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Bush's Lawlessness
The Bush Administration is proposing a rule that will force employers to accommodate healthcare workers who, as a matter of conscience, refuse to provide legal reproductive health services such as birth control pills or abortions. This places an unusual burden on the health industry which is obligated to supply these legal healthcare services.
It’s difficult for me to understand why Bush thinks employers should be subjected to this extra burden given that the people in question were free to choose their professions and their place of employment knowing full well what would be expected of them. He hasn’t offered similar accommodations elsewhere. The Army, for example, typically rejected claims of conscience by soldiers suddenly confronted with combat assignments in Iraq or Afghanistan.
Shouldn’t we at least require equal accommodation for anyone who acts out of conscience? Should defense workers be allowed to refuse to work on projects they deem immoral? Should bartenders who refuse to serve legal alcoholic beverages to customers be accommodated?
Both of these examples have religious underpinnings so by the administration’s logic, they all would certainly qualify for protections. But don’t count on seeing the regulations generalized any time soon to all who act out of conscience. The Bush administration has always viewed the law more as a political tool rather than a means of assuring fairness, equity and justice.
It has always endeavored to thwart laws that don’t suit it, circumventing laws against physical coercion by sending prisoners to overseas surrogates for torture or ignoring the law altogether when tapping the phones of American citizens. Thus, it should come as no surprise that acts of conscience will be accommodated only when it is politically convenient.
Many, Americans seem willing to ignore the administration’s contempt for the rule of law, viewing it as a harmless expedient. But what is it that makes America great; worth fighting for? If it’s democracy and the rule of law, then this "expedient" undermines the very foundations of the nation.
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