"When plunder becomes a way of life for a group of men living together in society, they create for themselves, in the course of time, a legal system that authorizes it and a moral code that glorifies it." — Frederic Bastiat
Sandra Fluke is a student at Georgetown Law. She’s also a “reproductive rights activist” who agrees wholeheartedly with the Obama administration’s controversial contraceptive mandate. Her reasoning, though, is likely to enrage some critics.
During a testimony in front of the House Democratic Steering and Policy Committee on Monday (a meeting that was held by House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi), Fluke — who was coincidentally the only witness heard — described the financial constraints that purchasing birth control puts on her peers.
“Forty percent of the female students at Georgetown Law reported to us that they struggled financially as a result of this policy,” Fluke said, referring to the fact that the university doesn’t pay for contraception. “Without insurance coverage, contraception, as you know, can cost a woman over $3,000 during law school.”
She detailed, among other stories, how one woman felt “embarrassed” and “powerless” at the pharmacy counter when she “learned for the first time” that contraceptives weren't‘t covered by the university’s health care plan.
Watch her complete testimony, below:
CNS News’ Craig Bannister, though, challenged Fluke’s $3,000 figure and came up with some pretty interesting numbers:
“$3,000 for birth control in three years? That’s a thousand dollars a year of sex – and, she wants us to pay for it. [...]
At a dollar a condom if she shops at CVS pharmacy’s website, that $3,000 would buy her 3,000 condoms – or, 1,000 a year…
Assuming it’s not a leap year, that’s 1,000 divided by 365 – or having sex 2.74 times a day, every day, for three straight years. And, I thought Georgetown was a Catholic university where women might be prone to shun casual, unmarried sex. At least its health insurance doesn’t cover contraception (that which you subsidize, you get more of, you know).”
Rush Limbaugh took off on Sandra during his radio show.
So, poor ole Sandra wants to have sex and wants us to pay for her birth control pills. If she is having sex and we are paying isn’t that the definition of prostitution? What is amazing is how this misguided girl is willing to go on public television and claim she needs her sex life subsidized by the school she is attending. Doesn’t she realize that Georgetown is a Catholic university and that she is demanding them to do something that goes against the tenants of the Catholic Church? Why not go to a Jewish university and demand they out pork on the cafeteria menu.
There is nothing stopping Sandra from going to a secular school for her law degree where she might be able to get her contraception medication for free. But no, Sandra wants it her way. She wants the Catholic Church to bend to her way of life. This is what progressives do.
In the liberation tradition, the dream is a liberation from all effort, a paradise on earth — a Utopia. The sweated laborer dreams of turning the tables on his employer and making him sweat. The housewife dreams of making her husband a drudge. The underprivileged minority dreams of privilege. The artist dreams of creative paradise. The businessman seeks liberation from the terror of failure. And the politician's eyes gleam.
The most glaring difference in the two traditions is over sex. Conservatives at our best want sexual freedom, the right to freely give your love and fidelity to one other in the central human drama of sexual reproduction. Liberals want sexual liberation, the right to opt out of the drama of sexual reproduction and separate sex from its curious connection with children. Liberals insist that we talk about contraception, abortion, gays, lesbians, and trans-genders and trundle out The Way We Never Were, according to author Stephanie Coontz, whenever conservatives start to talk about the collapse of marriage among the lower classes.
The trouble with liberation is that its dreams can be realized only with force, and so wherever it has been tried, the liberation movement has trod a trail of tears, a road back to serfdom. That is why liberal reformers want to force the Catholic Church to bend to their will. You can't have wall-to-wall sexual liberation if serious Christians are left with an opt-out.
The free man is joyful in taking responsibility; the liberated man is terrified of it. The free man is a risk-taker; the liberated man is a risk-avoider. The free man's word is his bond; the liberated man's word is a whine. The free man takes the blame; the liberated man lives to blame. The free man asks only to serve; the liberated man demands to be served. The free man lives to give back; the liberated man scorns the "give-back."
Conservatives have our own little yearning for liberation. We would like to be liberated from the tyranny of liberal cultural hegemony. But this is a weakness, for freedom has never promised liberation.
It is almost a divine witness that the two popular movements of the Obama era so exactly impersonate the ideas of the two traditions. The Tea Party takes its name from a protest against government-sponsored monopoly and privilege. The Occupy movement takes its name from the plan of every dawn raider: invade, occupy, and plunder.
We should thank President Obama for forcing us to choose between freedom and liberation. Usually liberal politicians try to muddy the waters, and they cloak their liberation in the language of freedom just like FDR and his Four Freedoms. They want us to think that America is still free when they pile on the compulsory and mandatory government programs. The dreadful fear that Obama stirs up in conservatives is this: what if Americans this November openly choose liberation instead of freedom? What happens to America then?
It's a fearful thought. But free men and free women have never believed in giving in to fear.
Sandra wants to be a liberated woman, but she wants someone else to foot the bill. She wants, in the words of Bastiat, plunder.
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