Stupak Makes His Case

Rep. Bart Stupak (of the much maligned Stupak Amendment fame) takes to the NY Times today in an op-ed to explain his case...badly.

Under our amendment, women who receive federal subsidies will be prohibited from using them to pay for insurance policies that cover abortion. The amendment does not prevent private plans from offering abortion services and it does not prohibit women from purchasing abortion coverage with their own money. The amendment specifically states that even those who receive federal subsidies can purchase a supplemental policy with private money to cover abortions.

Some opponents of the amendment have tried to argue that it would effectively end health insurance coverage of abortion in both the private and public sectors. This argument is nothing more than a scare tactic.

The language in our amendment is completely consistent with the Hyde Amendment, which in the 33 years since its passage has done nothing to inhibit private health insurers from offering abortion coverage. There is no reason to believe that a continuation of this policy would suddenly create undue hardship for the insurance industry — or for those who wish to use their private insurance to pay for an abortion.

(More after the jump...)
You know, Sen. Barbara Mikulski said it best yesterday:

I don’t know of any individual woman or any woman in consultation with the man that she loves and loves her saying, yeah, you know, we might have an abortion. Yeah, why don’t we buy that rider?

Nobody plans to have an abortion. It’s not the subject of what intimate conversations that families talk about as they plan their lives together.

You realize the intense discrimination a woman would face?

And how about why not have men buy an abortion rider for the women they get pregnant?

Indeed.  But Stupak soldiers on:

For example, the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program provides health insurance through a variety of companies to more than eight million Americans — but it does not allow abortion coverage in any of its policies. Yet the same companies that offer these abortion-free plans to federal employees also offer plans with abortion coverage to non-federal employees. Given that insurance companies are able to offer separate plans with and without abortion coverage now, it seems likely that they would be able to continue to do so on the newly established health insurance exchange.

You mean the same Federal Employees Health Benefits Program that's going to serve as the basis of the new public option?  And the point is not the Hyde Amendment language stops non-federal insurance plans, the point is that the insurance exchanges in the health care reform bill are run by the federal government, meaning that the Stupak Amendment would mandate that plans offered through the exchanges could not offer abortion coverage.

Since the whole point of the exchanges are to have insurance companies offer coverage that is more affordable and competitive, what coverage left would come down to riders or nothing.  If the new public option is being modeled after the federal health plans, abortion coverage will basically vanish unless people buy riders *ahead* of time.

In other words, Bart Stupak is being a mendacious twit.