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More hypocrisy from the anti-abortion crowd
Posted: Fri Nov 16, 2012 11:00 pm
by Grim Reaper
Houston Chronicle wrote:
Tenn. GOP congressman's ex-wife had 2 abortions
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Republican U.S. Rep. Scott DesJarlais, who opposes abortion rights, testified during divorce proceedings that he and his former wife made a mutual decision for her to have two abortions, according to divorce transcripts released Thursday.
DesJarlais, who practiced medicine before going to Congress, easily won a second term in Tennessee's conservative 4th District despite previous revelations that he once urged a patient with whom he was having an affair to get an abortion.
On his campaign website, DesJarlais espoused an anti-abortion position, saying: "All life should be cherished and protected. We are pro-life."
DesJarlais' spokesman and campaign manager did not return messages seeking comment.
Court documents from the 2001 divorce trial were released by the state Democratic Party, which had hoped to make them public before the Nov. 6 election. They couldn't because the 679-page transcript of testimony wasn't complete.
According to DesJarlais' testimony, his ex-wife Susan had her first abortion because she was taking an experimental drug that carried potential risks in pregnancy. The second came during problems in their relationship while they were living together before their marriage.
"Things were not going well between us and it was a mutual decision," DesJarlais testified. "I don't think that it was easy for either one of us. I think it was a very difficult and poor choice and I think that there are probably regrets both ways."
DesJarlais' first wife had supported earlier efforts to release the court records, though her attorney said Thursday he hadn't had time to review them enough to comment.
DesJarlais in the court proceedings acknowledged having sex with at least two patients and he said he prescribed painkillers for at least one of them.
"Yes, she is a patient and I wrote her prescriptions," DesJarlais said.
He urged one of those patients to get an abortion during a phone conversation that he recorded. The congressman denied during the campaign that he had recorded the call, but in his 2001 testimony he acknowledged that he did. DesJarlais said he was only trying to get her to admit she wasn't pregnant.
The transcripts show that woman testified under oath that she had been pregnant. She declined to answer whether she had an abortion but said she didn't have a child by DesJarlais.
The watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington last month filed a complaint with the Tennessee Department of Health arguing that DesJarlais conducted an inappropriate sexual relationship with a patient. DesJarlais said at the time that he doesn't expect anything to come out of the complaint.
While on the stand, DesJarlais testified that he had sexual affairs with eight different women during 1999 and 2000 while his divorce was pending. For some of the time, he was attempting to reconcile with his estranged wife, who also admitted to having sexual relations with multiple men during the same time.
As late as the day before the election, DesJarlais attorney Harvey Cameron angrily disputed Democrats' assertions that the congressman had relationships with eight women.
"I can assure you it's not in the transcript, according to the depositions at least," he told reporters after court hearings in Chattanooga that resulted in partial release of the transcript being blocked.
DesJarlais' volatile first marriage was also a focal point of his first successful bid for office when he defeated Democratic incumbent Lincoln Davis in 2010. Davis ran TV ads that cited court records to allege DesJarlais once held a gun in his mouth for three hours and that he repeatedly pulled the trigger of an unloaded gun outside a room where his wife had locked herself in.
Susan DesJarlais said her then-husband had held the gun in his mouth in response to finding out that his mistress had become pregnant.
"He stuck a gun in his mouth and almost killed himself," she testified. "You don't think that he was upset?"
DesJarlais explained in court proceedings that he wasn't considering killing himself.
"It was never a loaded gun. It was never a suicide attempt," he said. "It was an attention-seeking act."
He also denied that he dry-fired a revolver outside the locked room.
"I opened the gun up. It is a revolver. And when you open it and turn it, it clicks. I wanted to make sure it was not loaded and it was not loaded," he said. "I'm assuming that was the sound she heard."
During the campaign Republican officials largely kept their distance from DesJarlais, declining to weigh in on the allegations. The congressman himself disappeared from the campaign trail, though he ran a barrage of television ads linking his Democratic opponent to President Barack Obama and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.
State Senate Speaker Ron Ramsey told reporters before the release of the transcripts Thursday that voters in the deeply conservative district may have chosen to bide their time until a Republican challenger emerges.
"There are some that voted thinking next time there'll be somebody else in the primary — we don't want Pelosi to be speaker, so one more time we'll vote for Scott," he said. "He'll have a primary opponent. I mean, he knows that."
So this guy, who opposes abortions, had two abortions with his wife, and urged a patient (who he had sex with) to get an abortion when he thought she might be pregnant.
Which means he doesn't really care about the morality behind abortions, he just wants to extend government control and prevent women from making decisions about their own bodies.
Guess he won't be happy until we're like Ireland,
where a woman recently died because she was denied an abortion.
Re: More hypocrisy from the anti-abortion crowd
Posted: Fri Nov 16, 2012 11:09 pm
by TPFKA@W
If men could get pregnant abortion clinics would be as ubiquitous as Starbucks is.
Re: More hypocrisy from the anti-abortion crowd
Posted: Fri Nov 16, 2012 11:11 pm
by Scooter
If men could get pregnant the Catholic Church would have made abortion the eighth sacrament.
Re: More hypocrisy from the anti-abortion crowd
Posted: Fri Nov 16, 2012 11:12 pm
by Gob
That is mind-blowing hypocrisy!!
Re: More hypocrisy from the anti-abortion crowd
Posted: Fri Nov 16, 2012 11:38 pm
by Lord Jim
Well the guy has apparently lied about the affairs, and seems to be a real slimebag, (a physician having affairs with his patients) and something of a mental case, (the mock suicide drama)
However, the article says that he's just won his second term, ( he was first elected in 2010) while all the events in question seem to relate to a time period of 1999-2001, or earlier...
It's entirely possible that his views on abortion changed in that time period, in which case running as an anti-abortion candidate, (his constituents already knew about at least one abortion in his past, and at least one affair) may not have qualified as "hypocrisy"....
As opposed to the ethical slimebag mental case thing....
Re: More hypocrisy from the anti-abortion crowd
Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 1:41 pm
by oldr_n_wsr
You can't make this stuff up.
Re: More hypocrisy from the anti-abortion crowd
Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 2:05 pm
by rubato
Houston Chronicle wrote:
Tenn. GOP congressman's ex-wife had 2 abortions
... previous revelations that he once urged a patient with whom he was having an affair to get an abortion.
On his campaign website, DesJarlais espoused an anti-abortion position, saying: "All life should be cherished and protected. We are pro-life."
... "
He was elected because Republican male voters think that "not paying child support" is a reason for abortion, but rape and incest are not.
yrs,
rubato
Re: More hypocrisy from the anti-abortion crowd
Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 2:10 pm
by rubato
TPFKA@W wrote:If men could get pregnant abortion clinics would be as ubiquitous as Starbucks is.
I've never heard the Catholic church complain that their health insurance pays for Viagra, only birth control.
yrs,
rubato
Re: More hypocrisy from the anti-abortion crowd
Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 2:23 pm
by Lord Jim
He was elected because Republican male voters think that "not paying child support" is a reason for abortion, but rape and incest are not.
Well folks, we have here yet
another shining example of why it is utterly pointless to even
attempt to have anything approximating an adult, thoughtful discussion on any serious issue with this buffoon...
Re: More hypocrisy from the anti-abortion crowd
Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 3:35 pm
by oldr_n_wsr
rubato wrote:TPFKA@W wrote:If men could get pregnant abortion clinics would be as ubiquitous as Starbucks is.
I've never heard the Catholic church complain that their health insurance pays for Viagra, only birth control.
yrs,
rubato
I've didn't know that the Catholic Church (as a whole) had a health plan. Of course I would imagine that the priests and nuns do have some kind health plan but given their "only love of Christ" birth control and such are not a concern.
I have heard that certain elements (hospitals, parishes, etc) of the Catholic Church have health plans and that certain things are not paid for, much like any health plan that exists. My health plan does not pay for viagra and previous health plans I have had did not pay for birth control. We paid for it ourselves. My vasectomy was covered, but 5 years before it was not.
Since when does one expect the gov or insurance to cover everything one needs/wants?
Re: More hypocrisy from the anti-abortion crowd
Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 3:48 pm
by Big RR
Everything, oldr? I don't think anyone expects that; but the affordable healthcare act provisions aside, I think the government (state and federal) has always stepped in and demanded certain things be covered; indeed, since it's paid for with tax free dollars, I hardly think that's surprising or problematic. Would you be as cavalier if insirers routinely excluded coverage for chronic conditions such as diabetes, or for treatment of conditions like cancer, or for childbirth, or for any condition that could be reasonably detemrined as preexisiting? I think we do need some sort of protection from the things insurers could do to our detriment; it's not like many of us have any say in what our coverage is nor do we have any bargaining position in trying to get coverage beyond what is offered.
Re: More hypocrisy from the anti-abortion crowd
Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 4:20 pm
by oldr_n_wsr
I don't expect everything. I do expect basic health, and to me, birth control is not basic health. Condoms are available, for cheap, at any 7-11. If you choose not to use them, that decision should cost me money? Granted, the child may cost me more money in the long run via food stamps and welfare. But come on people, have some responsibility already. Maybe, if it the hand out was cut off, maybe, just maybe, people would become more responsible for themselves.
While my first child was an OOOPPPS, I never thought to use abortion as birth control. And if I did, I would not expect the gov (nor my health plan) to pay for it. Nor did I expect the gov to pay for his upbringing nor help me in that matter.
I do believe that people, more and more, are expecting the gov to "help" them when things get toungh and help them when their own "poor choices" turn out to be very poor. The safetynet (of which I have used) is just that. A way to get past a trying circumstance. Now it seems a way of life for many.
Re: More hypocrisy from the anti-abortion crowd
Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 4:21 pm
by oldr_n_wsr
I don't expect everything. I do expect basic health, and to me, birth control is not basic health. Condoms are available, for cheap, at any 7-11. If you choose not to use them, that decision should cost me money? Granted, the child may cost me more money in the long run via food stamps and welfare. But come on people, have some responsibility already. Maybe, if it the hand out was cut off, maybe, just maybe, people would become more responsible for themselves.
While my first child was an OOOPPPS, I never thought to use abortion as birth control. And if I did, I would not expect the gov (nor my health plan) to pay for it. Nor did I expect the gov to pay for his upbringing nor help me in that matter.
I do believe that people, more and more, are expecting the gov to "help" them when things get toungh and help them when their own "poor choices" turn out to be very poor. The safetynet (of which I have used) is just that. A way to get past a trying circumstance. Now it seems a way of life for many.
Re: More hypocrisy from the anti-abortion crowd
Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 4:42 pm
by Sue U
All health insurance plans are governed by state and (increasingly) federal law. Most states' insurance law requires insurers and HMOs to provide a set of minimum mandatory benefits, and otherwise regulates the terms and conditions of health plan coverage. For example, you may have heard of insurance exclusions for "preexisting conditions." Some states currently allow such exclusions, some do not, some have a "waiting period" for coverage. The new federal healthcare law creates a more uniform set of rules for coverage by prohibiting exclusions for preexisting conditions. Similarly, some insurance plans currently cover birth control and abortion; some states require them as part of mandatory coverages. That obviously doesn't force anyone to use birth control or have an abortion, it just allows for coverage of meds and procedures the same way that any other medical care is covered. The fact is, government already decides what must be covered by any health plan.
The Catholic church, through various corporations and institutions, operates a number of non-religious enterprises* (e.g., hospitals and universities) which offer health plan coverage as part of their employee compensation packages. The church is objecting to government-mandated coverage of birth control under any health plan it offers employees of its coprorate entities. But the fact is that in a secular democracy, you don't get a pass on complying with laws of general application simply because your particular religion believes something else. To put it another way, just because your religious order takes a vow of poverty, you can't refuse to pay your employees the state or federal mandatory minimum wage.
____________________________
* While the church may regard these activities as part of its mission, they are generally not seen as "religious" practices.
Re: More hypocrisy from the anti-abortion crowd
Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 4:45 pm
by Sue U
oldr_n_wsr wrote:While my first child was an OOOPPPS, I never thought to use abortion as birth control. And if I did, I would not expect the gov (nor my health plan) to pay for it.
But you certainly expected your health plan to cover the birth, didn't you? Why wouldn't you expect your health plan to cover the alternative medical procedure or preventive medicine?
Re: More hypocrisy from the anti-abortion crowd
Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 4:52 pm
by Big RR
Oldr--why do you see birth control as distinct from other health related expenses, like, e.g., lipitor. One could control one's cholesterol level in many cases by diet and exercise, why should the insruance cover it? Ditto for type 2 diabetes? If one engages in higher risk activities, like skiing, why should health care insurance pay for treatment of a skiing related injury? After all, if one would just take some responsibility, there would be less problems. And that's the point, we could use the "personal responsibility" critch to deny coverage for many things, but doesn't coverage make much more sense? I see birth control the same way.
Sue--good point.
Re: More hypocrisy from the anti-abortion crowd
Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 5:53 pm
by dgs49
Many muddled issues here.
First, INSURANCE is an indemnity contract whereby the insured pays a sum to be protected from extraordinary expenses arising out of certain pre-defined types of incidents. In a sane and ordinary situation, normal and routine expenses (doctor visits, routine prescriptions like an antibiotic for a cold) would NOT be covered, but an extraordinary expense would be covered. Those over 40 years old are quite familiar with having to go through deductibles and annual out-of-pocket requirements before significant health insurance benefits would kick in.
During the period when unions were at their strongest (and in the insular world of government employment), they were able to negotiate coverage for routine expenses like prescriptions, glasses, doctor checkups, and so on. Currently, such "bonus" coverages are all over the map, depending on whom you work for and what coverages you select. But again, this is aberrational: insurance was created to protect people from extraordinary expenses.
To the extent that the Catholic Church holds instrumentalities that employ humans - universities, hospitals, retirement homes, etc., - it tries to provide its employees with benefits that are comparable to what they might expect in comparable non-Church affiliated institutions. It does not require that its employees be Catholic or say prayers, or believe in god, or be virtuous in any way. They are not prohibited from "living in sin," using artificial birth control, or getting the occasional abortion, although some instances of disciplinary action have been noted where an employee flouts Catholic teaching in a way that is embarrassing to the institution.
But in many cases, the employees' health insurance at Catholic institutions is self-insurance. That is, the Church might have a commercial insurance carrier administer the plan, but the costs of the treatments, procedures, tests, and so on are borne by the church itself, and not the insurance company. Thus, when the Gub'mint demands that the Catholic institutions provide "coverage" for, for example sterilization, BC pills, and abortions, the Gub'mint is requiring that the Catholic Church directly pay for those procedures and pills.
The Congress has long recognized the simple principle that the taxpayers, many of whom are personally opposed on moral grounds, ought not be forced to pay for elective abortions. And yet, here we have a religious organization whose public position has uniformly been opposed to abortion basically forever, and they are supposed to grin and swallow this obligation in the interest of simply being good citizens. Rather perverse, if you ask me.
Footnotally I will add regarding the top of this thread (and ignoring the fact that this politician has definite dirtbag tendencies), it is possible for one to have had or supported an abortion or two in the past, and yet CHANGED ONE'S MIND ON THE SUBJECT (seen the light, so to speak) and not be a hypocrite. Is every ex-smoker who is now anti-smoking a phony? I hardly think so.
Re: More hypocrisy from the anti-abortion crowd
Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 6:51 pm
by oldr_n_wsr
Oldr--why do you see birth control as distinct from other health related expenses, like, e.g., lipitor.
I don't know. Really I don't know.
Maybe it's because that the result of that "activity" is a person being created and not just harm to ones self such as breaking a leg during skiing. Seems a little more responsibility needs to be taken given that you may create a life rather then just diminish your own.
Re: More hypocrisy from the anti-abortion crowd
Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 7:17 pm
by Guinevere
oldr_n_wsr wrote:Oldr--why do you see birth control as distinct from other health related expenses, like, e.g., lipitor.
I don't know. Really I don't know.
Maybe it's because that the result of that "activity" is a person being created and not just harm to ones self such as breaking a leg during skiing. Seems a little more responsibility needs to be taken given that you may create a life rather then just diminish your own.
You do know that the failure rate for condoms is significantly greater than the failure rate for chemical birth control, right? So why force people into rolling the dice, why not make the more effective measure as accessible as the less effective measure. Seems like a no-brainer to me.
Re: More hypocrisy from the anti-abortion crowd
Posted: Mon Nov 19, 2012 7:33 pm
by oldr_n_wsr
As I said, back when, my health plan did not cover birth control pills but we paid for them anyway. I also paid for my vasectomy. Just common sense if you ask me. Pay for birth control or pay for a child. The gov nor insurance need not get involved.
this, in no way means I am anti-insurance paid birth control, just given the choices if things were not covered I would weigh my options/costs