Yes and no. The kerfluffle was over whether or not non-church religious institutions could opt out of insurance coverage for contraception for their employees. There was already an exemption in the law as written for churches. But this language did not cover religious-funded institutions which are not churches, such as schools and hospitals. There's nothing about Federal funding involved AFAIK.
So effectively, this meant that when Sacred Heart hospital buys insurance coverage for its employees, it cannot tell the insurance company "Oh, and btw...we don't want any birth control coverage for our employees, even though it's part of the package we bought."
There is actually nothing preventing a private insurance company from creating an insurance package which doesn't cover contraception and selling that to their Catholic clients, if there's such a big demand. OMG....a market solution! Which Republicans are quite willing to ignore if it makes for good political theater.
Also ignores the fact that some 90% of American Catholic women report using birth control. That's one big area where American Catholics have long been willing to tell the Pope to fuck off in comparison to Europeans. What the Church doesn't like is that its own
employees (who may not be Catholics themselves, mind you) can tell them to fuck off, not just lay parishoners.
Of course, a lot of this is dog-whistling. Privately, the argument is that "if they can do this with contraception, they can do it with abortion". So the specter of "government-mandated abortion coverage" is being used to drum up support among the base without actually invoking something so patently ridiculous out in the open. Problem being, the approach is utterly tone-deaf and the image that's resulted is "OMG Republicans want to ban condoms". Which is also totally wrong, but hey...it's an image they helped create themeselves.
Romney wins utterly non-binding straw poll in Washington state. Ron Paul comes in 2nd, with Santorum a very close 3rd. Of course, nobody actually gets any delegates out of it, so it's a beauty contest. And one you'd expect Romney to do well in.
Attending his first caucus at the Labor Temple in Seattle's Belltown neighborhood, Dillon Smith, 31, vowed to write in Paul's name no matter who is on the ballot in November.
"I would rather die than vote for any of the other candidates," said Smith, because the country needs someone who will "basically slit the throat of the federal government."
So....it has come to this. Let's elect someone who will slit our collective throat.
Newest polls:
National:
Gallup has Romney back in front at +14 nationally. Are we beginning to see "primary fatigue" and a general sense of "F**k it, we're going to lose anyways, just put the rich guy in and hope for the best"?
Because Rasmussen's latest polls show no change: Romney or Santorum, they both lose to Obama nationally.
Georgia:
Gingrich has this one in hand, at +14-20. There must be something powerful strong in that peach cobbler down there.
Ohio:
Santorum clings to hope here, at +2. Focus is increasingly turning to Ohio as the "make or break state" on Tuesday, if only because it's the most competitive of the races.
Intrade seems to have decided the state is going to go Romney, but Nate Silver still gives Santorum a 2/3 shot of winning.
Tennessee:
Where MTSU's poll had Santorum at +21 just a couple of days ago and Vanderbilt's at +18 just before that, Rasmussen's poll shows him at a mere +4. Either his support has plummeted for some inexplicable reason, or once again Scott Rasmussen wouldn't know how to conduct a proper poll if it bit him in the ass. I'm inclined to go with the latter.
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Topic: American Election Megathread - It's Over (Read 769074 times)