The New Republic

Seems like extraordinary overreach from Picarello. I wonder if they see that as a bargaining position, or a line in the sand. What a despicable organization the conference of catholic bishops is, holding vastly disproportionate influence over American life due to the fig leaf the catholic church offers right-wing politicians looking for a stick to poke in the eye of Democrats.

- misterpibb

February 9, 2012 at 12:24am

Oh for heaven's sake. How come the "small government people" are fine with the "big church"? Anyway, I really thought we'd pretty much agreed that contraception is our private business, #1; and #2, makes sense, especially given both economic considerations and the fact that we have SEVEN BILLION people on this planet already? Finally. Just because G*d supposedly smote some guy back in the days of the dinosaurs for "spilling his seed" the Church doesn't believe in family planning? Or what?

- Sophia

February 9, 2012 at 2:25am

"And somehow I suspect the White House may soon be ordering some Taco Bell chalupas to celebrate." Y'all suspect that as well ?? And y'all know why. Push on BHO and he meets you 3/4 of the way-- and then looks for further compromise. The result is a Progressive disaster. Can you say stimulus package, health care, financial reform, BP, debt ceiling extension..../. And BHO never loudly, much less effectively, defends a Progressive starting position. What you get is a Dem making some Progressive noises that ALWAYS mollifies the Progressive wusses and then BHO adopts and defends rightist policies. And y'all think that re-electing this smurf is SO much better than a Repub president?? With a Repub House and Senate?? Good Luck with That. My strong suspicion is that the only way to get Progressives to any concerted and effective action -- and political control--is via initial total loss of control of all branches of government.

- drofnats1

February 9, 2012 at 5:59am

Funny, I argued just this point on Kathleen Parker’s comment string earlier this week. And I thought I was being funny. If the Catholic Church got into the pizza business and bought up all the pizza chains in the US thus establishing a pepperoni monopoly would free delivery in 30 minutes or less now be considered a form of "worship?" Would the Catholic bishops therefore consider themselves victims of religious persecution if they had to pay for the birth control of their delivery boys and girls? Apparently so. But here is the issue: Once the Church leaves the sanctuary of the church and starts opening businesses alongside other secular institutions in the market like hospitals, schools or even pizza parlors it loses the ability to substitute its values for the values of the democracy by creating its own set of rules within those big pieces of our society the Church has carved out for itself with its money. A hospital is not a church. A school is not a church. A pizza parlor is not a church. And for government to regulate a Catholic pizza parlor in exactly the same way as a Jewish pizza parlor (Kosher of course) is not an attack on the religious freedoms we enjoy under the First Amendment. Conservatives are trying to confound us with another of their easy to understand but misleading and simplistic syllogisms: Church says birth control wrong. Church employers told they must provide birth control coverage anyway like all employers. Ergo government is attacking religious liberty. Simple but wrong because it ignores the fact that all of us wear many hats in life, and that when the Church steps outside the sanctuary of the church to run hospitals, schools and other businesses it is no long a Church engaged in "worship" but an employer running a business. And these are businesses, we must remember, that get government assistance just like every other business, so the Church leadership wants to have it both ways. Accommodating everyone's beliefs as much as possible is part of the challenge of living in a complex society like ours and I am sure some arrangement can be found that gives women access to birth control while preventing the priesthood from feeling complicit in sin. But one of the prices we pay for a democratic society like ours is that we forfeit the right to make non-negotiable demands like the one the Church is making here when it says the antiquated beliefs on birth control that only a celibate and cloistered priesthood subscribe to must – in the name of RELIGIOUS LIBERTY -- take precedence over all other considerations including the health care needs and wants of 99% of women..

- TedFrier

February 9, 2012 at 7:25am

What's missing in Cohn's comment and now in MacGillis's comment is context, the context in which the Administration adopted the rquirement that health insurance cover birth control. And what is the context: minimum standards for health insurance, one of the major achievements of ACA. For those with employer-provided health insurance, you have the HR experts who, in collaboration (or negotiation) with the insurer, design insurance coverage that covers most health risks and with limits of coverage that have some relation to cost for them. In the individual insurance market there are no experts to help the insured pick a policy that he can afford and with coverage and limits that correlate to risks and costs. What are the chances that I may contract leukemia, and what are the likely treatments and costs if I do? The insured is at a total disadvantage when considering the many and varied options offered by insurers. ACA is intended to provide the minimum standards so that the insured has some expert advice on his side. Do I need guidance about whether contraceptives should be covered and the costs I may incur if I use them? What makes this ridiculous is that there are huge battles yet to come, as the Administration and insurers attempt to craft the minimum standards for policies, so that insureds in the individual market can be reasonably confident that the policy the insured chooses has coverage and limits that bear some relation to risks and costs. By picking a fight with the Catholics over birth control, that battle with the insurers over minimum standards was made much more difficult because it puts the Administration on the defensive when considering such illnesses as cancer, diabetes, ALS, and so on.

- rayward

February 9, 2012 at 7:28am

Ted and rayward begin to articulate the Progressive rationale that the BHO administration neglects, avoids, whatever.

- drofnats1

February 9, 2012 at 7:33am

There is another side to this dispute that is not getting much attention. If the Obama administration invaded the sanctuary of the Church and of the free exercise of religion with its order on birth control then the Catholic Church hierarchy invaded the precincts of politics on this issue a long time ago. The Church has a very long history here of opposing access to birth control for ALL Americans, and not just Catholic ones. It's opposition is why anti-contraception laws stayed on the books as long as they did, until struck down by the Court in 1965. The Church hierarchy does not view itself as merely the leadership of the Catholic Church alone but as stewards of our society and custodians of our culture. And so if the Catholic Church could have its way today I am quite sure that no one – neither Catholics nor non-Catholics -- would have access to birth control. We'd all be better people, the bishops say -- more responsible and less selfish -- if unprotected sex with the possibility of conception was the only kind of sex we could have. In that way, say the bishops, we would see that sex should be for procreation not recreation. Rick Santorum says as much openly out there on the stump when he worries out loud about sex becoming "deconstructed to the point where it's simply pleasure." Consequently, Santorum believes it is perfectly permissible for states to outlaw the sale or distribution of birth control so as to promote “family values” within their borders. And Santorum, it should be remembered, is not running to become Vicar of Christ but President of the United States. Yet, he is running as THE Catholic candidate for president as he wages a conspicuously Catholic campaign whose major themes -- “family, faith and freedom” -- are torn directly from the pages of conservative Catholic paternalism. Indeed, the Washington Post’s E.J. Dionne (a Catholic himself) says about the candidate who just won the last three Republican primaries that Santorum’s Catholicism “is the most important thing about him.” The Catholic Church knows that, politically, it could never get a bill through Congress to re-criminalize birth control. So, by exploiting the present controversy with President Obama the Church leadership hopes to do the next best thing, which is: To humble and humiliate another secular leader by showing him who is boss as the Church has done many times in its past while, at the same time, making a value statement by depriving Catholics and non-Catholics who work for Church businesses from having easy access to birth control. At the end of the day, this conflict with the President is the culture-shaping political agenda the Catholic bishops hope to sneak through underneath the protective camouflage of "religious freedom."

- TedFrier

February 9, 2012 at 7:40am

What a huge, stupid, distraction from the real issues of the day these Bishops have foisted upon us. And make no mistake, they have no position worthy of note here. The Bishops are wrong on every count. There is no issue of religious conscience - no Catholic will be forced to use contraception by this law. The church remains as free to preach it's Neanderthal sexual mores as they ever where. The law specifically exempts churches themselves, so the government is in no way interfering with the operation of a religious organization. The organizations which are affected are charities, not churches, and they are in most cases the beneficiaries of very significant public underwriting and subsidy, from Pell grants to Medicaid and Medicare, and to, ulitmately, the very subsidies the ACA establishes. They are indistinguishable in their operation, modulo some explicit crucifixes on the wall and perhaps one or two classes in a core curriculum, from their secular counterparts (I've been hopsitals, Catholic, Protestant, government and private - they are not particular distinguishable in what they do or how they do it; ditto Notre Dame vs Purdue). The moral imperatives that causes the church to be involved in these endeavors are not particularly Catholic imperatives, but rather the common currency of many religious and secular helping organizations. The church's (admirable) commitment to be in these businesses in their near-secular form is a commitment to engage society in its broadest needs (health care and education) and means (the use of secular innovation and subsidies, and the employment of non-Catholic personnel), and so must these institutions accept society's broader messiness - if they wish not to, they may always make over their institutions into true arms of the church. Nor is the Bishop's argument consistent even with the teachings of its supposed founder, who taught us to "Render unto Caesar those things which are Caesar's" in a case not particularly dissimilar to the one at hand, notwithstanding the two millenia separating it. Paul, of course, further amplified this teaching in Romans. (Neither of them mentions contraception as a sin, by the way) We are all required to pay in the interest of the "common" part of that "common defence and general welfare" mentioned in our founding documents for things we do not personally consider right. Finally, and not least, the Catholic Church here is simply wrong on the moral merits of their argument. Access to safe and effective contraception is a undisputed good for all of society, and one of the foundations of the success of women's equality in this country. It approaches and ought to be a universal right. It is not at all irrelevant to point out in this respect that a majority of the Catholic Church's membership in this country disagree in pragmatic terms with the Bishop's teachings on the subject of access to contraception, and demonstrate this by routinely using it. The Bishops are in this fight for their own perceived moral purity, and their obeisance to Rome, not for their membership, who have in large numbers rejected this teaching of the Church. That is important, because it distinguishes their case from that of, say, the Amish, who are exempted from certain secular rules (public education through age 18) and taxes (such as Social Security), but whose members actually live out the precepts for which they are exempted (by running their own schools, and caring for their own elderly entirely out of their own pockets). It is hypocritical, to say the least, for Bishops to stand on an argument with common government, which they have lost with their own membership. I am unsure of the political optics of this for Obama, but there is no question whatever that he is absolutely right on the moral and legal position as originally taken.

- IowaBeauty

February 9, 2012 at 8:15am

If the medical community advocates that contraception planning is part of health care, then my only question is whether requiring Catholic organizations to provide contraceptive health care is an imposition on religious freedom in an area where the practice of a particular religious belief can injure another party.

- Nusholtz

February 9, 2012 at 8:18am

Dro, you're such a dumbass. Obama has yet to compromise on this. Not only did this brouhaha start because Obama stood fast on contraception coverage, but by all accounts, EVEN BILL OREILLY'S, he has only gone so far as being willing to listen to the Church's arguments. So take your "meet's you 3/4th's" and shove it 3/4th's, because you're every bit as bad as the whiny, liberal kvetchers who rolled over the minute a Republican declared "overreach".

And I stand by what I commented yesterday. Catholic teaching only goes to the point of using contraception, but this is an issue of complying with "Caesar's" law, in offering health care insurance that covers the cost of these goods. On covering the cost, the best argument the Catholic Church has is that they don't want to because they consider the use of contraception morally reprehensible, which is all fine and good, but does not mitigate their responsibility to comply with the law.

I was watching Bill-O last night, on the TV in the lounge area of the locker room at my gym, so not by design, and he had a Catholic priest and a Universalist priest squaring off. The Catholic priest talked a good game initially, but couldn't stop trying to argue that this law would force a Catholic hospital to provide abortive services, which it doesn't. And the Universalist totally called him on it. At which point, Bill went to break and ended the segment, probably because he didn't want to see the Catholic priest get rolled any harder.

Superficially, this is fertile ground for Presidential overreach, and Obama's been doing so well the last month or so, so I guess it's only natural for the liberal kvetching class to assume they will lose the battle and start roll over procedures early, and then complain when Obama does not (or in Dro's case, assume he has, despite evidence to the contrary). But this is a total win for Obama; it has nothing to do with forcing anyone to buy a condom or get an abortion, and everything to do with enabling everyone to have a choice in the matter, no matter how loudly the other side claims otherwise.

- GSpinks

February 9, 2012 at 8:35am

GS, how about laying off the insult? Drof did not comment on other posters. There is no reason for him to be the object of this sort of thing (which we have quite enough of in the less civilized precincts of these boards). Your comments are, as always, quite worthy on their own. You don't need this to make your point.

- roidubouloi

February 9, 2012 at 8:55am

It is also important to remember that just prior to siding with HHS on its decision to require Catholic affiliated businesses to provide this coverage, Obama thrilled religious family values conservatives when he overturned a decision by the FDA to make the Plan B morning after pill available over the counter to those under 17 without parental or doctors permission. The President took a hit with his liberal base for this but it was a show of sensitivity for religious sensibilities, for which he gets no credit with Catholic bishops who, I suspect, had their own political reasons for wanting a high profile fight with the president in order to reinforce their flagging political clout.

- TedFrier

February 9, 2012 at 8:55am

The more I hear about this the more I think that apart from being good policy, this was the administration tying up the likely gop nominee in knots. Check out Rush Limbaugh's post this am on how Romney "flip flopped on the morning after pill and on the Catholic Church." Hold your nose while reading it - this is Rush, after all - but still it highlights this administration's power in throwing a monkey wrench into the already misfiring gop machine.

- Tristan

February 9, 2012 at 10:11am

Wager: the taco bell comment appears tonight on Rachel Maddow, source (MacGillis) unacknowledged.

- timteeter

February 9, 2012 at 10:14am

I wish Obama Co would stand up to these bullies on this, but something tells me they will cave. It does need to be said that a Catholic bishops having the gall to lecture anyone on anything insults me as an American and as a decent human being. Religious freedom, my arse - by their own logic there is no reason that clitorectomies shouldn't be perfectly legal (which they probably secretly support anyway, the old psychotic queens). I miss Christopher Hitchens this morning. I'm not a fan of the Catholic Church, to put it mildly - Catholic people are wonderful, the Church? A malevolent criminal enterprise, utterly demonic.

- WandreyCer

February 9, 2012 at 10:36am

You're right Roid. It would seem my patience was thin this morning. I could have been much more civil in addressing their post; I'll own that and apologize.

- GSpinks

February 9, 2012 at 10:50am

Time for Democrats to roll out the argument that Health insurance has to be separate and apart from employment, end the deduction that businesses get and ramp up state run insurance exchanges. What can Republicans say? That businesses deserve the right to meddle into their employees private health decisions? Make this the issue. Tell that asshole Picarello that no business should have the right to dictate to their employees their own religious preferences in health care. And it is laughable to say that Taco bell is going to provide health care to their minimum wage employees. And while Dems are at it they can also pitch for the Public option. Tell Republicans that the administration will support this exemption if those employees can access the public option on their own to make up their own health care choices. Give them a choice. And watch Repubicans dissemble.

- blackton

February 9, 2012 at 10:56am

Yes, that's an overreach on policy, but I doubt that becomes the Catholic Church's new line in the sand--or that any of the GOP candidates helping to push this adopt that position. If the bishops realize they are overreaching, it'll be easy enough to pull back to the simpler argument about officially Catholic institutions.

- polcereal

February 9, 2012 at 10:58am

I keep staring at the link on the main page: "Do Catholic Bishops Want to Take Away Everyone's Birth Control? "...D'uh! Of course they do. Their only mistake here was saying it out loud while everyone was paying attention. Oops!

Good call, Blackton. But not too soon, Obama stands to collect a lot of political capital on this issue. As soon as Republicans realize they're going to lose, Fox News will switch gears and pretend it never happened, like they usually do. Perhaps wait for them to try and mount a counter strike, perhaps by defending this overreach by the Catholics?

- GSpinks

February 9, 2012 at 11:52am

These are the same Catholic bishops that protected child molesters in their ranks, correct? Yes, they have a lot of moral authority.

- tmmats

February 9, 2012 at 12:16pm

Nicely done, Roid. Excellent acceptance, GSpinks.

- Nusholtz

February 9, 2012 at 12:20pm

Thanks, GS. There is no person bigger than one who will admit a mistake and accept responsibility. A singular contribution to the dialogue here.

- roidubouloi

February 9, 2012 at 1:09pm

Well, all due respect to Spinks and Roid, but I have to say, I understand the feeling that animated the response to drofnats. It doesn't matter what Obama does or doesn't do, there's an assumption he's going to cave and/or betray his true conservative colors and betray us all. It's a level of paranoia worthy of the far lunatic fringe of the tea party. Whether we want to be in the business of insults or name calling, drofnat's post got more respect than it deserved.

- miceelf

February 9, 2012 at 1:49pm

Of course removing the requirement from all employers is what this is about and has always been about. I've been appalled at the naive commentary from "liberal" Catholics that failed to grasp this reality. If the Catholics are going to be exempt, everyone will have to be exempt. It's true that the Catholic Church is the only religious entity with an historically long, adamant and CODIFIED objection to contraception, but how can the government allow an exemption for them without allowing an exemption for those many religious practioners who believe in a personal God and direct, personal guidance. I'm an employer, if I am "born again" and inspired, by what I believe is God's direct intercession to deny reproductive insurance coverage to my employees, how can the government stop me if it has carved out a religious exemption for ANY employer? Can I be inspired to stop contributing to Social Security and Medicare, to disability and unemployment benefits as a matter of "conscience," too? At issue here really isn't employers' freedom of conscience, but that employees'. Should the government support an employer's efforts, through financial coersion, to force employees' to follow their (the employer's) religious dictates? And, of course, also at issue is the governments ability to set rules in the workplace.

- esmense

February 9, 2012 at 2:05pm

Has anyone checked into Chick-fil-a's policies here? They seem the closest thing out there now to the hypothetical church-run pizza chain someone tossed out there above.

- cspencef

February 9, 2012 at 3:20pm

micelf, I don't know how much respect drof's post did or did not get, and I think it is no holds barred as to anything addressed to the content of his post. I just don't think that posters, as opposed to posts, are a proper subject matter here. Granted sometimes that line can be fuzzy, but I don't think it was here. Although the law of libel is not directly applicable for many reasons, I think you can discern the line if, hypothetically, you consider a comment about a person as a factual claim. If it were untrue about an identified person, it would be libelous. Any remark that is not capable so to be transmuted into libel might be offensive to some or all, but I wouldn't take issue with the propriety of making it, only with its content. _________________ Upon reflection, I think that any exception for the Catholic Church in its capacity as an employer, not within the confines of the church itself, in order to accommodate church doctrine would be an unconstitutional violation of the Establishment Clause. If the church does not want to abide by laws of general applicability to employment, it needs to devolve its business enterprises into independent charities and get out of business.

- roidubouloi

February 9, 2012 at 5:01pm

Pick on Dro all you want but he has a point. Like this: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/10/obama-birth-control_n_1267677.html Not a complete cave but it does follow a pattern.

- tmmats

February 10, 2012 at 10:50am

tmmats. Quite correct. Others will not admit it, but after much was blogged to the contrary above, the BHO partial cave just occurred.. Not a complete cave, but the pattern continues. And the game on this issue is not over. Does any one remember how the stimulus package evolved?? BP?? Financial reform?? Health care?? Extension of Bush Tax cuts?? Debt extension debates?? And how BHO's evolving position started out versus ended up?? ALWAYS in the same direction (And don't give me BS about political necessity). This dumbass may yet be be wrong on this issue, but was right from early on once discerning the pattern on each of the issues above. Whereas so many nondumbass BHO accolytes were wrong on how each issue would evolve after decrying this dumbass-- but those posts go down the same memory hole that stores a lot of Fox News predictions. My intent indeed is to convince deluded nondumbasses to be realistic dumbasses. Enough converted to dumbassery [the donkey is iconic in that respect] and the Dems and this country may yet have a Progressive future-- in their time if not in mine. The giggles you hear will be from a keyboard warmed up in Hell.

- drofnats1

February 10, 2012 at 4:53pm

I'm not feeling the outrage here; the idea that my private health insurance, paid for by my employer, should cover my condoms, pills or other flavours of my lifestyle choice is a bit bizarre. It's hardly essential health cover. Certainly no business of the governments either.

- IggyPop

February 10, 2012 at 4:57pm

IggyPop. I'm sure all above, especially Iowa Beauty and Sophia, are in full agreement. This dumbass disagrees. I know the Health Industry, and private insurers will no way agree-- or end up providing contraception for free. All of you perhaps save one (tmmats) I presume buy BHO's argument given below from Citizen Cohn's column. This dumbass again disagrees. I'd be delighted to take bets. Sooner or later I'll lose one. "The White House says this is possible because, overall, contraception saves money. That appears to be true. Independent analysts have found that the upfront costs of providing birth control are less than the long-term costs of prenatal and maternity care. In theory, this means insurers could handle the cost of contraception without drawing extra employer funds. Theory and practice are different things, of course. Birth control may save money over the long run, but the drug makers and doctors providing it will still charge fees. How will insurers pay those fees? The Washington Post's Sarah Kliff gets at the potential glitch here: The catch here is that there’s a difference between “revenue neutral” and “free.” By one report’s measure, it costs about $21.40 to add birth control, IUDs and other contraceptives to an insurance plan. Those costs may be offset by a reduction in pregnancies. But unless drug manufacturers decide to start handing out free contraceptives, the money to buy them will have to come from somewhere."

- drofnats1

February 10, 2012 at 5:08pm

"Independent analysts have found that the upfront costs of providing birth control are less than the long-term costs of prenatal and maternity care." Independent analysts found out what about my private life? From this distance, that's scary Big Brother stuff. Maybe it's because I come from a country where you don't expect other people to contribute to your condoms but then again abortion is illegal here and only recently could you get divorced. You really should buy your own condoms and by doing so you're not giving the finger to your employer, that's a bonus. O'bama needs to tell these pressure groups where to go.

- IggyPop

February 10, 2012 at 5:17pm

Iggy, I think the point is not so much the exciting stuff that goes on in the Irish Midlands after the sun goes down, but to what extent a religious consideration on the employer's part can be seen as invalidating an otherwise legal health care contract that sets out certain rights and responsibilities for both insurance company and policyholder. Should the employer be able to muscle in on this relationship and declare certain coverage unacceptable for his employees? It's not exactly going to come up in a similar fashion in every other country, mainly because the employer-carried health care model is an American eccentricity.

- ironyroad

February 10, 2012 at 6:00pm

But that's not entirely true Iron,y regarding this being a parochial issue. The vast majority of people here contribute to a private health care plan and even the most luxurious plan doesn't include contraception. Surely, your contraception or lack thereof, is a private matter, mutually exclusive from any group contribution? I'm no fan of the Catholic Church, Wandrey has it spot on: A movement for good perverted beyond redemption, ironically enough, but maybe they have a point. (Midland exciting stuff after the sun goes down, Irony? That's not a good image. How do you expect me to sleep after that?)

- IggyPop

February 10, 2012 at 6:22pm

Meant the employer health care model is not parochial, Irony. Clearly, the issue/news cycle is very American.

- IggyPop

February 10, 2012 at 6:29pm