The decision of HHS Secretary Sebelius’ to narrow the conscience exception should come as no surprise. Under her interpretation, employers must provide contraception as “preventive health service” under Obamacare. That includes abortifacients, like the morning-after pill. Religious institutions, like hospitals and schools, are not exempt.

In 2007, Jonah Goldberg authored a book with the provocative title of Liberal Fascism. Goldberg’s thesis is that there is an affinity between modern American liberalism and fascism.  He defined liberalism as the “ideology of good intentions” that can end up in “the totalitarian temptation.” The Sebelius decision was a classic example of what Goldberg meant.

He defined Fascism as “the religion of the state.” Mussolini was clear about that. “Everything in the State, nothing outside the State, nothing against the State.” The current conflict between the Obama administration and the Catholic Church (and other religions) has an historical precursor.

Mussolini waged jihad against Catholic social organizations, notably Catholic Action. Their social activities, including with youth, were viewed as operations “outside the State” and hence a threat to it. The activities were treated as political actions adverse to the state. In the fascist mindset, all mediating institutions threaten the state. In this instance, the Obama Administration is dangerously close to adopting that mindset.

In 1931, Pope Pius XI issued an Encyclical defending Catholic Action and the Church (Non Abbiamao Bisogno). He noted that “liberty and right are the heritage of souls.” In strong language, reminiscent of the strong language of U.S. Bishops today, Pius XI said the fascist ideology “clearly resolves itself into a true, a real pagan worship of the State – the ‘Statolatry’ which is no less in contrast with the natural rights of the family than it is in contradiction with the supernatural rights of the Church.”

In its pursuit of the good intentions of promoting women’s health, the Obama administration has succumbed to the totalitarian temptation. It has trampled the Constitution’s protection of the free exercise of religion. Instead of permitting Americans to practice the faith of their choosing, it endeavors to make us all worship in the pagan religion of the State.

Jerry O’Driscoll

Note the conclusion in the third to last paragraph: To abide by the law, leads to a violation of our moral teachings. To ignore the law makes us subject to fines and other consequences. To act within the “nonexemption” leads us to abandon our mission to serve people in need. None of these is acceptable to people of faith.

This is what lead to the founding of our great nation. Freedom from religious persecution.

And the critical last question posed by the Nevada bishops: “Where else will this regulation lead?”

Obama and his ilk must be stopped for the sake of our freedoms.

The suppressive equality argument that a desperate president is trying to sell to distract attention from his miserable performance in office is falling flat on its face. Why, you ask? Because it is against the very core of human nature. Man by nature wants to grow, to improve, to succeed. That nature demands the hope that this core need can be met by individual effort. Essential to that hope is the freedom enshrined in law to pursue dreams, to succeed and yes to fail. Obama’s equality argument dims that hope, puts a lid on that freedom, turns success into something to be condemned. He has traveled the country railing against the successful.

Ryan Streeter posits a kinder opinion for the OWS misfits’ protests in his Indystar post, How to succeed by merit. He suggests that what the protestors really oppose is unearned wealth: “America isn’t a land divided by the 99 percent and the 1 percent. It’s a land divided by those who earn their success day after day and those who don’t. This class distinction has nothing to do with how rich or poor you are. It has everything to do with what kind of person you are.”

Streeter contrasts Steve Jobs with Bernie Madoff then gives examples of unearned success: lottery winners, Fannie and Freddie executives, unionized public employees, ineffective tenured teachers, spoiled rich kids, and too-big-to fail corporations. Trying to put a good face on and ascribe good intentions to “the bearded misfit sitting in a festering tent on public property” Streeter suggests that what he really objects to is this “unearned success.”

In a hopeful conclusion he argues: “It’s time to stop protesting a false premise and focus instead on promoting earned success. Do we need to end too-big-too-fail policies? Yes. Do we need to end harmful welfare programs? Yes. But most of all, we need to encourage earned success in our own homes. That’s where the real change begins.”

Now I would submit that income inequality is good. It sets the ever changing level to which to aspire. The lower views the higher status as something to be strived for and eventually attained. Even if not in his current generation so long as his children will be in positions to continue to improve. Challenge to improve is key to success; the lower the position on the income scale the greater the challenge.

The beauty of inequality is that it exists all up and down the income scale. It causes challenge, effort and either success or failure up and down the ladder. Those close to the top want to leapfrog into the number one position. And once that is attained someone below will always be striving to leapfrog again.This in turn promotes an aggregate rise in the standard of living for the whole of society. It’s Adam Smith’s “invisible hand” at work.

So we should reject Obama’s socialistic, big-government equality hogwash and promote freedom to succeed with fewer limits and less government.

Rany York sent the following video in which Nigel Farage, MEP and UKIP, describes the situation with some accurate historical perspective. He correctly points out the shaky assumptions on which the EU and European Monetary Union were based. His fiery indictment of the unelected technocrats should serve as a warning to us in America: our bureaucrats, agencies, commissions, and tzars are nothing other than unelected technocrats!

Witness the financial upheaval in European financial markets resulting in yesterday’s failed German bond auction, to see where socialism leads. Sadly our President and the leftist Democrats think we are somehow immune.

“So we get hauled in front of the Congress for developing a product that’s free, that serves a billion people. OK? I mean, I don’t know how to say it any clearer,” Mr. Schmidt told the Post. “It’s not like we raised prices. We could lower prices from free to . . . lower than free? You see what I’m saying?” HARD TO ARGUE.

“Mr. Schmidt recounted a dinner in 1995 featuring a talk by Andy Grove, a founder of Intel: “He says, ‘This is easy to understand. High tech runs three times faster than normal businesses. And the government runs three times slower than normal businesses. So we have a nine-times gap.’ All of my experiences are consistent with Andy Grove’s observation.”

“Mr. Schmidt explained there was only one way to deal with this nine-times gap, which this column hereby christens “Grove’s Law of Government.” That is “to make sure that the government does not get in the way and slow things down.”

In other words: GET OUT OF THE WAY! This is not exactly what President Obama advocates. He wants Silicon Valley money, he wants Wall Street money, and he gets both. Yet when he and his liberal ilk need political pinatas or need, as in this case, to extort juice from other rent seekers, they bash both. For show or for real? Who knows?

Don’t you just love Obama voters facing Obama reality?

Don Parsons alerts us to the recent NASA data that debunks the environmental alarmists “global warming” models. On point is James Taylor’s article in Forbes, New NASA Data Blow Gaping Hole in Global Warming Alarmism.

“In short, the central premise of alarmist global warming theory is that carbon dioxide emissions should be directly and indirectly trapping a certain amount of heat in the earth’s atmosphere and preventing it from escaping into space. Real-world measurements, however, show far less heat is being trapped in the earth’s atmosphere than the alarmist computer models predict, and far more heat is escaping into space than the alarmist computer models predict.

“When objective NASA satellite data, reported in a peer-reviewed scientific journal, show a “huge discrepancy” between alarmist climate models and real-world facts, climate scientists, the media and our elected officials would be wise to take notice. Whether or not they do so will tell us a great deal about how honest the purveyors of global warming alarmism truly are.”

Now, think of how California is shooting itself in the foot with its own emission standards more stringent than the current national standards. And don’t forget the EPA’s current efforts to regulate CO2!

So why in this time of sky high deficits and unsustainable debt burdens we are laying on our grandchildren, do so-called Republican candidates support the ethanol fraud? Votes in corn producing states! It’s that simple.

Newt Gingrich, if he’s still a viable candidate, is an ethanol whore. He supports it. Mitt Romney, that smooth talking flip-flopper who developed the fore runner of Obamacare, is an ethanol whore. He supports it.

In fact, Mitt supported it publicly in Iowa as a follow-up to Tim Pawlenty’s gutsy Iowa statement that we can’t afford ethanol subsidies. So not only is Mitt a ethanol whore, but he’s a cheap one at that.

I expect Obama to win in 2012, if Mitt Romney, father of ObamneyCare, is leading the Republican field. When you think of it, Mitt should be running as a Democratt!

It’s heartening to see that the Senate today voted to end ethanol subsidies. That means it’s probably time for another Mitt Romney flip-flop. Get ready!