Puppet governor

Gov. Sam Brownback, could you please let us know when your debt to Kansans for Life is paid in full so that you can then take on the job of governor of the state of Kansas? We have quite a few serious issues that affect either all Kansans or at least a far greater number impacted by legislation, harassment and contrived regulations against any organization associated with abortion.

These significant issues — such as unemployment, the budget, health care, education, the environment, businesses, agriculture and energy — are quite complex and really could use some significant and focused attention. Perhaps it has slipped your mind, but being a puppet for Kansans for Life didn’t work out very well for Phill Kline.

I appreciate The Star’s pre-election work giving candidates’ responses on issues. It’s a valuable comparison tool. Could the following question be added? “If elected, do you intend to pursue legislation, programs and initiatives based upon your personal beliefs, or the consensus of those of your constituents?”

Lisa Hays
Overland Park

Comments

[Smarter Than You]

Spin it however you will, Steve, but the simple truth you opt to ignore to keep with your talking points is that the US still offered to provide for health care for women in countries receiving foreign aid under Bush, there was just a restriction on American tax dollars funding abortion…a restriction President Obama endorsed via executive order.

Your insistence that the only way for the US to take care of foreign women is by providing abortion is repugnant, and rings of the eugenics endorsed by Margaret Sanger.

[Steven Klein]

STY - you just keep making my point. If you or anyone can read my comments and conclude from them that I have a wholehearted commitment to aborting babies and I place a higher priority on killing babies than providing for women's health care, then it makes it a easier to understand how you can minimize the hell in which millions of young girls exist in too many parts of the planet.

[Smarter Than You]

Your wholehearted commitment to aborting babies, Steve, is well documented for all this evening. Funny thing about all of those tens of thousands of abortions, but you never document whether these “mothers” want the abortion or are being forced to have it (given your colorful spin that they are victims in everything that happens to them, that is a fair question).

You place killing babies on a higher pedestal than actually providing for the health of women. Someone doesn’t have to be smarter than you to see that your priorities are horribly skewed.

Tell you what, Steve; if liberals want to open Abortions-R-Us franchises worldwide, and pay for them out of their own private coffers, I support your right to do that. Meanwhile, in the real world, we’re trying to control our government spending and you want to subsidize abortion worldwide at the tax payer expense.

[Kate]

The policy required non-governmental organizations to "agree as a condition of their receipt of [U.S.] federal funds" that they would "neither perform nor actively promote abortion as a method of family planning in other nations". The policy had exceptions for abortions done in response to rape, incest, or life-threatening conditions.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexico_City_Policy

[Steven Klein]

STY - you still don't seem to understand the issues I raised re the misery inflicted on huge numbers of young women in very violent parts of the world,the violence with which many of them are involuntarily impregnated, the consequences for their health and well-being, and the cruelty of not only denying such often very young victims the possibility of an abortion even when their health is at great risk but also then the compounded cruelty of denying funding to clinics which provide many other health services as well because of the ideological rigidity of American political and social conservatives. I don't know if your failure to understand is willful or simply the result of some moral blindness. Either way, the irony of your choice of nom de plume grows with every comment.

[John S]

Murdering babies or fostering it is NOT responsible leadership.

It never ceases to amaze me that the left is critical of the right for advocating the death penalty for those who commit heinous crimes while they advocate the death penalty for innocent children who are simply "inconvenient".

How did such miscreants ever gain the right to state sanctioned abortion?

[Smarter Than You]

But Kate, Steve never lets a little thing like the facts to get in the way of a talking point.

Bottom line, Steve, is that if they gave up performing abortions there was no danger to funding. Obama, after signing an executive order prohibiting federal funds from financing abortions, has now personally OK'd "tens of thousands" of abortions on the American dime.

I understand the implications of your argument Steve. Do you?

[Kate]

The Mexico City Policy prohibited NGOs from using US taxpayer funds to promote abortion as a method of birth control. There were exceptions for rape, incest and where the mother's life was in danger.

[Steven Klein]

STY - you really evade the heart of my comments and I understand why. I think that most fair-minded people who read my remarks will understand the nature of the problem. The Bush administration in fact did eliminate funding for overseas clinics which provided abortions and thereby eliminated support for all of the other services they try to provide under very difficult circumstances.. Pres Obama reversed that decision. It was the decent and humane thing to do. Sorry you oppose it.

[Smarter Than You]

Tens of thousands abortions paid for each year on the US dime is really your position, Steve? It’s a nice talking point, I guess, but totally unsubstantiated. Even if, for arguments sake, I were to agree with your number, I’d still argue the US paying for tens of thousands of abortions runs counter to the deal Obama made and is wrong.

There is nothing precluding the US financing for the myriad of other health services, Steve, and you are smart enough to know that. So please save me the bleeding heart blather about how, without paying to abort babies, the US can’t provide aid. It’s contemptuous, even for you.

[Steven Klein]

If I understand STY correctly, in order to secure U.S. aid foreign health clinics, in his opinion, had a choice between providing abortions to tens of thousands of impregnated young women and very young girls (ages as young as 11, 12, 13)often living in the midst of unspeakable social and political violence, mass rape, brutal attack, dysfunctional family lives, disease and miserable hygiene, etc or foregoing that health service to preserve funding for other health issues important to the lives and safety of thousands of additional women. In his view, this seemed a reasonable imposed choice, and the moral burden really lay on frontline health providers living in the midst of this hell to decide which groups to rescue. It may be unfair but the parallel to Sytron's "Sophie's Choice" seems too close.

As earlier, I still do not understand the mentality.

[Smarter Than You]

Funding abortion as a moral act?

Those foreign providers of abortions had the "choice" of continuing to provide all of the other medical services, except abortions, or to find other funding.

It was this President, in order to buy the votes for Obamacare, who signed an executive order reaffirming that federal funds should not be utilized to pay for abortions.

[Steven Klein]

President Obama restored funding for U.S. programs which provided financial assistance to family clinics overseas which provide broad healthcare support for women and children. Because many of these clinics provided abortions as part of their services, the Bush administration cutoff such funding.

This was one of the current administration's most moral acts. In order to satisfy the demands of his conservative base, Pres Bush's actions not only cut off funds for abortions in impoverished and violent societies where women are sexually abused and violated by family members, raped by child soldiers, endangered by difficult pregnancies and at very young ages subjected to a range of acts of sexual violence, but Pres Bush de facto also eliminated financial support for all of the non-abortion medical support from these clinics which these desperate people need.

I simply do not understand the mentality of people who would applaud and encourage such decisions.

[renfro]

Ms. Hays ----- The following is a repost but your reference to the motives of Phill Kline and Sam Brownback parallel those of State House and bedfellow problems that are developing in MISSOURI. --- (re: closing paragraph)
=========================
Before moderates in Kansas could rid themselves of one “Nutcase” the religious right elected another. – Facing disbarment for ethics violation in the investigation of Planned Parenthood and Wichita abortion provider George Tiller former Attorney General Phill Kline pleads “Law has been my life” – For Kansas Governor Sam Brownback and Phill Kline “The LAW” they practice on Sunday may and could supersede that of the Constitution!

The faithful are politically vulnerable and easily led --- exhibiting such behavior invites a search for votes that is not limited to the Republican Party. – Missourians should be aware DEMOCRATIC Governor Jay Nixon by failing to Veto and leaving a more restrictive Abortion bill unsigned all but “CAVED” to our Religious Taliban Representatives in Jefferson City.

[hajkar]

zeno wrote:

"OH I guess I missed all those posts you made taking Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid and Pres Obama for only working on liberal causes."

You also did not see any objections from me when others rightfully called these people to task for mishandling healthcare overhaul.

Try judging me on what I actually say rather than on what you want me to say based on what I did not say.

[David]

Propose and pass 'possibly Constitutional' anti-abortion legislation.

Cut spending on mental health facilities.

Use savings to hire campaign contributors as defense of earlier abortion legislation.

Profit!

[zeno]

Partisan crying? Because both sides do it does not diminish the irresponsibility.

Posted by: hajkar | August 01, 2011 at 09:10 AM

OH I guess I missed all those posts you made taking Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid and Pres Obama for only working on liberal causes. Please re-post some of them.
(not holding my breath).

BTW I will spell it out for you. There are no such posts and that is why it make you look stupid, because you are correct both sides do the same. But you only cry about a repub doing it.

[Hananova]

Hello letter-writer, please get your nose out of the newspaper and TV and read and consider *all* points of view, not just the radical left-wing. No wonder you are misinformed, reading "The Daily Disinformation."

[hajkar]

Partisan crying? Because both sides do it does not diminish the irresponsibility.

[Mark Robertson]

Lisa,
You mean like President Obama and former Governor Sebelius. Obama is possibly the most pro-active pro-abort to ever hold a U.S. political office. And Kathleen Sebelius was continually pursuing a radical pro-abort agenda as governor of KS.
But, according to Lisa, if one is a pro-life conservative, they must not bring their personal beliefs to office.
And just how does one create a "consensus" between pro-lifers and pro-aborts. Would it mean just killing half the child? Thank you.

Mark Robertson
Independence