Why is the GOP continuing to fund Planned Parenthood and abortions?
They told us to give them the House and they’d repeal Obamacare. We did that in 2010. Then they said they needed the Senate. We gave them that in 2014. Then they needed the White House. We got that for them in November 2016.
Now they say they’ve hit a snag because Senate Parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough, a hack appointed by Harry Reid (D-NV) in 2012, ruled that provisions of the Obamacare repeal-and-replace bill prohibiting taxpayer funding of Planned Parenthood violate the Byrd Rule. That rule, named after the late Senator Robert Byrd (D-KKK), subjects non-budgetary provisions of bills to filibustering, thereby requiring 60 votes for passage rather than 50-plus-Pence. And what differentiates “budgetary” from “non-budgetary” provisions under the Byrd Rule? Aside from MacDonough’s whims, not much.
Now that we’ve voted Democrats out of the House, Senate, and White House, where do we go to vote out the Democrats’ Senate Parliamentarian? Nowhere, because she serves at the pleasure of the Senate’s majority leader.
Which raises the question of why the current majority leader, Mitch McConnell (R-KY) won’t replace her as Trent Lott did in 2001 when he canned the left-over Democratic parliamentarian. Or simply overrule her, something he and Vice President Mike Pence, as President of the Senate, are lawfully entitled to do.
McConnell won’t because MacDonough provides additional cover for his sabotage of efforts to end Obamacare. We may soon witness McConnell and other Republicans use a rule named after a dead senator from the Democrats’ Klan wing as a reason for failing to repeal Obamacare. After all, we can’t kill Obamacare, McConnell will soon tell us, if replacing it means funding abortion, right?
But even that Hobson’s choice is illusory. Inauguration Day was over six months ago, but the tax dollars keep a flowin’ to Planned Parenthood. My bet is that, by summer’s end, our “Republican” Congress will still be fully funding both Obamacare and Planned Parenthood.
