Arizona Republic Gets It Wrong ... Again!

The Editorial Board of the Arizona Republic (TEBAR) would have you believe that President Obama made a huge mistake in regards to contraceptive coverage for employees of religiously affiliated organizations.  They believe that since the issue was about really about “liberty” and “religious freedom” that Republicans had a winning issue with which to beat President Obama this November.

“Once upon a time, Republicans had a very good issue going for them in their battle to replace President Barack Obama with one of their own.

It was something precious and universal: Liberty. Religious freedom.

Once, they had the chance to fight the federal leviathan, which sought to impose its will and its own set of morals on America's people of faith. And to carry the fight from the moral high ground.

In the face of Obama's mandates regarding insurance for abortifacients and sterilization and the rest, they had the First Amendment. They had a founding principle of the American way of life.”

Yes, TEBAR believes denying women healthcare coverage for contraception was a “very good issue”, that is, until Rush Limbaugh started talking about it.

“What does it say about the college coed Susan [sic] Fluke, who goes before a congressional committee and essentially says that she must be paid to have sex? What does that make her? It makes her a slut, right? It makes her a prostitute. She wants to be paid to have sex.

She's having so much sex she can't afford the contraception. She wants you and me and the taxpayers to pay her to have sex. What does that make us? We're the pimps.

The johns, that's right. We would be the johns -- no! We're not the johns. Well -- yeah, that's right. Pimp's not the right word.

OK, so, she's not a slut. She's round-heeled. I take it back.”

“So Miss Fluke and the rest of you feminazis, here's the deal.  If we are going to pay for your contraceptives and thus pay for you to have sex, we want something. We want you to post the videos online so we can all watch.”

But TEBAR gets it wrong, again.  Requiring religiously affiliated institutions such as hospitals to provide health care insurance for their employees that included contraceptive coverage was never about “liberty” or “religious freedom”.  It was always about a woman’s ability to receive equal access to healthcare insurance with contraceptive coverage no matter if the woman is an employee of GE or St. Joseph’s Hospital.

A woman doesn’t have to use that coverage if their religious views don’t allow it, but that is their individual choice, not the choice of their employer.  No employer, religiously affiliated or not, should have the ability to deny anyone, male or female, access to certain coverage by insurance providers due the employer’s religious views or affiliation.

The Republicans were getting their ass kicked on this issue, even before Mr. Limbaugh decided to speak on it.  They made numerous missteps, including having only men testify about contraceptives in front of a Congressional Committee chaired by Congressman Darrel Issa.  Hell, just the fact that 98% of women who identified themselves as Catholic stated that they use contraceptives, against Catholic dictate, made the war on contraceptive coverage a losing issue.

Republicans are grasping at straws.  They know that the real issues are the economy and jobs.  They also know that they have no real remedies to help the economy or to create more jobs.  That’s why they thought the issue of contraceptive coverage by religiously affiliated institutions was a winning issue.  And that’s why The Editorial Board of the Arizona Republic tried to make the issue really about “liberty” and “religious freedom” when it was nothing of the sort.

President Obama Proposes A Republican Plan To "Save" The USPS

There is no denying that the United States Postal Service is in deep financial crises.  What has been overlooked by the vast majority is that this "crises" was formulated in 2006 by a Republican Congress and a Republican President.  The USPS, in seeing fuel prices rocket, went to Congress hoping to get more flexibility in raising prices.  Of course, Republicans being Republicans, saw this as an opportunity to cripple and possibly even destroy the USPS and by extension, the union representing USPS carriers.

So, Republicans enacted a law that gave the USPS nominal flexibility to raise prices, but also saddled it with a mandate to fully fund their employee pension plan to cover the next 75 years.  That's correct, the USPS had to fund their pension plan to not only fully cover current employees, but also employees who haven't even been hired or born yet.  To make matters worse, the law required the USPS to fully fund those 75 years in only 10 years time.  That means that the USPS has had to make yearly payments of over $5 billion into their pension plan, payments that eat away at its financial stability.  It should be noted that no other entity, private or public, within the United States is required to fully fund their pension plans for the next 75 years, only the USPS.

Because of that yearly payment, the USPS has been posting major operating losses in the billions, since 2006.  Instead of being able to raise prices, it has had to borrow against the Republican imposed $15 billion "credit line" with the Treasury Department, which is almost depleted.  So, while incurring monumental operating losses due to its requirement to fully fund their pension plans, unable to raise prices enough to meet expenses, the USPS has also incurred a massive debt to Treasury.  Only now, it can't make its Republican imposed yearly pension fund payment, because it doesn't have the cash to do so.

The Post Master General, Patrick Donahoe, has asked Congress to give him the ability to break the contracts the USPS has with its union employees which would allow him to fire over 200,000 postal employees, to end Saturday service and to opt for a different pension plan.  Congressman Darrel Issa (R-CA) appears more than eager to go along with Mr. Donahoe's proposal, thus achieving a major goal of Republicans in 2006.

Now in steps President Obama with his plan to "save" the USPS.  The "plan" is at its very heart, a Republican "plan", which encompasses restructuring the pension pre-funding, to sell non-USPS products and the elimination of Saturday service.  No proposal to get rid of the Republican imposed full pension funding.  No proposal to give the USPS even more flexibility to raise rates.  Nope, just as with the "job's package" from a couple weeks ago, President Obama has proposed only Republican ideas to "save" the USPS.

Mr. President, the Republicans don't want to save the USPS.  They want it gone, period and they will do whatever it takes to see that mission accomplished.  Why the fuck are you helping that process along?  Why aren't you firing the Post Master General for proposing to fuck over the carriers?  Why aren't you fighting for the carriers instead of once again doing the Republican's dirty work for them?  Why don't you propose that junk bulk mailers pay more equitable postage rates?

There are better proposals than sending 220,000 more people to the unemployment lines and cutting Saturday service.  But since they aren't Republican proposals, I am sure President Obama has no use for them.