Health Care Plan Will Force the Hiring Of Homosexual Administrators, Are You Serious?

If the crazy christian people weren't so dangerous their craziness would be funny. A christian right group called Pray In The Name Of Jesus Project had a petition opposing the health care reform proposal. They have many petitions, mostly funny, but very dangerous. The health care petition says:

"Your tax-dollars will pay for preferential hiring of homosexual hospital administrators, who distribute $50,000 grants to gender-confused activists for unneeded elective surgery to mutilate their own genitals, (and force Christian doctors to perform it.)

On August 4 Politifact released its research and the truth regarding this stupid christian claim. Politifact writes:

"On Aug. 4, a news release to that effect went out under the name of Matt Barber, who is director of cultural affairs with Liberty Counsel, a conservative legal group, and the associate dean of Liberty University School of Law, which was founded by the late televangelist Jerry Falwell. It was quickly spread by blogs on the left and the right.

Titled, 'ObamaCare Likely to Mandate Free ‘Sex Change’ Surgeries,' the release asserted that 'the weight of the evidence indicates that cosmetic ‘gender reassignment’ surgeries for both U.S. citizens and illegal immigrants who suffer from [the American Psychiatric Association-] recognized ‘Gender Identity Disorder’ (GID) may also be provided – free of charge – courtesy of the U.S. taxpayer. The current price tag for such a procedure can exceed $50,000.'

To confirm Barber’s authorship and learn more about his reasoning, we tried to reach him through the phone number and e-mail address listed on the release, as well as through a call to a different number at Liberty Counsel. But he did not respond. Because we couldn't confirm his authorship, we're attributing this item to our generic category 'bloggers,' since they have spread it so widely.

Before we delve into our findings in detail, here's an overview of why we found the claim was False: The news release tries to stitch together a patchwork of unrelated items to back up the sex-change claim, but the health care bills as they appear today simply don't do what the release alleges. There is no mandate for sex-change coverage.

The news release offers three pieces of evidence:

* An exchange between Sens. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, and Barbara Mikulski, D-Md., about the legislation covering treatments that would be 'medically necessary.'

* Language in the House version of the health care bill that provides for 'standards, as appropriate, for the collection of accurate data on health and health care' based on 'sex, sexual orientation [and] gender identity.'

* And language in a draft Senate bill that requires the Department of Health and Human Services to ‘develop standards for the measurement of gender’ (i.e., officially recognize subjectively self-determined "transgender" or "transsexual" gender identities). It further mandates ‘participation in the institutions’ programs of individuals and groups from ... different genders and sexual orientations.'

Let’s take these assertions one by one.

Go to politifact for the rest of the story.

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