Much ado about several things

We've all been hearing far too much about what President Bush might do in his last remaining days in office. He appears to be cooperating nicely with President Elect Obama, which while it surprises me a bit, makes me a little nervous too. I'm sure he's worried about his legacy and since there is not much else that's very good in it, maybe he'll slip under the radar if he appears to be playing nice.

However, there is the notion of how many folks (and who they are) that he'll be pardoning on his way out of town. That in itself isn't new, President Clinton had his fair share of pardons as he departed as well. But there is also the notion of what type of legislation he's going to enact on his way out. He did give a deadline for all new requests that has since past, but that isn't stopping this one new rule that he would like to see enacted. The rule is to protect health providers from having to perform abortions, be in any way related to those performing abortions, be involved in dispensing contraceptives, etc. if it is against their religious or moral beliefs.

The argument is that this is already covered and these folks are already protected under the equal employment rules. If they try to take this further, it will be very difficult for woman to get the services they might need (and I don't just mean abortion) if every place they try to go someone is screaming it's against their beliefs to service them. There are lots of things in everyone's jobs that they don't like to do, but we do get paid for what we were hired for. I would believe that if anyone has a huge objection, they've probably already worked that out, and are already protected. So the question is... why is this new rule important enough for Bush to care about now? My guess is that he has to further his agenda to squash the rights of women before he leaves because we have an incoming President who appears to actually care about our rights, even if he himself doesn't have the same beliefs about them. That's what we need in office. I'm glad there is only 64 days left.