Campaign ’12 truly is the race to avoid saying something stupid (and some fail)

It was an old Saturday Night Live gag – a parody of a presidential debate was introduced by famed announcer Don Pardo as “the race to avoid saying something stupid.”

AKIN: Still not sure what he meant

There is an element of truth to that in any campaign event. And by that standard, Rep. Todd Akin, R-Mo., has failed – although I’m sure there are some people who will want to believe him and will go out of their way to cast ballots for him come Nov. 6.

AKIN, OF COURSE, is the guy who turned himself from no-name congressman to national nitwit this past weekend when, while discussing the whole issue of rape and abortion and reproductive rights, gave us the phrase “legitimate rape.”

He also gave us the pseudo-science lesson that tells us women who are forced into sexual intercourse against their will have something occur within their bodies that causes them to shut down in a way that they cannot become pregnant.

Which, I guess, means that all those women who have become pregnant following a rape weren’t really raped. He probably thinks they are just sluts who brought “it” on themselves and got what they deserved.

Which is incredibly ignorant not only to say, but to even think.

THEN AGAIN, THE people to whom Akin was trying to appeal to are ones who aren’t all that concerned with the women involved in these instances. They try to cadge their language with talk of “defending life” and protecting the life of the unborn.

But they really don’t want the “real” life (that of the mother, rather than the unborn) to have a choice about themselves.

That is what Akin was really getting at, and I think I’d have a little more respect for him if he would have just come out and said it that bluntly.

Then again, I also think I’d have more respect for him if he’d have come up with some pseudo-religious explanation along the lines of saying that Jesus comes down and blesses the women who were raped to protect them.

WHICH WOULD STILL imply that some women are sluts who brought it on themselves.

He has since (with the very same news cycle on Sunday) issued a pseudo-apology, claiming his remarks were “ill-conceived.” Although he hasn’t really clarified what he really believes, which gives the real majority of our society the impression that the only thing Akin is “sorry” about is that he’s being given grief and called on his nonsense-talk.

But it has me wondering how delusional Akin was in school on the day in biology class when he was ever taught something that he interpreted to mean that a woman’s body could shut down in ways to prevent a pregnancy from occurring.

If that were true, don’t you think many women would be taking advantage of that, rather than relying on unreliable birth control pills or other devices?

AKIN IS GETTING his national derision. Political pundits are now wondering if the Democratic Party candidate (a woman) actually has a chance to defeat him come Election Day.

President Barack Obama himself is adding on to the piling on against Akin, using it as a serious example of the harm that can come from putting these ideologues in positions of authority where they can influence public health policy.

OBAMA: Joining in the criticism



Even though I’m sure the ideologues who backed Akin before will claim that Obama is being a “bully” for defending the women they would prefer to deride. Which is nonsense on so many levels. It’s laughable!

Even Republican presidential challenger Mitt Romney is going out of his way to put as much distance between himself and Akin. “Guilt by association” through the same political party. Romney has enough problems. He doesn’t need Akin adding to them.

ALTHOUGH ROMNEY HAS his own concern. He can’t put too much distance between himself and Akin, because like I wrote earlier, there are those people in our society who are going to want to believe the Congressman.

And if Romney tries to condemn Akin too much, they may turn on Romney to the degree that he loses the Nov. 6 elections by an even larger margin.

Which makes me wonder -- when the Romney camp accuses Obama of running a campaign of "division and anger and hate," what are they thinking. Nothing that has come from Obama's mouth has been as bitter as what some of these ideologues seem to want to believe about science and biology!

  -30-