Mitt Romney Presidential Campaign

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oldcelt said:
I really think you are reading too much into this. The President is attempting to implement something that has been talked about for decades. There are going to be bumps.

I also think that you underestimate the American people. They have a history of not sitting idly by while others are being persecuted.

One final point, I believe there are some within the Church who will accept nothing less than this law reflecting their view of Catholic teaching. That is not likely to happen, but so long as Catholics are not forced to support something that they view as evil, that should be enough.

Remember, all of us, as US citizens, occasionally see tax dollars being spent on things we do not support. I understand that abortion holds a special place in these issues, but if a compromise can be reached whereby a Catholic is not directly or indirectly funding abortion, that should do it.

I remain optimistic.

John
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John,
I’ll be honest with you. I’m not only a student of American politics but of 20th century history in general. No one ever thinks disaster can happen in their own country. They ALL think they’re better than that. It’s true. The Germans didn’t think it could happen there. The Italians didn’t either. Neither did all those Russian peasants who fought for freedom in 1917. Nor the Chinese after WWII. But in all those cases, it did. It did.

Things never go quite according to plan. People do what they have to do. When it’s good, it can be very good. And everything has to be done to keep it that way. Because when it’s bad, it’s disastrous, and it could happen here as easily as anywhere else. Don’t kid yourself. You’re smarter than that.

About your practical comments which are very vague: You still aren’t talking about what happens to the OFM whose superior must choose to abandon the apostolate, violate basic Catholic teaching, or go under. Or the Catholic school principal. Or the Catholic Family Services employee who is an abortion counselor. There are no specifics in your comments–only a very rosy, don’t worry, be happy. That’s not good enough.

Perhaps you’re telling me that the peace and justice wing likes the idea of charity better than the actual charity provided by the OFM on the street. If that’s whatt you’re telling me, just be upfront about it. I might easily be able to believe that.
 
iloveangels said:
John,
I’ll be honest with you. I’m not only a student of American politics but of 20th century history in general. No one ever thinks disaster can happen in their own country. They ALL think they’re better than that. It’s true. The Germans didn’t think it could happen there. The Italians didn’t either. Neither did all those Russian peasants who fought for freedom in 1917. Nor the Chinese after WWII. But in all those cases, it did. It did.

Things never go quite according to plan. People do what they have to do. When it’s good, it can be very good. And everything has to be done to keep it that way. Because when it’s bad, it’s disastrous, and it could happen here as easily as anywhere else. Don’t kid yourself. You’re smarter than that.

About your practical comments which are very vague: You still aren’t talking about what happens to the OFM whose superior must choose to abandon the apostolate, violate basic Catholic teaching, or go under. Or the Catholic school principal. Or the Catholic Family Services employee who is an abortion counselor. There are no specifics in your comments–only a very rosy, don’t worry, be happy. That’s not good enough.

Perhaps you’re telling me that the peace and justice wing likes the idea of charity better than the actual charity provided by the OFM on the street. If that’s whatt you’re telling me, just be upfront about it. I might easily be able to believe that.
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You still aren’t talking about what happens to the OFM whose superior must choose to abandon the apostolate, violate basic Catholic teaching, or go under.
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I don’t understand…Why would they have to do any such thing if an option would be available that does not violate their principles? Are you speaking of groups that do not currently provide insurance? If that is your question, then I’m not certain.

John
 
oldcelt said:
I don’t understand…Why would they have to do any such thing if an option would be available that does not violate their principles? Are you speaking of groups that do not currently provide insurance? If that is your question, then I’m not certain.

John
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Apparently you haven’t read the details of the HHS mandate.
  1. Many secular Catholics work for companies through whom they get their insurance now. They probably already pay for all kinds of birth control yada, yada and they probably know it because a lot of them use it. This won’t change in the short term. Bad Catholic behavior, sure, but it’s grandfathered out. Been going on for a long time & not likely to change. This is not the issue here, HOWEVER.
  2. Many poor people don’t have any coverage. They are “required” to buy coverage, which may even be subsidized, however many probably won’t anyway. They’ll be fined but that’s also going to be individual, and based on what they were doing before, and a small amount. Many people will catch on and only get insurance which is more expensive than the fine, when they are sick. No way for the govt to get around this.
  3. Some well-off people choose not to insure themselves. See #2. Same thing applies, except for the subsidy part.
  4. NOW THE CATHOLIC PART: Most Catholic dioceses, schools, colleges, religious orders etc have been engaged in self-insuring, through Catholic agencies. These plans have not covered abortion, birth control, reproductive technologies of various sorts that the Church deems immoral. These will no longer count as insurance plans under the taxing law upheld by the supreme court because they violate the law for not covering abortion etc. which is the law. Those who insist on buying these will still be subject to fines as though they weren’t insured at all.
a) Those who work for a very narrowly defined group of Catholic institutions which don’t violate the 4 rules I listed on a previous post, given here, for the sake of brevity
heritage.org/research/reports/2012/03/obamacares-preventive-services-mandate-and-religious-liberty
won’t pay the fine.

Note that the only people who are not subject to the fine, when those 4 rules are applied, are specifically employees of the parish church building or the diocesan catholic offices proper. If there is any outreach, if they serve non-catholics, if their goal is anything else than the inculcation of religion or if they have not in the past been tax-exempt, they are subject to the fine.

b) All other Catholic employees must either buy the insurance covering abortion etc or pay a fine of $100/day/employee which is levied against the employer, not the individual. Collected by the IRS. It will end up costing the employee, but indirectly, probably in terms of their job. No Catholic apostolate can afford this fine: $36500/year/employee.
 
So what does this mean?

If a priest stays in his parish, serves only Catholics, teaches only religion as defined by the rules, the diocese doesn’t have to pay the tax for him. However, he can’t serve, operate or sponsor a food bank, for instance, that serves non-Catholics. If he serves someone on their death bed, they need to be Catholic. Etc etc. And they’re probably going to have to ask. Or he is at risk of losing the exemption for the diocesan priests’ insurance plans if exceptions occur. It will be considered insurance fraud.

Do you remember when Fr. Groeschel used to go and stand in the abortion protests? He used to get arrested occasionally. Well, now the order will stand to lose its exemption from the mandate if one of the friars does that. At vast cost to the congregation. It will probably go out of existence if this happens.
 
iloveangels said:
So what does this mean?

If a priest stays in his parish, serves only Catholics, teaches only religion as defined by the rules, the diocese doesn’t have to pay the tax for him. However, he can’t serve, operate or sponsor a food bank, for instance, that serves non-Catholics. If he serves someone on their death bed, they need to be Catholic. Etc etc. And they’re probably going to have to ask. Or he is at risk of losing the exemption for the diocesan priests’ insurance plans if exceptions occur. It will be considered insurance fraud.

Do you remember when Fr. Groeschel used to go and stand in the abortion protests? He used to get arrested occasionally. Well, now the order will stand to lose its exemption from the mandate if one of the friars does that. At vast cost to the congregation. It will probably go out of existence if this happens.
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This is all a bit much for me to absorb at this hour, and you are right…from what you are presenting, I was ignorant of these provisions.

My initial take, if these groups have been self-insuring and their employees are happy…leave well enough alone.

John
 
oldcelt said:
This is all a bit much for me to absorb at this hour, and you are right…from what you are presenting, I was ignorant of these provisions.
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Hello.
oldcelt said:
My initial take, if these groups have been self-insuring and their employees are happy…leave well enough alone.

John
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That’s long gone, John. Long, long gone. That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.

If you pay attention when you go to the doctor, you’ll notice that they’re doing a lot more paperwork lately. Go ahead, ask the nurse about it, and she’ll tell you what’s going on. Obamacare is already kicking in and has been for some time now.

If you go for an infected finger, they will take not only your temperature but your blood pressure, weight and even your height. They might counsel you on your weight and tell you about your Body Mass Index. Necessary for a cut finger? No. New? Yes. Provisions of Obamacare that they are required to “provide.” The data goes into a new government database. YOu are donating your data to the federal government now. Surprise! You’re also paying for the extra stuff, indirectly and sometimes directly, even though you don’t need it. Surprise!

OH, by the way, you might also get a print-out of your medical stuff going back some time, either there in the office when you check out, or in the mail, whether you want to pay for it or not. I make them give it to me there because I do not want my medical information floating around the US post office. MAJOR, MAJOR INVASION OF PRIVACY. Good luck.

And REMEMBER: The DEMOCRATS did this to YOU.
 
Despite all the talk of additional compromise, the HHS mandate as originally published became effective Aug 1, 2012.
There were NO changes.
It became final on Aug 1st.

See here

and here.

This administration is placating its PP / NARAL /abortion base with this mandate.
The administration has shown contempt for freedom of religion.
That’s why the lawsuits will go forward.
 
JimG said:
Despite all the talk of additional compromise, the HHS mandate as originally published became effective Aug 1, 2012.
There were NO changes.
It became final on Aug 1st.

See here

and here.

This administration is placating its PP / NARAL /abortion base with this mandate.
The administration has shown contempt for freedom of religion.
That’s why the lawsuits will go forward.
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I hope the lawsuits succeed better than the ones attempting to overturn Roe vs. Wade have. I’m not sure how this is going to turn out and I don’t think anyone else can predict it either.

The best way to stop it is to elect an opposition–meaning Republican in this case–Congress and President and attempt to get at it that way. Maybe it can be sawn up or defunded or something and we can salvage religious liberty. Personal liberty and privacy need to be salvaged too.

AND we do not NEED and cannot allow a Supreme Court packed with these sorts of people. And that’s at stake this time too. Tell me, what would THAT do to the Church???

I can’t get over the whole irony of it. The supposed rationale for abortion in 1973 was the privacy between the woman and the doctor. Now you see. That was FAKE. They don’t care about privacy or they wouldn’t be collecting my personal information and yours for a giant database. They care about money and power, which is actually completely predictable. Political parties aren’t religions or moral entities, they’re political parties!! They’re ABOUT power and money–that’s the point of a political party. THey exist to get people elected and to broker power.
 
iloveangels said:
I hope the lawsuits succeed better than the ones attempting to overturn Roe vs. Wade have. I’m not sure how this is going to turn out and I don’t think anyone else can predict it either.

The best way to stop it is to elect an opposition–meaning Republican in this case–Congress and President and attempt to get at it that way. Maybe it can be sawn up or defunded or something and we can salvage religious liberty. Personal liberty and privacy need to be salvaged too.

AND we do not NEED and cannot allow a Supreme Court packed with these sorts of people. And that’s at stake this time too. Tell me, what would THAT do to the Church???

I can’t get over the whole irony of it. The supposed (but fake as you can now see) rationale for abortion in 1973 was the privacy between the woman and the doctor. Now you see. That was FAKE. They don’t care about privacy. They care about money and power, which is actually completely predictable. Political parties aren’t religions or moral entities, they’re political parties!! They’re ABOUT power and money–that’s the point of a political party.
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I have been rather astonished at the administration’s recalcitrance on this issue. They would like to tamp down the objections against limiting religious liberty while not really giving anything up. The president values the pro-choice vote and the gay marriage vote a whole lot more than he values the traditional Catholic vote. He believes he can fake Catholics into believing they have been given a compromise. They have not.

I am pretty certain that this religious repression will get worse in a second term.

Edit: I should add that I have no confident that the citizenry in general would protest religious persecution of Catholics or Evangelicals or any other group. Catholics were heavily persecuted in the 1920’s, even by the KKK, and there was not much objection. (Read “Rising Road, A True Tale of Love, Race and Religion in America,” to get a feel for that era. It could happen again.
 
JimG said:
I have been rather astonished at the administration’s recalcitrance on this issue. They would like to tamp down the objections against limiting religious liberty while not really giving anything up. The president values the pro-choice vote and the gay marriage vote a whole lot more than he values the traditional Catholic vote. He believes he can fake Catholics into believing they have been given a compromise. They have not.
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I don’t know why you find this surprising. It’s been building up to this for some time now. And this administration’s makeup is a dead giveaway. Look at the “religious backgrounds” of the people in this administration. Hint, hint. It’s all about power, Jim, all about power. And tools are what they can get their hands on, if that’s what interests them.
JimG said:
I am pretty certain that this religious repression will get worse in a second term.
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I agree. I’m shocked that more Catholics don’t see this freight train coming.

They’re going to try to bully us into providing all kinds of “services” that are immoral, and make us suffer if we refuse to provide them. We may have to shut ourselves off from the general public to avoid it, which is also something most Catholics are going to have a lot of trouble with. Even insisting on a policy of “strict membership + practicing behavior to obtain services” is going to be a problem because we’ve been so sloppy about who we offered services to in the past.

Also I expect freedom of speech condemnations when it comes to certain mortally sinful acts. Priests in the armed forces are under all kinds of pressure–that’s going to get worse as well.

These will shortly be the “good old days” if we don’t stand up and vote this guy and some of his congressional cronies out of office.
 
JimG said:
Despite all the talk of additional compromise, the HHS mandate as originally published became effective Aug 1, 2012.
There were NO changes.
It became final on Aug 1st.

See here

and here.

This administration is placating its PP / NARAL /abortion base with this mandate.
The administration has shown contempt for freedom of religion.
That’s why the lawsuits will go forward.
Click to expand...
And you are correct, Jim. All that blather about compromise was no compromise at all. The law was put into the federal record and will be enforced as originally written. There were no changes to the text. It became final on August 1, 2012, a little over a month ago.
 
iloveangels said:
All the more reason he shouldn’t be in the white house. We need somebody who is more reliable and thinks we don’t have 57 states.
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Maybe Obama got this mixed up with Heinz Ketchup’s 57 varieties. There are so many rich and thick red states, it’s easily understandable.
 
JimG said:
Edit: I should add that I have no confident that the citizenry in general would protest religious persecution of Catholics or Evangelicals or any other group. Catholics were heavily persecuted in the 1920’s, even by the KKK, and there was not much objection. (Read “Rising Road, A True Tale of Love, Race and Religion in America,” to get a feel for that era. It could happen again.
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The thing that a lot of Catholics don’t get is that most Americans (70% or so) don’t care about Catholics one way or the other. UP until 2002, we were never really on their radar, except in the occasional Christmas movie. As long as they didn’t have to hear about us except for a little bell and candle entertainment, they were good with that. We were normal people at work, and privately so what if we were latin-mumbling spaghetti-eaters or whatever. If we didn’t make a big deal of it, they didn’t either.

That changed a little with the sex abuse crisis. We’re considered two-faced aka hypocritical and corrupt, now, because we have all these rules about behavior but this famous and spectacular, let’s face it, scandal. And it involved kids. Bad news. Reactions to the news one is Catholic at work are different now. People feel free to say things they didn’t before. Nevertheless, if they don’t have to think about us, they don’t.

But the stage has been set for us to be used as a target. It works with some people, and it could work with more if conditions get a lot worse. It’s not a nice dynamic but one that’s well-known to anthropologists. We’ve got to stop acting like goofballs and behave ourselves quietly while working to get out of trouble. I don’t know if Catholics can do that. They’ve been solidly rewarded for being theology-bereft goofballs for years.

I mean, if it becomes necessary to play it kind of close to the vest and work together to protect the sanctity of our buildings, practices, sacraments and beliefs, can we do that? Can we discern what’s inside and what’s outside? We’re going to have to learn, I guess.
 
meltzerboy said:
Maybe Obama got this mixed up with Heinz Ketchup’s 57 varieties. There are so many rich and thick red states, it’s easily understandable.
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Well, Meltzerboy,

You’d better hope there are a lot of red states this time. When they get done with us, there’s nothing keeping them from coming after other groups. If they learn they can get power from it, it will become part of the playbook.
 
Pollster Dick Morris said pollsters weight the samples so it reflects what they believe the turn out is going to be. Rassmussun assumes 13% black turn out when historically it has been 11% in 2010, 2004 and 2000. If put back at 11% the 49 - 45 Obama poll is even. Downgrading senior vote, upgrading Latino vote and those weights distort
 
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