Do you think this man should have been aborted?
Senate Bill 826 is pretty simple: Make Virginia law compatible with federal law when it comes to abortion.
As it stands, Virginia taxpayers are on the hook to fund abortions that terminate kids with Down’s Syndrome or other diseases – like being born without arms and legs. Kids known to Senator Donald McEachin (D) as “tragically incompatible with life.”
In 1982, the following code passed here. “§ 32.1-92.2. Funding of certain abortions where fetus is believed to have incapacitating physical deformity or mental deficiency; physician’s certificate.”
What the law explicitly says is,
“From the moneys appropriated to the Department from the general fund, the Board shall fund abortions for women who otherwise meet the financial eligibility criteria of the State Medical Assistance Plan in any case in which a physician who is trained and qualified to perform such tests certifies in writing, after appropriate tests have been performed, that he believes the fetus will be born with a gross and totally incapacitating physical deformity or with a gross and totally incapacitating mental deficiency.”
In other words, taxpayer money has been allocated to destroy the weakest among us, before they are even born, should a doctor say so.
This year’s SB 826, proposed by State Sen. Tom Garrett, would repeal the above section of code, making Virginia compatible with federal law when it comes to taxpayer funding of abortion; the way it’s been since 1976. In fact, at the federal level, the law remains endorsed by this current administration under Pres. Barack Obama.
Unfortunately, in Virginia, when it comes to “reproductive rights” or “women’s health”, we live in the land of hyperbole, where any bill that even strikes of being balanced, fair, or worthy of compromise, becomes a pitched battle of the partisans – especially when one side senses a fundraising opportunity.
“I’m not in the ‘being offended’ business,” said Garrett. “But I can hearken back in history where we did have certain leaders thinking that they could be arbiters of human life.”
Well, today we had a moment of opportunity and decision to send this Draconian bill of eugenics into to the scrap pile of history.
Inexplicably, in the Health and Education Committee, the bill was voted to “indefinitely pass by.” In political terms, this means the bill is dead. As dead as those “mentally deficient” babies who we taxpayers continue to fund to abort each year.
By a largely partisan vote of 8-7, the bill’s demise was sealed.
But that doesn’t seem right. Don’t Republicans hold sway in the committees because of the decision to make them the majority, 21-20, with the vote of LG Bolling?
Indeed that is true, and Republicans do have a majority in this committee, 8-7, which means one GOP senator voted with the Democrats instead.
Personally shocking to me, it was my senator, Sen. Harry Blevins (R-Chesapeake), who cast the deciding vote.
I’m absolutely dumbfounded.
I attempted to contact my senator, but he was unavailable.
I have known Sen. Blevins for years, and it is my sense is that there is more to this story. In fact it’s probably a long story, but without having the chance to speak with him yet, I’m concerned that today could be an indicator of the so-called “Grand Bargain” that was postulated last week.
For those that missed it, the Huffington Post reported [1] that Majority Leader Tommy Norment would exchange to the Democrats one Republican vote to ensure that no new anti-abortion legislation would pass, like SB 826, and that the Dems would begin to lay low on the whole “war on women” issue and drop efforts to repeal abortion laws.
Norment called it “balderdash”, but today sure does appear to seem otherwise.
If my senator truly is part of such a deal, I can’t tell you how deeply disappointed and betrayed as a constituent I would become.
Regardless, if Blevins did not vote this way because of a “bargain”, one still has to wonder what principle Blevins was exercising with this vote?
Garrett explained to me that “no one is talking about denying access to abortion.” This bill was merely an effort to ensure that taxpayer money was not being used to fund something a great number of the population finds abhorrent.
And my Republican senator – a true leader in my community – voted to continue the practice. I’m totally shocked.