August 21, 2012
"I'm Todd Akin... Rape is an evil act. I used the wrong words in the wrong way and for that I apologize."
Can you find it in your heart to forgive him? If you forgive him, should you say, nevertheless: Get out, you're hurting your party right now, and it's a big distraction? It's a wrong irreparable in a short time span. Now, you've got until 5 p.m. to get out of the race.
It's like some cowboy movie: You've got until sundown to get out of Dodge.
Now, I think Akin should drop out. It's not fair for him to hold the spotlight, and he's hurt his entire party. From the party's point of view, every day that's about him — and the war-on-women topic rape — is a day that not about the economy and what Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan might do to save us from the depredations of the Democrats.
And yet... would the Democrats oust one of their own because he said one thing wrong? The GOP got played into destroying George Allen over the inane word "macaca." Democrats have their ways of disparaging Republicans for being racist/sexist/homophobe/whatever. It's not like they're going to stop. Each time they take a guy out it creates incentive to take another guy out. We can ruin X, like we ruined Allen and Akin.... It's a fun game... for them.
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248 comments:
«Oldest ‹Older 201 – 248 of 248@Bender:You mean the link to a story that references obscure medical texts from hundreds of years ago and uses quotes from people from Britain and pro-choice sources?
Nice to see you followed ONE link. Other links cite, for example, the Physicians for Life newsletter, and legislators and activist in the pr-life movement who said what they said very publicly. Over the last (ahem) 25 years.
And, again, that is the common tactic of the pro-abortion crowd. They take the small number of abortion-related abortions (which the pro-abortion Alan Guttmacher Institute has determined in two studies to be no more than one percent of all abortions) and use them as leverage to justify abortion on demand for any and all reasons.
I did no such thing.
"[I]f there's a sexual predator out there who has impregnated a young girl, say a 13 year old girl, and it happens in America more times than you and I like to think, that sexual predator can pick that girl off the playground at the middle school and haul her across the state line and force her to get an abortion to eradicate the evidence of his crime"
Rep. Steve King, 2 weeks ago...so he knows it "happens more than [he] likes to think", but, no one has told him about it so it doesn't count...got it.
Hey machine! Ya better put a link for that quote or Jay will call you a retarded bimbo...
Says Akin: "I misspoke one word in one sentence."
What a thick sh*t-for-brains this boob is. Before I thought he was merely an idiot. Now I'm getting pissed off.
purplepenquin said...
Uh, but it is true. Rep. King did say that he’s never heard of a child getting pregnant from statutory rape or incest.
Hysterical.
You keep telling yourself that.
It will be magically true.
I promise
purplepenquin said...
So ya'll are upset that people are claiming that he says he never heard of it, because what he really said is that he never heard of it but is willing to discuss it if he does ever hear about it?
Notice how this dipshit's "facts" include truncating the actual sentence.
Gee, why would this dipshit do that?
@Bender: Some pro-life activists are saying it even <a href="http://thenewcivilrightsmovement.com/bryan-fischer-akin-is-right-genuine-rape-makes-it-impossible-to-conceive/politics/2012/08/20/47070>NOW</a>.
"When you have a real, genuine rape, a case of forcible rape, a case of assault rape, where a woman has been violated against her will, through the use of physical force,” Fischer describes, adding “there’s a very delicate and complex mix of hormones that take place that are released in a woman’s body and if that gets interfered with it may make it impossible for her or difficult in that particular circumstance to conceive a child.”
purplepenquin said...
But it ain't a lie. His exact words included "I just haven't heard of that", and nothing in the rest of his quote says otherwise.
No his exact quote was:
Well I just haven’t heard of that being a circumstance that’s been brought to me in any personal way
And the fact that you can't realize the meaning of a sentence speaks volumes about your intellect.
Of course you forgive him. He is stupid. But you dont hire him.
The Republic is going down in flames, but all some women and beta males are worried about is free birth control and a goofy old geezer's understanding of biology.
The NUMBER ONE reason that Akin needs to go is because we are now all talking about THIS bullshit instead of the economy and the dismal fuck up of a failure Obama's administration has been.
purplepenquin said...
I haven't heard anybody...especially me...claim that "he doesn't think it ever happened, or that he never heard of the possibility of it having happened".
Oh really?
Here is what Talking Points Memo had to say about Rep King:
A Democratic source flagged King’s praise of Akin in the KMEG interview to TPM. But potentially more controversial for King is his suggestion that pregnancies from statutory rape or incest don’t exist or happen rarely.
Not only are you a propagandist, you're a shitty one at that.
Mainly because you're stupid.
Oh, and note how the pathetic little machine and the idiot purple penguin swallow whole the propagand that TPM is selling.
Here is the actual transcript of King's remarks:
REPORTER: You support the “No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act” that would provide federal funding for abortions to a person who has been forcibly raped. But what if someone isn’t forcibly raped – and for example a 12-year old who gets pregnant. You know, should she have to bring this baby to full term?
REP. STEVE KING: “Well, I just haven’t heard of that being a circumstance that’s been brought to me in any personal way and I’d be open to hearing discussion about that subject matter. Generally speaking it’s this: that there [are] millions of abortions in this country every year. Millions of them are paid for at least in part by taxpayers. I think it’s immoral for us to compel conscientious objecting taxpayers to fund abortion through the federal government, or any other government for that matter. So that’s my stand. And if there are exceptions there, then bring me those exceptions, let’s talk about it. In the meantime it’s wrong for us to compel pro-life people to pay taxes to fund abortion.”
Nowhere does King say he hasn't heard of "a child getting pregnant from statutory rape or incest"
You people are not only retarded, you're fucking sick.
Go take your silly shit elsewhere.
Jay sure is one angry unicorn.
What is really funny is that just the other day he was making up stuff & putting it between actual quote marks (and defending such actions when called out on it), and now he is having a total meltdown 'cause he thinks everyone is misinterpreting what Rep. King really meant when he said "I just haven't heard of that..."
What a bimbo. He's gotta be a Moby, 'cause nobody could really be this rude, hypocritical, and dumb...can they?
And notice smear merchants machine & purplepenguin ignore King's response to TPM:
“The liberal press and their allies have again twisted my words,” he said in a statement. “I never said, nor do I believe, a woman, including minors, cannot get pregnant from rape, statutory rape or incest. Suggesting otherwise is ridiculous, shameful, disgusting and nothing but an attempt to falsely define who I am.”
He added, “I have never heard of and categorically reject the so-called medical theory that launched this controversy.”
You people are pathetic.
purplepenquin said...
What is really funny is that just the other day he was making up stuff & putting it between actual quote marks (and defending such actions when called out on it),
Except I did no such thing, idiot.
he thinks everyone is misinterpreting what Rep. King really meant when he said "I just haven't heard of that..."
Unlike you, dumbass, I'm posting the full quote and the actual transcript.
Want to guess why you never bothered to post the full transcript?
Want to guess why you keep truncating the quote?
purplepenquin said...
What is really funny is that just the other day he was making up stuff
No I wasn't you dipshit liar.
By the way, now that it has been demonstrated that TPM has asserted pretty clearly that King believes that rape of minors doesn't result in pregnancy, you're retracting that claim of yours, right?
DBQ -- the dumbass doesn't even know what the controversy is all about, he doesn't even understand what was wrong with what he said, thick-headedly thinking that the only problem is that he "misspoke one word in one sentence."
Oh really?
Really-truly. I don't read TPM on a regular basis.
What leads you to think I do?
Nowhere does King say he hasn't heard of "a child getting pregnant from statutory rape or incest"
In the link to the Fox Station I provided earlier he clearly states "Well I just haven't heard of that..." when asked about abortions for victims of statutory rape or incest.
Tho, in all fairness, I see that his spokesperson is now claiming that he never said those words at all, so maybe the TV reporter just made the whole thing up.
*shrug*
If your body doesn't "shut it down" that means it was probably (to use your own word) "less traumatizing"... what do you think the emotional or psychological resonance of that is for someone who's been raped and gotten pregnant? You got pregant, so that proves it wasn't that traumatic? You didn't "shut it down," so statistically that means it was less likely to be a "legitimate rape"?
No, because he said even that sometimes doesn't work.
Look, I'm not defending his "science". Just that it isn't necessary to mix up the cause and effects he was trying to talk about so it can be made even more horrible than it already was.
Let me take the rape out of it. I have a friend who believed a raw diet and positive emotions would keep her cancer at bay. She chose this treatment rather than traditional chemo.
When her cancer came back, I did not for one minute think it was because she hadn't had positive enough emotions. I did not think she wanted the relapse because she had the relapse.
And had I gotten cancer while not eating a raw diet, she would never have thought I must have, on some level, wanted the cancer.
The body sometimes does what surprises us by acting in a way we did not think it would or should. It is rare that we bring those surprises upon ourselves.
Or another way to say it:
I know a lot of people believe in the power of positive thinking, when it comes to health. Some people go as far as Oprah, with "The Secret". But many believe if you fight fight fight you can overcome a serious illness.
Yet that is not the same as saying: if they succumb to that illness, they must have wanted that illness because otherwise their body would have fought it off for them.
Except I did no such thing
Except you did. In this thread.
Just because you deny it twice doesn't mean it never happened.
purplepenquin said...
In the link to the Fox Station I provided earlier he clearly states "Well I just haven't heard of that..." when asked about abortions for victims of statutory rape or incest.
Um, you're truncating the quote.
Even when the full transcript has been posted.
Why do you think you continue to truncate the quote?
purplepenquin said...
Except you did. In this thread.
No, I didn't
And you accusing me of something doesn't make it true.
No go truncate another quote, you big truth teller you.
purplepenquin said...
Really-truly. I don't read TPM on a regular basis.
What leads you to think I do?
Because you're a silly, ignorant leftist.
And, everything you post here is a lie or in service to a lie.
Kind of like TPM.
purplepenquin said...
Tho, in all fairness, I see that his spokesperson is now claiming that he never said those words at all, so maybe the TV reporter just made the whole thing up
Complete & utter bullshit.
You can't post without lying.
And had I gotten cancer while not eating a raw diet, she would never have thought I must have, on some level, wanted the cancer.
Of course, and that analogy is fair to an extent. But surely you're aware that in our culture the topic of "rape"-- as opposed to the topic of "cancer"-- is entangled with inflammatory memes such as whether or not a woman really "wants it" or was "asking for it" or "enjoyed it," memes that touch on the raped woman's complicity or blame or shame.
And not just memes: the experience of rape has heavy psychological consequences, which often involve feelings of shame, humiliation, guilt (even though these feelings are objectively irrational).
Seen from that perspective, there's no comparison between cancer and rape.
You say your friend "believed a raw diet and positive emotions would keep her cancer at bay," and go on to say what you did or didn't think when she relapsed, but you didn't mention what *she* thought. It's possible that a person who really believed that might in fact blame themselves for not maintaining the positive emotions necessary to keep the cancer at bay.
Just so, someone who took Akin's remarks seriously and believed them might regard a woman who got pregnant after being raped as someone who very likely wasn't "legitimately" raped, someone who for whatever reason failed to "shut it down." Why did her body fail to shut it down? Why did her body instead welcome it in?
Can't you see how something like that might lead to culturally toxic and psychologically damaging notions that shame and blame the rape victim for getting pregnant? Even if Akin himself didn't mean that, his rhetoric all too easily lends itself to that.
And by the way, the fact that Akin has doubled down and is apparently utterly oblivious about what was wrong with his remarks, makes me more apt to think he did mean it that way:
AKIN: You know, Dr. Willkie has just released a statement and part of his letter, I think he just stated it very clearly. He said, of course Akin never used the word legitimate to refer to the rapist, but to false claims like those made in Roe v. Wade and I think that simplifies it….. There isn’t any legitimate rapist…. [I was] making the point that there were people who use false claims, like those that basically created Roe v. Wade.
!!!! So he's saying that if you get pregnant after being raped, that would lead one to conclude (just statistically, doctor) that the rape was likely to be a false claim. Not necessarily-- but probably.
Don't you see how awful an implication that is? Even if there are many false claims of rape, tying that topic into the topic of pregnancy after rape and abortion is just beyond idiotic and offensive.
Nice meltdown Jay. I see that once again you are choosing to go with quantity rather than quality.
Seriously - are people supposed to take you serious when you act like this? Do you really talk like this in real life, with the constant name-calling and repeating the same insults over&over again?
Pretty obvious that you're just a Moby...'cause your schtick is too far over the top to be beleivable.
Ignore Jay. I once wasted some time trying to get him to see sense over some relatively simple thing. Basically everyone of his posts is some variation on the theme "GET OFF MY LAWN".
Once he decides you are a leftist its all over, nothing you say will be of any value, you are just a lying bag of shit like all the other damn leftists.
AReasonableMan said...
Ignore Jay. I once wasted some time trying to get him to see sense over some relatively simple thing
Hysterical.
I bet you did.
purplepenquin said...
Seriously - are people supposed to take you serious when you act like this?
I'm not the one truncating quotes and lying.
You are.
So who do you think takes you seriously, idiot?
Pretty obvious that you're just a Moby...'cause your schtick is too far over the top to be beleivable.
But you DID post a truncated quote, that changes the basic meaning of what was said.
That's like Maureen Dowd with her sudden ellipses.
Once he decides you are a leftist its all over,
He reminds me of Sally's dad.
~~~~~~
So who do you think takes you seriously, idiot?
Do you really talk like that in real life?
That aside, it looks like AReasonableMan just did take me seriously. Right there in front of ya and you still missed it.
You sure are one dumb unicorn.
But you DID post a truncated quote, that changes the basic meaning of what was said.
The basic meaning is the same no matter if it is the exact quote or the statement I used to sum up his quote.
The truncated quote would be untrue if the part that was left out was "but I've read about some cases" or something similar....but he didn't clarify anything of the sort, did he? He said he never heard of it happening...no exceptions given.
I do agree that some others have made an unfair summary of his actual statement. For example, he never said it was impossible for a rape victim to get pregnant, but I never said that he did say that.
purplepenquin said...
The basic meaning is the same no matter if it is the exact quote or the statement I used to sum up his quote.
Actually it isn't because you're not referencing the question, which was also misrepresented.
Hey, you know who plays silly, bullshit games like that?
People telling the truth.
Really, they do!
Asshole.
purplepenquin said...
I do agree that some others have made an unfair summary of his actual statement.
You did, retard.
Your very first post here was an effort to validate what "machine" said which was inaccurate.
What you continue to do is propagandize the whole thing.
Just admit you were duped and be done with it, you silly, gullible hack.
purplepenquin said...
He said he never heard of it happening...no exceptions given.
No, he didn't.
The full transcript was posted to refute your lies, yet you keep lying.
See, stupid, the question was about a 12 year old who "happens to get pregnant" and the answer was "I just haven’t heard of that being a circumstance that’s been brought to me in any personal way"
Of course with your high school education, you can't follow the grammar rules and are unable to see the importance of you truncating the quote.
Just admit you were duped and be done with it.
Jay and Purplepenguin, guys are boring us all to death. Why don't you take it outside (email each other) or get a room.
I'm beginning to thing that you are both sock puppets trying to derail the thread.. Scrolling past your petty bullcrap is tiresome.
And God so loved Claire McCaskill that he sent her Todd Aikin for an opponent.u
Ann, GOP resisted throwing Angle and Christine O Donnell under the bus in 2010... and it resulted in GOP defeats in both winnable senate races
Dear Ann Althouse:
We absolutely do not want Akin to step aside. We like him where he is, bringing to the attention of the American people the extreme radicalism of the Republican Party.
Akin's policies are Republican policies and they reduce the freedom of American women as they ram their religions down our throats.
Just another chance for a political cheapshot from Ann.
Yashu-
I'm afraid that I do not believe that because people may be deeply emotional about something that happened to them, that we all must filter words spoken through their emotion and determine what the speaker meant based on what the offended felt about it.
As for the example with my friend with cancer, she certainly did not think she must have *wanted* it to return, on some level, because her body did not fight it off for her. She didn't think that the practitioners telling her about positive thinking meant that if she got cancer again she must want it.
The power of positive thinking and the "mind-body" connection are frequent beliefs in this country. I have never heard anyone who believes in those things say that people who then get a disease wanted it, have you?
I don't see why a rape victim would be more susceptible to hearing such an implication (that isn't being made) than say, a breast cancer victim. Almost all of my friends with cancer have wondered on some level what they did to encourage their bodies to fail them(diet? plastic water bottles?). None of them think they must have secretly wanted cancer.
Don't you see how awful an implication that is? Even if there are many false claims of rape, tying that topic into the topic of pregnancy after rape and abortion is just beyond idiotic and offensive.
He was an idiot to tie levels of rape to pregnancy at all. He seems to be a bit of an idiot in general.
But this particular term - legitimate rape- is going to be a problem for people who want to discuss whether rape is an exception for otherwise illegal abortions.
We do have a segment of society that tries to redefine rape down. We also have a segment of society who thought Dr Tiller was a hero because he was willing to perform late term abortions based on the poor "mental health" of the pregnant woman.
If laws like the one Akin wants are passed, we're going to have to deal with the definition of rape or we are going to have to accept that any woman who wants an abortion can just say she was raped and get one. Just as the women going to Dr Tiller were able to say they had mental health issues, no proof required.
Now, I don't want any of that. And Akin did a terrible job of presenting his position, in part because he wants physiology to take care of the conundrum for him.
But I don't think we need to make a connection that wasn't made, and is not made when people say similar things about other horrible conditions. We don't need to *add* meaning to make it more complicated or awful.
It's a pity Akin didn't make this remark before the primary rather than after. This has all become NYS wrestling which is a pity. The only saving grace of all this would be a focus henceforth on the science of the issue.
Semantics are of minor importance except to those in search of butthurt. There are various forms of rape, such as:
beaten/shot/stabbed/etc and raped, held down, incapacitated, legs forced apart, tied up, whatever
raped with cooperation due to extortion, e.g., with a gun to victim's, children's head
raped under influence of drunk, drugs, mental illness
raped with fraud, e.g. it was dark and rapist pretended to be husband; or friend shared girl with his buddies; or under the pretence of a medical exam
raped statutorily: age limits, miscegenation when that was illegal, incest
raped as in regrets it later-she didn't get the part, he didn't pay her, he's not really a football player, he didn't call, she got caught by her parents or her husband...
And no doubt others. Can anyone doubt that biological responses could differ across such cases?
And intuitively, is it hard to believe, either that cortisols or any other ingredients of the biochemical stew in question could affect ovulation, fertilization, implantation, or indeed cause spontaneous abortion or miscarriage in a woman already pregnant? This is absurd? You think that if a pregnant rape victim lost her baby, there could not be a connection?
Cedarford, repugnant as he is, at least offered a counterhypothesis, that rape promotes fertility. No evidence that I've seen, and I asked him for it, but it is an argument. Data might be gathered, say, in Bosnia.
But it's just about the winning, about the goring of oxen. Epicteus would be so proud.
Maybee, fair enough, let's agree to disagree.
*I* hear that implication (or suggestion) in Akin's remarks as well as his later clarification of those remarks, in fact his clarifications make things on this count worse. (NB in one of his subsequent interviews he admits that rape *can* cause pregnancy, and says he was unaware of that fact as of two days ago. So IMO when he said "rare" he meant, he believed, basically virtually "never".)
True, if we want to be very charitable and give him the full benefit of the doubt, one could exculpate him from having that implication in mind. The fact that I (and many others) immediately drew that implication, doesn't absolve him from the monumentally harmful clumsiness of his rhetoric (as you yourself agree). But unlike you, I'm not convinced that his "apology" and explanation (which so completely missed the point as to be delusional) exonerates him from having that implication in mind.
I do impute that to him. You're right, I'm not being charitable, but given the entire context of his remarks and behavior, I'm not inclined to be charitable.
I agree that in principle and generally speaking,
I do not believe that because people may be deeply emotional about something that happened to them, that we all must filter words spoken through their emotion and determine what the speaker meant based on what the offended felt about it.
But in this particular case-- given the extremity of his apparent cluelessness and the fact that he's doubled down on it-- I disagree.
It's like saying Biden's "they want to put y'all back in chains" remark contains no allusion whatsoever to slavery, only to the harmful economic effects of Wall Street deregulation.
Biden and Akin are both idiots, and it's easy enough to recognize that without going over their rhetoric with a fine-toothed comb.
Which brings me back to what should be the central lesson here- people in government do not have to be smart to rise high. Why do we want to give them any more power than absolutely necessary?
And for the people who do want to give them more power- name some names! Who is such a successful genius politician that you want to give them more decision making power in *your* life?
Which brings me back to what should be the central lesson here- people in government do not have to be smart to rise high. Why do we want to give them any more power than absolutely necessary?
Absolutely. !00% agree, and it's a pity that people on the left (who have has many political bogeymen as we do) don't see things this way.
Again PP.
What is being killed?
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