Bush pandering to the "religious right"

I saw a news story over the weekend about out-of-wedlock births. It seems that it has reached an all-time high in the U.S. Last year 37% of all babies were born to single woman. That is almost four out of every ten babies born. Compare this to 1960. The rate then was about 5.3%. So 1960 it was approximately 5 out of 100. Today it’s almost 4 out of 10. That is quite an increase.

Of course, you know there has to be a government agency that deals with this problem. I mean if we can have a government agency that deals with the standardization of the threads of screws and nuts, there must be one that deals with birth control.

This responsibility falls under the Department of Health and Human Services and the person in charge is someone with the title of the deputy assistant secretary of population affairs. This is no joke…this position really exists! And you thought they just made up titles and positions at your job.

Anyways, this deputy assistant secretary of population affairs oversees the Title X family-planning program. His job is to provide birth control information to the general public. He's also responsible for providing information on such matters as HIV and other STDs. Over 4000 clinics around the country are funded by this program.

So who is the deputy assistant secretary of population affairs? Well, it turns out that President Bush has just appointed a new one. He's an OB-GYN doctor from Massachusetts. So he should know all about birth control, right? Well, not exactly. Dr. Eric Keroack doesn't believe in birth control ... of any kind…

Here are some of the publicly stated opinions of our newly appointed deputy assistant secretary of population affairs:

1. Condoms offer no real protection from herpes or HIV.
2. Fifteen out of 100 people who have sex (outside of marriage, I presume) will get AIDS.
3. The use of birth control is demeaning to women and degrading of human sexuality.
4. A woman who has an abortion will be eight times more likely to get breast cancer before she's 45.
5. If you have premarital sex you won't be able to bond with your wife or husband and your marriage will most likely fail.

Wow!!! Almost all of those statements can be proven false … However, our President, George W Bush, has made this guy the nation's go-to bureaucrat for family planning! What the hell is Bush thinking?

Oh, that’s right… I must have forgotten. The Republicans just got kicked in the head in the midterm election and Bush thinks it's because they abandoned their core conservative values. He would be right, but to some of us core conservative values mean less government, lower taxes, less spending, more individual responsibility and defending our nation. Bush must somehow think that these core conservative values mean pandering to the so-called "religious right."

“Amazing Grace” is not the answer here.

Now, I am not trying to say that abstinence is the wrong answer. It is the only answer that I know of to be 100% effective, but it is not the only answer. If abstinence works for you then that’s great, but anyone who thinks for a moment that this country is going to accept abstinence as the preferred form of birth control is completely out of touch with the American people. Someone's been listening to Dr. James Dobson a little too long.

If you folks don't know who Dr. Dobson is then I just proved my point.