Apparently, the "smoke and mirrors" actions of those in Washington now over this health care deform disaster of a bill is getting more and more furious.

At over 2,000 pages, from its inception it is nothing more than the second Lawyers Employment Act legislation (the first being the Patriot Act itself) mostly for the revenues of those in the legal profession, many of whom in Washington are also members.

The argument over federal funding for elective abortions actually is such hyperbole it is at this point incredible, and does go to show just how much the media is being used in order to shift the focus on many of the provisions of the bill which bear further scrutiny while focusing on a really inconsequential provision.

Why inconsequential?

As with the health care bill's focus on whether or not it should provide benefits for immigrants, whether legal or otherwise (since this broad terminology will be played with in the courts in the near future on a "test" case using an illegal in order to set a precedent),  this argument now over elective abortions is redudant and really "after the fact," since at the present time health care for legal or illegal immigrants is already provided under separate legislation that was enacted "behind closed doors" but apparently only known widely by those who have lived in a border state for any length of time, as is also elective abortions. 

How so?

Many groups and "civic" organizations throughout the country receive federal funding for their programs through grant monies provided. 

Planned Parenthood, as a deemed "educational institution" primarily is one of them, and also provides services for elective abortions - in fact, is one of the civic organization that has become the focus of those opposing abortion, but also those not at all opposing abortion in and of itself, but opposing the "partial birth" abortion method utilized throughout the country at some public or low cost health care clinics now. 

The procedure that is nothing more than the "section and suction" extraction that has resulted in many women becoming subseqently sterile in the process due to the procedure itself which can and has pierced a woman's uterus effectively making her unable to carry a full term child thereafter.

And is in the opinion of many, barbaric in its method.

But this argument, without recission of the grant monies that are given now to many of these groups throughout the nation for elective abortions, has done a great job in swinging all those that have been crying foul over the entire focus of this bill to selective features of it.

Which apparently is the goal, after all, not the fact that the entire bill was written for and by the special interest groups and industries which will once again benefit without any fundamental changes in both the provision of health care in this country or its costs.

While charging many a now jobless and homeless American another "fee" and "tax" for Washington if they are unable to comply.  In essence, if Americans do not cowtow to Washington's will, they will pay a price.  A little less than the cost of getting that coverage - but either Big Daddy, or their special interest "favored subject" will profit, come hell or highwater.

Regulation, and performing their Constitutional function would address the difficulties that actually lack of regulation has created most of all, and also the expense and globalization of this financial sector into high risk investments they have progressively done with all those excess premium payments in weak economies thus then making their premium payers take some of those losses - with their very lives in denied coverages.

I mean, this legislations was the most expensive undertaking the health care industry has ever funded.  Which means their profit margins at this point are off the charts in order to have paid six figure salaries to all those lobbyists on K Street in order to once again increase their bottom line profits at the American public's expense. 

Americans will once again be feeding the global investors in the health care sector, at now the cost of their very lives - and bankbooks.

It appears, soon all Americans will be on welfare due to legislating with this mindset and logic.

For the last several days on most of the mainstream media outlets, there has been much reported with respect to the shooting and murder of Dr. George Tiller in Kansas, the middle of the Bible belt in middle America. 

Such instances as have occurred in the few cases of such violence in the past have attracted extensive media coverage due to the division that still remains in this country over the abortion issue, and especially late term or "partial birth" abortions as were reported conducted by Dr. Tiller at his Kansas clinic.

Much rhetoric has been spewed by both sides of this issue, and the media feeding into the frenzy so much so that this instance has again dominated our television news casts and reporting for several days.

Much misinformation has also been a part of the media hype and reporting.  On the one hand, Dr. Tiller is being painted as almost a saint due to his providing a service that few physicians perform in order to help poor, hapless women who have had to undergo abortions late in the pregnancies for various medical reasons, or due to criminal rape or incest.

On the other hand, he is being painted as a murderer of innocent fetuses who would have been viable and alive if not for Dr. Tiller' and his clinic's services.

Maybe the truth lies somewhere in the middle, and there was also a political motivation involved.  No one has questioned in the slightest at this point a great many irregularities that have been reported both in the media, and the details as has been reported of the crime itself.

First, Dr. Tiller has been painted as performing a service that few physicians in this country undertake.  In fact, one news source quoted that his clinic was "only one of three" that provided such services as abortions past the 20th week of pregnancy.  

That is a blatant falsehood, as there are several of such clinics in most states now throughout the country due to the fact that most states have been as hesitant as the federal government in addressing the late term and partial birth issue now almost 30 years post Roe, which only addressed an abortion conducted in the  first trimester of pregnancy.

Second, if the perpetrator was actually a "fundamentalist" Christian and vehement anti-abortion radical, then why would this shooting have occurred, of all places, at the church where Dr. Tiller was serving as an usher reportedly?  If this gentleman truly believed he was "doing God's work," as has also been reported, would he not have chosen another day rather than the Sabbath in middle America, a day of rest and worship?

And if Dr. Tiller was truly limiting his practice to those circumstances in which the fetus was no longer viable, medical emergencies, and cases of rape or incest, wouldn't a hospital rather than a medical "clinic," with better facilities in the event of potential complications be the proper place in order for such medical procedures to be carried out? 

The instances and health risks of such late term abortions have been documented in many medical journals throughout the nation at this point due to the actual manner in which these abortions are carried out.    Post operative hemorrahaging is becoming more and more common the more this risky procedure continues to be performed.

The militants on both sides have drawn their battle lines. Even Mr. Obama made a public statement with respect to the crime and his feelings on the abortion issue.

But still there is the negligence of our federal government and Congress to address this basic duty now thirty years post Roe, and the incidences, public outrage and political fodder has raised the national temperature over this issue, while the politicians continue to use such instances as this and the divisiveness over the abortion issue as just more political rhetoric for votes come election time.

Its a hard job, but that is what our elected officials are for, are they not?  Defining "life" for Constitutional and legal purposes, and drawing a line in the sand between purely "elective" abortions and those necessitated by medical emergency or necessary premature deliveries is something that is long overdue.

Such an action would then leave the states free to then provide the parameters and consent and legal requirements individually and at the more local level that would be needed for these medical emergency, rape, incest, teen pregnancies or other later term medically necessitated abortions, as opposed to those which are truly nothing more than premature deliveries due to the developmental stage involved, and which require also then life saving methods to protect both the life of the mother and infant. 

Thirty years now post Roe we have birth control methods that were unknown at the time that decision was rendered, and also methods to detect pregnancy now within literally days and/or hours of conception. 

The founders based an entire document in order to secure "life" for them and their posterity. 

Isn't it time that our Congress got to the hard work of tackling these issues, and in addition many, many other issues and complications that have arisen due to continued federal negligence such as this, and cut the lobbyists, bankers and federal pork beggers loose for a session or two while it truly gets down to the matter of our government, rather than business and self interests?

Recently Barack Obama presented another one of his speeches to the graduating class of Notre Dame University in South Bend, Indiana - a Catholic University.

Since the announcement of Mr. Obama's handpicked universities for his appearances, there had been much controversy and debate with respect to his choice of Notre Dame due to his clear advocacy and support for unrestricted access to abortions in this country, even going so far as to oppose an Illinois bill attempting to ban the heinous late term "partial birth" abortion practice within that state prior to his election to the Senate, which did come up during the election campaign a few times and which he never convincingly explained. 

This practice has also been known due to its brutal method, to cause trauma and injury to the woman in the process, and the U.S. Supreme Court recently upheld its ban due to both the timing and the method which is then used, and the risks to the mother. 

The Catholic Church, of course, takes exception to this position as in violation of their church teachings on the sanctity of human life. 

There was much build up reported in the mainstream media in this country, with some in the academic community vocalizing their objections, and others apparently more interested in the press that such a visit would entail for the university who attempted to downplay the conflict. 

Its hard to fault some at the school, since they were in a "no win" political situation.  Although if ever there was a time for the head of the university to take a stand for his Church's teachings, you would think this would have been one of them in order to set that example for those graduating seniors.  But it would appear that there was some political politicking within the Church or other force preventing him from doing so. 

Perhaps this was the point all along. 

It truly was interesting in light of Mr. Obama's positions that he would choose Notre Dame to begin with, and sort of makes one wonder what his true agenda actually was all about.

There are literally thousands of college campuses in this country, and it did appear there was a method to his madness in that of the three universities selected - Arizona State University in Tempe, Arizona; Notre Dame in South Bend, Indiana; and the Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland - one was a public university, another a private religious institution, and the third a military academy.

According to the local South Bend newspaper, the final event was pulled off without a hitch.  The reason being, of course, that as soon as some of the more vocal members of the student body decided to use their freedom of speech, they were summarily escorted from the auditorium by the security detail assigned for the event.

Interestingly, the piece from the local paper also summarized the gist of the message Mr. Obama had chosen for those graduating seniors.  The final paragraph of which quoted Mr. Obama's final instruction and message:

"In this world of competing claims about what is right and what is true, have confidence in the values with which you've been raised and educated," he said. "Be unafraid to speak your mind when those values are at stake. Hold firm to your faith and allow it to guide you on your journey. Stand as a lighthouse."

Based upon the treatment of those in the audience who were "unafraid to speak their minds when their values were at stake," and their subsequent ejection from the event, I hope I'm not the only one that caught the hypocricy there.

Although Notre Dame is a private university, it receives much in the way of public funding in grant monies from the American taxpayers, and is not truly privately funded at all.  And most of those private funds also come from members of the Catholic community.

Here is an instance, again, of the over-expansion of the federal government being involved at all in education, since it truly is not one of its enumerated powers in the slightest - these should be state and local issues and funded accordingly either privately or through charitable donations as education was handled and as Jefferson and the founders planned. 

They warned that if the federal government got involved in education, it could use such power inappropriately.  As it appears just may have been the case here with the political subterfuges in selecting that university in the first place that clearly most likely would become controversial given Mr. Obama's position.

I wonder who spoke at Mr. Obama's graduation ceremony from Harvard as one who was schooled and would gather passed his Constitutional law classes?

Mikhail Gorbechev?

Maybe rather than traipsing around the country on one PR tour after another, Mr. Obama should remain in Washington at his desk earning his salary as the final check on the checks and balances for legislation, and reduce his carbon footprints in the process.

http://www.southbendtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090518/News01/905189969/1011/News

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/05/16/obama.notre.dame/index.html?eref=rss_topstories