Why Stupak Is Wrong
The Senate bill doesn't fund abortions. Here's why he thinks it does.
By Timothy Noah
Slate.com
Posted Thursday, March 4, 2010
A central puzzle of the health reform debate is why Rep. Bart Stupak, D-Mich., keeps saying that the Senate-passed bill allows taxpayer dollars to be spent on abortions. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops says it, too. This dispute concerns (or at least pretends to concern) matters of fact, not belief. The question of whether the government funds a given medical procedure is not like the question of whether human life begins at conception. It's empirical, not ideological. And Stupak happens to be wrong.
Stupak's and the bishops' claim is important because abortion is the single likeliest issue to scuttle the bill. Stupak says that "at least" 12 pro-life House members who previously voted aye on health reform, including himself, will vote against President Obama's package, which is based on the Senate bill, unless it contains abortion language that he inserted into the House bill. The trouble is, Stupak's language can't be shoehorned into President Obama's package, because it's nonbudgetary and therefore ineligible for inclusion in a budget reconciliation bill. Republican Scott Brown's Massachusetts Senate victory made reconciliation the only possible vehicle for passing health care reform.
If House Speaker Nancy Pelosi loses a dozen pro-life votes, then health care reform will fail. Already health reform's five-vote House victory margin in November is down to three due to the resignations of three representatives and the death of a fourth. Take away just Stupak and Rep. Joseph Cao of Louisiana (the only Republican who voted aye, who is similarly threatening an abortion-based nay vote), and health reform lacks even that narrow majority. Pelosi may pick up a few Democrats who voted against the bill last time, but it's extremely doubtful that she can pick up 11, which is what she'd need to compensate for losing 12. (That's before we even consider possible attrition among Blue Dog Democrats who voted aye last time, or the possible resignation of the pro-reform Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., who's in hot water for breaking the House gift rule and just gave up the chairmanship of the House ways and means committee.)
Given these stakes, it's worth making some effort to find out what led Stupak and the bishops to think that health reform would spend federal funds on abortion.
"If you go to Page 2069 through Page 2078 [of the Senate bill]," Stupak told George Stephanopoulos on March 4 on Good Morning America, "you will find in there the federal government would directly subsidize abortions, plus every enrollee in the Office of Personnel Management-enrolled plan, every enrollee has to pay a minimum of one dollar per month toward reproductive rights, which includes abortions." Stupak is here referring to the exchanges created under health reform and to a nonprofit plan managed by the Office of Personnel Management that would be sold through the exchanges. The latter was a consolation prize to supporters of a public-option government health insurance program that didn't make it into the bill.
(Continued here.)
By Timothy Noah
Slate.com
Posted Thursday, March 4, 2010
A central puzzle of the health reform debate is why Rep. Bart Stupak, D-Mich., keeps saying that the Senate-passed bill allows taxpayer dollars to be spent on abortions. The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops says it, too. This dispute concerns (or at least pretends to concern) matters of fact, not belief. The question of whether the government funds a given medical procedure is not like the question of whether human life begins at conception. It's empirical, not ideological. And Stupak happens to be wrong.
Stupak's and the bishops' claim is important because abortion is the single likeliest issue to scuttle the bill. Stupak says that "at least" 12 pro-life House members who previously voted aye on health reform, including himself, will vote against President Obama's package, which is based on the Senate bill, unless it contains abortion language that he inserted into the House bill. The trouble is, Stupak's language can't be shoehorned into President Obama's package, because it's nonbudgetary and therefore ineligible for inclusion in a budget reconciliation bill. Republican Scott Brown's Massachusetts Senate victory made reconciliation the only possible vehicle for passing health care reform.
If House Speaker Nancy Pelosi loses a dozen pro-life votes, then health care reform will fail. Already health reform's five-vote House victory margin in November is down to three due to the resignations of three representatives and the death of a fourth. Take away just Stupak and Rep. Joseph Cao of Louisiana (the only Republican who voted aye, who is similarly threatening an abortion-based nay vote), and health reform lacks even that narrow majority. Pelosi may pick up a few Democrats who voted against the bill last time, but it's extremely doubtful that she can pick up 11, which is what she'd need to compensate for losing 12. (That's before we even consider possible attrition among Blue Dog Democrats who voted aye last time, or the possible resignation of the pro-reform Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., who's in hot water for breaking the House gift rule and just gave up the chairmanship of the House ways and means committee.)
Given these stakes, it's worth making some effort to find out what led Stupak and the bishops to think that health reform would spend federal funds on abortion.
"If you go to Page 2069 through Page 2078 [of the Senate bill]," Stupak told George Stephanopoulos on March 4 on Good Morning America, "you will find in there the federal government would directly subsidize abortions, plus every enrollee in the Office of Personnel Management-enrolled plan, every enrollee has to pay a minimum of one dollar per month toward reproductive rights, which includes abortions." Stupak is here referring to the exchanges created under health reform and to a nonprofit plan managed by the Office of Personnel Management that would be sold through the exchanges. The latter was a consolation prize to supporters of a public-option government health insurance program that didn't make it into the bill.
(Continued here.)
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