Abortion and the tax exclusion

I have been writing about this for awhile.....the abortion debate as defined by the Stupak amendment is a concocted controversy and not based on principle....the federal government already subsidizes abortion via the tax exclusion of employer paid insurance and has done so systematically since Roe v. Wade became the law of the land (tax exclusion has been in place since WWII). I don't mean to imply that abortion is an irrelevant issue, or that Rep. Stupak is not earnest in his opposition to abortion, only that it doesn't belong in the health reform discussion. It is about as devisive an issue as there is. I don't think I have ever met anyone who changed their mind about it.

The members of the House Democratic caucus pushing this are either (1) trying to kill reform in a way that gives them an out, (2) don't understand one of the most basic aspects of the US health care system (the tax exclusion), or (3) they like attention.