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Wednesday, October 01, 2008

Anti-Abortion Zealots Who Lie About It

Planned Parenthood shines a spotlight where it needs to be:



But check out this flabbergastingly deceptive exchange between Couric and Palin on the Early Show (yes, I know it's also a word salad -- we expect that now -- it's the active deception that matters here):
COURIC: Palin says she makes no apologies for her pro-life views and opposes abortion, even in the case of rape or incest.

Gov. PALIN: I'm saying that personally I would counsel that person to choose life, despite horrific, horrific circumstances that this person would find themselves in. And if you're asking, though, kind of foundationally here should anybody end up in jail for having had an abortion, absolutely not. That's nothing that I would ever support.

Actually, making abortion illegal, even in cases of rape and incest, is not "counseling that person to choose life," it's putting a gun to her head if she tries to be anything but her rapist's incubator. If Palin is trying to imply here that she does not think abortion should be illegal, that it is a woman's personal decision, then she is pro-choice. That would be a stunning reversal. Of course, it's actually just a disgusting effort to deceive the American people. No doubt baby Jesus wants her to lie so it's okay.

[Transcript via Atrios]

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Anti-choice people never answer that question. If abortion should be illegal, what should the punishment for it be?

Not jail? Ok, then what? If you commit petty theft you could end up in jail (people usually don't, but the law allows for that option), so these people are saying that abortion is a criminal act, but not as criminal as stealing candy from a candy store.

Robin said...

This is one of those authoritarian Republican moves. Women shouldn't go to jail for the illegal act of abortion because they aren't full moral agents. For the same reason they weren't capable of voting, they aren't full agents in the sense that they can actually be punished for their crimes. You don't punish a cat because it doesn't understand. Same with women.

(Have you noticed the punishment that women schoolteachers get for sleeping with 11 year old boys versus the punishment that male schoolteachers get for sleeping with 11 year old girls? A WORLD of difference.)

It's another way of reinforcing the view it assumes: women can't be expected to make these sorts of decisions for themselves because their pretty little heads can't handle that level of complex choice. So take it away, but don't really punish them for the alleged "murder" - cats kill birds all the time. They need shelter, not punishment.

So it goes.

Anonymous said...

This is just the Rethuglican leadership attempting to appear to be recoiling from the ugliness of the anti-choice position in order to gather up more votes from the growing sector of the public who recognise that ugliness, all the while without actually giving up any of the ugliness itself.

They're just trying to slather some make-up onto the sick face of punishing women for not having complete control over their bodies, control which they themselves deny in service to their nebulous beliefs about how things are "meant to be".