More distracting news: Rep. Todd Akin made a misstatement on Sunday during an interview regarding abortion and rape. Here is his exact quote as transcribed (since most media and youtubers seems to be condensing it to fit their political agenda):
"From what I understand from doctors, that's really rare. ... If it's a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down ... .
"But let's assume that maybe that didn't work or something. I think there should be some punishment, but the punishment ought to be on the rapist and not attacking the child."
The “a legitimate rape” phrase was, at best, a poor choice of words on his part. Replace them with “forcible sex” and you have the same meaning I’m fairly sure Rep. Akin was trying to convey.
Naturally, Rep. Todd Akin has been disowned by everyone in America because he didn’t choose his words carefully. Apparently, most people are too lazy to do a little research into the topic.
Now, I don’t know if what he was saying is true. I imagine that if a woman is subjected to sex against her will, she might not provide the fluids needed for the sperm to survive and swim up to the egg. This does not mean that pregnancy cannot result, just that it is very unlikely in an actual rape. But don’t take my word for it ladies because I don’t really know, nor do I care to because I have no interest in rape, not even Japanese manga tentacle rape.
One thing I would like to point out is that I think Rep. Akin should not have fallen into the abortion trap. Congressional Republicans in both houses have made it clear that they have no interest in overturning Roe v. Wade as evidenced by the almost universal non-support of Rep. Ron Paul’s many attempts to do so through legislative measures. If they really cared about the matter, they would have all co-signed the bill, brought to the floor for debate, and voted to pass it back when President Bush Junior had control of things.
The dirty little secret about the whole Abortion debate in national politics is that the Republicans have little else to count on besides the vote of those who are socially conservative. By claiming to be pro-life, they basically are given a free pass on just about every other issue. Hell, half of the conservatives who voted for John McCain in 2008 did so for that sole reason. None of them ever really liked John McCain, but because he was pro-life, he was their man. Of course, the same cannot be said for Willard “Mitt” Romney, but I digress.
Honestly, I don’t care whether or not Todd Akin wins his Senate race anymore than I care whether or not Romney or Obama win. In fact, I care much less because all I see these days is two sides to the same corporatist coin with very little to distinguish between both parties.
In any case, the abortion issue still continues to be a divisive non-issue on the national level because of the stupidity of the dumb masses to see that they are being used by the parties to corner a large portion of voters for themselves.