More Than a Touch of Malice
When Barack Obama first announced that he intended to force all employers, including Catholic institutions, to provide contraception and abortifacients as part of the healthcare package they offer their employees, my friend Michael Barone observed that the President “was spitting in the eyes of millions of Americans and threatening the existence of charitable programs that help millions of people of all faiths”; and, presuming that the President could not possibly have intended to stir up a hornet’s nest, he suggested that his decision in this matter must have been a function of ignorance and isolation. This was my first instinct as well. It seemed foolish – guaranteed to alienate a constituency that had supported Barack Obama in 2008 and had hailed his election.
We know a bit more now. We know that the President did not act on impulse, that he took his time in making this decision, and that he sought advice from a range of individuals within the Democratic Party. Vice-President Joe Biden and William Daley, who was then Obama’s Chief of Staff, both profess to be Catholic, and they strongly advised against doing anything that would antagonize the Catholic bishops and the laity. Kathleen Sebelius, the Secretary of Health and Human Services, and Nancy Pelosi, the former Speaker of the House and current Democratic minority leader, were also consulted. They, too, profess to be Catholic, and they fiercely advocated imposing this burden on all employers providing health insurance for their employees.
The decision appears to have been made before the New Hampshire primary. Otherwise, it would be hard to explain why, at the debate in New Hampshire in early January, George Stephanopoulos – who pretends to be a journalist but is still obviously nothing more than a Democratic operative – repeatedly pressed Mitt Romney to spell out where he stood on the question of contraception. Stephanopoulos’ disgraceful performance, which drew boos and catcalls from the crowd, is an indication that Obama and at least some of his aides thought that they had something to gain by injecting this question into this year’s campaign.
On the face of it, President Obama would appear to be shooting himself in the foot. Why would he risk losing the Catholic vote? One could, of course, argue that his aim was to excite the feminists and give them a reason to turn out in November. As a rationale, however, even this seems a bit lame. The benefit that the President proposes to provide is insubstantial. The administration’s claim to the contrary notwithstanding, the pill and other birth control devices are not free. But the expense involved is not great. Among those who are employed and have healthcare insurance, no one is hard put to come up with the paltry sum required.
This suggests that there can be only one reason why Sebelius, Pelosi, and Obama decided to proceed. They wanted to show the bishops and the Catholic laity who is boss. They wanted to make those who think contraception wrong and abortion a species of murder complicit in both. They wanted to rub the noses of their opponents in it. They wanted to marginalize them. Humiliation was, in fact, their only aim, and malice, their motive.
Last week, when, in response to the fierce resistance he had deliberately stirred up, the President offered the bishops what he called “an accommodation,” what he proffered was nothing more than a fig leaf. His maneuver was, in fact, a gesture of contempt, and I believe that it was Barack Obama’s final offer. From his perspective and from that of Sebelius and Pelosi, the genuine Catholics still within the Democratic coalition are no more than what Vladimir Lenin called “useful idiots,” and, now that the progressive project is near completion, they are expendable – for there is no longer any need to curry their favor.
In his piece in The Washington Examiner, which I link above, Michael Barone mentioned Obama’s decree with regard to contraception and abortifacients in tandem with a brief discussion of the President’s decision to reject the construction of the Keystone Pipeline. He was, I think, right to do so – for there is no good reason that any student of public policy can cite for doing what the President did. Cancelling the pipeline will not delay or stop the extraction of oil from the tar sands in Alberta, and the pipeline itself would pose no environmental threat. If the President’s decision had any purpose, it was symbolic – an indication to all that he cared not one whit about the plight of the white working class and that he was capable of punishing those whom he does not like and more than willing to do so.
In 2008, when he first ran for the Presidency, Barack Obama posed as a moderate most of the time. This time, he is openly running as a radical. His aim is to win a mandate for the fundamental transformation of the United States that he promised in passing on the eve of his election four years ago and that he promised again when he called his administration The New Foundation. In the process, he intends to reshape the Democratic coalition – to bring the old hypocrisy to an end, to eliminate those who stand in the way of the final consolidation of the administrative entitlements state, to drive out the faithful Catholics once and for all, to jettison the white working class, and to build a new American regime on a coalition of highly educated upper-middle class whites, feminists, African-Americans, Hispanics, illegal immigrants, and those belonging to the public-sector unions. To Americans outside this coalition, he intends to show no mercy.
Mark my words. If Barack Obama wins in November, he will force the Catholic hospitals to perform abortions, and the bishops, priests, and nuns who fostered the steady growth of the administrative entitlements state, thinking that they were pursuing “the common good,” will reap what they have sown.
In the end, politics has as its focus persuasion. Our difficulties are a function of policy, not of mismanagement. If we are to stop Barack Obama in 2012, we will have to find a standard-bearer who can articulate a compelling argument against the administrative entitlements state and, by means of persuasion and praxis, reverse our democracy’s inexorable soft despotic drift. Let us hope that one or another of the remaining candidates rises to the occasion.
ADDENDUM: This post is intended as a sequel to two earlier posts on related subjects: American Catholicism's Pact with the Devil and American Catholicism: A Call to Arms.
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Comments:
Apr '11
Re: More Than a Touch of Malice
My belief is that wether you are talking of the HHS mandate (we want women barefoot and pregnant), the Xl pipeline (we want dirty air and water), immigration (we are bigoted and have no compassion), Same sex marriage (we are homophobic) or taxes for the rich (we wish an unfair America), the president is carefully picking every area conservatives can be painted as extreme, out of touch and downright scary.
I also believe he does want to fundamentally transform America but isn't really afraid of being painted a radical since he knows from the 2008 election that none of that will stick and that conservatives using that argument will only appear more of the fringe, kooky crazies the media helps portray us as on a daily basis.
The true argument that must be made to the country is that all american's liberties, our individual sovereignty if you will, are at stake when a strong centralized government supplies all this supposed choice on our behalf. Contraception, abortion, welfare, environmentalism, you name it, are not choices for us but control cloaked in collectivism and under the guise of fairness, compassion and common sense we are being systematically enslaved.
Aug '11
Re: More Than a Touch of Malice
Stephen Spicer:
I also believe he does want to fundamentally transform America but isn't really afraid of being painted a radical since he knows from the 2008 election that none of that will stick and that conservatives using that argument will only appear more of the fringe, kooky crazies the media helps portray us as on a daily basis.
I agree with the notion that he isn't hiding it this time. I suspect that even he was surprised by how much the media covered for him in 2008, and now, knowing that they will defend him to the deaths of their own publications and broadcast outlets, he's letting it all hang out.
Jul '11
Re: More Than a Touch of Malice
I've been mulling this post over for a few hours now and I'm having trouble with one point: why choose this fight with Catholic institutions this year? His re-election prospects are clearly better if he avoids this fight until 2013. Is he that confident of winning that this is truly meant as a public humiliation along the lines of "I don't need you anymore"? I'm convinced that an Obama win will truly be transformative (or, more fittingly, transmogrifative), but is his hubris so profound that he thinks it's a done deal?
Aug '10
Re: More Than a Touch of Malice
In another article this morning, Kangor mentioned that Dick Morris called this a deliberate attack. They also brought up Obama's mentor, and stand in father Frank Marshall Davis (aka Bob Greene) who carried the torch of anti-Catholicism for years, devoting much of his writing to taking the fight to the Church.
This makes perfect sense as we see how so much of the influence of Davis' on his minion has been brought to the fore in public policy.
From your writing, it begins to look like the Church is just a paper tiger after all, and the left senses that and is going for the jugular, calculating that losing a segment of traditional Catholics is a reasonable tradeoff.
Re: More Than a Touch of Malice
I agree entirely -- and the candidate we need to support is the one who best articulates this argument.
Re: More Than a Touch of Malice
flownover: In another article this morning, Kangor mentioned that Dick Morris called this a deliberate attack. They also brought up Obama's mentor, and stand in father Frank Marshall Davis (aka Bob Greene) who carried the torch of anti-Catholicism for years, devoting much of his writing to taking the fight to the Church.
This makes perfect sense as we see how so much of the influence of Davis' on his minion has been brought to the fore in public policy.
From your writing, it begins to look like the Church is just a paper tiger after all, and the left senses that and is going for the jugular, calculating that losing a segment of traditional Catholics is a reasonable tradeoff. · 12 minutes ago
The American Church was a paper tiger, for sure; and the Left things that it still is. Whether they are right, however, remains to be seen. I wrote what I wrote -- here, earlier this week, and last Friday -- in an attempt to bring home to the bishops the stakes. How many of them understand those stakes I do not now know.
Re: More Than a Touch of Malice
A done deal? Perhaps, not. But he recognizes that to close a deal like this one a politician must make his case directly to the public. Only an electoral victory in a campaign run on questions of first principle can settle questions like these.
Aug '11
Re: More Than a Touch of Malice
Paul A. Rahe
The American Church wasa paper tiger, for sure; and the Left things that it still is. Whether they are right, however, remains to be seen. I wrote what I wrote -- here, earlier this week, and last Friday -- in an attempt to bring home to the bishops the stakes. How many of them understand those stakes I do not now know. · 0 minutes ago
I think the unforeseen factor, however, is how many non-Catholics have recognized this first-amendment violation. In attacking the Catholic church, it seems that the President has roused the Evangelicals as well.
Feb '12
Re: More Than a Touch of Malice
The title to this piece describes the situation best. God help this country, and God help the bishops who, so far, have been holding strong, albeit a little late. I've written my bishop to suggest - strongly urge - that in pulpits throughout this diocese, sermons this Lent lay out for Catholics WHY the Church opposes contraceptives and birth control. There are many who've forgotten why the Church teaches as it does; even more have NEVER heard that Church opposes these practices and why.
Barack Obama has an agenda, but it isn't healthcare.
Aug '11
Re: More Than a Touch of Malice
That's nice an' all, but in all my conversations about this, I have repeatedly come back to the point that the reason this issue is important has nothing at all to do with contraception and everything to do with the Constitution. So go ahead and use this issue as an opportunity to explain the church's teaching on contraception, but if you ignore the Constitutional aspect, you're playing right into the President's hands.
In the end, he won't care if Catholics still support contraception. He'll have managed to impose his will on the nation at large, in spite of the Constitution, and he'll start looking for the next thing he can force us to do.
Jun '10
Re: More Than a Touch of Malice
"More" than a touch of malice, I agree. Barack Obama is the final and complete manifestation of the progressive politician. Leftists have been working for decades within our institutions (educational, religious, and media) to produce exactly a president with his background and mindset. He is the progressive messiah standing above the rest of us with his god-like perspective. Is it any wonder why progressives have elected for a full-court press of their objectives?
God Save the Republic!
Sep '10
Re: More Than a Touch of Malice
Paul A. Rahe
So, we have to choose between Romney and Santorum. I suspect that Romney is the one who better understands budgets and management. Santorum is a man of firm principles. Neither is consistently eloquent (and that is an understatement). We shall see. · 2 hours ago
Both would continue to grow government. In 2000 if Gore had won 9/11 would still have happened and the Dems would have been discredited for a generation or more. As it is Bush won. I can not help but think this in the long run was not the best outcome for that election. Certainly the government is no smaller for it.
Aug '10
Re: More Than a Touch of Malice
Dr Rahe,
There are alot of conservative Protestants out here just praying that the Catholic Church has some fight left in it. Our efforts have been diluted as most of our churches went off the rails some time ago.
The Presbyterians stripped Onward, Christian Soldiers from the hymnal in 1990, don't expect much from that quarter.
Jan '11
Re: More Than a Touch of Malice
DrewInWisconsin
... this issue ... has nothing at all to do with contraception and everything to do with the Constitution.
That, I take it, is the real gravamen of this issue. It is not, first and foremost, an attack on Catholics or their church. It is a full assault on the citizen-sovereign, and thereby a full assault on the very foundations of constitutional democracy. This should be the central issue in the coming election. Where oh where are the grownups in the Republican party?
Feb '12
Re: More Than a Touch of Malice
DrewInWisconsin
That's nice an' all, but in all my conversations about this, I have repeatedly come back to the point that the reason this issue is important has nothing at all to do with contraception and everything to do with the Constitution. So go ahead and use this issue as an opportunity to explain the church's teaching on contraception, but if you ignore the Constitutional aspect, you're playing right into the President's hands.
In the end, he won't care if Catholics still support contraception. He'll have managed to impose his will on the nation at large, in spite of the Constitution, and he'll start looking for the next thing he can force us to do. · 4 minutes ago
No, I had no intention of glossing over the primary Constitutional issue. However, there are too many Catholics out there who, apart from that, can't see what the big deal is.
Regardless, the mandate must be resisted. It's too bad that the deadline is well after the (re)election.
Apr '11
Re: More Than a Touch of Malice
DrewInWisconsin
That's nice an' all, but in all my conversations about this, I have repeatedly come back to the point that the reason this issue is important has nothing at all to do with contraception and everything to do with the Constitution.
That's correct, just as his desire to raise taxes is out real fairness.
I'm reminded of a passage from Genesis 3:1, Now the serpent was more cunning than any beast of the field which the Lord God has made.
May '11
Re: More Than a Touch of Malice
"In 2008, when he first ran for the Presidency, Barack Obama posed as a moderate most of the time. This time, he is openly running as a radical. His aim is to win a mandate for the fundamental transformation of the United States that he promised in passing on the eve of his election four years ago and that he promised again when he called his administration The New Foundation. "
I ask myself why he would be so blatant and answer because he can. If he loses it will only be because of the racism of America.
Dec '10
Re: More Than a Touch of Malice
Dr. Rahe,
Your analysis is completely correct. What is important now is that those who are turned off to Obama be turned on to his opponent. ABO (Anyone But Obama) needs your support. This is the response from people that we all should want. Everyone should commit to writing a blank check in their mind to the committee to defeat Obama in 2012. Harry Reid must go down with him or they will play obstructionist games with the Senate. So long Barach and Harry ASAP.
Regards,
Jim
Re: More Than a Touch of Malice
flownover: Dr Rahe,
There are alot of conservative Protestants out here just praying that the Catholic Church has some fight left in it. Our efforts have been diluted as most of our churches went off the rails some time ago.
The Presbyterians stripped Onward, Christian Soldiersfrom the hymnal in 1990, don't expect much from that quarter. · 2 hours ago
Onward, Christian Soldiers dropped! Terrible!
Apr '11
Re: More Than a Touch of Malice
I respectfully disagree with Dr. Rahe's post about the President's reasoning on this issue. First, I believe that President Obama would prefer to face Sen. Santorum in the fall than Gov. Romney. It is not just conincidental that Sen. Santorum won the caucuses right after this decision was announced. Second, and more importantly, if he loses this argument on religious freedom grounds, he wins on constitutional ones. This is wrong because the president cannot tell a business what products to provide at what price. A well-informed citizenship is key to a well-functioning democracy. If the president told the Washington Post that they had to distribute the print version of their paper to everyone free of charge, we would not say that is wrong because it takes away freedom of the press. Instead, we would say the government cannot tell a business what to do. If the result of this struggle is that religious groups get a waiver from the requirement, we have lost the policy argument. I believe that is why President Obama directed this - to win the policy agrument war by losing the religious freedom battle.