The Quiet Conservative March 1, 2009
Kathleen Sebelius is the Perfect Pick for HHS Secretary
(The Forgotten Veto May 4, 2008)
It is now reported that Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius is the pick by President Obama as the
new Secretary of Health and Human Services. She is the single best choice after the now disgraced
Tom Daschle. With the White House going full blown in support of abortion, there is no better pick to
head HHS than Kansas’s own most fanatical abortion provider guardian.
As late as Friday Lifenews.com was reporting her appointment at HHS was being held up due to
her close ties to indicted late term abortionist Dr. George Tiller. However, this close connection is
rather a resume enhancer than a detriment to the new administration. Also in her corner is the fact she
is a pro abortion Catholic in the heretical tradition of Nancy Pelosi, Joe Biden, and Tom Daschle.
Archbishop Naumann, Sebelius’s bishop, has told her not to present herself for communion. As with
Pelosi, it is presumed this doesn't phase the governor as she isn't following church teaching anyway.
As a pick, Obama gets what he wants most- someone to actively promote abortion and to
marginalize the one church institution, the Catholic Church, which actively opposes murdering the
unborn. Kathleen Sebelius admirably fulfills both functions. The president can claim to have Catholics
while not really having Catholics.
So the hesitation on her appointment is not due to her views on abortion. If she had been
photographed carrying bio hazard bags full of slaughtered babies to an incinerator it would only have
shown she was the White House’s kind of Catholic. No, the pause is from the queasy feeling that her
chummy relationship to the nation’s most notorious late term abortionist might blow up in the
administration’s face the way Catholic Daschle’s tax cheating limo ways did.
Operation Rescue, Tiller’s opponent in Wichita, got the goods on a private party the Governor
threw for Tiller and his clinic workers in the governor’s mansion in April 2007. This party had
pictures that were leaked. Despite the fact the press in Kansas refused to follow up, because of those
pictures the story had enough legs to last. Governor Sebelius originally stated the dinner was a prize
won in a raffle given at a charity event by the Greater Kansas City Women’s Political Caucus. The
story had so many holes it sank immediately, even as the press did their best to help by spiking the
story. Operation Rescue had fought for a year to get the records for the party and it turned out the
State of Kansas picked up the tab. Only when Operation Rescue forced the release of the information
did the state get reimbursed by the organization throwing the charity. Yet, there were no records the
organization sponsored the dinner, nor was it a prize, nor was the prize now being reported enough to
cover the entire clinic’s staff (who were photographed at the dinner), nor was the dinner reported on
any required state reporting form.
However, with no press interest the story was consigned to the pro life blogosphere. The full story
appears at the Operation Rescue web site. What appeared to be a ham handed lie and poorly
constructed cover up was allowed to stand. Now however, the governor is moving beyond the pet
Kansas press as she heads national.
The dinner party, though, is just one part of the whole. The national press can look back at the
well documented connections between Dr. Tiller and his political PAC’s and the Kansas Democratic
Party. To anyone following the blood money from Tiller to the Kansas Democratic Party, there is no
quicker resource than the one Kansan doing political reporting. He is not a journalist at a major paper,
but an individual blogging in his off time. Earl Glynn at www.kansasmeadowlark.com tagged the
political contributions between Tiller, Sebelius’s Buestem PAC, and Pro Kan Do, Tiller’s first front
group. Between the two sources Operation Rescue and the Kansas Meadowlark, any national
journalist who still aspired to credibility will have a lot of dots to connect. The presumption is, though,
the White House and Sebelius have gone through the closet and think any skeletons are old and moldy
enough to allow her through the confirmation process. With the rest of the administration officials and
their shady connections sliding through, the odds are very good they are right.
Before the sham of the confirmation hearing start, think about actions instead of carefully measured
words that mean only what the speaker wants them to mean and are subject to later….’clarification.’
For her entire time as governor Kathleen Sebelius has fought any restriction or reform of Kansas
abortion laws. The last, the veto of the CARA, was especially odious. This points to actions, not the
honeyed words of someone engaged in political theater. Here is the column from May 4, 2008 titled
The Forgotten Veto:
The Quiet Conservative May 4, 2008
The Forgotten Veto
Directly across the front pages of many newspapers in the last two days were the stories of the
successful defeat of the 3.6 billion dollar expansion of the Holcomb power plants. Those stories were
contrasted with the stories of legislators worried about a budget deficit and declining revenues for
future state programs. The irony wasn't funny, it was pathetic.
With the Sunflower coal fight dominating the news, a second and far more controversial veto
passed by without much notice or outrage. It was the Governor’s veto of CARA, The Comprehensive
Abortion Reform Act. Below is her press release on the act:
Veto Message for House Substitute for Senate Bill 389
Over the last several years, we have worked on lowering abortion rates in Kansas by focusing on
adoption incentives, extended health services for pregnant women, providing sex education and
offering a variety of support services for families. Those efforts are having a positive impact;
recently we learned that the abortion rate in Kansas continues to go down.
For years, the people of Kansas have asked their elected officials to move beyond legislative
debates on issues like abortion and focus their attention on issues that can be solved in the
Statehouse - stronger schools, affordable health care and economic growth. Kansans are proud of
the progress we've made lowering the abortion rate and lifting our economy. It's time for legislators
to recognize that progress and focus on the things that continue to move us forward.
I am concerned about a number of provisions in SB 389. The United States Supreme Court
decisions make clear that any law regulating abortion must contain exceptions for pregnancies
which endanger the woman’s life or health. However, SB 389 allows a variety of individuals to seek
a court order preventing a woman from obtaining an abortion, even where it may be necessary to
save her life. I am concerned that the bill is likely unconstitutional or even worse, endangers the
lives of women.
The bill contains unprecedented expansions of legal proceedings which would likely encourage
extensive litigation and also unnecessarily jeopardizes the privacy of Kansas women’s confidential
medical records.
As Governor, nothing is more important to me than the safety, health and privacy rights of our
citizens. I am vetoing SB 389 because it endangers the health of women and is likely to be found in
violation the United States Constitution and the Constitution of the State of Kansas.
Therefore, pursuant to Article 2, Section 14 of the Constitution of the State of Kansas, I veto
House Substitute for Senate Bill 389.
The above statement is deceptive. The reasoning is specious. The intent behind the veto is suspect.
The abortion industry is among the largest PAC donors to the Kansas Democratic Party. The abortion
industry has spent millions on electing Democratic officials. If we examine the Governor’s statement,
and what the bill actually stated, we can see if the money was well spent.
"Over the last several years, we have worked on lowering abortion rates in Kansas by focusing on
adoption incentives, extended health services for pregnant women, providing sex education and
offering a variety of support services for families. Those efforts are having a positive impact;
recently we learned that the abortion rate in Kansas continues to go down."
The above lead in to the veto takes credit for the declining abortion rates in Kansas without a shred
of proof. There is no indication that abortion has been discouraged in any way shape or form by the
Governor, who has consistently vetoed any measure restricting abortion or regulating abortion
providers. As for adoption incentives, health services for pregnant women, sex education, and a variety
of support services for families, all are good efforts in themselves but to claim them in the name of
reducing abortion is unfounded. As for the reduction in abortions, what statistics are showing that
reduction aren't provided. A quick search of the web brings any reduction to question. From www.
johnstonsarchive.net the table showing statewide abortions culled from the CDC numbers show no
such reduction.
As often misrepresented in the press, abortion in Kansas was legal before Roe V. Wade. Individual
states decided what abortion laws would apply in their state. What Roe did was take that ability to set
laws away from the states and made up a new constitutional right where none existed. Roe imposed
abortion nationwide. In 1972, the year before Roe, there were 12,800 abortions in Kansas. The
numbers have fluctuated over the years but for the last years on the table: 2004, 2005, 2006 the total
number of abortions on the table were 11, 357; 10,837; and 11,183 respectively. What possible
reduction is the Governor citing?
"For years, the people of Kansas have asked their elected officials to move beyond legislative
debates on issues like abortion and focus their attention on issues that can be solved in the
Statehouse - stronger schools, affordable health care and economic growth.
Kansans are proud of the progress we've made lowering the abortion rate and lifting our economy.
It's time for legislators to recognize that progress and focus on the things that continue to move us
forward."
For years the people of Kansas have been asking for the abortion laws on the books to be enforced
by an executive branch that has refused to do so. Late term abortion provider Dr. Tiller has performed
late term abortions with impunity, and so notoriously that even the politicians he put in office couldn't
cover all his alleged indiscretions. Still facing multiple criminal counts, the state is dragging its feet on
the case against Dr. Tiller while possibly trying to kill the charges originally brought by Kline.
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