Hewitt Blog

Just as pro-life Democrats in the House are coming under enormous pressure to vote for the Senate version of Obamacare which includes public funding for abortion, Denver's Archbishop Charles Chaput delivers an important speech on John F. Kennedy's famous Houston speech of 50 years ago.

Thanks to Fr. Z. for the pointer.

The entire text is here.

Key excerpts:

Fifty years after Kennedy’s Houston speech, we have more Catholics in national public office than ever before.  But I wonder if we’ve ever had fewer of them who can coherently explain how their faith informs their work, or who even feel obligated to try.  The life of our country is no more “Catholic” or “Christian” than it was 100 years ago.  In fact it's arguably less so.  And at least one of the reasons for it is this:  Too many Catholics confuse their personal opinions with a real Christian conscience.  Too many live their faith as if it were a private idiosyncrasy – the kind that they’ll never allow to become a public nuisance.  And too many just don't really believe.  Maybe it’s different in Protestant circles.  But I hope you’ll forgive me if I say, “I doubt it.”...

Now before ending, I want to turn briefly to the third point I mentioned earlier in my talk:  the realities we face today, and what Christians need to do about them.  As I was preparing these comments for tonight, I listed all the urgent issues that demand our attention as believers: abortion; immigration; our obligations to the poor, the elderly and the disabled; questions of war and peace; our national confusion about sexual identity and human nature, and the attacks on marriage and family life that flow from this confusion; the growing disconnection of our science and technology from real moral reflection; the erosion of freedom of conscience in our national health-care debates; the content and quality of the schools that form our children. 

The list is long.  I believe abortion is the foundational human rights issue of our lifetime.  We need to do everything we can to support women in their pregnancies and to end the legal killing of unborn children.  We may want to remember that the Romans had a visceral hatred for Carthage not because Carthage was a commercial rival, or because its people had a different language and customs.  The Romans hated Carthage above all because its people sacrificed their infants to Ba’al.  For the Romans, who themselves were a hard people, that was a unique kind of wickedness and barbarism.  As a nation, we might profitably ask ourselves whom and what we’ve really been worshipping in our 40 million “legal” abortions since 1973.

Send the remarks to every Catholic in Congress as the crucial votes on Obamacare approach, and of course, read the whole thing.  I guess the Archbishop intended it for everyone to read and not just legislators.

 

Given that the proposed use of reconciliation is an illegitimate use of the procedure, the Senate GOP ought to be preparing to counter the jam down with a flood of amendments, each one of which requires an up or down vote.  The prospect of thousand, or tens of thousands, or perhaps even a million amendments and the resulting spectacle of a Senate paralyzed by endless roll call counts should worry Democrats much more than Republicans as the American public doesn't want Obamacare, and a last ditch stand to stop it via a blizzard of amendments will put the spotlight on the bill and its many flaws.  It will also show a Republican leadership willing to fight to stop this radical rewrite of the rules of American medicine,

But where to get thousands and thousands of draft amendments?  This is the joy of the internet.  If the NRSC is on its toes, it will already be setting up a site where visitors can draft and submit their own amendments for use in the process. (The NRSC website is already accepting input on the topic.) Some of the draft amendments will be inspired and informed as experts weigh in. Some will be absurd.  Some no doubt will be vulgar or obscene as trolls invade. 

But the vast bulk of them would come from ordinary Americans with ideas on how to reform health care.  The NRSC staff can suggest drafting guidelines consistent with the Senate's rules, but then turn the input switch on and let voters have their part in the amendment process.  What's a hundred thousand up-or-down votes between friends? Speaker Pelosi demanded "a simple majority vote" after all, so she should get an avalanche of simple majority votes.

While individual senators of course must offer every specific amendment, they would do well to attribute any particular draft to its original author.  Thus would Tea Party activists, state legislators, candidates for Congress, high school civics classes, and each one of my law students have a chance to impact the legislative process.  (I might assign the drafting of two amendments each to my Con Law students --a memorable participation in an exercise in saving separation of powers and the traditional role of the Senate.)

With technology and the ability to employ new media to spread the word, the Senate GOP can summon up as many amendments as it needs to block reconciliation.  A radical solution?  Not as radical as ignoring the vote in Massachusetts, bypassing the established conference committee process, and abusing the obscure reconciliation to jam down a massive and unpopular rewrite of every rule of American healthcare.

Stopping Obamacare is a priority among a large majority of Americans.  Senate Republicans would be well advised to let that vast group of concerned citizens help them make the stand against the president and his radical agenda.

. 

Guy Benson sits in for me on the radio this week.  Hopefully he will keep the audience up to date on the dispatch of Team Rubicon to Chile.  Guy is from Chicago, as is most of the original Team Rubicon team members.

If you want to help the victims of the earthquake in Chile, support Team Rubicon. 

.

. 

My Washington Examiner column notes the radical nature of the push to use the reconciliation process to pass Obamacare.

My Townhall.com column provides all the contact info for House Blue Dogs and pro-Obamacare Democrats from swing districts.  Spend some time calling as many as you can.

. 

The Monday morning column from Clark Judge:

Republicans, Conservative Democrats, the Health Care Summit, and American Exceptionalism
By Clark S. Judge, managing director, White House Writers Group (www.whwg.com <http://www.whwg.com> ) and chairman, Pacific Research Institute (www.pacificresearch.org <http://www.pacificresearch.org> ).
 
“Blue Dogs want health care to come up again,” said a long-time veteran of the House in a closed door briefing last Monday.   “So they can vote against it.”  
 
Many conservative Democratic members of Congress cast their ballots for the bill last time – and those who did not are widely seen as part of a Speaker Nancy Pelosi con game that gave vulnerable members a pass.  Either way, all want a chance to show that they are against the bill – really and truly against it.  No con no way.

 Read More...

Hard to imagine that Chile won't need teams of first responders.  Keep an eye on Team Rubicon's website.  If any of them deploy, it will be a great place to direct financial aid with an assurance of its effective and immediate use.



. 

Friday's show is an extended interview with Lee Smith, whose new book, The Strong Horse: Power, Politics, and the Clash of Arab Civilizations, is must reading.



For an assessment of Thursday's "summit," be sure to consult Mark Steyn's comments here, and then please continue to call these Democratic Congressmen and urge they oppose Obamacare or face certain defeat in November.

The transcript of my interview with Lee Smith can be found here. 

John McCain's response to the president's denunciation of Medicare Advantage in which the Arizona Republican noted the carve out of 800,000 Medicare Advantage enrolles in Florida was a pretty devastating exchange for the president and Obamacare advocates generally.  It was not only a complete rebuttal on the specifics of the president's argument, but a representative moment that underscores the vast gap between the president's talking points and reality as well as a prime example of the special interest deals that are stuffed throughout the bill.

The GOP is winning this day decisively despite playing on the president's home field because the bill itself is so awful.  It cannot survive close scrutiny which is why it has been shielded from scrutiny throughout 2009.  It is hard to imagine that the endangered Democratic House members are going to rush forward to embrace such an obviously flawed and deeply destructive bill.

Keep calling these House Democrats and repeating the same message: support for Obamacare guarantees their defeat in November.  

The president's credibility crashes through the floor as word leaks of his back-up plan to his exercise in political theater today.

Call the House Democrats on these lists and tell them to oppose Obamacare. 

Start with Ohio's Zach Space via his toll-free line:  1-866-910-7577.

. 

Michael Belay, a longtime employee of Chapman University in Orange County, has devoted most of his free time and much of his resources over the past many years to an orphanage and school in his native Ethiopia.  Now he is trying to bring clean drinking water to the compound.  Please consider helping Michael and the children he helps care for.