The Secretary of Health and Human Services tweeted this comment from the President of the United States:

President Obama: Being a woman is no longer a pre-existing condition. #ThanksObamacare

— Kathleen Sebelius (@Sebelius) May 10, 2013

Yes: Democrats believe that without a massive government program being a woman is a “pre-existing condition.” Womanhood is a disease you cannot shake. Femininity turns out to be a disability.

Talk about a war on women? This is an assault on womanhood itself: declaring being a woman tantamount to having cancer or a genetic disorder.

Absolutely disgusting, utterly patronizing, and wholly degrading.

The president better lookout if he doesn’t want to catch what *she* has…

The ear-catching line:

“…each act of aggravated murder he committed by terminating pregnancies…”

The Cuyahoga County prosecutor, Thomas McGinty, intends to pursue charges against Ariel Castro for each and every criminal action that evidence can show Castro may have committed over the ten years he held three women captive in Cleveland. The charges could number in the thousands, based on evidence and testimony

That includes multiple charges for felonious assault, rape, perhaps a separate kidnapping charge for each day of their captivity, and a whole host of things. But the most remarkable possible charge, given the way our laws handle such things, is the “aggravated murder” charge for starving and beating the women until they miscarried when he got them pregnant.

Notice the language of the alleged offense: “terminating pregnancies.” He didn’t say, “killing children,” or “aborting fetuses,” or anything that recognizes the humanity of the child in utero, but he still believes aggravated murder charges are a possibility.

Charges should certainly be pursued for the starvation and the assault that caused the miscarriages, but aggravated murder charges should only apply if the human entity killed had his or her own personal right to life. We don’t know the exact gestational age of the fetuses at the time of miscarriage, but if the fetus who was killed in the miscarriage could just as legally be aborted as carried to term, why pursue charges for murder? Mothers can unilaterally choose to “terminate the pregnancy,” why can’t fathers? Granted, fathers cannot starve and beat the woman they impregnated, but again, starving and beating someone don’t reach the level of “aggravated murder” unless someone died in the process.

FYI: I’m a child, not a choice.

And then we have this case. It is not clear if the mother wanted the child once she realized she was pregnant by a rapist, and the child clearly was not wanted by the rapist father. Perhaps the mother would have aborted the child had she been raped but was free to pursue an abortion—an option obviously unavailable to her here.

Either way, the only way logically to pursue aggravated murder charges for “terminating pregnancies” in this case is if the child in utero is acknowledged by law to have its own inherent right to life. I’m in favor of the law recognizing this fact, but our present laws are so confused on this foundational question.

The aggravated murder charge ought to be pursued for the same reason abortion ought not be legal in any case: because the law recognizes the inherent right to life of all human persons from the moment of conception, not because someone—whether the mother or a county prosecutor—who had the good fortune to escape the womb alive “chose.”

Not even the the cardinal archbishop of Washington could be bothered to utter a word of condemnation or even a tut-tut. The loudest voices for his ouster will likely come from Washington Wizards fans, but considering his stats their rationale likely won’t be his sexuality. Though some of the less cordial ones may use anti-gay slurs in voicing their displeasure.

Anyhow, I thought this factoid might be helpful in discussing the Carla Hale matter.

Bishop Watterson High School, where Carla Hale used to teach Phys Ed.

Carla Hale was a teacher at a Catholic high school. Jason Collins plays basketball.

Carla Hale worked for an organization which believes one’s personal example is the most powerful teacher; that students can look up to their teachers for an education not only in their classroom instruction but in how they live their lives in light of the Gospel.

Jason Collins plays basketball and is only a role model for those who choose to emulate him.

Carla Hale, like every other teacher at that Catholic High School, and even Bishop Campbell himself, was charged with teaching not only through classroom instruction, but also through the witness of her life. Hale, like every other teacher and even Bishop Campbell himself, is a sinner in various ways. No one is fired for simply being a sinner—no one would be left to teach. The question is not “does one sin?” but “how does one react to their own sins?”

A teacher who enters into an adulterous relationship but who is never caught cannot be fired for what no one knows about. If the affairs becomes public knowledge, it seems to me that would be grounds for a review of employment. If the person ends it, repents, and honestly, truly seeks the healing and help he or she needs not to do it again, that person could probably stay on. If that person persists in the affair and refuses to acknowledge the wrong, that person ought to be fired. It’s a matter of public witness in a Catholic setting—do you repent and accept the Gospel as taught by the Catholic Church, or do you persist and reject?

None of this, of course, applies to Jason Collins playing basketball. He does not work for an organization that is dedicated to teaching. He does not work for an organization that upholds Catholic morality and works to instill those values in the young. He gets paid to play basketball by an organization whose mission is to field a good basketball team for the entertainment of their fans. Therefore, it really does not matter that Collins has come out as gay (to tell the truth, I’m glad he did… but that’s another post).

Jason Collins still is employed because being actively, openly gay is not a barrier to playing basketball.

Carla Hale is no longer employed by the Catholic high school because embracing the homosexual lifestyle to the point of publicly listing your same-sex partner as a spouse bars one from being considered a teacher of Catholic morality.

Frankly, had Carla Hale not allowed her mother’s obituary to reference her partner as a “spouse,” or if she had accepted that the relationship was inconsistent with Catholic teaching, ended it, sought the counseling necessary to rectify some off-kilter matters in her life, and publicly apologized for the scandal, she would likely still be employed.

In two separate reports on NBC, Mitchell reported that “Republicans are taking direct aim at Hillary Clinton” in their quest to find out what led to the death of Stevens and four other Americans in Libya this past September 11.

Stevens’ nefarious Republican plot may just work as House Republicans seem willing to accept the fictitious tapestry of intrigue he wove before he died. They will soon hold hearings, and Gregory Hicks, the deputy mission chief in Libya at the time Stevens’ plan went into action, will play his part.

Hicks claims that he and everyone on the ground in Libya at the time “knew” it was a so-called “terrorist” attack immediately, and were “stunned” when Susan Rice, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, who was drinking in the best intelligence available back in New York City, let us know it was actually not terrorism at all but a demonstration in reaction to a malicious video on YouTube that simply got out of hand.

According to Hicks, he fielded a call from Ambassador Stevens when the so-called attack got out of hand and he ordered military assistance to head to Benghazi. An order, he claims, that was “overruled.” Though a mere diplomat and not a military expert, he posits that commandos from the embassy in Libya or fighter jets in the area could have arrived in plenty of time to prevent the worst of the “attack.” Mitchell points out, however, that the commandos whose job when in theater is to always be ready to fight could not have gotten ready in time; that an embassy in a war-torn region had such sparse security that it could not spare four commandos to go save the ambassador’s life; and supersonic fighter jets based closer to Benghazi than Lincoln, Nebraska, is to Washington, D.C., would have taken five hours to arrive. So the refusal to send any assistance was entirely justifiable—after all, it was just a simple demonstration gone awry.

The moment of Christopher Stevens’ victory: at last, Hillary will be embarrassed.

Then there is the matter of the requests Stevens himself allegedly made for more security that some of these unstable Republicans are waving like a bloody, soot-stained shirt. This is more evidence of Stevens’ evil deep seated desire to embarrass Hillary Clinton, America’s favorite Democrat. Stevens, even though the additional security was not granted, chose to go to Benghazi at a time when a peaceful demonstration over a disgusting YouTube video might get out of hand. Had Stevens stayed back at the well-protected embassy in Tripoli (remember all those commandos defending the china?) then none of this would have happened. His decision to put himself in such a dangerous situation is clear evidence that he was, in Mitchell’s excellent phrasing, “a Republican taking direct aim at Hillary Clinton.” He calculated that he might die, and that his death would be an exquisite way to embarrass Hillary Clinton.

Clearly, this is a deep and committed plot on the part of unstable Republicans who have been led by the nose by that mastermind Republican, Christopher Stevens, whose example has emboldened his followers to pick up the torch and embarrass Hillary Clinton at all costs, even if it means their own death.

Thank Gaia the real menace behind this whole awful saga, the man who made that terrible YouTube video, is still safely behind bars, if only for giving Stevens, Hicks, and the other unstable Republicans a pretext under which to embarrass Hillary Clinton!

Parting question: CAN THE REPUBLIC SURVIVE IF HILLARY CLINTON IS EMBARRASSED?!

MAN shouts at abortion survivor @melissaohden to “Shut up!” We will NOT shut up! You, sir, are #inhuman twitter.com/Students4LifeH…

— Students for Life(@Students4LifeHQ) May 1, 2013

Some people just cannot stand to have their base assumptions challenged by living, breathing evidence to the contrary.

Bravo to the Students for Life, Lila Rose and LiveAction, and all those involved in exposing the inhumanity of the abortion industry.

Also, according to Father Greg Shaffer, the priest at George Washington University whose ardent Catholicism riled some gay activists recently, the late-term abortionist protested today is a block away from the GWU Newman Center. He and his students have prayed the rosary there weekly during the school year.

And why are they there? Because this is a reality (screen capture taken from LiveAction.org/inhuman):

Anthony Munoz, former Cincinnati Bengals star, Pro Football Hall of Famer, and big-time local philanthropist, was asked by Xavier University to give this year’s commencement address.

Xavier University is a Catholic, Jesuit University, which means they like community service and social justice things like what Munoz champions in the local community.

But Anthony Munoz also believes that marriage should be between one man and one woman and isn’t shy about publicly supporting that belief. This is also a truth that the Catholic Church teaches and has taught uncompromisingly, so Xavier should be on board.

But this position is, apparently, radical and dangerous to some. So radical and dangerous, in fact, that in spite of his many great and laudable efforts to help so many people, a city council member thinks Munoz is unfit to speak to the graduates at Xavier, even though, one can reasonably assume, Munoz would not make marriage a major topic in his talk. Never mind any of that: Since Munoz dares disagree with same-sex marriage he must be censored.

Xavier, being a Catholic university, really has a great opportunity here to witness to the sanctity of marriage, express the true compassion at the heart of the Church’s message for all persons, show how this compassion is beautifully expressed in and through the teachings of the Church—even the ones some find hard or absurd, and to stand up for Munoz’s right to speak even if what he believes or says seems reprehensible to some in positions of power.

Or to students.

According to the city council member, a petition at the chronically laughable change.org regarding this kerfuffle was set up by Xavier students. The petition reads, in part: “Xavier University deserves a commencement speaker that all around  reflects our university’s values…At this time, Mr. Munoz does not reflect those values.”

For their part the University said, “Anthony Munoz was selected as this year’s commencement speaker because of his tremendous service to our community through the Anthony Munoz Foundation and his remarkable reputation for charitable work.”

So the students think “tremendous service to our community,” a “remarkable reputation for charitable work,” and upholding the sanctity of marriage do not reflect the “university’s values”?  Clearly they don’t understand what a Catholic university is all about.

For heaven’s sake, in 2009 Notre Dame honored the rabidly pro-abortion Barack Obama, whom Notre Dame would later sue for violating our constitutionally protected religious liberty, and had him speak at commencement in spite of massive and high-level opposition; ‘twould truly be a travesty if a city council member and a student petition cowed Xavier into disinviting Munoz because he boldly upholds a Catholic teaching that is not presently in vogue.

But if it is true, and I’m going to treat it that way until definitively renounced, bravo to whoever the brave souls are on each side who had the guts (decency?) to out this disgusting plan.

It seems members of both parties are involved in very confidential talks to exempt the whole seedy mess of lawmakers and their aides from the “third world experience” of the “huge train wreck” coming down the tracks we know as Obamacare…

Congressional leaders in both parties are engaged in high-level, confidential talks about exempting lawmakers and Capitol Hill aides from the insurance exchanges they are mandated to join as part of President Barack Obama’s health care overhaul, sources in both parties said.

Yes: the healthcare overhaul that we so desperately needed to make sure all was well in America; that we needed to come into the 20th century (let alone the 21st); that we needed to assure justice to all persons who manage to escape the womb alive; that we needed lest we all be a nation of selfish prigs… is not good enough for the very people responsible for foisting it upon us.

This law and its provisions are important enough that the religious objections of the nation’s largest religious group—objections that merited an unprecedented unanimity among the bishops (non-Catholics, and even a fair number of Catholics, have no idea how remarkable that is)—can be set aside. But it is not good enough for the very people responsible for tying this burden on our backs.

To be sure, scads of other exemptions have been granted—to unions and Obama donors, mostly—but the sheer, unmitigated gall necessary for them to see how bad it will be and choose to exempt themselves while not tossing it out root and branch lest that which they dislike fall upon the rest of us anyhow really beats all. As @Iowahawkblog said, “Here’s an idea: instead of just unions, Obama donors, and Congress, exempt EVERYBODY from Obamacare.” Couldn’t agree more.

I suppose I cannot really blame any Republicans here—they didn’t want the monstrosity in the first place, did what they could to stop it, and got absolutely steamrolled through procedural gimmickry. If they can rescue anyone from the huge train wreck they almost have an obligation to do so.

And, come to think of it, one sure way to sour the public on Obamacare even more is by executing a maneuver as distasteful and disgustingly yellow as this. It’ll probably result in a few Republicans going down, but far more Dems since it is their law. They own it. It is their unruly, menacing, spoiled rotten child entirely, without reserve, without joint custody, without weekend supervised visitation rights, even.

It’s a poison pill, then?

I don’t think I can give the GOP leadership credit for being that clever.

But there you have it: we have an aristocracy in this country, fellow subjects. That which is good enough for us simply will not do for them.

A former physical education teacher lost her job because of her relationship with another woman.

…

Apetition [sic] was created on Change.org in support of Hale as a teacher, simply requesting: “Reinstate faculty member Carla Hale and apologize for discriminating against her on the basis of sexuality.”

…

Supporters added, “It’s unfair that someone who cared so much about her students and her job should lose them on the basis of something she cannot even control.”

Not quite. A distinction anyone should be able to see plainly has been entirely ignored.

A person with homosexual tendencies and same-sex attraction who lives a chaste, celibate life would not be fired by a Catholic school for “being gay.”

A person with heterosexual tendencies who is still single and maintains a chaste, celibate life would not be fired by a Catholic school for “being straight.” Seems ridiculous to say this, yes, but it is important when setting up the parallels here.

Simply being gay is not sinful and is not grounds for dismissal anymore than being straight is. A person who is gay but maintains that chastity consonant with his or her state of life—a virtue to which we all are called, by the way, gay, straight, bi, married, single, whatever—would not be fired for being gay.

The error, the sin, the grounds for dismissal, comes when the person decides that it is appropriate and acceptable to act upon their disordered desires and then does so. Again, this applies equally to a heterosexual person who pursues extra-marital sex and cohabitation as it does to those persons who engage in same-sex relationships and pursue same-sex “marriage.”

Whether a person is born gay or not is immaterial because, contra Lady Gaga, “Born This Way” Does NOT Mean “Act This Way”. Whether a person is heterosexual or homosexual, that person has a choice whether he or she will participate in sexual relations at all at any given moment, let alone whether they will act on disordered sexual desires—again, whether disordered but basically heterosexual or disordered and basically homosexual.

This teacher was not dismissed because of something she “cannot control” but because of what she chose to do in an area she most definitely can control.

There is a difference between disposition and behavior. Between inclination and action. Between thinking something and doing something. Between desire and activity. This mighty important distinction has been utterly lost in this discussion it seems.

The Diocese of Columbus is being sued for violating the city of Columbus’ statute against discrimination, which includes sexual orientation, and has no religious exemption. Three interesting points here:

1) The fairly recent Hosanna Tabor case should be a strong argument to toss the Columbus statute and force them to re-write it with a religious exemption.

2) Since she was not fired for the simple fact of her homosexuality but because she had engaged in behavior antithetical to Catholic teaching it is possible that the statute does not actually apply at all.

3) If this statute does apply, it means homosexual activities are more protected in law than heterosexual activities because there would be no civil law preventing the Diocese of Columbus for firing a teacher who was cohabiting with an opposite-sex partner.

We shall see how this plays out, but it is another sign that the only intolerance still allowed is anti-Christian intolerance.

Saint Joseph Cathedral, Columbus, Ohio.

They did WHAT to babies’ necks?

I’ve been beating a particular drum lately because of the confluence of topics in the national conversation: gun violence in a few spectacular cases on the one hand, and the horror that has taken place at a particular abortion clinic on the other.

A guest post in the Chicago Tribune adds to the conversation.

As you read this piece, try something: in your mind, read all references to abortions-gone-wrong as “gun violence,” all references to abortion clinics as “gun clubs,” all references to Planned Parenthood as “gun manufacturers and retailers,” and all references to the abortion lobby as “the NRA.”

If you can do this successfully, imagine then the hue and cry that would dominate the news cycles for weeks until the Second Amendment were repealed and all gun owners jailed.

Some choice excerpts below (all bolding mine), but I recommend that you read it all.

“We have no idea how many facilities like Gosnell’s have remained out of sight, out of mind of [the Department of Health] for decades,” the [Philadelphia grand jury] report concluded. The department inspected Gosnell’s clinic only “sporadically” from 1978 to 1993 and never again until 2010. Why? Because “officials concluded that inspections would be ‘putting a barrier up to women’ seeking abortions,” the report said. Added an agency lawyer, “People die.”

…

The abortion industry tut-tuts it all as a deplorable, yet a single, isolated incident. It ignores the clinics being investigated for botched abortions or hazardous facilities in Alabama, New Mexico, Minnesota, Maryland, Colorado and Florida. There may be more, since abortion record-keeping is abysmal.

Even Illinois, by law, doesn’t keep records of infants born alive during an abortion, an Illinois Department of Public Health spokeswoman said in an email. Amazingly, Illinois abortion clinics hadn’t been inspected for up to 15 years before the Gosnell case broke, an Associated Press investigation found.

…

In a fog of excuses for their failures, that clinic and the Northern Illinois Women’s Center in Rockford surrendered their licenses last year. That’s two out of nine clinics with serious health and safety problems — 22 percent of the state’s pregnancy termination centers. Hardly isolated incidents.

Then there is last year’s Tonya Reaves case; she allegedly bled for more than five hours from a uterine perforation in a Planned Parenthood office in Chicago before paramedics were called, too late to save her.

Astonishingly, the state health department doesn’t regulate Planned Parenthood — the nation’s largest abortion provider.

…

Today, who can confidently say exactly how carefully abortion clinics are regulated and inspected? Where are the independent audits, newspaper investigations, legislative hearings and proposals to strengthen those regulations? The abortion industry remains one of Illinois’ most powerful lobbies, frustrating any attempt to further protect women and infants from exploitation of the likes of Gosnell and who knows who else? Whether from apathy or outright hostility against pro-life advocates, we’ve placed too much trust in abortionists and their friends to regulate themselves.

Dear Lord, the shrieks that would justifiably be coming from so many quarters if the various federal and state agencies had so utterly failed or simply refused to execute the laws on the books for fear of restricting access, or if actual gun lobbies and actual gun manufacturers and retailers protected this manner of carnage by resisting all regulation of this Constitutional right!

There *are* regulatory laws on the books in both cases that have been ignored by law enforcement.

In 2010, 15,000 felons and fugitives attempted to illegally purchase firearms. Of those 15,000, only 44 were prosecuted by Eric Holder’s Justice Department. MOAR LAWS will not close that gap.

More restrictive gun laws and expanded background checks will not take the guns out of the hands of criminals. They’re criminals. The gun may be more expensive as the market tightens, but the criminal will pay it, especially since the same law means law-abiding citizens will reliably be lightly armed sitting ducks, less likely or able to shoot back.

With abortion laws, we have the message loud and clear from the grand jury report: “Officials concluded that inspections would be ‘putting a barrier up to women’ seeking abortions.” Making sure women got their abortion was more important than making sure women were not treated worse than cattle going to the slaughter.

But for effect, let’s edit that sentence a little: “Officials concluded that an assault weapons ban would be ‘putting up a barrier to citizens’ purchasing weapons.”

Jarring, no?

Some might say “back-alley abortions” are the equivalent in my equivalency  to illegal gun purchases? Well, two things:

1) Abortion always takes an innocent human life and harms the mother even when done in optimal conditions, while guns only do so when misused and/or used illegally (i.e., there is never a time when abortion is good, while self-defense is clearly a good use of a gun).

2) Some claim that the reason women were forced to Gosnell was poor access to abortion due to poverty, the solution being expanded access to abortion, presumably through government dollars. That’s equivalent to saying, “Too many people are doing dangerous things to acquire the guns they feel they need so we need expand access to them.” No matter about people dying anyhow because, as the agency lawyer quoted in the grand jury report said, “People die.”

The question we should be asking is not, “Why were women forced to go to Gosnell?” but, “How could someone like Kermit Gosnell do what he did and get away with it for so long?”

A huge reason gun rights supporters oppose almost anything the government proposes these days is precisely because the government has proven itself incapable of such bedrock responsibilities as protecting the innocent and promoting liberty, but entirely devoted to expanding and protecting the made-up “right” to abortion and the control that same government has over everyone’s lives.

Say what you will, but resisting this topsy-turvy governance is precisely what the Second Amendment is there for.

Today I’ve got a piece from ThinkProgress.com, where they argue that “poverty” drove women to Gosnell, so rather than try to help the woman and the child have a good life together the obvious solution is to further subsidize abortions for low-income women and consider allowing them later in pregnancies. They write:

Abortions are expensive, and they get even more expensive the later into a pregnancy they occur…Seventy percent of women who have had an abortion would have done it earlier in their pregnancy if they hadn’t had to delay to get the money. By the time the funds are raised, the pregnancy can be so far along that few providers will perform an abortion, but Gosnell regularly performed late-term procedures.

You see: It’s a sob story. These poor women just wake up pregnant, apparently through no fault of their own, and they cannot afford the simple medical procedure to have the condition taken care of. As they scrape together the cash the fetus does what fetuses do: it grows. That makes the eviction more expensive. Eventually, if they are not able to raise the cash until very late in the pregnancy, they are past the legal timeframe. Now they’re stuck, “punished with a baby,” in our President’s coarse phrasing.

But there is an out: an abortion provider who will perform a late-late term abortion. After all, the women wanted to terminate the pregnancy back when it was still legal, why should their inability to raise the money quickly stop them getting what they want, just a little later?

Enter Kermit Gosnell.

He was able to charge less because he didn’t bother with all the expensive extra things like trained nurses and proper medical equipment. If he did worry about those things he would have had to charge more, and then where would these women be? That’s right: punished with a child. Gosnell is providing a much needed service after all.

The piece continues:

As social worker Jeff Deeny wrote this week in The Atlantic, he’s seen many Philadelphia-area women living in poverty struggle with this very problem. He recounted the story of Ashley, a young mother on welfare struggling with homelessness and worried that another pregnancy would throw everything she was working toward off track…

For starters, she could avoid another pregnancy by avoiding having sex. Really: it is possible, and it is the number 1 way of avoiding an unwanted pregnancy.

In his article Deeny said of Ashley,

Watching Ashley struggle with a decision that on one hand could ruin her own future but on the other ruin her relationship with her mother and her church was heart rending.

Having a child would “ruin her own future”? It would certainly alter her future, perhaps make it difficult in ways she hadn’t anticipated, but “ruin”? If given the proper support by her family, the child’s father, the community, there is no reason at all that having a child should ever “ruin” a woman’s future—that child is her child, the fruit of her womb, a new human person to love and be loved. What kind of future is not enriched by new life and love?

No one is ever punished with a child: children are an amazing gift, the assurance of a future, a new opportunity, a world of possibilities, a source of love and joy, posterity.

Children are so much more than a cost-benefit analysis, especially one done at such an emotionally charged time as a pregnancy.

More Deeny:

[I]f access to safe and legal abortions were expanded, and public funds used to provide them, there wouldn’t have been a Kermit Gosnell. The poor women upon whom Gosnell preyed would not be shunted into the black market if earlier on there had been safe, free services available to everyone in need.

(Emphasis by ThinkProgress)

Two points here: 1) ThinkProgress never even thinks about finding ways to assist mothers with crisis pregnancies to have smooth pregnancies and to keep their babies or put them up for adoption (like what the angels at AIM Women’s Center do here in Steubenville); their thought is solely on terminating the pregnancy and trying to pretend like that woman is not a mother and never had a child living in her womb.

2) ThinkProgress seems to think that the only reason women would go to a Gosnell would be because they could not afford an abortion sooner. What if they or someone with influence over them decide later in the pregnancy that the child has to go? There will always be Gosnells because there will always be demand for that thing that is just outside the arbitrary line of the law but looks remarkably similar to what the law allows.

Mother Teresa, Blessed Teresa of Calcutta, said, “Please don’t kill the child. I want the child. Please give me the child. I am willing to accept any child who would be aborted, and to give that child to a married couple who will love the child, and be loved by the child. From our children’s home in Calcutta alone, we have saved over 3,000 children from abortions. These children have brought such love and joy to their adopting parents, and have grown up so full of love and joy!”