Opinion: Population Control, American Style

It was not the poor of the world who brought down the U.S. financial system, or caused the housing crisis, but the wealthy and powerful.

FRONT ROYAL, VA. (Population Research Institute) - Most of us understand that children are the only future a nation has. The Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, apparently does not. In the name of fiscal austerity, she wants us to embark upon a population control program here at home to drive down the birth rate.

How else can one understand her desire to add hundreds of millions of dollars of "family planning" spending to the stimulus package under discussion in the Congress?

For Speaker Pelosi, it is all about costs. As she said on ABC's This Week, "Family planning services reduce cost. The states are in terrible fiscal budget crises now and part of what we do for children's health, education and some of those elements are to help the states meet their financial needs."

Those of us who celebrate the natural family and the new life that it brings into the world do so in part for hard, practical reasons. Babies grow up into productive workers. They marry and buy homes and cars. They pay taxes, including social security taxes, that help defend this country from its enemies and provide for the care of the elderly.

Of course, such anti-people attitudes generally come to the fore during a recession. Wealthy elites like Pelosi--people who are already predisposed to blame the poor for their poverty--will be emboldened by the current crisis. As the unemployment rate goes up, they will seek to eliminate this growing "surplus population." They will demand that the poor be aborted, sterilized and contracepted in even greater numbers.

Never mind that it was not the poor of the world who brought down the U.S. financial system, or caused the housing crisis, but the wealthy and powerful.

In one sense, Pelosi's position is a reflection of the incoming U.S. administration. President-elect Obama's positions on life and family questions are more radical than any his predecessors. He will undoubtedly support Pelosi's move to drive down the birth rate by targeting the pregnancies of the poor.

Never mind that he himself, as the mixed race offspring of a single mother, not to mention Pelosi's Italian Catholic ancesters, would have been among those targeted in an earlier era.

Obama's appointment of moderates to key financial and security positions has angered the Left wing of the Democratic Party, and will probably make his adoption of aggressive, pro-abortion and pro-population control policies more likely as he seeks to placate his base. Pelosi will follow suit.

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Welcome to population control, American-style.

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PRI is a 501(c)(3) educational organization. We work to reverse the trends brought about by the myth of overpopulation. Our growing, global network of pro-life groups spans over 30 countries. To date, we have successfully eliminated $790 million in U.S. tax dollars to International Planned Parenthood, UNFPA, and other anti-life aboritionists while redirecting much of this to family friendly programs like Child Survival.

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