Thread: Obama Administration: Health Insurers Must Cover Birth Control With No Copays

Obama announces ‘accommodation’ for religious institutions on contraception
By Rachel Rose Hartman | The Ticket – 5 hrs ago

Amid a backlash from many Catholics and proponents of religious liberty, President Barack Obama announced Friday that his administration will not require religious institutions like hospitals and universities to provide free contraception to their employees in their health insurance.

Speaking to reporters at the White House Friday, Obama offered a compromise that would allow women to obtain free contraception but would require them to obtain it directly from their insurance companies if their employers object to birth control because of religious beliefs.

"Whether you're a teacher or a small businesswoman or a nurse or a janitor, no woman's 's health should depend on who she is, or where she works, or how much money she makes," Obama said, calling free contraceptive care a "core principle" of his health care law, which requires that all preventive services be provided at no cost to patients.

Obama went out of his way to say that he supports freedom of religion, pointing out that one of his stints as a community organizer in Chicago was funded by a Catholic group.

"As a citizen and as a Christian I cherish this right," Obama said. "I saw that local churches did more good for a community than a government program ever could."

Planned Parenthood and the Catholic Health Association each approved of the compromise, which the White House is calling an "accommodation," in statements on Friday.

Obama's staff was deeply divided over the decision to require free contraception, with Vice President Joe Biden and Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, both Catholics, very opposed, ABC's Jake Tapper reported earlier this week.

White House officials said on a conference call with reporters Friday that the proposal would allow the government to guarantee preventive services to "nurses, teachers, janitors, mothers" who work at religious organizations, while maintaining "religious liberties."

When pressed, the White House officials--who asked to remain anonymous--did not say they are confident that the proposal will end objections from Catholic bishops. Cardinal-designate Timothy Dolan, the head of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, said in a statement Friday afternoon that Obama's announcement is "a first step in the right direction," but that he does not know all of the details yet. "We hope to work with the Administration to guarantee that Americans' consciences and our religious freedom are not harmed by these regulations," he said.

The Obama administration says insurers can provide birth control for free because contraception reduces costs for them overall by preventing expensive-to-cover pregnancies, as well as reducing the risk of ovarian cancer.

Some are skeptical of Obama's claim that insurers won't pass on their costs to religious employers. "If you believe the insurance companies will actually provide the drugs for free, you know nothing of economics," Red State blogger Erick Erickson wrote on Twitter. Sarah Kliff at the Washington Post points to a Guttmacher Institute report that estimates it costs about $21 per patient to add contraception to a plan for a year. Even if those costs were offset by a reduction in pregnancies as the Obama administration suggests, the up-front cost to insurance companies would be considerable.

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/o...170500694.html

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Setting aside the issue of the separation of church and state issues, please explain to me how this is free? Does it bother anyone that the people who are in charge actually think things are free??

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Since I can't have kids, could we get our medical insurance reduced so it doesn't cover pregnancy or birth control?

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How about mandatory birth control for ANYONE on government assistance!?

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"his health care law, which requires that all preventive services be provided at no cost to patients."

Nothing is free. Charges and fees will be hiked where ever they can

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I've read the US constitution and don't find a "right" to health care anywhere, I do see my RIGHT TO BARE ARMS though; does this now mean the Government will be providing me the weapon of my choice.

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The word mandate and freedom will never go together.

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When did we decide in this country that things should be free? Well guess what, nothing is free, if you're a taxpayer.

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Muslim groups have waivers from participating in the health care plan. as it is against their religion to buy insurance. over 1200 groups now have waivers. #$%$ is this a political economy or is it capitalism? H ow come he never tramples on the muslims religious beliefes hmmmm

Obama's birth control compromise: 'Still unacceptable'?
By The Week's Editorial Staff | The Week – 7 hrs ago

The president offers an olive branch on his new contraception law — but Catholic bishops aren't exactly thrilled by his overture

Retreat! After weeks of criticism, the Obama administration is offering an "accommodation" to U.S. Catholic bishops and other critics of a new federal rule that requires religiously affiliated hospitals, charities, and universities to provide their employees insurance with copay-free contraception. Obama's compromise, which he announced Friday, would essentially allow employers who object to contraception on religious grounds to usher employees into side deals with insurance companies, freeing religiously affiliated organizations from having to directly provide birth control coverage themselves. Will this satisfy the president's critics?

This supposed accomodation is "unacceptable": "There's a simple principle in Catholic moral theology," says Tom Crowe at Catholic Vote: "If you materially support another's grave sin and facilitate it knowingly, you are also guilty of the grave sin." What's the difference between requiring religious institutions to tell employees where to find contraception and having employers dish out the contraceptives themselves? Either way, the government is forcing Catholics to "support gravely immoral activity." This remains "a violation of the freedom of religion."

C'mon. This is a legitimate compromise: Look, says Scott Lemieux at The American Prospect. Obama's supporters should be happy: "Employees will still be able to receive contraceptive coverage at no extra cost." And the Catholic Hospital Association, for one, is "very pleased" with the religious exemption, saying that it "protects the religious liberty and conscience rights of Catholic institutions." It's only the "intransigent bishops" who aren't on board. The rest of us can see that this is a fair deal.

But who's going to pay for this? There's a big catch here, says Sarah Kliff at The Washington Post. The White House claims this is "a good deal for insurance companies," since over the long haul, covering contraceptives lowers the rate of expensive pregnancies, and thus becomes revenue neutral for insurers. But "there's a difference between 'revenue neutral' and 'free.'" It costs about $20 per person per year to cover contraceptives. "Unless drug manufacturers decide to start handing out free contraceptives, the money to buy them will have to come from somewhere." Obama's new rule puts the cost on insurers — who make their money from subscribers' premiums. It's hard to see how insurers won't pass on this new cost to the rest of us.

http://news.yahoo.com/obamas-birth-c...154100900.html

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isclaimer: I am not a Catholic nor very religious. Catholic hospitals around the world treat millions of people and many at little or no cost to the patient. Catholic hospitals get significant funding from donations from individuals and corporations. Little from the taxpayer through the government. They save thousands and thousands of lives. They make the very sick comfortable in their last days. They treat the family of the grieving with the respect and sympathy anyone would desire in the time of a lost loved one. They treat EVERY PERSON that walks or is carried through their doors regardless of their faith. Catholic hospitals are non-profit which many hate anyway. It keeps costs down and allows them to treat so many for little or no cost to the patient.
They provide a great service and the language and bigotry shown toward them is harsher on these boards than I have ever read about the most radical of the Muslims. It shocks me that so many are so uninformed about what the Catholic church does. All they remember is the priest sex issue. That's all they post. I have posted, the teachers union members are far more responsible than all the priests combined. Do the research and it will show you.

This is the Catholics today, they came for the Catholics but since I wasn't Catholci I didn't speak up....

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Compromise? If the health insurer of the employer must pay for the cervices and pills as this "compromise" says, are the insurance companies not just going to raise their fees?
Do you really think THEY will pay and not the insured in the end? Really?
I guess we now understand why Obama thinks unemployment checks create jobs and ATM's, tsunamis and kiosks caused the recession.

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You really don't get it do you? This is NOT about a woman's right to use birth control. It is about a President overstepping his authority, (once again) and imposing an unfunded mandate on a religious group. This is strictly forbidden by the Constitution. If he wants Democrats to draft a bill and secure funding then THAT is what is required by law. Obama has no authority to mandate anything to private insurers of religious groups. If you think this is a good thing, just wait until the shoe is on the other foot.

The White House Fact Sheet is riddled with doublespeak and contradiction. It states, for example, that religious employers “will not” have to pay for abortion pills, sterilization and contraception, but their “insurance companies” will.

Who pays for the insurance policy? The religious employer.

If you follow this entire issue closely, Obama has tipped his hand—at the end of the day, he will use force, coercion and ruinous fines that put faith-based charities, hospitals and schools at risk of closure, harming millions of kids, as well as the poor, sick and disabled, that they serve, in order to force obedience to Obama’s will.

Bishops to Obama: No dice
posted at 8:40 am on February 11, 2012 by Ed Morrissey

After a long day of supposed “accommodation” and discussion, the US Conference of Catholic Bishops took a close look at the supposed adjustment of the HHS mandate yesterday. Their conclusion? It represents no change at all, and the bishops will press for a “legislative solution” to Barack Obama’s mandate:
http://usccb.org/news/2012/12-026.cfm

These changes require careful moral analysis, and moreover, appear subject to some measure of change. But we note at the outset that the lack of clear protection for key stakeholders—for self-insured religious employers; for religious and secular for-profit employers; for secular non-profit employers; for religious insurers; and for individuals—is unacceptable and must be corrected. And in the case where the employee and insurer agree to add the objectionable coverage, that coverage is still provided as a part of the objecting employer’s plan, financed in the same way as the rest of the coverage offered by the objecting employer. This, too, raises serious moral concerns.

We just received information about this proposal for the first time this morning; we were not consulted in advance. Some information we have is in writing and some is oral. We will, of course, continue to press for the greatest conscience protection we can secure from the Executive Branch. But stepping away from the particulars, we note that today’s proposal continues to involve needless government intrusion in the internal governance of religious institutions, and to threaten government coercion of religious people and groups to violate their most deeply held convictions. In a nation dedicated to religious liberty as its first and founding principle, we should not be limited to negotiating within these parameters. The only complete solution to this religious liberty problem is for HHS to rescind the mandate of these objectionable services.

We will therefore continue—with no less vigor, no less sense of urgency—our efforts to correct this problem through the other two branches of government. For example, we renew our call on Congress to pass, and the Administration to sign, the Respect for Rights of Conscience Act. And we renew our call to the Catholic faithful, and to all our fellow Americans, to join together in this effort to protect religious liberty and freedom of conscience for all.

The bishops note that the Obama administration never even bothered to contact them to discover what their true objections are, and what would satisfy them. The White House simply presumed to know church business better than the bishops and offered an “accommodation” that is anything but. In fact, that sounds a lot like the process that produced this mandate in the first place.

There are two broad objections in the USCCB statement. First, they are opposed to the mandate in general for moral reasons, but that alone would probably take the form of a teaching moment for the bishops rather than a call to action. They note that the overall mandate is “unsupported in the law and remains a grave moral concern,” and that they “cannot fail to reiterate this, even as so many would focus exclusively on the question of religious liberty.” But it’s that question that animates their activism, and it’s not just the fact that these religious organizations will end up paying for these products and services either directly or indirectly — which we’ll address momentarily. The mandate forces these organizations to facilitate the use of products and services that violate their religious doctrine, under penalty of government force. It’s exactly the type of government threat from which the First Amendment was written to protect religious practice — and that included the practice of religion outside of worship spaces.

Second, supporters of the Obama administration’s mandate claim that there won’t be any cost at all to pass along from this new policy, based on this analysis from HHS itself, included in last night’s QOTD: http://aspe.hhs.gov/health/reports/2...tives/ib.shtml

The direct costs of providing contraception as part of a health insurance plan are very low and do not add more than approximately 0.5% to the premium costs per adult enrollee. Studies from three actuarial firms, Buck Consultants, PriceWaterhouseCoopers (PwC), and the Actuarial Research Corporation (ARC) have estimated the direct costs of providing contraception coverage.

However, as indicated by the empirical evidence described above, these direct estimated costs overstate the total premium cost of providing contraceptive coverage. When medical costs associated with unintended pregnancies are taken into account, including costs of prenatal care, pregnancy complications, and deliveries,the net effect on premiums is close to zero. One study author concluded, ‘The message is simple: regardless of payment mechanism or contraceptive method, contraception saves money.’

When indirect costs such as time away from work and productivity loss are considered, they further reduce the total cost to an employer.

At the same time, LifeNews quoted a Blue Cross study that showed the mandate would cost insurers — and their clients — almost $3 billion. So who’s right? It’s Blue Cross, and here’s why. Blue Cross estimated what the actual costs for providing the mandated products and services would be, while HHS projected estimates of long-term savings. In truth, no one is really sure whether those long-term savings will come to pass, but what we do know is that costs will rise immediately as insurers have to pay for the contraceptives and abortifacients for which they will get no cost-sharing from the women who use them. When those costs go up in the short term, so will premiums. If the long-term savings that HHS predicts do come to pass, all it will do will be to avoid premium hikes far down the road, but the initial impact will force insurers to raise premiums to cover these costs — and that means the religious organizations that have to pay more to cover the costs of the mandate. So yes indeed, they will have to pay for contraceptives and abortifacients despite the shell game announced by the White House yesterday.

The Obama administration’s “accommodation” was nothing more than a smoke screen intended to get rid of a bad political problem. The bishops aren’t going to let them get away with it, and that means that Obama will still have religious organizations — and not just Catholics — demanding an end to the mandate and forcing a fight over religious liberty. Don’t expect it to go on for long, because this will prove disastrous to Obama’s political support in the fall if left in its current status. I’d give it a week, perhaps less, before we see a real climbdown.

http://hotair.com/archives/2012/02/1...obama-no-dice/

Time To Admit It: The Church Has Always Been Right On Birth Control
Michael Brendan Dougherty and Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry | Feb. 8, 2012, 4:39 PM

Painting the Catholic Church as "out of touch" is like shooting fish in a barrel, what with the funny hats and gilded churches. And nothing makes it easier than the Church's stance against contraception.

Many people, (including our editor) are wondering why the Catholic Church doesn't just ditch this requirement. They note that most Catholics ignore it, and that most everyone else finds it divisive, or "out-dated." C'mon! It's the 21st century, they say! Don't they SEE that it's STUPID, they scream.

Here's the thing, though: the Catholic Church is the world's biggest and oldest organization. It has buried all of the greatest empires known to man, from the Romans to the Soviets. It has establishments literally all over the world, touching every area of human endeavor. It's given us some of the world's greatest thinkers, from Saint Augustine on down to René Girard. When it does things, it usually has a good reason. Everyone has a right to disagree, but it's not that they're a bunch of crazy old white dudes who are stuck in the Middle Ages.

So, what's going on?

The Church teaches that love, marriage, sex, and procreation are all things that belong together. That's it. But it's pretty important. And though the Church has been teaching this for 2,000 years, it's probably never been as salient as today.

Today's injunctions against birth control were re-affirmed in a 1968 document by Pope Paul VI called Humanae Vitae. He warned of four results if the widespread use of contraceptives was accepted:

1. General lowering of moral standards
2. A rise in infidelity, and illegitimacy
3. The reduction of women to objects used to satisfy men.
4. Government coercion in reproductive matters.

Does that sound familiar?

Because it sure sounds like what's been happening for the past 40 years.

As George Akerloff wrote in Slate over a decade ago,

By making the birth of the child the physical choice of the mother, the sexual revolution has made marriage and child support a social choice of the father.

Instead of two parents being responsible for the children they conceive, an expectation that was held up by social norms and by the law, we now take it for granted that neither parent is necessarily responsible for their children. Men are now considered to be fulfilling their duties merely by paying court-ordered child-support. That's a pretty dramatic lowering of standards for "fatherhood."

Today's moral lodestar

Kim Kardashian

People.com

How else are we doing since this great sexual revolution? Kim Kardashian's marriage lasted 72 days. Illegitimacy: way up. In 1960, 5.3% of all births in America were to unmarried women. By 2010, it was 40.8% [PDF]. In 1960 married families made up almost three-quarters of all households; but by the census of 2010 they accounted for just 48 percent of them. Cohabitation has increased tenfold since 1960.

And if you don't think women are being reduced to objects to satisfy men, welcome to the internet, how long have you been here? Government coercion: just look to China (or America, where a government rule on contraception coverage is the reason why we're talking about this right now).

Is this all due to the Pill? Of course not. But the idea that widely-available contraception hasn't led to dramatic societal change, or that this change has been exclusively to the good, is a much sillier notion than anything the Catholic Church teaches.

So is the notion that it's just OBVIOUSLY SILLY to get your moral cues from a venerable faith (as opposed to what? Britney Spears?).

But let's turn to another aspect of this. The reason our editor thinks Catholics shouldn't be fruitful and multiply doesn't hold up, either. The world's population, he writes, is on an "unsustainable" growth path.

The Population Bureau of the Department of Economic and Social Affairs of the United Nations sees (PDF, h/t Pax Dickinson) the rate of population growth slowing over the next decades and stabilizing around 9 billion in 2050…and holding there until 2300. (And note that the UN, which promotes birth control and abortions around the world, isn't exactly in the be-fruitful-and-multiply camp.)

More broadly, the Malthusian view of population growth has been resilient despite having been proven wrong time and time again and causing lots of unnecessary human suffering. For example, China is headed for a demographic crunch and social dislocation due to its misguided one-child policy.

Human progress is people. Everything that makes life better, from democracy to the economy to the internet to penicillin was either discovered and built by people. More people means more progress. The inventor of the cure for cancer might be someone's fourth child that they decided not to have.

So, just to sum up:

* It's a good idea for people to be fruitful and multiply; and
* Regardless of how you feel about the Church's stance on birth control, it's proven pretty prophetic.

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/time-...#ixzz1m7f4AIZw

Women Working for Religious Institutions Are Nothing More Than Incubators
Yahoo! Contributor Network By Donald Pennington Fri, Feb 10, 2012

COMMENTARY | If you're a woman who works for a religious institution -- be it a Catholic hospital or a school -- and you find yourself not ready for children, well, that's just too bad. If your boss believes the myths written down thousands of years ago by primitive, painfully ignorant desert nomads and has an imaginary friend you will not have the same level access to contraception as other American citizens. You are nothing more than a baby-making machine -- so says the church. And if our government tries to offer you the same coverage as other American citizens, you're out of luck.

The plan your company pays for doesn't see the wisdom in paying approximately $21 a year to prevent an unwanted pregnancy, as in this report from The Ticket, because their God has deemed it so. According to the same report, when President Barack Obama tried saying those religious-oriented employers were required to recognize your right to control your own reproduction, they raged. As well, Speaker of the House John Boehner did all he could to make the idea seem un-American, as also covered by The Ticket,

For those churches, President Obama isn't at war with your imaginary religion. He just wanted the same coverage available to your employees as all American women. How "Taliban-ish" of you to demand your employees have to conform to your religious beliefs, even when off the clock.

Regardless of the beliefs of any administrator or supervisor, if your employees want to prevent a pregnancy it's their choice, not yours. You only get to decide their actions on the clock. These churches don't even promote a modern-day American mentality. Shame on them.

But the religious of America will not be dismayed. In the video shared on another post from The Ticket, we have a commenter saying "He doesn't understand where people are coming from," in regard to contraception.

Am I the only one who remembers the flak President Obama got for being associated with the ultra-Christian Jeremiah Wright? He was the preacher famous for denouncing America. So for those who say President Obama has no Christian basis, I say you're ridiculous.

Employers -- of any religious persuasion -- have a right to their own personal religious beliefs -- and that's it.

http://news.yahoo.com/women-working-...223800416.html

comments

Ok, even though this was relatively short I was unable to finish reading it. Here are some logical failures. Contraception costs $21 dollars a year, so employers not providing this coverage to employees is a denial of rights. Fail. If it costs 21 a year the employee can purchase it themselves. Number 2. An employer (or insurance plan) deciding what health benefits it wishes to offer its employees (or covered members) is an imposition of its morality on others and a denial of their rights. Fail. Private contracts can be entered into by private concerns. Number 3. Government dictating the terms of a private contract is permissable. Fail, in this matter (though not in all matters, I am aware) government dictating the terms of a private contract is unConstitutional. What I am so puzzled by is that people are so blinded here. Don't you realize this unConstitutional decree by the government means the end of your liberty? I guess the dumbing down of our schools has left people completely unarmed intellectually in these matters. They just see the possibility that possible censure is being passed on their sexual practices by someone somewhere somehow and they march blindly to their own enslavement.

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Donald, sorry Sanger and her vision missed your family.

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Question for Pennington: What were women before the birth control pill was invented?

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The militant atheist author would have #$%$ his pants out of fear before typing this article up had he thought of referring to Islam

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What a ridiculous piece of tripe - none of these employers are preventing their workers from getting these services - they are just refusing to pay for them. What garbage - if these women want to get these things - they can pay for them - they should have money, as they are employed. Should my employer pay for my coffee so I don't have to suffer from sleepiness - or cigarettes so I don't have to suffer from nicotine withdrawal? Don't make this about rights of the employee.
No one should be forced to pay for "treatment" for a completely avoidable situation.

Jehovah witnesses do not use blood products because it is against their beliefs. They are not screaming about blood and its components being covered.

They do not charge you for a transfusion unless you recieve one. This would force everyone to pay for services wehter they use them or not. I have had a tubal and my DH as well... but I am still required to pay for BC and maternity coverage. Can't refuse it ... it is part of the package... have to pay for it regardless. Now this will force everyone to pay for this coverage ... what happened to "choose your own coverage" we were promised ?? Just anoth politicians' promis. And I promise you, it is not JUST the Catholic church protesting this ... but they will get the most media coverage ( and the most negative coverage as well. )

With the Supreme Court hearing the Obamacare case this spring, it’s unlikely we’ll see the administration admitting that swaths of the law were not thought through very well. However, we will see attempts to make the public think the administration is willing to compromise on certain aspects of the law’s implementation. These give-and-takes are carefully calculated so they result in… the exact same law being implemented. But as far as concessions go, even the most merciful and caring administration in history has to draw the line somewhere.

From Fox News: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012...-is-done-deal/

Despite renewed statements of concern by Catholic leaders, the Obama administration is done negotiating and will finalize its plan requiring insurance companies to provide free contraception to women working and studying at religious institutions, President Obama’s chief of staff said Sunday.

Jacob Lew told “Fox News Sunday” that the compromise offered last week to address objections by the Catholic Church is clear and consistent with the president’s “very deep belief that a woman has a right to all forms of preventive health care, including contraception.”

“We have set out our policy,” Lew said. “We are going to finalize it in the final rules, but I think what the president announced on Friday is a balanced approach that meets the concerns raised both in terms of access to health care and in terms of protecting religious liberties, and we think that’s the right approach.”

Lost in the mix here seems to be the point that the administration doesn’t have the authority to do any of this in the first place, which is why it’s important reject the entire premise and not validate the effort by accepting any “revised compromise.” Assume somebody says they’re going to take four of my cookies, and I say they have no right to do that. Then they say they’re willing to compromise and only take two cookies, and I reluctantly agree. Either way I’ve admitted that they have a right to reach into my cookie jar, so before I know it there won’t be any cookies left… at which point I’ll be told it was for my own good because I needed to lose a few pounds anyway.

Obama telegraphed where he’d be coming from on this (and related) issues in a 2008 speech making it clear which side must come out on top in a dispute between the State and the Church in order for society as a whole to be better off: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...wzy-vKaFI#t=0s

Freedom Under Attack

http://governmentgonewild.org/freedomunderattack

When I first heard about the administration requiring Catholic organizations to provide services that were against their religious beliefs, I considered it an attack against the religion and wrote an article about it. Since then, I have thought more about the issue. I watched a talk show on TV where a Catholic priest and a Protestant minister gave their views on the subject. The minister really tweaked my thought process when she said that this issue was not about religion but about healthcare. That was a profound statement and it exposes what is in store for our country if ObamaCare is allowed to stand. Since then, I have heard others use the same argument that this is not about religion but about the health of women.

Think about it. What other actions do we do or don’t do that could be considered to have an impact on our health? What we eat, how much we weigh, what we drive, what temperature we set in our homes, what and how much we drink, and do we exercise are topics that immediately surface. Much like the “commerce clause” in our Constitution, nearly everything that the government wants to do, it somehow determines that the commerce clause applies and thus it has the authority. The same will apply with the healthcare law.

Remember that the then Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi said that we had to pass the bill to discover what was in it. Since that time, we have learned about many of the hidden aspects in the law and much of it is being pored over by bureaucrats as they determine what certain aspects mean and how they are going to implement them. Thus we have this first attack demanding that church affiliates must provide services that they deem against their religion. Freedom of religion as outlined in the First Amendment does not seem to bother those who are seeking more and more power.

Remember that Obamacare assumes one seventh of our economy and with that much power and control. Each time the government assumes more power, the people lose more freedom. Freedom lost is rarely ever regained.

~ Colonel Don Myers

USMC (ret.)


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It has NEVER been about healthcare. It’s about taking TOTAL CONTROL over the American People. You either work in the healthcare field or are a patient or both. Ronald Reagan said in 1961: “One of the traditional methods of imposing statism or socialism on a people has been by way of medicine. It’s very easy to disguise a medical program as a humanitarian project. Most people are a little reluctant to oppose anything that suggests medical care for people who possibly can’t afford it”. We miss you Ronnie, and your WISDOM.

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It is about freedom, not about healthcare. We do not automatically deserve to have our insurance provided for us by an employer. That is a benefit that is offered to us in lieu of more money. Because the company can purchase insurance in bulk, this service costs them less to offer to employees than it would cost the employee to purchase for themselves. No employer should have to offer insurance to an employee that violates the employer’s moral values. If the employee desires this coverage anyway, the employee should purchase their own supplemental rider to provide it for themselves.

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This “New” mandate is really about the power being used by our leadership be it the President, the Senate or Congress. f we have to have it passed in order to know what the new law is, then we can be assured that someone wants MORE power over the people like a dictator has.

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Connie Carter: You missed the whole point of the above article: If the Gov’t can demand that “religious people” give up a belief held for 2,000 years, in order to obey their rules, then, they can demand ANYTHING from you in the name of “HealthCare”!! They may outlaw M&M’s, all fast food, tell you that you don’t need that pace-maker, just take a pain pill, as Obama famously told a lady about her mother…they can twist things around to justify practically ANYTHING in the name of “It is good for your health.” They could outlaw Driving, it’s better to Walk, isn’t it?! Better Health! Wake up and smell the coffee, before they outlaw it!

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It’s not about women’s health, it’s about paying for something that can be interpreted as elective. No one is saying you have to take birth control or that you can’t take it if YOU pay for it yourself. I really believe people think this bill is going to be totally paid for by the gov’t. And they don’t equate the taxpayer fuels the gov’t. We will all be paying more and getting less for it.

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I don’t think it is about healthcare at all. It is about the government ( Obama) wanting to control every aspect of our lives. He has a welfare mind and he wants everybody else to have one. I , myself, am so tired of this wrangling between the democrats and republicans. They should all do what is right for everyone, not their party. People will soon tire of this and rise up and there will be hell for all.

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The 2012 election had been gearing up to be one about the economy and jobs. Jobs, jobs. In that regard, the Obama administration was desperate to change the subject. The irony is, that the economy may be on the rebound, in spite of the administration’s poor policies. But in their effort to divert attention from the economy with their ruling on compelled abortion on demand, they have reopened the glaring tyranny of Obamacare, that is now clearly apparent to all Americans, which is a viscous attack not just on our freedom of religion, a founding principle grounded in our constitution, but on freedom itself.

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If you are willing to give up what little freedom the government hasn’t taken away yet, then it is about Health Care, not the loss of Religious Freedom. Still haven’t figured out how “elective” birth control is being considered a health issue unless you are willing to let the government in on your decision, thereby giving up a little more of that liberty and freedom.

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I love the way the left makes it out to be that if the Church doesn’t provide this coverage, then women will have no where else to go!! WRONG!! They have never been given this coverage, and they have been surviving. If someone doesn’t like the way the coverage is at their current employer, they can find another job. There are other places to get Contraceptives. You are right to say that once a freedom is lost, it is rarely regained.

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it’s about the government controlling our lives! We are supposed to be a free country but if they tell you that they’re doing it under the guise of helping provide a service, it should be voluntary and NOT mandantory. What do think a mandate is!

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Obama is without a doubt moving this country toward being a nation of obedient cattle. He has no respect for freedom….of health, religion, jobs, financial, and now reproductive. He wants us to all do and believe the same things. Obama is a danger to our country in do many ways..by not enforcing illegal immigration laws, giving our money away to his tune,not ours.

I agree that freedom lost is rarely ever regained. Also, is you don’t use it, you lose it. There are so many ways the “Washington” group are stealing from the people who elected them. Our money should not be going to other countries for other than humanitarian relief. Not should the congress be paving their future on our money, never using social secutiry, or paying for their health care. It is not just the congress, but federal employees as a whole.