number...NOW!
How Far Does This Go?
Submitted by Br.John on Sat Oct. 10, 2009 2:37 PM PDT.
How far does the personal conscience protection go? Would a Jehovah Witness physician be able to deny blood transfusions? What if the only doctor available is a strict Catholic and in an emergency where only the mother or the baby can be saved? 'The Church' commands that the baby gets first priority in this situation.
John Henry Phelan
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Women's bodies
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Sun Oct. 11, 2009 12:30 PM PDT.
Our right to choose what to do with our bodies is trumped by "pro life" only when they can take that parasite of a fetus, remove it, and bring it to term themselves.
Yes, parasite is a harsh word, but it is accurate. And it is not to say that many women want these parasites and are happy to have them. But a fetus is growing by sucking nutrients out of it's mother's body, and if she doesn't want it to do so, she should have the right to end it's parasitical ways.
Sorry if that offends you, MR Wallis. You need to work on a way to permit men like you to carry babies so women who don't want to won't have to.
Too bad this is a democracy
Submitted by joanmartha on Sun Oct. 11, 2009 4:36 PM PDT.
Too bad this is a democracy and that most people - a rising number, by the stats - actually consider a fetus which has attained viability something morally worth protecting. It is a personal spiritual/religious issue whether one thinks that a fetus should be protected immediately post-coitus, and certainly the far right religious taliban view, which in a democracy should not prevail. Likewise, the view that a fetus is a parasite right up to the moment it takes its first breath is the other end of the extreme and should not prevail either. I applaud Obama for not being an ideologue on this issue. Jim Wallis is a helluva lot better than the Dobson/Roberts/Falwell/700-club-folks ilk of spiritual community representative. A true representative of the community of faith is - duh - going to acknowledge the deeply felt repugnance toward the uncritical acceptance of the fetus-as-simply-parasite view. It would be as out of line to make that our political policy as the idea that we must legislate abstinence. I'm an RN who would not choose to work in an abortion facility and I have the right to choose that. I also fully believe that "anonymous" above should have an abortion the instant she finds out she is pregnant and that she should have that right. If she diddles around and decides that in the 5th or 6th month of pregnancy folks who find that morally repugnant should not have to pay for it. Abortion as a form of birth control is not most folks idea of health care, and not the heart of this debate. As Wallis says, we need to compromise.
Critics on democracy...
Submitted by stephenmorphey on Sun Oct. 11, 2009 10:33 PM PDT.
I will not exaggerate others' beliefs nor make unfounded prejudicial assumptions based on labels, categories, or stereotypes. I will always extend the benefit of the doubt.
Read Wallis again
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Sun Oct. 11, 2009 10:44 PM PDT.
If you re-read what Wallis said, you will find that nowhere has he suggested that abortion be outlawed; he has only said it should not be federally funded -- a world of difference.
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Adele Stan on Jim Wallis
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Sat Oct. 24, 2009 5:28 PM PDT.
I’m taken aback by Adele Stan’s comments on Jim Wallis (October 8). I appreciate that the topic of abortion gets people riled up. But her dismissal of Wallis and his viewpoint struck me as kind of vitriolic. The left is capable of better.
Plenty of progressives who have put their all into fighting for justice in the world also find unborn human life making compelling demands on that same sense of justice.
Dismissing us wholesale will not make a better movement. Judgmental intolerance has been the hallmark of the political right and a singularly destructive phenomenon in our society for years. Now that they’ve driven themselves into a ditch as a result, why would those on the left want to mimic them?
Paul Magno
Washington DC
A physician's first
Submitted by oreillette bluetooth (not verified) on Thu Nov. 5, 2009 2:43 AM PST.
A physician's first responsibility is to the patient. That would be the mother. It's always been that way. It is not a political decision and public approval is not required. I knew this is where the debate was headed but I don't believe it's a legitimate reason to delay the vote. A woman's decision is her own and if she is influenced by religion or the neighbors for that matter, so be it. But it's definitely not up to the rest of us. ANNA
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