Abortion insurance, conscience, and symbolism

Published December 18, 2009 5:00am ET



Liberal blogger Matt Yglesias at the Center for American Progress attacks Ben Nelson for his opposition to taxpayer funding of abortion. Yglesias seems to belong to the Jon Chait school of liberal blogging, which apparently holds that nastiness and name-calling are the proper means for discussing complex moral and political issues. Here’s the money paragraph in Yglesias’s latest post on abortion subsidies in health care:

And part of the insanity of it is that the actual impact on the number of abortions in America is going to be tiny. Middle-class women will be able to pay for abortions out of pocket, and the “Hyde Amendment” status quo already screws poor women. But it’s a nice symbolic dig at pro-choice America, and a further means of stigmatizing reproductive health services as somehow not real health care. And Nelson, Bart Stupack, and various bishops love the idea of holding the whole package hostage to this point, since I guess the dead kids with trauma injuries will go to heaven anyway or something.

Trusted reporting.Unlimited access.

Subscribe for full access to Washington Examiner coverage, expert political analysis, and subscriber-only journalism.

Get Unlimited Access

Already a member? Log in

Cancel anytime.