By Lawrence

I just want to add my2 cents about this topic.  I have heard all the arguments from the right and from the left, but I feel that there is one thought that has been missing.  What we know so far is that President Obama had made a decision through the Health and Human Services Department, in which he had appointed Kathleen Sebelius as the Secretary of HHS son after his inauguration, which Catholic hospitals and charities would have to pay for their female employees to have free contraceptives.  Now, I am sure that this decree was not intended to be pointed at Catholic institutions, in general, but, however, has been mandated in order to maintain consistency with his healthcare mandates in general.

There was a huge blowback because the Catholic institutions did not want to have to pay for contraceptives for their employees because it goes against the Catholic faith to prevent nor abort pregnancy.  This debate has been centered around the 1^st amendment of the U.S. Constitution which allows for freedom of religion.  I do agree that that the Catholic institutions do have a point in this matter, in that they should not be forced to do something against their faith which does not impede on someone elses rights ;however, this is not what I intend to speak about in this article.

Most of the arguments of the proponents of the decision have been centered around the effort to make sure that women’s healthcare is provided for no matter where the individual works.  To be perfectly honest, I find this to be a completely empty argument.  Even despite the freedom of religion issue, there is no one preventing women from having whatever contraceptive treatment, devices, or medication that they want.  The argument is purely about who pays for it.  I don’t believe that the financial issue is even the bottom line of the argument.  Catholic institutions just do not want to be the aid providers for something that they are morally against.  I is not the simple act of putting money forward to it, but the moral act of contributing to it that is their concern.  Is this a violation of a freedom of religion?  That is actually, quite hazy, yet I do offer forth that it is a strict violation of the U.S. Constitution and a violation of common sense in all regards.

Constitution

Today, President Obama put forth a “compromise” plan in which the religious institutions would not have to ay directly for female employees to have contraceptives, but would, instead, let it be mandated that the insurance companies would have to offer complete, free coverage of contraceptives to all women.  Now, of course, the same Catholic institutions and charities would have to pay for the insurance policies, so this is not much of a compromise on that point, but that is not, for me the fundamental concern in this issue.

The fact the President Obama has offered a decree and then offered another decree means that this is a part of Obamacare that has not yet been put into law.  This is, in fact, something that he and the HHS are currently deciding about healthcare.  It is then logical to conclude that the Obama administration is currently drafting the rules or laws for his healthcare plan.  The President is the lead of the executive branch of government, the law enforcement branch.  The president is not supposed to have his office be the head of law making.  That is is for the legislative branch of government,  the House of Representatives and Senate.  If this doesn’t worry you, just read a little further.

Even if one is not concerned about the constitution, the simple fact that one man and his hand-picked administrators is deciding what the healthcare of everyone in this country will be like is quite scary.  If you think this is an overstatement, then let me at least point a few things out to you:

1. From his own announcement sof decision making, President Obama apparently has the power to say what healthcare should and should not include in insurance policies as well as co-pays or non-co-pay items.
2. From his “compromise” announcement, apparently, President Obama can decide what party should be responsible for payment, either the employer directly, or, as in the new compromise offer, the health insurance companies.
3. President Obama’s recent decrees have been the announced separations from the original agreement he had with the Catholic Bishops in their support for Obamacare when it was being voted upon.  Apparently he disappointed them. The lesson here is that when you vote for a bill that is not the law in and of itself from the legislature, but a an allowance for the law to be made from the executive branch of government, you are entering into hot water because whoever eventually gets to make the decisions as to what the laws really are regarding healthcare can do whatever they want.

I realize that the U.S. Constitution has been trampled on for years with the Office of the President being able to appoint and create agencies that would design legislation.  Yet, we should have the confidence in saying when enough has been enough.  The Office of the Presidency needs to stay within its bounds whether it is a Republican or Democrat political office at the time.

Right now, the Obama administration is deciding laws about healthcare.  We have only heard about one of them.  From what I stated above, apparently, due to the Obamacare bill he and his administration has the ability to decide just about everything in healthcare.  If they an decide what is covered, what is not covered, who pays, who doesn’t pay, and what is essentially someone’s “right” to have for free….. what else is there to control in healthcare?  All other aspects of personal healthcare stem from these core powers.

Common Sense

Here are some of the chief arguments about this issue, which I have expanded into a much larger one, have to say about this argument alone.  I think that some truly honest and concerted thought about these arguments can shed some light about the foolishness is giving the office of president this power.  For those of you who feel that you like this decision, just think about the power behind the decision.  If the government can grant you rights as to what is “free,” they can also, certainly grant you restrictions as to what is not.  Beyond this, if they can say what is allowed in healthcare, they can also say whatis not allowed in healthcare.  If the Obama administration has such specific power to make the decisions that they are making, in this case, imagine what specifics they can decide about others.  For instance, what medication do you take?  How much do you pay?  How much does the employer pay?  How much does the insurance company pay?  These three questions have already been proven to be within the realm of the President’s decision making.  Do you really think that he will decide what you want for all your cases?  Wit health insurance companies, you, at least, had some recourse to the court system.  Yu won’t have that with the President making the laws.

As we have already seen, the President is also willing to become the judiciary.  In the case of the GM and Chrysler bankruptcies, the Office of the President oversaw the entire legal process by buying stock in the companies and botany temporary ownership over the companies.  They then set them “free” after canceling out the debts to secure bondholders (the people who loaned money to the companies to help them before they went under) and saved the pensions of union worked by making them shief bondholders and majority owners of Chrysler and significant owners of GM.  In other words, folks, President Obama are comfortable being all 3 branches of government, especially when he can help out a big supporter like the United Auto Workers Union.  He knows that by doing this, the union will throw millions in workers’ dues money right back at him for his re-election.

Common Sense Thoughts about the pro-Obam care Women’s Healthcare for Free arguments:

1. This is a women’s healthcare issue, they are denying access to healthcare for women who are working for religious institutions – Bullshit. No one is preventing a woman from having healthcare, and no one is preventing a woman from having contraceptives.  The decision is who pays for it.  Catholic institutions don’t want to pay for it, but, to be honest, I don’t either, and if you think about it, neither do you.  If health insurance companies have to pay for it and not give a co-pay to the individual, that means premiums go up for everyone.  Our health insurance premiums have been going up and up ever since Obamacare.  Remember, they were doing it to make healthcare more affordable for everyone?
2. You will see reductions in Ovarian Cancer and other diseases caused by STDs – Ok, well the, obviously it should not be about contraceptives in general, it should be about condoms.  They are the only contraceptive that can prevent STDs.  They are cheap, buy them yourself.  If you are so poor, then perhaps the very small price of a condom should fall second in the line of importance to food.  We don’t hear anything about that being required payments, now do we?
3. What about rape victims? – This is a sick argument for people to come up with.  No one plans to get raped.  No one wants this to happen.  Perhaps health insurance policies can have, and many of them do, for hospital, counseling, and other treatments for victims of rape.  Why even bring this up when contraceptives have to do with preventing pregnancy or STDs in instances when one is actually PLANNING ON HAVING SEX?
4. Women should have Equal Rights – O, we did that already.  Women can buy whatever contraceptives they want.  If they can’t, the government has already seen fit to have institutions out there practically throwing condoms at people, not realizing, it is not an access issue, but a personal responsibility issue.  At some point, people have to take care of themselves.  If you want to talk about equal rights, why aren’t condoms for men free?
5. Men get Viagra through Insurance – Ok, but this is not a government mandate.  Men buy insurance plans that cover them for their age and pay a higher premium for it to get coverage for these things.  Sure, it is fine for insurance companies to ffer the same for women, but have you ever check ed out if they do?  God forbid if you have to pay for a higher premiums for such plans, like men do for theirs.

So what is the Real Issue?

Well, for those who want to play the government handout game, it really boils down to trying to get enough influence to make one man and his administration give you what he wants.  Right now, you need to give him what he wants as far as getting votes to get re-elected.  After that, well, he has nothing to lose; you’ll just have to deal with whatever he gives you.

For the Liberals

Now that President Obama has opened this up.  All of you who feel that you are going to get what you want, just remember, another president may come who will take the same power and do some things that you don’t want.

My Point

Obamacare needs to be removed as legislation period.  Even if you agree with some things about it or all things about it, those things can easily be removed or changed as different offices come in.  Yeah, you can complain, but it may be met with the same type of bullshit that the Catholic Church has been faced with now.  Remember, when you give an office or a branch too much power that power remains and can always backfire on you!

Nah, that’s Crazy!

Ok, just wait and see when you are confronted with something you don’t like and have no recourse because all the health insurance companies follow the same regulations and they cannot be challenged because the laws are made by the same office that enforces the laws.

“Oh well, I agree with what they’re doing right now!”

-          Future Serf

I will be presenting my piece, Angel ing, at the 13th Biennial Symposium on Arts and Technology at the American Center for Arts and Technology at Connecticut College n March.  I have been asked to write a paper on the the creation of the piece as a paper presentatio topic.  I have decided to make this paper available here so folks can see how he piece was made.

Download (PDF, 516.78KB)

In October, I completed the piece, Spectral Voices in the Light, which pays homage to radio sound and EVPs (Electronic Voice henomena). This is when spirits or ghosts speak through electronic devices using a portion of the lecto-magnetic spectrum to emit sound.  This piece is somewhat tongue-in-cheec, but certainly does not make fun of EVPs. I composed the music by recrding sounds thatI was able t make with my shotwave radio.  I then pitch-shifted this material with Csound.  The resulting tracks wee mixed in Dolby 5.1 in Cakewalk Sonar.

The video was created by using Processing to generate semi-random distributions of white noise graphics that I made in Photoshop.  I also used Procesing to distribute some words an faces that I also generated in Photoshop.  The filtering and final video production was done in Sony Vegas.

I think that launching a blog on Friday 13th will work out very well.