Abortion Bill Reopens Sensitive Subject for GOP
This bill won’t pass in the senate, so it’s all knee jerk grandstanding as the zealots in charge of the GOP waste our time and tax dollars once more in an effort to limit women’s & family’s choices.
Even before the full House began discussing the bill to ban abortion after 20 weeks of pregnancy, Republicans had a sharp reminder of how sensitive the issue can be when Rep. Trent Franks (R-Ariz.) appeared to say Wednesday that rape rarely results in pregnancy. “The incidence of rape resulting in pregnancy (is) very low,” Franks said, at a committee hearing on the bill.
Franks later said he meant that third-trimester abortions of pregnancies caused by rape are rare.
But for a party that has been blunt about its negative image with women, the controversy is like seeing a bad movie over again.
“This comes too close for comfort. It’s different, but it’s too close for comfort,” says Ari Fleischer, former Bush administration spokesman who co-wrote the GOP’s post-election report on its need for better communication with minorities and women. “Republicans should have learned a lesson as to how to talk and act more respectfully. Even this comes too close after the two previous problems. Stop anything on this topic that even comes close to being foolish and out of touch.”