As you may know, there is a plan afoot to have Pennsylvania's sell-out Senator Bob Casey come up with "pro-life" language for an amendment to the Senate's "health care" bill that Ben Nelson could live with.It's just more smoke and mirrors from a Democrat leadership that has proven a radical bias towards abortion.
Says Nebraska Right to Life's Executive Director, Julie Schmit-Albin, of this latest trick, "We have not seen the actual Casey language addressing abortion. We only know what has been imparted to us verbally by Senator Nelson's staff late this afternoon.
"From what we know, without seeing the actual language, it in no way resembles the Stupak language and still allows federal subsidies for plans that cover abortion on demand, which is entirely unacceptable for Nebraska Right to Life and thousands of Nebraskans who oppose public funding of elective abortion.
The proposed opt-out clause is particularly offensive -- the federal government would treat abortion on demand as if it was really health care, and then allow people to apply for status as conscientious objectors? Give me a break."
I followed up Julie's press release with a phone call to Ben Nelson's office.
It took awhile to get through, but when I did I politely explained to the aide who answered who I was and why I was calling. I reminded them that Vital Signs Ministries (and all the pro-life, pro-family organizations in the state) had good reasons not to trust Bob Casey's pro-life conscience and certainly could not trust how the Democratic leadership might alter any abortion-related amendment that might be accepted.
I told her to please pass on to Senator Nelson that because of actions of this Democrat-controlled Senate (i.e., abortions being paid for in the District of Columbia with federal tax funds, conscience clauses eliminated, abortion advocacy overseas being paid for with federal tax funds, and other deplorable matters) the majority leadership was selling out the sanctity of life ethic that most Americans embrace. Therefore, we don't trust anything that they do or say about abortion "compromises."
I told her to tell Senator Nelson we were so far very pleased at his stand but he must stay stronger than ever right now and vote No on what has clearly become a boondoggle bill on several fronts. It's a budget-buster that Americans obviously don't want forced upon them by secretive, power-mad bureaucrats. So please tell Senator Nelson not to cave-in to Democrat pressure as he has at other times and just say No to this terrible bill. By so doing, he will win the applause and gratitude of not just the people of Nebraska...but most of the rest of America too.
We then followed up with e-mails to the Senator's office. Here's what Claire had to say:
Dear Senator Nelson,
Thank you for standing firm so far on the abortion issue. But now it's crunch time so please don't cave-in. I want to urge you to vote NO on the health care bill. It is a horribly expensive bill that does not solve the needed health care problems. Indeed, it will make us (and our economy) sicker than ever before! As you well know, the majority of Americans do NOT want this bill. So please go down in history as voting NO on this disastrous bill.
Please add your voices to ours -- right now! As Julie said in her note, "Things are changing by the hour back there and we don't have the luxury of mulling this over."
