The Republicans are now in a win-win situation regarding Obamacare which is now called the "Edward M. Kennedy Memorial Health Care Reform Act" or nicknamed "ObamaTeddyCare".  The Democrat leadership in Congress - cynical as ever- are trying to increase support for their deader-than-a-door-nail Obamacare and are taking advantage of Senator Kennedy's death by renaming this disastrous bill.  

George Stephanopoulos, of ABC's Sunday morning talk show, told Laura Ingraham on Bill O'Reilly's show last night that Kennedy's death won't make that much difference in the health care debate.  Stephanopoulos said if anything passes this year, it will have to be a scaled-back bill.   

News broke late last week on Capitol Hill that White House thuggery is being copied by some powerful congressional committee chairmen.  "The Washington Times" editorialized that "Government coercion is becoming standard operating procedure in the nation's capitol."   

Of course, considering that the most anti-business White House in American history is being populated with some of the most virulent anti-capitalist radicals in America - such as the avowed communist and former convict, Van Jones - maybe the fact that they are infecting their Democrat brethren on Capitol Hill isn't too surprising.   

Yet another otherwise "non-partisan" and/or liberal outlet has confirmed what those of us on the right have been saying all along, that the so-called health care "reform" plan pushed by Obama and liberal members of Congress would indeed result in taxpayer funding of abortions.

In this case, it's Time magazine, who now joins the Associated Press and FactCheck.org in confirming what Obama has derisively referred to as a "fabrication".

Time reports that "The health-care reform proposed by House Democrats, if enacted, would in fact mark a significant change in the Federal Government's role in the financing of abortions." It goes on to report how the so-called "public option" would be set up and concludes that, "...in effect, anyone who wanted to sign up for the public option, a federally funded and administered program, would find themselves paying for abortion coverage."

They go on to point out that private insurance companies that receive any taxpayer subsidies to cover low-income Americans could potentially use those funds to cover abortions.

Add this to the fact that the House committees dealing with the legislation repeatedly voted down amendments that would have specifically prohibited abortion funding via government healthcare and you have a pretty good idea of what many of its supporters want to accomplish.

Despite Obama's claims that health care "reform" opponents were spreading "fabrications" and "bearing false witness" about his plan, even the non-partisan FactCheck.org has weighed in and admitted that currently proposed plans would indeed result in the use of taxpayer funds to pay for abortions.

The truth is that bills now before Congress don't require federal money to be used for supporting abortion coverage. So the president is right to that limited extent. But it's equally true that House and Senate legislation would allow a new "public" insurance plan to cover abortions, despite language added to the House bill that technically forbids using public funds to pay for them. Obama has said in the past that "reproductive services" would be covered by his public plan, so it's likely that any new federal insurance plan would cover abortion unless Congress expressly prohibits that. Low- and moderate-income persons who would choose the "public plan" would qualify for federal subsidies to purchase it. Private plans that cover abortion also could be purchased with the help of federal subsidies. Therefore, we judge that the president goes too far when he calls the statements that government would be funding abortions "fabrications."

Now we'll just sit back and wait for the White House to say FactCheck is "fabricating".

***

I have beern reading much over the healthcare reform issue and am dismayed that ANY christian can be against reform. That any christian could possibly support a system that refuses to assist those who cannot get healthcare for themselves.

It is quite clear That as christians there are certain "works" that are REQUIRED. These are direct commandments as spoken by Jesus Christ himself. Personally the issue, for christians, is quite simple. As a son of a preacher I know that there are no works of humanity that will get you into heaven. What I was not taught is that while works may not get you into heaven, works (or the lack of works), can certainly keep you out of heaven.

When Jesus describes the final judgement and the seperation of the sheep and the goats, the left and the right, one of the main considerations is how you have treated the ill and those less capable than yourself. All of this can be found in Matthew 25:31-46

It would seem that not only is Obamacare not healthy for Democrat political fortunes, but it doesn't seem to be too healthy for the AARP either.

CBS News has learned that up to 60,000 people have cancelled
their AARP memberships since July 1, angered over the group’s position
on health care.

Elaine Guardiani has been with AARP for 14 years, and said, "I’m extremely disappointed in AARP."

Retired nurse Dale Anderson has 12 years with AARP and said, "I don’t wanna be connected with AARP."

Many are switching to the American Seniors Association, a group that
calls itself the conservative alternative as CBS News Investigative
Correspondent Sharyl Attkisson reports.

Last week alone, they added more than 5,000 new members. Our camera was there Friday when the mail came.

Letters were filled with cut-up AARP cards.

"I think that probably the seniors are most upset with cuts in Medicare," said ASA President Stuart Barton.

Despite the trial balloon floated by Obama and Sebelius over the past few days, leading people to think that they’re really not that set on the "public" option (ie. government run healthcare) that has many people so upset, conservatives could do well not to lay down their arms, so to speak.

So what's going on?  It could mean several things.  It could be an attempt to allay the fears of some conservatives (or just folks in the middle) while town-halls are still going on...perhaps give Democrats some breathing room and reduce the incoming fire.  Maybe an attempt to gin up the liberal side of the debate by scaring them into seeing their dream of government run healthcare not coming to fruition...causing them to get more energized to counter conservatives.  Most likely all of the above.

But what we can rest fairly assuredly that it does NOT mean is that Obama and Company have given up on their objective of government run healthcare and eventually a single-payer system.