In the matter and manner of Intrusion

"We are reminded that this decision [Roe v Wade] not only protects women's health and reproductive freedom but stands for a broader principle: that government should not intrude on our most private family matters. I remain committed to protecting a woman's right to choose." President Barack Obama, January 23, 2009

Intrusion, I think, is a matter of perspective especially under such circumstances as those pertaining to abortion. President Obama says the government should not intrude in those “most private family matters” as abortion (flawed logic, that), but this statement was also made the day he reversed the so-called “Mexico City Policy” which had previously banned US taxpayer funds from being used to promote or provide abortion abroad. In his aversion to intrusion, President Obama has pretty much given the US government an overwhelmingly intrusive, rather than a more appropriate neutral, role. The Congress seems willing, if eager, to help.

The US House just passed HR 2410, the “Foreign Affairs Reauthorization Act”, which now goes to the US Senate for its consideration. Within this Act is the creation of a new office within the US State Department called the “Office for Global Women’s Issues”. My own congressman, US Rep. Mike Ross, D-AR, in response to my concerns about what I believe to be the understated issues and back door advances involved in the creation of such an office, said that HR 2410 had nothing to do with abortion or the Mexico City policy. If this much is true, then HR2410 is little more than an appropriations bill for the US State Department. If Mr. Ross was wrong in his assessment – and this remains to be seen in full – then he is either incredibly dishonest or incredibly naïve. In a hearing before the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is quoted as having said, “We are now an administration that will protect the rights of women, including their rights to reproductive health care” and that “reproductive health includes access to abortion.” In the case of Mike Ross and his assessment (he voted in favor of HR2410), my vote is for his naiveté (after all, he is a “good ol’ boy, I reckon).

US Rep. Chris Smith, R-NJ, offered an amendment that would have prevented funding for such an office of “empowerment”, but his amendment was defeated. Such a move leads me to believe that abortion and the Mexico City Policy have everything to do with the creation of such an office as designed to "coordinate efforts of the United States Government regarding gender integration and women’s empowerment in United States foreign policy." To this end, it sounds to me as though government “intrusion” is exactly what the creation of this office is all about, but the intrusion will reach far beyond the borders of the United States. This new office of “empowerment” also sounds a lot like a conduit through which these previously banned US funds (Mexico City policy) can be channeled. The “good will” of the United States is no longer about the principles of democracy. It is, instead, about the intentional destruction of unwanted children like so many litters of puppies and kittens.

What I find even more disconcerting than a government in debt spending even more on such an abhorrent act is the rather aggressive position this administration is taking on the issue of abortion, as if suggesting that there is not nearly enough death in this crazy world, that the US government needs to export and finance even more – and apparently to countries where there is not enough. It is one thing to remain neutral and acknowledge that each of us has, I suppose, an inherent “right” to destroy our own lives if we so choose; it is quite another thing to actively and aggressively promote as “foreign aid” that “right” by which we destroy the lives of others, presuming that such destruction of life will somehow enhance our own. The world and this administration may consider the willful destruction of innocent life to be “empowerment”, but there will soon be a terrible price to be paid for our cavalier attitude regarding our own children’s very right to exist. Are there really so many cold-blooded members of this Congress and this administration that they actually consider such death and destruction a “right” to be celebrated and protected and even funded, no matter the cost or concern?

This administration, indeed this entire government, has long crossed a line that should never have been crossed, but this administration and this Congress seem to believe we’ve not gone far enough. “Intrusion” will soon be the least of our worries. What this nation cannot see through such despicable policies is that the US government is involved in population control within sovereign territories outside of US control under the pretense of empowering women, which will likely take place within national borders of those nations and cultures in which women are still considered second-class citizens or outright possessions. How will destroying future generations change this attitude or enhance life and the future of these nations?

It is a sad day indeed when our nation, and far too many of this nation’s Christians, have allowed us all to digress to such a point when we consider the destruction of innocent human life to be “progress”. That is the perspective of this administration and this Congress, and we are allowing it to take place. The blood of these millions of children will demand an accounting soon enough and it will be as the 19th century American philosopher, Elbert Hubbard, once said: “We will be punished by our sins, not for them.” Shame on them for bringing this to us; shame on us for allowing it.