Alexia Kelly

Honestly, we’re not sure who the real Asshole should be–Alexia Kelley or President Obama for appointing her to head the Department of Health and Human Services’ Center for Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships.

We understand Obama’s thing about bringing political opponents into his government, à la Abraham Lincoln, but come on! Kelley, an antichoice zealot, will have the power to reduce abortion access in an agency charged with expanding it, or at least facilitating it. Given that, you might think Obama should be our nominee for Asshole of the Month. But since we still want to give the Prez time to prove himself, we’ll focus on the holier-than-thou Kelley.

As founder of Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good (CACG), Kelley is not just antiabortion but also anti-contraception. Hello? If you are against abortions, shouldn’t you be for birth control? Most mainstream Catholics have dismissed anti-contraception church doctrine as a quaint, unsophisticated relic of the Middle Ages. Not Kelley. According to blogger Francis Kissling, Kelley is so anti-choice, she comes across as “more Catholic than the Pope.” While the CACG claims its agenda is “seeking common ground” with those in favor of choice, what’s clear is that there isn’t a lot of real estate to stand on.

Kelley’s way of reducing the abortion rate, for example, is to pay pregnant women to go fullterm. That includes funding programs for job creation, primary and prenatal healthcare and nutrition. But Kelley’s study, which purported to show a reduction in abortions as the result of such programs, has been largely discredited.

Logic alone, it would seem, negates Kelley’s position on how to reduce abortions. How can you strive to reduce abortions while at the same time oppose comprehensive sex education? It stands to reason that if you provide information on sexual reproduction, women will be better able to avoid unwanted pregnancies. But, gosh, that would mean disseminating information on contraception, wouldn’t it? And that’s against Kelley’s beliefs as a Catholic.

Just look at what the CACG has to say about abortion: “We support full legal protection for unborn children as a requirement of justice and as a matter of essential human rights.”

Is Kelley the ideal person to hold a “faithbased” government position? Or should Obama have appointed someone from, say, Catholics for Choice, a progressive organization that’s been around far longer than the CACG?

Let’s examine the root of Kelley’s beliefs: Catholicism itself. Adherents are told that the Pope is infallible. So if he says abortion is wrong, then it must, perforce, be wrong. Someone who is infallible, by definition, can’t be wrong–the 1992 pardoning (or absolution) of Galileo not withstanding. Damn that Galileo with his scientific trickery about the Earth not being the center of the universe! Damn those telescopes!

And, of course, the Vatican wasn’t wrong to blame the death of Jesus on the Jews, setting in motion centuries of anti-Semitic violence that led directly to the Holocaust in Nazi Germany–and the deaths of six million Jews. Nor was the Vatican wrong during the Spanish Inquisition when countless “heretics” were tortured to death. And how about its claim that all non-Catholics are going to hell? Could all that be wrong? No! Impossible! Unless, of course, the Catholic Church has, throughout history, zealously embraced stupidity and ignorance. Which is more likely? Infallible? Stupid?

The church seems to agree with the latter, since it has admitted those aforementioned precepts were wrong. Probably some heavenly static on the direct line to God. And let’s not get into that nastiness about the Vatican’s protection of pedophile priests.

Regarding abortions, Kelley maintains that this time the Pope is most certainly correct. Abortion is wrong; birth control is wrong; sex education is wrong. The Pope couldn’t be blowing smoke up our ass again, could he?

But what about global warming? Overpopulation? That couldn’t possibly be a valid reason for birth control, could it? (It’s not okay to abort a zygote, but apparently it is okay to abort all life on our planet.) And what about those who choose abortion because they can’t afford to provide the child with a good home? Does Kelley plan on providing cash to such women after they give birth?

More than anything, however, we wonder by what right Kelley thinks she should impose her religious beliefs on everyone else. Oh, yeah, by divine right taken from a book written by people who thought that the world was flat and that if you could throw a stone high enough, you would break the sky.

Since Kelley’s religious beliefs are so much a part of her life, it’s only fair to ask how she found Catholicism.Was it by thoroughly investigating every spiritual philosophy? Or was it a sudden moment of blinding insight after years of searching, introspection and meditation? Oh, that’s right. Kelley was born into it! It’s so much easier that way.You believe what your parents believe. You know, the more we think about it, the more convinced we are that Kelley is the right choice for Asshole of the Month. But what about Obama? He’s not Catholic. It’s worth noting, though, that the CACG is generally credited with pushing the conservative voters of Kansas into electing Democrat Kathleen Sebelius governor in 2006. (She’s now Secretary of Health and Human Services.) The CACG is also believed to have helped Obama pull in Catholic voters. Could the Sebelius and Kelley appointments be political payback? Can you say business as usual?