Tag Archives: pregnancy

More Good News

Crazy Congressman Allen West of Florida lost to Patrick Murphy.

Ignorant Congressman Joe Walsh of Illinois, who opposed a “life of the mother” exception to an abortion ban because he said women’s lives are never threatened by pregnancy, lost to Iraq War vet Tammy Duckworth, who lost both her legs while serving as a helicopter pilot there.

And Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin will become the first openly gay member of the U. S. Senate, having defeated Tommy Thompson.  I was thinking of you, Butters, when I wrote “openly.”

Is this a great country or what?

Newtie’s Back!

“Moderate Mitt” needs to keep the crazies locked away till November 7, but serial adulterer and hypocrite Newtie, who loathes Mitt, is not cooperating.

Newtie weighed in today on Indiana Senate candidate Richard Mourdock’s statement that God intends pregnancies from rape.

He thinks the whole brouhaha is “nonsense,” calls President Obama the “radical” on abortion rights, and advises the Obama campaign (and, by extension, all of us who are outraged) to “get over it.”

Newtie implicitly criticized Mitt for criticizing Mourdock.  Newt at least knows a fellow hypocrite when he sees one.  Mitt can’t criticize Mourdock or Missouri’s Todd Akin without criticizing Paul Ryan, who believes the government should treat rape victims as criminals if they choose abortion.

With about a week to go, Mitt definitely doesn’t need Newtie reminding us how extreme the GOP has become.  But all of us need to listen.

Oh, Boo Hoo, Richard Mourdock

Richard Mourdock, the Indiana GOP Senate candidate who claims that if you get pregnant from a rape, “God intended it,” said last night that yesterday was “one of the toughest days” of his life.

You want “tough,” moron?  Try being forced by your government to spend 270 days pregnant with your rapist’s baby.  Now I think that would be tough.

We have mental institutions filled with people who believe God talks directly to them, and they know what He thinks and wants.  Mourdock should choose one and check himself in.

Rove Wants Akin to Swim with the Fishes

Karl Rove, meeting with donors to his Super PAC yesterday in Tampa, urged the GOP to “sink Todd Akin,” the Missouri Senate candidate who believes that women who are “legitimately” raped don’t get pregnant.

Rove also said, “If he’s mysteriously murdered, don’t look for my whereabouts.”

Akin’s office said that since the FBI is currently investigating threats against Akin (now there’s a waste of taxpayers’ money), they didn’t find Rove funny.

Ann, Christie Messages Clash

Ann Romney took the stage at the GOP convention last night and said that she was there to talk about love.

Immediately after, Chris Christie took the stage.  Love?  Fuhgeddaboudit.  He was there to talk about respect.

It was an awkward contrast, and it made the messages seem totally uncoordinated.  The speeches aren’t supposed to take place in individual vacuums, they are supposed to flow and create an overall consistent narrative.

Similarly, you had a succession of GOP governors talk about how great things are in their state, how the economy was getting better with more jobs and lower unemployment.  Again, those states don’t exist in a vacuum, you add up their stories and put them all together, and it creates an overarching impression that the economy must be improving all across the country — under President Obama.  It was as if no one thought through the cumulative effect of these gubernatorial testimonies.

Ann Romney’s speech wasn’t what I expected.  I thought she was going to tell warm and fuzzy Mitt stories that would make us see him as less cold and robotic.  Instead, she shamelessly pandered to women, as if saying “I love you, women.  We hear your voices,” would make up for a GOP platform that says no abortions ever, even if you’ve been raped, or if the pregnancy will kill you.   The GOP may hear women’s voices, but it doesn’t listen to them and honor them.

She came across as noblesse oblige-y in her efforts to say she understands the problems and struggles of women who aren’t as well off as she is, which is pretty much all the other women in this country, unless you’re Miriam Adelson or Julia Koch.  Ann went from her rich daddy’s house to her rich husband’s house.  She has never had to worry about paying an emergency room bill or keeping the heat on.  She has never spent a day outside the cocoon of the 1%.

She didn’t make us see Mitt through a gauzier lens, and she had nothing concrete to offer women to offset the GOP’s Taliban positions.  I don’t think her speech moved the numbers among women at all, so to me it was a failure.

Christie told us how wonderful he is and what a great job he’s done in Jersey.  Again, I don’t think his speech moved any numbers for Mitt.  Mitt needs votes in 2012, Christie was looking for votes in 2016.

Rove Bullies Akin

Karl Rove is furious at Missouri Senate candidate Todd (“Legitimate rape victims don’t get pregnant”) Akin for pulling back the curtain on the GOP’s extremism and insanity.  Rove is predicting that Akin will “go down in defeat with the biggest loss of any Republican candidate for Senate in modern history.”

Rove’s statement is as dumb as the Akin comment that started this whole uproar.  Missouri is a conservative state, and while Akin may lose to Claire McCaskill, it won’t be the epic loss Rove is predicting.

Rove wants Akin out because he knows how much he’s hurting the GOP effort to win the White House and other congressional races, not because he wants to spare Akin a humiliating and historic defeat.  Rove’s making an apocalyptic public statement like that just embarrasses Akin and encourages him to prove Rove wrong.

I’m delighted to see someone stand up to Rove, even if it is one of the bat-shit crazies.

Rove has spent his career stirring up people to vote against their economic interests, to basically serve the Koch Brothers and the Bain Capitals of this country, by getting them all wee wee’d up on abortion and guns and gays and immigrants.  Let him reap what he’s sown.

Todd Akin is Rove’s baby, as it were, and let Rove be forced to carry him to term in November.

The Toto of 2012

From “Do You Get It?,” Josh Marshall, Talking Points Memo:

“The intensity of the desire to banish Akin from the 2012 cycle is exactly in proportion to Republicans’ perceived vulnerability on what the Democrats term the ‘War on Women.’  And that means they feel pretty damned vulnerable. Akin is particularly ignorant and offensive. But his basic points are actually pretty similar to what a large swath of the Congressional GOP believes. Holding that up to bright light scrutiny just as the bulk of the public is tuning into the national political debate is perilous in the extreme.”

The truth is that they want Akin out not because he’s some outlier with bizarre views, but because he showed a little too much leg about what the pro-life movement and the GOP really believe.  He pulled back a curtain they wanted to keep drawn.  He’s the Toto of 2012.

White suburban women, the soccer moms of 2000 and security moms of 2004 who went for Bush, but then went for Obama in 2008, will decide this election.  Akin makes them flee from Romney and his Akin-clone Ryan.