The Congressional Budget Office has released their breakdown of the President’s proposed budget, and it isn’t pretty. The AP pulls out a salient bit (via Reason – click here for the original article):

The congressional report said to achieve his $1.1 trillion in savings over the next decade, Obama relies on $974 billion in higher revenue and $172 billion in spending cuts. That is nearly a 6-1 ratio.

This is the balanced, wise, responsible compromise our President talks about? Six-to-one?? And all of this increased revenue – it isn’t going to fix our problems:

Overall, the budget office says Obama’s budget would produce $5.2 trillion in red ink through 2023. That is $1.1 trillion less than the deficits that would be generated over that time if no tax or spending laws are changed.

Six-to-one and we’re still spending ourselves silly. Great.

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Anthony Esolen at The Public Discourse shares the statement released by NARAL Pro-Choice America’s President Ilyse Hogue on the conviction of Kermit Gosnell. Here is the statement (click here for the original and here for Esolen’s article):

Justice was served to Kermit Gosnell today and he will pay the price for the atrocities he committed. We hope that the lessons of the trial do not fade with the verdict. Anti-choice politicians, and their unrelenting efforts to deny women access to safe and legal abortion care, will only drive more women to back-alley butchers like Kermit Gosnell.

From the lack of funding available for low-income women to access abortion services, to the sharp decline of reputable providers in Pennsylvania, to the gross negligence of authorities to enforce the law after complaints were filed against Gosnell, each aspect of this case must be a teachable moment for lawmakers: until we reject the politicization of women’s medical care and leave these decisions where they belong—between a woman and her family and her doctor—women will never be safe. The horrifying story of Kermit Gosnell is a peek into the world before Roe v. Wade made legal a woman’s right to make her own choices.

NARAL Pro-Choice America’s annual Who Decides? publication has given Pennsylvania an ‘F’ grade precisely because it has passed medically unnecessary laws that restrict access to safe and legal abortion care. It is my sincere hope that the women in Gosnell’s clinic did not suffer in vain and that Pennsylvania, and every state, will step up and join us in making the protection of women’s ability to get, safe, high quality, and legal abortion care a top priority.

Esolen has a great takedown of this ridiculous statement, but let me share just a few quick bullet-points of my reactions:

1. Gosnell was convicted of killing babies. These are the “atrocities.” Not having dirty facilties.

2. How on earth does Hogue not even mention the babies?!? That takes a special kind of obfuscation.

3. Hogue decries the failures of government authorities to respond to complaints but then wants to keep the government out of decisions “between a woman and her family and her doctor” and resists safety standards.

There is more to be said, but it bears emphasizing once more: How on earth can this President look herself in the mirror after writing three paragraphs about Gosnell’s “atrocities” without ever once mentioning the babies he killed?  Ridiculous.

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Dr. Mark Mitchell shares a depressing but convincing outlook on American democracy at Front Porch Repulic. Presently, and for many years now, Americans seem increasingly to be accepting an expansionist view of government where we are not so much responsible citizens as dependent children. We see our government as a nursemaid and an unstoppable, untouchable institution. We all-too-happily abdicate our responsibilities to the state. From his piece (click here to read the whole article):

We have not been attentive enough to the basic fact that power, itself, tends toward centralization and that, as Tocqueville put it, the longer a democracy endures, the more centralized its power will become…. A democracy can only thrive when people perceive themselves as citizens with real voices who can effect real change. I fear that many Americans today see themselves primarily as subjects or beneficiaries or even victims but not as citizens.

And sadly, many of us who would purport to be conservatives have our own blindspots:

We hear some railing against “big government” but at the same time cheering “big business” as if the two are not intimately conjoined. We hear from some quarters a steady militant drumbeat but we hear no admission that the warfare state is as beneficial to the centralization of power as the welfare state.

I fear this prognosis is far too accurate and, perhaps, now irreversible. I fear what the United States will look like for our children and grandchildren. Any change must come from the ground up – from men and women in small communities spurning the broad powers and provisions of the federal government and looking to themselves, their families, and their neighbors to meet their needs. We must regain an emphasis on the local. We must rediscover the centrality of the family, the church, the local institutions and small governments. If there is any hope for change, it will be a slow, hard change.

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The good news is that six abortion clinics have closed in Northern California. The bad news is that Planned Parenthood has opened several more in the same area – seemingly gaining yet more dominance in our nation’s abortion markets. The other good news is that the new surgical clinics will not provide abortions beyond 14 weeks – the clinics that closed were providing later-term abortions.

Clearly, a life is a life, but restricting abortion to 14 weeks will surely save some lives. LifeNews reports on the development (click here for the article):

When a member of [40 Days for Life Sacramento] called the Sacramento [abortion clinic] office last week, they got a pleasant surprise. A receptionist told her that clinic and the Fremont and San Jose clinics were all closing this week. “We just didn’t have enough patients,” she said, when asked why the clinics were shutting down.

Praise God – but clearly there is still much work to be done. Planned Parenthood’s expansion in the same area is troubling, but it is joyous to see that there weren’t enough local women near Sacramento desiring to abort their children to support the clinic’s terrible practice.

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Big moves from our President. President Obama yesterday fired the IRS commissioner and released 100 internal emails about the Benghazi events. With his administration practically falling apart around him in recent weeks, this isn’t a surprising move. And I would expect more to follow in regard to the Associated Press scandal. From RealClearPolitics (click here for the article):

President Obama added some octane to his laid-back crisis management demeanor on Wednesday by firing the acting IRS commissioner and publicly releasing 100 internal emails about the Benghazi attacks.

Seared by firestorms at the Internal Revenue Service (alleged political bias); the State Department and CIA (Benghazi talking points); and the Justice Department (secret searches through Associated Press phone records), the president accepted advice from friends and foes and tried to reassure Americans that his administration had not shredded the law or Americans’ rights.

I think it’s too late for that. I’ve had plenty of differences over the past several years with Obama’s liberal, expansionist view of federal government and his general emphasis on establishing and empowering “experts” to make decisions for society as a whole, but this most recent round of scandals has taken his administration’s faults to an entirely new level. They have shown themselves to be aggressively impinging on the freedoms and privacy of American citizens. And I haven’t even mentioned his claimed authority to order hits on people with impunity.

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Now that the Gosnell trial is over, there’s an opportunity to contemplate the state of abortion in our country today. Catholic Voices USA features a great perspective for the average Christian. From the piece (click here to read the whole thing):

The verdict in the Gosnell trial isn’t a closing but an opening. We must work to provide convincing, attractive, and viable options for women so that they do not even feel the need to enter the door of an abortion clinic. Besides advocating for the overturning of legal abortion and the funding of abortion providers, we must be prepared to find funding, real resources, and persons to provide women with real sources, authentic health care, and the education and opportunities they need so that they do not feel that they need to choose between their future and the life of their unborn child.

A common accusation against pro-lifers is that we only care about the baby, not the woman. This is absurd, of course. Beyond my own anecdotal experience with other pro-lifers, you need only look to the vast array of crisis pregnancy centers established by pro-lifers that help young women as they move through their pregnancies and prepare to care for a new baby.

It is important, however, for pro-lifers to be vocal about these organizations. Moreover, it is essential that pro-lifers work within churches and private charities to embrace and support young mothers – particularly single mothers. Too often young women with surprise pregnancies abort their children out of a fear. A proper, loving, compassionate safety net is one of the best efforts we can make in the effort to eliminate abortions.

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