As the inauguration countdown enters its last 60 days, the Bush administration is doing what any of us do when we're about to leave a job -- no, not downloading company secrets and stealing all the good pens -- they're tidying up, finishing those outstanding tasks that they just won't feel right if they leave undone. You know, like limiting women's access to reproductive healthcare! This story came up while talking about a battle over contraception in the Philippines: for the past several months, the administration has pushed for new rules requiring any healthcare organization that receives federal funding to "protect" workers who had "conscience"-based objections to performing or assisting in abortion or sterilizatin-related activity. The rule's definition of abortion, as many have pointed out, would also apply to hormonal birth control devices such as the pill or Nuva ring.
Leaving aside the objections of the American Medical Association, the American Hospital Association, the National Association of Chain Drug Stores, the attorneys general of 13 states, and about a third of the congress (so far), the rule is rejected by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission as totally unnecessary, despite the adminstration's stance that it's merely seeking to protect workers from being discriminated against for their convictions. It's unclear whether the administration, or anyone else, has ever met anyone whose job was put in jeopardy for such actions (and it's kind of hard for me to understand why someone who has religious objections to providing healthcare would work in the field, but maybe that's just me). So who's for the new rule? The Catholic Health Association and the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, among other religious groups.
Perhaps the most hypocritical part of the proposal is that it violates the Bush adminstration's own rules about this kind of last-minute action. According to the New York Times, "the White House said in May that new regulations should be proposed by June 1 and issued by Nov. 1. The “provider conscience” rule missed both deadlines."
Speaking of deadlines: if the rule is put into place, it would be overturned by a new President Obama as soon as he takes office, but even then it will take three to six months (and a lot of wasted taxpayer money) for the reversal to be complete. I propose, then, that any unwanted children resulting from this rule -- let's say, born to a woman who was raped and denied the morning-after pill by her friendly local conscience-driven pharmacist -- be named George and immediately sent down to Crawford, Texas. I hear there's a retiree and his wife who will raise them up to be good Christians.
