The effort to explicitly exclude abortion from being a required benefit that is paid for by taxpayer dollars fell victim to politics last night.

Rep. Joe Pitts, R-Penn., offered an amendment prohibiting the government from mandating that any health insurance plan provide coverage for abortions. The amendment passed, by a vote of 30 to 29 (click here to view the vote tally). But committee Chairman Henry Waxman, D-Calif., used a House rule to switch his vote to yes so that he could bring the amendment back up for reconsideration. Sure enough, an hour later Waxman did bring up the amendment again. This time it failed by a vote of 31 to 27 (click here for the vote tally).  Joining Waxman in changing his vote was Rep. Bart Gordon, D-Tenn.

A similar amendment has failed in two other House committees dealing with the healthcare bill and in one Senate committee. But Pitts vowed to reintroduce the amendment as early as today: “We want an explicit exclusion in the bill to prevent any taxpayer funding from paying for abortions. Anything else is wrong, and contrary to overwhelming popular opinion.”

For more on the abortion debate in the healthcare bill, see my article “Killer bill” in the latest issue of WORLD.

A look back at the news of the week, colorfully illustrated by some of the best editorial cartoonists in the business: Pulitzer Prize-winner Steve Breen, Michael Ramirez, Scott Stantis, and Gary Varvel.

“August has both peril and opportunity,” White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel told TIME.

Members of the House are finishing votes today, then heading back to their respective districts for the month of August. The Senate will finish up at the end of next week. Lawmakers will return to hear the demands of their constituents: they’ll face tea parties, pressure from interest groups, assorted rallies. Conservative groups have planned tea parties nationwide focused on health care for August 22.

And that’s why this month holds peril and opportunity for the president’s agenda. This is part of the reason Obama had earlier set an August deadline for health care reform. Lawmakers can help sell his priorities and come back emboldened to vote “yes” on major legislation like health care, or they could get cold feet after hearing from displeased constituents.

Let’s all wish our youthful president a happy birthday. Barack Obama turns 48 on Tuesday. May he be forever young in the minds of the American people.

Those of us who have been around for a while know that the office of president of the United States seems to age our leaders at an accelerated pace. You’ve always heard that one “dog year” equals seven human years, but unlike man’s best friend, there is no universally recognized measure for “president years.” I’d like to establish such a standard because I’m concerned about the disconcerting signs that President Obama is aging faster than all 43 of his predecessors.

I have been spending this week with 20 economists at a meeting in Wichita, Kan., where the Economic Freedom of the World index has been the topic of a few of our discussions. It was noted that America declined in economic freedom—from a No. 3 ranking in the world to No. 8—under President George W. Bush. In his book Bureaucracy, the economist Ludwig Von Mises called those who promote bureaucracy, which is the enemy of economic freedom, “old men.” Therefore, President Bush is an old man by economic freedom standards.

Although President Obama defines himself as a “progressive,” his policy goals are those of old men. Instead of rolling back government and promoting more freedom (i.e., progress) for the American economy, Obama seeks to heap bureaucracy on his country with expensive red-tape initiatives like his massive healthcare program.

The economists in our group this week predicted that in just a few years Obama’s policies could bump the United States to 20th position on the Economic Freedom of the World index, which is currently occupied by Slovakia, decreasing American wealth 20 to 25 percent. If each percentage point in the index were to equal seven years—I’ll call them “president years”—Obama could be a very, very old man by the end of his first term.

We Americans appreciate youthful, vigorous presidents. Even though Ronald Reagan was an old man in regular human years, he seemed so young and full of energy and life, especially when it came to economic policies. Remember when he cut taxes in response to the recession early in his presidency?

Perhaps Obama’s approval ratings are in steep decline because the American public senses a sudden onset of old age. I know that I prefer to envision Obama as a young man, but because we’re likely to view him frequently on the tube during August promoting his healthcare program while Congress is out of session, I know that I’ll start seeing him more and more as an old man.

Let’s give President Obama a youthful birthday present this year. We can keep him young by saying no to big bureaucratic programs like his healthcare plan. We did it for President Clinton in 1994, let’s do it for President Obama now. Happy 48th birthday, President Obama. May you be forever young.

In a thoughtful column, the author of The Evolution of God wonders why, if he no longer believes in a personal God,  does he want to be born again? Robert Wright wonders why he feels the accumulation of sin and the need for forgiveness:

Why, if I don’t believe in heaven, do I still want something you could call salvation? …  [M]aybe it’s because, actually, trudging around under the burden of sin, in pursuit of ever-receding salvation, isn’t such a bad life.

A sense of salvation gives purpose, and a sense of sin checks the tendency towards self-dramatization, he says.

Salvation, at the most abstract level, is the sense that you’re on the right side of the moral law, and the sense of sin is what keeps you not-quite-sure that you are. It also keeps you longing for that final affirmation — the true born-again experience, the one that will end the uncertainty. But don’t hold your breath.

You can still be an atheist and believe in right and wrong and try to align yourself with a moral axis, he argues. But it’s not quite the same:

But, for my money, there’s nothing quite like the idea that what’s behind that purpose is something that can approve or disapprove of you. It keeps you on your toes, and it keeps your life mattering, even when it’s only a feeling, and no longer a belief.

Email alerts are popping into in-boxes all across the country, pointing out what is believed to be contained in the massive HR 3200 bill, aka “America’s Affordable Health Choices Act.” What? You haven’t read all 1,017 pages and 2,541 sections to find out for sure? Never fear—in case you need to do a little homework before your lawmakers come home for the August recess, your friends at WORLD have conveniently compiled a summary of what appears to be in store for us should this bill become law. (And if you do want to read HR 3200 in its entirety, we’ve provided a link to a pdf of the complete bill at the end.)

Oh, and be sure to email all your friends.

UPDATE: Please see “Shameless propaganda, lies, distortions?”

Mourners gathered yesterday at the graves of those who killed during the Tehran protests last month, including grave of the iconic 27-year-old Neda Agha Soltan. Iranian security forces blocked opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi from going to the graves, but crowds gathered 7,000 strong by some accounts.

From one eyewitness,

There was a heavy guard presence at the Interior Ministry. No protesters there, but forces were on standby [amadeh-bash]. There were clashes at Fatemi Square. One man honking in his car was dragged out and ruthlessly beaten. People around him began screaming, “They’ve split his head open!” He was thrown onto a motorbike and taken away.

Near the Yousef Abad cross, teargas was thrown. I and a dozen others took shelter in a pharmacy, crouching in the dark and peering through the windows where Guards were chasing and beating people on the street outside. We felt enraged but powerless to help them.

Further up, near Jam-e-Jam (IRIB headquarters), candles had been lit and placed on the sidewalk. My friend and I went into a grocery store and bought a couple of candles. As we were lighting them, a group of plainclothes forces began running toward us and we took flight into a nearby alley.

Other eyewitnesses reported that some police officers were sympathetic, and pointed them to Neda’s grave.

But in Tehran at large, security forces cracked down on protesters in the streets. From The Washington Post:

Police fired tear gas, attacked demonstrators with batons and smashed car windshields. But the protesters fought back, battling hand-to-hand with security forces in some of the most violent confrontations of the summer. In one case, three members of the much-feared voluntary militia known as the Basij were beaten with their own batons after a group of opposition activists pulled them off their motorcycles near a park. The motorcycles were set on fire, witnesses reported.

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will be sworn in next week.

I have tended to think of the Apostle Paul as bossy—or at least independent (with a touch of abrasiveness) and not inclined to take orders or advice from others. This impression has been fostered by such details as the whole first and second chapters of Galatians. Excerpts:

“For I did not received [the gospel] from any man, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ” (1:12). “And from those who seemed to be influential (what they were makes no difference to me; God shows no partiality)—those, I say, who seemed influential added nothing to me” (2:6). “But when Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned” (2:11).

So I was surprised today in my reading of Acts to see another side of Paul—Paul the submissive church member. Paul and Timothy were making the rounds of the new churches, and “as they went on their way through the cities, they delivered to them for observance the decisions that had been reached by the apostles and elders who were in Jerusalem” (16:4). They did as they were told (Galatians 2:10).

This refers back to the big Council episode of Acts 15, in which Paul and Barnabas submitted to the Antioch church’s decision that they go back to Jerusalem headquarters to get advice about a certain doctrinal controversy that had flared up. Paul did not run roughshod over that convocation of brothers. Peter took his turn to speak. Then Paul and Barnabas. Then James put in his opinion. The decisions reached there were the product of a lot of humble listening and mutual submission.

Later, we read that “The brothers immediately sent Paul and Silas away by night to Berea” (17:10). But when the mob from Thessalonica caught up with Paul there, “the brothers immediately sent Paul off on his way to the sea” (17:14). During the riot at Ephesus, “when Paul wished to go in among the crowd, the disciples would not let him” (19:30). Paul, it seems, did a lot of denying of his own will.

Admittedly, the prophets and people did not prevail against Paul’s wishes later on when he insisted on going to Jerusalem (21:13). The Holy Spirit had indicated to them that Paul would get beat up there, but the Holy Spirit in Paul told him to go even if he gets beat up.

And so “the spirits of prophets are subject to prophets” (1 Corinthians 14:32). This is part of the dance we all must learn—to submit to one another in humility while being obedient to the Holy Spirit’s voice in us when it sometimes pulls the other way. This is how you do church.

To hear commentaries by Andrée Seu, click here.

Good morning!

Today’s quote is from an Scottish-American pastor:

“The truth is that more spiritual progress is made through failure and tears than success and laughter.”

Welcome to our daily (except Sundays) open thread, where you, the commenters, choose the topics of conversation.

Much has been made over the Henry Gates-Sgt. James Crowley-President Obama controversy, which is all supposed to come to a happy ending this evening at a White House “beer summit.” While most of the focus has been on race relations, a new front has opened concerning the president’s choice of brew: Bud Light.

“Some 20-something staffer must have said, ‘How about Bud Light? It’s the best seller in the country,’” Tom Dalldorf, publisher of Celebrator Beer News, told FOXNews.com. “Sadly, Budweiser was purchased last year by a Belgian/Brazilian consortium for $52 billion. Almost enough to get the president’s health care reform bill paid for. If you want foreign beer, how about Tsingtao from China. Since they hold the note on the majority of our national debt, can you think of a better choice? What a glorious moment for politics. Not a good day for beer.”

Meanwhile, Gates will go with a Red Stripe, a Jamaican brew, while Crowley will quaff a Blue Moon, brewed in Colorado. (What? You mean to tell me that neither of these gentlemen from Cambridge chose a Samuel Adams!?!)

At least we know—if we take editorial cartoonist Gary Varvel’s word for it—there will be no Miller High Life available to serve: