The Blunt Amendment

The Blunt Amendment would have overridden the Obama Administration's new contraception coverage rule and allowed any employer to refuse to cover any kind of health care service by citing "moral reasons." Three Democrats, Sens. Bob Casey (Pa.), Joe Manchin (W.Va.) and Ben Nelson (Neb.), voted with Republicans in favor of the amendment, and only one Republican, Sen. Olympia Snowe (Maine), voted against it. It was a 51 to 48 vote against this amendment.

I think all this debate is very interesting because Republicans have used this reform to attack Obama accusing him of jeopardizing religious freedom. I really think we should be done with the contraceptives debate. the supreme court already ruled in 1965, in the case Griswold vs Connecticut that prohibiting birth control violates the law. Clearly every women have the choice if they want to get contraceptives or not, and their insurance should provide it, like it would provide any other medication. giving the choice to employer would be very harmful. Some of them would choose not to pay for contraceptives just to save cost.
I wonder what would happen if this wasn't an election year. The polarization seems to increase once we reach the election year. I also think that rhetoric has been increasing lately in both sides. They both exaggerated the issue, in order to get more people on their side. At the end I think this is going to back fire the republicans because of all the things they have said in the media lately. This is one of the quotes that I find very interesting:"If the government is allowed to tell people to buy health care, it won't stop there. I wonder what's next? This isn't about one particular religion -- it's about the right of any American to live out their faith without the government picking and choosing which doctrines they're allowed to follow."It was said by Mitch McConnell (R). I think is very obvious that the government decision’s was on women’s health, and not religion freedom. People like Mitch McConnell, try to capitalize on a government decision by using rhetoric, that my not work with educated people


Sources:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/fact-checker/post/sen-chuck-schumers-remarks-about-the-blunt-amendment/2012/03/01/gIQAwt6bmR_blog.html
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/02/jon-stewart-rips-blunt-amendment_n_1315955.html?ref=comedy
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/01/blunt-amendment-vote-fails-senate-contraception_n_1313287.html