House Dems Axe Birth Control Funds From Stimulus Bill - Presidential Politics | Political News - FOXNews.com

I'm not sure how closely all of you have been following the economic stimulus proposal, but I didn't see a thread on this subject and wanted to see what you guys thought.

Originally, the bill had 200 million dollars set aside for contraception services and education. I, like most of you I'm sure, scratched my head at this. Is the contraception sector of business struggling or something? No, the reasoning was that preventing unwanted births would save the federal government money.

Obviously, Republicans were outraged at this. (I personally agree, I'll explain below) So in the spirit of bipartisanship, President Obama told House Democrats to cut that spending out, as it does not fit with the purpose of the bill, and the House Democrats complied.

Now, in the interest of discussion, I see a couple potential issues to be discussed in this article.

The first issue is obviously, the legislation that was cut from the bill. Do you think the contraception funding belongs in the stimulus program or not? Personally, I don't think it does. The stimulus program is not about saving the federal government money. It is primarily about creating and saving jobs. Frankly, I don't see how free condoms is going to solve that problem. If the Democrats want to try and pass legislation of this nature, they should do it in the right place, preferably it's own bill.

Second, the less obvious issue, but one I feel is important. Should the President have this much sway with Congress? Frankly, I agree with his decision and his reasoning behind it, (whether he personally disagreed with the legislation or whether it was merely a compromise to House Republicans, they are both good reasons to oppose such legislation) but frankly, from a principles standpoint alone the House Democrats should have stood their ground if they felt it was important. However, there is a chance that the contraception legislation was slipped in by a few Democrats trying to push their agenda on the back of the stimulus program (*cough* Nancy Pelosi *cough*) and the majority of House Democrats felt that it was unnecessary as well. However, it's still food for thought.

The report now is there is 335million in STD prevention.

http://www.drudgereport.com/flashsb.htm

This thing's not a stimulus package, its a budget. Lets debate and pass a stimulus and then debate and pass all this other garbage.

Yeah, they should cut that from the stimulus bill as well. I realize the house is about to vote on this in another hour or 2, but hopefully the Senate will have a bit more sense. I mean, I'm for better funding for programs that promote safe sex, but this is not the time or place for it.

Doesn't this mean the Stim. Package will be down to like 500 Billion now?

Nah, they haven't even cut a single billion from it. :P

Oh well ****, I thought it said billion, not million.

It's perfectly reasonable that the spending (which would have mostly gone to the poorer demographics) should have be implemented- unwanted children stresses families and social services. If the President wants to save Social Security and implement universal healthcare, other obligations can't be dragging the government's finances down.

This sounds dangerously close to the Chinese model of family planning to me.

And these arguments are completely sound. However, the point of the stimulus program is first and foremost to create jobs. All of that reasoning you just posted have nothing to do with that.

No, the purpose of a stimulus bill is to stimulate the economy. If people don't have to spend money, effort and time on children they didn't want, their ability to invest and start business is greatly increased.

Your angle of perception is skewed here.