Boring headline, but factual.
Santorum said he was talking specifically about some, but not all, prenatal testing, and not about prenatal care in general.
“There are all sorts of prenatal testing which should be provided free,” Santorum said. “I have no problem with that if the insurance companies want to. I’m not for any of these things to be forced.”
Rick Santorum opposes all mandated coverage without co-pays. Rick Santorum is linking mandated coverage to abortion because it’s politically beneficial to him to do so. It doesn’t matter if the mandated coverage without co-pays is screening for gestational diabetes or amniocentesis, so this is (of course) not about abortion because screening for gestational diabetes without a co-pay (for example) has nothing to do with abortion, and Santorum opposes that, too. I know that because that’s what he said.
There’s really no reason to discuss amniocentesis specifically, other than the fact that media swallowed Santorum’s carefully calculated and misleading framing whole and thus discussed only what he wants to discuss.
How about this headline: Rick Santorum is protecting large employers and health insurance companies, and he’s using disabled children to do that.
The conservative opposition to mandated coverage in insurance policies is about opposing federal regulation of health insurance companies and large employers, not abortion, because conservatives oppose all mandated coverage without co-pays. All of the rest of this over-heated nonsense is misdirection.
No one ever asked the religious leaders what other sections of the health care law that apply to large employers they opposed, and that’s a shame, because that would have been a very good question.
Baud
Santorum has consistently pointed out that he has a conservative and not a libertarian view of the role of government. So he is for forcing some things, just not regulation of businesses in support of public health.
It would be nice if someone asked him to explain how he makes choices about what types of things should be forced.
c u n d gulag
Icky Sticky Ricky says:
”I’m not for any of these things to be forced.”
Does that mean that he’s now against the mechanical rape of pregnant women’s VAgina’s who are seeking abortions in Ol’ Virginia?
No, of course not!
“Torquemada” Santorum is a sick, sick bastard, whose mother wishes contraception and/or abortion were more readily available and legal when his Daddy got the gleam in his eye that led to the conception of this moral monster.
Betty Cracker
Great point. It’s easy to forget that when the person making the policy pronouncement is a convincing fetus fetishist like Santorum, but that’s by design. Their goal is to protect the One Percent. The rest is bread and circuses.
kay
@Baud:
It really would, because states mandate coverage in insurance, and Republicans would over turn that with federal law.
People really need to know that what they’re talking about is removing the state law guarantees that people have NOW.
It would really save a lot of time if we could discuss the issue, which is regulation of large employers and insurance companies, but I suppose we’ll have to go LINE BY LINE through the health care law until someone says “they oppose all regulation of insurance companies and large businesses! Glory be!”
There’s a shocker. Republicans oppose regulation.
I mean, jesus christ, who has time for this, in the real world? This could take months, and it could have been wrapped up with three questions.
Frankensteinbeck
Thank goodness Santorum is SO bugfuck insane that he’s taking this right out and unapologetically into ‘I want to take away all the medical coverage Obama has given you for free, ladies’ and ‘birth control is wrong’. He’s prime ‘reasonable people disagree’ bait for the media, and they’re already eating it up. They love people with strong principles, defined as any rigid morality that isn’t about helping people, which is obviously just naive.
The man’s positions are way beyond extreme, enough to hit home rather than being someone else’s problem. I don’t think you can totebag them, no matter how hard you try.
kay
@Betty Cracker:
It really is. I love: “if the insurance companies want to“.
Run on that, you cowardly asshole. Run on “if the insurance companies want to”. Leave disabled kids out of it.
WereBear
At last. We have a real life incarnation of the cowardly weasel, played by Martin Sheen in the movie The Dead Zone, who was exposed when he used a toddler as a live fire shield.
Video mashup, please!
pluege
The conservative opposition to mandated coverage in insurance policies is about opposing federal regulation of health insurance companies and large employers…
conservatives don’t oppose mandated coverage – not long ago it was their idea. They’ve decided its something to attack obama over – that’s the whole of their opposition now.
kay
@pluege:
They oppose specific services that have to be included in health insurance plans. States regulate that now.
They oppose it at the state level, and always have, under the conservative theory that they shouldn’t have to pay for “other people’s” health care.
It’s a race to the bottom. We’d buy junk insurance that doesn’t cover anything, but people would not find that out until they made a claim, and that’s very, very good for insurance companies.
kay
@pluege:
The most tragic part is religious conservatives opposing mandated coverage of services related to pregnancy, because religious conservatives so benefit from other people sharing in the insurance pool and mitigating the cost of insurance for people who have a lot of children.
Your state probably mandates maternity coverage right now, whether or not you’ll ever have children. That’s cost-sharing, and spreading risk.
Santorum is screwing his own voters. They wouldn’t be able to afford maternity coverage if a lot of people who don’t have children weren’t sharing the cost.
harlana
i can’t stand this guy, on a visceral level. i mean more than Newt, and that’s saying a lot. he is an icky, creepy, whiny, totally self-absorbed, tribalistic, cruel, sadistic bastard.
please let him be the nominee!
ornery_curmudgeon
“…the fact that media swallowed Santorum’s carefully calculated and misleading framing whole and thus discussed only what he wants…”
No, the media did not get “fooled” into discussing only what the corporatist Republican wanted to discuss.
THE CORPORATE MEDIA IS BOUGHT. Purchased. Owned. Directed and controlled. They are issuing corporate propaganda.
Scary, yes, but pretending otherwise does NOT make things safer. Will another war convince? Is there ANYTHING the corporate media can do to make their owned status clear enough to see and admit?
Jim C
@kay:
The Insurance Sketch.
Vicar: But my car was struck by a lorry while standing in the garage and you refuse to pay my claim.
Devious: Oh, well, Reverend Morrison, in your policy … in your policy … here we are. It states quite clearly that no claim you make will be paid.
Vicar: Oh, dear.
Devious: You see, you unfortunately plumped for our “Neverpay” policy, which, you know, if you never claim is very worthwhile … but you had to claim and well, there it is …
Vicar: Oh, dear. Oh, dear.
Devious: Still, never mind, could be worse …
[Vicar begins to sob]
Devious: Look … Rev … I hate to see a man cry. So, shove off out the office, there’s a good chap.
— Monty Python’s Flying Circus (1970)
video link here.
Hoodie
@Frankensteinbeck: You know who else wore sweaters and shilled for his corporate masters? Just sayin’.
tern
“Republicans oppose regulation of large employers and health insurance companies” but want to regulate your lady parts.
Nemesis
We can bash the media all day. There is certainly a lot to abhor, but it gets us nowhere.
Looks like a bit of a perfect storm for Frothy McMixMaster. The media love to laud his “principled” leadership (see the media darling Paul Ryan for background material).
Unfortunately, there will be little if any response from the Dems for two reasons:
1. Dems could not message effectively if their political lives depended on it (and it does)
2. Dems may be sitting back, watching, taking notes and allowing Frothy to pander to the brain-dead culture war loving base. Gonna be hard to Frothy to tack back anywhere near the middle without losing his base supporters. So maybe, just maybe, Dems are giving rope to the gop in hopes Frothy comes thorugh the process as the nominee. Then, maybe we destroy him in the election.
Contraception, womens access to healthcare as campaign issues? WTF?
squirrelhugger
Call him what he is– a reactionary trying to simply turn back the clock 70 years or so. He isn’t attempting some honorable recapturing of conservative values, he’s trying to stuff us all in a wayback machine. He and his pals need to be labelled properly; it’s the first step towards getting the dim masses to understand what they represent.
jrg
Just catching up this morning… Wow, Santorum is a lunatic.
What does he expect to do with the babies that wind up in state care? Is he so dumb he doesn’t think that will happen? Or does he think that the easter bunny will pay for it, like he did and does with Iraq, Medicare part D, and red state welfare?
Villago Delenda Est
With Rih, it’s all about being a moral scold. A sexuality moral scold, not a greed moral scold. Because sex is icky, but greed is good.
This guy needs a tumbrel ride so fucking bad.
cmorenc
@Betty Cracker:
The correct answer to whether Santorum is EITHER: 1) spouting a hard-line on insurance coverage re: contraception because he’s a true hard-core fundamentalist believer whose first priority is a fundamental change in government in line with his beliefs; OR: 2) a willing protector (and personal/political beneficiary) of the one percent and insurance companies at the expense of the 99% of ordinary citizens
IS:
BOTH !
Folks, this is NOT an either/or question, and most things do not have single either/or causes or motivations. This is one of them. IMHO it’s actually more dangerous, not less that Santorum’s primary motivation is ideological/religious, but that serving the big insurers financial interests is happily consistent with and convenient toward his own fundamental goals.
harlana
@jrg:
1. who cares? any child that ends up “on welfare” doesn’t deserve to live once they’re out of the womb
2. he doesn’t care, see answer #1
harlana
@Villago Delenda Est:
the Victorian Era, those were some good times
Rick Taylor
Yes, yes, a thousand times yes. The public supports the availability of contraception, but I expect they’d support access for children’s insurance and for those with pre-existing conditions even more. We need to shift this to a conversation about all the issues involving health care.
harlana
@Rick Taylor: i’d like to know what kinds of prenatal testing, etc., Karen had with all those problem pregnancies of hers and how he would have felt if his insurance company just felt icky about paying for all that prenatal stuff? wouldn’t that be an interesting, and rather relevant question for a debate?
harlana
some day, only those that can afford a damn good private insurance policy will be able to get coverage for things that, like, you know, help keep you from dying and stuff.
Falconlady
Lack of regulation is what got us here in the first place. Santorum and his ilk think it is perfectly fine to not cover children, pre-existing conditions and the less fortunate. Profit before people is his mantra (and the rest of the Repubs)
scav
@harlana: How else does GoD manifest his divine approval except by the blessings of lotsnlotsnlots of bucks? His Agents and Angels are now Ministering LLCs and I’m pretty sure I saw the Gabriel (in the Annunciation) sporting a FedEx logo.
HRA
This is just another way to target the poor unmarried mothers.
Throughout his debating he hones in on the not having children until you have a marriage between a man and a woman. IOW family first. Even when he engaged Willard Mitt on his MA healthcare mandate, that was the force driving him to do it.
What he does not understand is “poor unmarried mothers” are also widows or deserted women as well.
The stupidity is reaching higher with each word (drivel) coming from him.
Nutella
For example, no one asked those nasty old men in Issa’s hearing whether they were against insurance covering any health care for men. Vasectomies, for example.
J R in WVa
@Hoodie: I don’t remember, so here’s a wild guess: Mr. Rodgers?
Another guess: Al Gore?
Who did you have in mind?
edit: Oh, Oh, I know now: Jimmy Carter! amiright?
/snark
Oh no, we’ve hit that law about nazis already… I don’t use Utube much or I wouldn’t have guessed. darn it.
General Stuck (Bravo Nope Zero)
Rick Santorum is a misogynist pig fucker.
rikyrah
will someone please tell me who is paying for the insurance that’s keeping his sick child alive?
harlana
@rikyrah: i was JUST wondering the same thing. Thank You!
but, then, Santorum is special and so is his family since God loves them, they are the precious little gems from Ricky’s loins, otherwise he wouldn’t be as rich as he is, you see. those kids born in poverty, well that’s another story. anyway, that’s how come God gave him insurance that would ensure that he and his family received the best possible care.
harlana
and, also, why the unwashed masses have to pay for it.
cckids
@kay:
If insurance companies “wants” are what makes the rules, disabled kids will most surely be left completely out of it. Those little suckers are viciously expensive to cover.
Gus
It’s a dog whistle. Amnio is the most foolproof way to detect birth defects. If a birth defect is discovered, there is a greater chance of abortion. Remember how all liberals hate Sarah Palin because she didn’t abort her baby with Down syndrome? That’s partially what this is all about.
kay
Cckids, exactly.
He’s not for any of these things being “forced”.
He’s against the regulation of insurance companies, in other words, which makes him different from any other
Republican, how, again?
I love how “social conservatives” are identical to Grover Norquist, in all but rhetoric.
Who cares how they dress it up? They all get to the same place, which is protecting business from regulation, at the expense of ordinary people.
Gretchen
The maddening thing is that these folks think abortion is the worst evil ever, and oppose anything that would keep someone from having one, like free birth control. I’m sure many women have abortions because they feel they can’t afford a child right now. Free maternity care and free daycare would go a long ways towards letting some of these women have a choice. But Rick wants none of that – in fact he’s against public schools and favors home schoolin. If you’re poorly educated, your kids will be poorly educated and be no competition for his precious snowflakes.
Chris T.
cmorenc is right, Santorum is both crazy-as-a-bedbug and in the tank. It’s hard to say which parts are causes and which parts are effects.
The Republican establishment as a whole, though, is getting pretty desperate. They managed to get the label “Obamacare” to stick, and people are starting to like it. This makes the “Obama brand name” more attractive. Hence the urgent need to throw monkey wrenches into what they have gotten everyone else to call “Obamacare”, so as to tarnish the brand.