Look here:¹

“The Obama administration projects their budget plan would save $4 trillion by 2022. However, the budget proposal for the fiscal year beginning Oct. 1, projects a $1.33 trillion deficit, marking a fourth consecutive year of trillion-dollar deficits.

The president’s plan projects that the deficit would drop to $901 billion in 2013 and to $575 billion by 2018. It would raise taxes on households earning more than $250,000 and individuals earning $200,000 by letting some of the Bush tax cuts expire. It also proposes to raise $41 billion over 10 years by hiking taxes on oil, gas and coal companies.”

In an election year, you won’t find anyone willing to support a budget with these features. They’re all cowards, every one of them. They might also be realists!!

I was somewhat surprised that WW used that source, considering that this was also part of it.

“We’ve got a nearly $16 trillion debt. We’re borrowing more than 40 cents of every dollar we spend. Entitlements are going broke. Millions are out of work, and Democrats can’t even put a plan on paper for a vote?” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said during a floor speech Wednesday. “What are they doing over there? Isn’t anybody over there embarrassed by the fact that they haven’t offered a budget in three years?”

“As far as I can tell, their only plan is to take shots at our plans and hope nobody notices they not only don’t have one of their own,” McConnell continued. “They’re so unserious they won’t even vote for a budget that was written by a president of their own party. It doesn’t get more irresponsible than that.”

While Wagonwheel surely doesn’t like Senator Mitch McConnell (R-KY), even he cannot deny the Minority Leader’s point: the Democrats in Congress don’t support the President’s plan, won’t support any of the plans offered by the Republicans, but don’t have one of their own to substitute. Your Editor noted, three months ago, that Secretary of the Treasury Timothy Geithner admitted, under oath, to Representative Paul Ryan’s (R-WI) House Budget Committee that the Obama Administration had no plans at all for dealing with the long-term debt crisis:

We’re not coming before you to say we have a definitive solution to that long-term problem. What we do know is we don’t like yours.

In 2008, when George Bush was President, Senator Barack Obama (D-IL), the presidential nominee, and the Democratic congressional candidates, never really ran for anything more detailed than “Hope” and “Change,” but did a great job of running against President Bush and the Republicans. It’s 3½ years later, and it looks like President Obama and the Democrats are still running against Republicans, but apparently not for anything. The Democrats in Congress won’t vote for their President’s own budget plan, because, as our liberal from Lewes admits, “you won’t find anyone willing to support a budget with these features. They’re all cowards, every one of them.”

Well, the Republicans are running on something. The plans pushed by Mr Ryan, and others, are certainly harsh ones, and we can guarantee that a lot of people won’t like the plans or austerity, but the Republicans have the cojones to vote for those plans and run on those plans, the Republicans have shown the courage to say what they are for, have shown the courage to tell the voters just what they will try to do. Republican voters in Nebraska just nominated Deb Fischer, the TEA Party candidate backed by former Governor Sarah Palin (R-AK), for the open United States Senate seat, ignoring the wishes of the more traditionally-minded Republican establishment. It seems that Republicans and conservatives really are willing to vote for candidates who actually support things. All the Democrats seem to be willing to do is say, “We’re not Republicans.”

Barbara O’Brien on the Mahablog attempted to make excuses for the Democrats, echoing the complaint of the White House, that it wasn’t really the President’s budget which was rejected, but a shell of it which could have mean old Republicans play nasty tricks like change numbers or conditions. (Hat tip to William Teach.) But, as Karen, the Lonely Conservative, pointed out, “what was stopping them from putting Obama’s complete budget up for a vote?” After all, the Democrats still have the majority in the Senate, and all it would have required is for one Democratic senator to propose an amendment to substitute the President’s complete FY2013 budget proposal, and the Democrats would have had the votes to approve such an amendment; they never even tried.

Your Editor would think that a reasonably well-read Democrat like Wagonwheel would be disgusted by the Democrats’ performance. The Democrats tried the approach of not standing for anything in the 2010 elections, other than to say that they weren’t Republicans. Neither the House nor the Senate in the 111^th Congress passed, or even tried to pass, a budget for FY2011, because they were afraid that, if they did, why the mean old Republicans would base their campaigns on running against the things for which the Democrats voted. Imagine that: for the Democrats, it’s now some sort of dirty trick for Republicans to run on the Democrats’ votes and stated positions. But, as is frequently the case for plans based on cowardice, running scared didn’t work out for them anyway. If they were going to lose, you’d have thought they’d at least have wanted to go down fighting.

Instead, with two out in the bottom of the ninth inning, and an 0-2 count, the Democrats took a called third strike, on a fastball right down the middle.
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Greek Leftist Leader Throws Down Gauntlet on Debt

By JAMES ANGELOS And ALKMAN GRANITSAS

ATHENS—The head of Greece’s radical left party says there is little chance Europe will cut off funding to the country and if it does, Greece will repudiate its debts, throwing down a gauntlet that could increase tensions between Greece’s recalcitrant politicians and frustrated European creditors.

A financial collapse in Greece would drag down the rest of the euro zone, says Alexis Tsipras, the 37-year-old head of the Coalition of the Radical Left, known as Syriza, and potentially the country’s next prime minister. Instead, he says, Europe must consider a more growth-oriented policy to arrest Greece’s spiraling recession and address what he calls a growing “humanitarian crisis” facing the country.

“Our first choice is to convince our European partners that, in their own interest, financing must not be stopped,” Mr. Tsipras said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal. “If we can’t convince them—because we don’t have the intention to take unilateral action—but if they proceed with unilateral action on their side, in other words they cut off our funding, then we will be forced to stop paying our creditors, to go to a suspension in payments to our creditors.”

According to recent opinion polls, Mr. Tsipras’ party is poised to win the most votes in repeat elections next month, bettering its surprise second-place finish in an inconclusive May 6 vote that left no party or coalition with enough seats in Parliament to form a government. With Mr. Tsipras poised to win pole position in the coming vote, it raises the risk that Greece will soon face a showdown with its European creditors over the contentious austerity program that Athens must implement in order to receive fresh aid.

The cynic in me says, “Let ‘em! After all, it’s going to happen sooner or later anyway.”

Mr Tsipras believes that he has the rest of Europe over a barrel, and to some, he probably does, but if the next installment of foreign aid, €173 billion, does not come through, the Greek government “won’t have enough money to pay for basic services like schools and hospitals.”

Of course, Greece could always just start printing drachmas — assuming it withdraws from the euro — to make payments, but that has never really worked anywhere before. Inflation runs rampant at the same time that the local currency devalues against foreign monies. If Greece could stick to a strict policy of not importing foreign goods, it could be made to work, but that would be difficult considering that Greece has no domestic petroleum production, and must rely completely on imports for all its oil. Without petroleum fuels, Greece grinds to a halt, and a rapidly devaluing drachma would mean that oil prices would skyrocket, since oil producers would demand either dollars or euros.

However, Greek voters might very well like Mr Tsipras’ message, and give him their votes. They are a free people, and have every right to commit economic suicide.

Hey, maybe my darling bride and I can take that summer vacation on Santorini! If Mr Tsipras does as he has threatened to do, we can probably get a nice whitewashed villa for $2.14 a week.

Breaking – Barack Obama’s Literary Agent in 1991 – ‘Born in Kenya and Raised in Indonesia and Hawaii’
Written on May 17, 2012 by V2A, Filed under Liberal Hypocrisy, Politics

Breitbart News has obtained a promotional booklet produced in 1991 by Barack Obama’s then-literary agency, Acton & Dystel, which touts Obama as “born in Kenya and raised in Indonesia and Hawaii.”

The booklet, which was distributed to “business colleagues” in the publishing industry, includes a brief biography of Obama among the biographies of eighty-nine other authors represented by Acton & Dystel.

It also promotes Obama’s anticipated first book, Journeys in Black and White–which Obama abandoned, later publishing Dreams from My Father instead.

Obama’s biography in the booklet is as follows:

Barack Obama, the first African-American president of the Harvard Law Review, was born in Kenya and raised in Indonesia and Hawaii. The son of an American anthropologist (Stanley Ann Dunham) and a Kenyan finance minister Barack Obama Sr. or 1), he attended Columbia University and worked as a financial journalist and editor for Business International Corporation. (This is a new one. Another peg with still a lot of holes left) He served as project coordinator in Harlem for the New York Public Interest Research Group, and was Executive Director of the Developing Communities Project in Chicago’s South Side. His commitment to social and racial issues will be evident in his first book, Journeys in Black and White.

http://visiontoamerica.org/9789/breaking-obamas-literary-agent-in-1991-born-in-kenya-and-raised-in-indonesia-and-hawaii/

Mitt Romney Brings Up National Debt Clock, MSNBC Brings Up Bush

May 17, 2012 | By Lonely Conservative

MSNBC is ridiculous. Mitt Romney made a campaign appearance in Florida today and rolled out the National Debt Clock to show the dangerous path this country is traveling on. Mitt Romney had nothing to do with the nearly $16 trillion in national debt, but he did acknowledge that many Republicans did. So, how did MSNBC report the news?

“There was another area during [President Obama's] campaign, he said he would focus on. You see, he was very critical of his predecessor for the debts his predecessor put in place. And sure it’s true you can’t blame one party or the other for all the debts this country has, because both parties in my opinion have spent too much and borrowed too much when they were in power,” Romney said in this key swing state.

(Interestingly, Romney danced around the actual name of that predecessor, George W. Bush, who on Tuesday endorsed the former Massachusetts Governor when asked a question by an ABC News reporter.)

What was George Bush supposed to say when he was asked who he was pulling for in the next election? Obama? The Democrats were just as – if not more – culpable for the economic meltdown as the Republicans. President Obama happened to be a Senator for the party that controlled Congress at the time, in case anyone forgot. In fact, the economy was doing pretty well before they took over during Bush’s lame duck years. I kind of remember them running against the Republicans’ rotten 5% unemployment rate. Those were the days.

Way to shill for your man, MSNBC. We expect nothing more from you. While most political bloggers wear our ideologies on our sleeves, you continue to pretend you’re a neutral and objective news organization. What a joke.

Karen isn’t really surprised that MSNBC is a technically-unaffiliated but nevertheless important part of President Obama’s re-election campaign. While it might be nicer if they’d go ahead and put up the Obama banners in the background, MSNBC’s leftward bias has been a conscious and obvious part of their programing philosophy. Given that your Editor supports Fox News right to be oriented toward conservatism and the truth, he cannot object to MSNBC having a bias toward liberalism and falsehood. Considering that Fox gets roughly 2½ times the viewers of MSNBC, it works out pretty well.

Oh, by the way, the national debt went up by about half a billion dollars between the time Mitt Romney made his speech and the time I wrote this post.

And this is why THE FIRST STREET JOURNAL maintains the icon to the left permanently available in teh sidebar: if you click on it, you will be directed to the Treasury Department’s Debt to the Penny page; the Total Federal Debt Outstanding, as of the 15^th, was $15,716,115,612,805.06, which was an increase of $39,119,338,944.24 over the previous day.

Of course, we already know — but your Editor will remind you, yet again — what Senator Barack Husseon Obama (D-IL) said about a President who had added $4 trillion to the national debt “all by his lonesome,” something the host of Bridging the Gap said was “pathetic“.

Given that President Obama managed to exceed President Bush’s two term record in only 3¼ years, perhaps that was what he meant by pathetic. It certainly is true that President Bush was a piker compared to President Obama when it comes to piling up debt!

Mitt Romney needs to keep hammering on President Obama’s record on the economy, including ridiculous spending levels and the huge increase in the deficit and the national debt. He should hammer hard, every day.
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Update: posted after Wagonwheel’s comment. William Teach cited John Hinderaker, who noted that the United States Senate has voted on five separate FY2013 budget resolutions, and all have failed, because not one Democrat ever voted for a single one of them, including President Obama’s budget!

Four different Republican budgets were taken up by the Senate. The House budget (commonly referred to as the Ryan budget) was voted down 41-58. The vote on Pat Toomey’s budget was 42-47; the vote on Rand Paul’s budget was 16-83; and the vote on Mike Lee’s budget was 17-82. The common denominator was that no Democrat had the courage to vote for any of them.

The Senate vote on President Obama’s budget was 0-99; not one single senator voted for it.

Now, tell me again about how hardworking and dedicated the Democrats are.

To the chagrin of the Ruling Class Republicans.

Deb Fischer was in third place, 16 points behind the front-runner establishment-picked candidate. Jim DeMint endorsed the other non-establishment Conservative candidate, who was in second place and finished a dismal third place. Sarah Palin endorsed Deb Fischer, who went from 16 points down to winning by 5 points. Not bad for an irrelevant person’s endorsement, eh?

Oh, and immediately after Deb Fischer won the Primary over the Establishment Candidate, Jim DeMint endorsed her. No dilly dallying around. No sour grapes. No nothing. He was happy to endorse Deb Fischer with his Conservative endorsement.

What does a Sarah Palin endorsement mean? If you read the comment section at the above link, you will find out exactly what it means. Cornhuskers who were considering voting for someone other than Fischer heard of Palin’s endorsement. That meant they needed to do research. It did not mean they had to mindlessly vote for “Palin’s Pick”. And, upon doing their research, they found Deb Fischer to be just what the doctor ordered.

Make no mistake, the Republican Primary in the Cornhusker State was the NCAA Finals. The General Election is just a formality as the Democrat stands no chance to win in the strongly Conservative state of Nebraska, especially after the Cornhusker Kickback destroyed the current Democrat Senator so much so that he had to “retire” and get a carpet-bagging replacement for himself on the Democrat ticket. Immediately after Deb Fischer won the Republican Primary, she was declared by PPP (a Democrat polling outfit) to be a 10 point favorite over Kerrey, a 12-year New York State resident who moved to Nebraska specifically to run as the Democrat replacement for the Cornhusker Kickback bribe-taker (who cannot even go to a pizzaria without getting booed out of the place).

You know who this helps? Ted Cruz of Texas. Yes, the irrelevant Sarah Palin, whose endorsements cause people to research and then vote for her endorsements, has endorsed Ted Cruz over some cat named Lt Gov Dewhurst. And Dewhurst’s dishonest smears of Ted Cruz are all over Conservative radio in Texas. I know. I live in Texas and I listen to Conservative talk radio on my way to and from work.

Rick Perry has endorsed David Dewhurst. Sarah Palin has endorsed Ted Cruz. Rick Perry was in danger of losing his Republican Primary bid for Governor to squishy Kay Bailey Hutchison until Sarah Palin rode in on her white horse and endorsed Rick Perry. Now, their competing endorsements will tell a tale. Having endorsed Ted Cruz long before Sarah Palin did, I welcome Sarahcuda’s endorsement of my candidate of choice. And I expect Mama Grizzly will have more pull in the great state of Texas than Texas’ own Republican Governor Perry.

So much for the “Sarah Palin is irrelevant” meme. But it’s also more proof that the Conservative use of “social media” is shaking things up in national politics, and especially harming the Ruling Class elitist Republicans.

Attention SC Senator Grahamnesty:

Be afraid. Be very afraid. We’re coming for YOU! Your stupid claim that the TEA Party was short-lived and irrelevant will come back and bite you in the arse, come 2014. You will be Primaried out of office (unless you “retire” first).

UPDATE: Robert Stacy McCain weighs in with an epic smack-down of some stupid dumb-arse.

The first sentence of this story about the GOP Senate primary by Josh Lederman in the Hill absurdly portrays state Sen. Deb Fischer’s victory over Nebraska State Attorney General Jon Bruning as “dealing a blow to both the Republican establishment and the Tea Party.”

This is stupid. If the Republican establishment loses to a candidate backed by both Sarah Palin and Herman Cain, of course the Tea Party wins. What else could explain it?

And Sarah Palin congratulates Deb Fischer on her victory.

Congratulations to Deb Fischer

by Sarah Palin on Tuesday, May 15, 2012 at 9:35pm ·

As recently as a week ago, Deb Fischer was dismissed by the establishment. Why? Because she is not part of the good old boys’ permanent political class. The message from the people of Nebraska is simple and powerful: America is looking for real change in Washington, and commonsense conservatives like Deb Fischer represent that change. I applaud Moms like Deb Fischer who are bold enough to step up and run on a conservative platform to restore America and protect our children’s future. Congratulations to the people of Nebraska. As the Huskers’ fight song goes: “The eyes of the land, upon every hand, are looking at you. Fight on for victory!”

– Sarah Palin

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Originally published on Truth Before Dishonor
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***Note: All restrictions regarding my articles are in place regarding this, my article.

Greeks set election date amid possibility of bank panic

From Antonia Mortensen and Matthew Chance, CNN | May 16, 2012 — Updated 1212 GMT (2012 HKT)

Athens, Greece (CNN) — Greece will hold new elections on June 17, state media reported Wednesday, after Greeks pulled hundreds of millions of euros out the banking system amid fears that the country will not be able to stay in the European Union’s single currency.

Setting the date for a new vote comes 10 days after a national election where voters punished the major parties for harsh budget cuts, leaving no party able to form a government.

A caretaker administration led by a senior judge will run the country until the new vote.

The interim prime minister, Panagiotis Pikrammenos, will go to the office of President Karolos Papoulias to receive his official instructions Wednesday, Greek state television reported.

More at the link. Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany stated that she regretted the suffering through which the Greek people must go, but the austerity measures, though harsh and unpopular, were nevertheless necessary.

We at THE FIRST STREET JOURNAL have frequently quoted Margaret Thatcher’s famous dictum that “The trouble with Socialism is that eventually you run out of other people’s money.”¹ That is what has happened to Greece, and that is what has happened to Italy. Chancellor Merkel tried to save the Greeks, because she knew that a Greek default would have continent-wide repercussions, and that Germans would be hurt by the damage done to the euro, the common currency. Her own people have suffered a bit — though certainly not as much as the Greeks — due to the Chancellor’s attempts to save the Greeks from the consequences of the folly of socialism; now it is starting to look as though all the German sacrifice was simply to delay the inevitable. the German voters may have lost patience with the Chancellor:

German state election deals blow to Angela Merkel’s party

Voters in North Rhine-Westphalia give opposition parties enough support to form a governing coalition. The chancellor’s Christian Democrats receive about 26%.
May 14, 2012 | By Aaron Wiener, Los Angeles Times

DUESSELDORF, Germany — Voters in Germany’s most populous state dealt a decisive blow to Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union on Sunday, preliminary results show, a potentially ominous preview of things to come for the chancellor in next year’s federal elections.

Merkel’s party mustered about 26% of the vote in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, a drop from 35% in 2010 and 45% in 2005, the year she took office, the results show. The opposition Social Democrats and Greens, at about 39% and more than 11%, respectively, secured the majority of seats they needed to form a governing coalition.

The upstart Pirate Party, a group primarily devoted to Internet freedom, rode its recent surge in popularity to a nearly 8% vote share and won entry into its fourth consecutive state parliament. Merkel’s national coalition partner, the Free Democrats, managed a better-than-expected 8%, above the 5% threshold needed for representation, while the far-left Left Party was kicked out of the statehouse with less than 3% of the vote. Other parties with low shares accounted for the remaining votes.

Election results in North Rhine-Westphalia have been harbingers of change in the past. It was a loss in this state in 2005 that brought down the chancellorship of Merkel’s predecessor, Social Democrat Gerhard Schroeder. Now, the state that allowed Merkel to assume power in the first place could undermine her quest for a third term.

More at the link.

The French replaced President Nicolas Sarkozy with a Socialist, François Hollande, because they, too, were not pleased with austerity movements; former President Sarkozy also failed to reduce the traditionally high French unemployment rate, which is above 10%. But, in the end, though the will of the voters will be done in democracies, there are no options to reducing high deficits and living within their means: the French and the Germans, though still with strong economies, will eventually run out of other people’s money.

Your Editor has repeated this, time and time again: you cannot live beyond the means justified by your production forever. The Greeks and the Italians and the Spaniards and the Portuguese have already hit the wall, and run out of other people’s money, and the other European nations aren’t all that far behind. Austerity is, as the Chancellor noted, “very bitter,” but when the choices are between the bitter and all-out collapse, the choice becomes, if not easy, at least rational.

In the United States, we face the same choices. As much as our good friends on the left insist that there is a better choice, further stimulus, they are wrong: not only did the last intentional stimulus plan fail, but we have been, in effect, stimulating the economy for thirty five years, ever since we went from a trade surplus to a trade deficit, and have been borrowing and borrowing and borrowing to support a lifestyle more luxurious than what we have earned. We can still borrow more, due to the advantages the American economy has, but if we choose to go that route, we will eventually reach the point the Greeks have reached: collapse.
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US election: ‘When your name is Barack Hussein Obama, getting elected is difficult’

Prejudice among some American voters will make it difficult for President Barack Obama to win re-election, he has suggested.
By Jon Swaine, Washington | 7:57PM BST 15 May 2012

Asked during a television interview how close he expected the result of November’s presidential election to be, Mr Obama said: “When your name is Barack Obama, it’s always tight”.

After a host noted that his full name was “Barack Hussein Obama,” he repeated this twice, stressing the middle name that has led conspiracy theorists to claim erroneously that he is secretly Muslim.

The remarks, made on ABC’s The View, appeared to be a rare admission by Mr Obama that four years after he became the first black US president, his ethnicity continues to repel some American voters.

Uhhh, President Obama was elected with that very same name, and no record; if he is defeated in November, it won’t be because of his name but because he now has a record. As for his name, the only elections Mr Obama has ever lost have been Democratic primary elections, in 2000 to incumbent Representative Bobby Rush, and several during the 2008 Democratic presidential primaries. If he has been discriminated against due to his name — or his race — it hasn’t been enough to actually cost him elections.

Of course, even President Obama sort of understands:

Asked “why do you say that now, after four years?” Mr Obama appeared to gather his thoughts and said: “I think it’s going to be tight because the fact of the matter is, the country has gone through a very difficult time – the worst financial crisis, the worst economic crisis, since the 1930s.”

In simpler terms, the President is going to be judged on his record, and that’s the way it should be. Naturally, he’ll try to blame George Bush for his own failures, but the American people really don’t care for whiners.

Italy’s banks shaken as economic slump deepens

As Greece erupts, Italy is moving into the eye of the storm. Its economy is contracting at speeds not seen since the depths of the slump in 2009 as draconian austerity bites, greatly increasing the risk of social revolt and a banking crisis.
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, International business editor | 9:10PM BST 15 May 2012

With the world’s third largest debt after the US and Japan at €1.9 trillion (£1.18 trillion), it is big enough to bring the global financial system to its knees. It is also in the front line of contagion as the Greek crisis metastasizes.

Yields on 10-year Italian debt jumped 16 points to 5.86pc on Tuesday after Italy’s data agency said the country is sliding even into deeper recession, with GDP shrinking 0.8pc in the first quarter.

Output is now 6pc below its peak in 2008. Italy has been trapped in perma-slump for a decade, the only major state to suffer a fall in real per capita income since 2000.

Rising anger has led to a spate of violent attacks by terrorist groups over recent weeks, all too like the traumatic ‘years of lead’ in the late 1970s. The government is mulling use of troops to protect targets after anarchists shot the head of Ansaldo Nucleare last week and hurled petrol bombs at tax offices.

The unelected government of Mario Monti is carrying out net fiscal tightening of 3.5pc of GDP this year even though Italy’s budget is near primary surplus. This is three times the International Monetary Fund’s “therapeutic” pace. All key measures of Italy’s money supply have been contracting at 1930s rates over the last six months.

Our liberal from Lewes would say, “See? This is what austerity does to you!” And that’s true enough, but Italy has no choice! In frightening confirmation of Margaret Thatcher’s maxim, they have run out of other people’s money.

Economists are worried about what will happen to the world’s financial system if Italy defaults on it’s €1.9 debt; what would happen if the United States defaults on our $15,676,996,273,860.82 debt?

This is why we at THE FIRST STREET JOURNAL are so concerned about our rising debt and absolutely oppose further government deficits to “stimulate” the economy: we’ve been stimulating the economy for half a century now, and what has it gotten us but further in debt?

The austerity solution is not a very pleasant one, to be sure, and a lot of people will be hurt. The only advantage it has is that it’s better than any other solution.

Campus Health Insurance Policy

The Obama Administration has mandated that all health insurance plans must cover “women’s health services” including contraception, sterilization, and abortion-causing medications as part of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA). Up to this time, Franciscan University has specifically excluded these services and products from its student health insurance policy, and we will not participate in a plan that requires us to violate the consistent teachings of the Catholic Church on the sacredness of human life.

Additionally, the PPACA increased the mandated maximum coverage amount for student policies to $100,000 for the 2012-13 school year, which would effectively double your premium cost for the policy in fall 2012, with the expectation of further increases in the future.

Due to these changes in regulation by the federal government, beginning with the 2012-13 school year, the University 1) will no longer require that all full-time undergraduate students carry health insurance, 2) will no longer offer a student health insurance plan, and 3) will no longer bill those not covered under a parent/guardian plan or personal plan for student health insurance. The current student health insurance plan will expire on August 15, 2012.

We encourage you to decide how you are going to provide for accidents or illnesses requiring visits to physicians, health clinics, or the hospital emergency room while you are a student here. As always, our Health Center on campus will be staffed by a certified nurse practitioner Monday – Friday during normal business hours. No insurance is necessary to receive basic health-related services at the Health Center, and the visits cost only $5 at the time of service. However, if you are referred off campus for further lab testing, physician specialists, X-rays, etc., you will be responsible to pay for those services.

Hat tip to Karen, who wrote:

How many students, if they had their choice here, would have said they would prefer the affordable student coverage, even though it did not cover birth control and sterilization, as opposed to having no coverage at all? Sure, maybe some of them can go back on their parents’ plans, but what about those whose parents don’t have health insurance? Or what if the health insurance their parents have is more than the insurance offered through the school? Well, those are moot points now, thanks to the Obama administration and the Democrats.

Franciscan University’s home page has the motto, “Academically excellent, Passionately Catholic,” front and center. From their About Franciscan page:

Your knowledge — illuminated by faith — comes alive and leads you confidently into the world when you study at Franciscan University of Steubenville. Here, your exceptional education is grounded in a passionately Catholic faith tradition that takes you beyond yourself and into the community where you can evangelize and transform the culture.

Grow in wisdom, faith, maturity, strength, purpose, and dedication at Franciscan. How you live your life — where you go, what you do, who you are — builds on the life of Christ within you and what you embrace while you’re here. With the solid foundation of faith and reason you create at Franciscan University, you are the message the world is waiting for!

In just over 60 years, Franciscan University of Steubenville has emerged as a leader in academically excellent and passionately Catholic education. By integrating faith and reason in the pursuit of truth and right living, the University has grown from a small facility serving local veterans of World War II to a beautiful hillside campus and an educational institution recognized nationally and internationally for its programs, faculty, and graduates. . . .

Franciscan University follows the example of St. Francis of Assisi in finding its identity at the heart of the Catholic Church. We embrace the teachings of Sacred Scripture, Sacred Tradition, and the Magisterium with a spirit of Christian humanism that relates all learning to Jesus Christ. At Franciscan University, you’ll grow in mind, body, and spirit through the integration of faith and reason.

The college doesn’t try to hide it or mealy-mouth their heritage: they are a Catholic university, and every student knows what the college is before he matriculates. The college is a private school, not a state university.

No one is forced to go to Franciscan; admission is completely voluntary, and it is the student who chooses to attend Franciscan. If a student believes that he must have access to contraceptive services from his student health plan, he is perfectly able to attend another school, one which provides such. Since the University is making the change effective beginning with the next school year, current students will have ample opportunity to choose to transfer to another college.

President Obama and his minions, of course, believe differently, believe that contraceptive services simply must be provided, regardless of whether the institution believes that such is moral or in line with its tradition. The ridiculous “compromise,” that the institution wouldn’t have to pay for it, but the insurance company would have to provide such coverage, was always wholly meaningless: the insurance companies have to cover their costs and would simply increase premiums to do so, with just a wink-and-nudge, “Hey, it isn’t the Catholic school which is doing this.” The bishops saw through the President’s silliness right away, and rejected his “compromise” offer.

And now we have an important Catholic university taking that next step, and choosing not to provide health insurance at all rather than to participate in something the Church finds to be sinful. The students are, of course, perfectly free to choose whatever health insurance they wish — and can pay for — and if it covers contraception, that’s between the student and the insurer.

Franciscan’s move will now push other Catholic colleges and institutions, to show them the way out. This isn’t something a Catholic institution would want to do — the Church supported President Obama’s attempt to create a universal health care coverage policy — but when the choice has to be made between something that the Church would like to do and something the Church is forbidden to do, the latter is going to win, every time.