Missouri senators split on birth control mandate
Sen. Roy Blunt
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. — Missouri Senator Roy Blunt is defending himself amid the controversy over an amendment he sponsors that would allow for people or institutions to opt out of provisions of the new national health care act due to religious or morale objections.
“People would have the same right going forward that they have had for 220 years, including up until last week,” said Blunt during a conference call with statewide reporters this week.
Blunt helped stoke the flames of a recent controversy arising from a provision in the federal Affordable Care Act that would require employers or insurance companies to provide free contraceptives.
Opponents of the measure say Blunt’s amendment is an effort to restrict women’s access to contraceptives and other health services. They say employers without a religious affiliation could withhold insurance coverage for certain procedures and drugs citing “moral convictions” which are not specified in Blunt’s amendment.
Among those critical of the amendment is Blunt’s Democratic counterpart from Missouri.
“I am very concerned about the war on contraception,” said Sen. Claire McCaskill during a weekly conference with reporters. “I’m concerned that a woman who’s a cook in one hospital couldn’t get birth control, while a woman who’s a cook in a hospital in another location could get birth control, based on who their employer is.”
Blunt counters that anyone seeking a waiver from providing services or participating in procedures would have to prove their case.
“You would have to be able to defend that decision,” said Blunt. “You couldn’t just decide that you want an insurance company to write a policy that doesn’t exist, or, two, you’ve just suddenly had a religious epiphany. You’d have to defend this in court if necessary.”
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Posted by Dick Aldrich on February 17, 2012. Filed under Politics, Subscribers.
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God Bless the Honorable Roy Blunt for upholding his oath to protect and defend the Constitution against all enemies foreign and domestic.
The First Ammendment states “Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof”; Mt:37-38,”You shall love the Lord, your God,with all your heart, your soul, your mind. This is the greatest and first commandment”… Religion clearly begins within each of us as individuals “heart,soul and mind” and then, by extension to the Church and her charitable institutions. The birth control mandate is an assault on our ‘individual free exercise’ of religion. Mrs.McCaskill,you have chosen to frame opposition to the birth control mandate as a threat to contraception for women.This is an intellectually dishonest diversion from the truth, and dereliction of duty, by failure to adhere to your sworn oath in good faith. Madame Sen. McCaskill, your are a glaring disgrace to your office, and have shamefully dishonored the citizens of Missouri. You are serving the author of lies and deception, your master, very well. I pray for your eternal soul. I hope your 15 minutes of power and fame, was worth it.