Repubs Show Commitment to Jobs Creation by Redefining *Rape* for Abortion Funding Purposes

Jobs, schmobs, American public.  The Republicans have a much more important agenda and now that they’ve (in their minds) repealed health care reform it’s time to move to the next highest priority on their list.  Redefining rape for purposes of federal abortion funding !

And, no, they’re not making it more liberal.  No, INDEEDY!  Citing the high priority of this issue, the Rethugs have introduced the “No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act” with 173 sponsors.  Mainly, duh, Republicans. 

But we already have laws preventing federal funds from being used for abortions, you say.  With exceptions for rape, incest and health of the mother, of course.  Silly reader!  We have laws preventing federal funds from being used for abortions with exceptions for rape, incest and health of the mother but U R DEFINING RAPE AND INCEST RONG!!!

Contrary to what you thought you believed dear readers, rape is not rape unless it’s forcible rape!  And incest is not incest unless u r under 18!  All others need not apply.  Note especially that statutory rape is not really, truly rape (unless, of course, it’s your uncle doing you).  Neither, for that matter is date rape, rape of a drunk or drugged person or, best of all, rape of women with “limited mental capacity”.  He didn’t rough you up and break your nose?  Sorry, sister slut!  Carry that baby to term.

The proposed law has other odious provisions such as not allowing for non-sanctioned abortions-due-to-rape to be paid for from HSA’s!  Or deducted on your tax return!  Yay!  We’re well on our way back to the days of keepin’ em barefoot and pregnant with this here Republican Congress, thanks to, well, you know who y’are.

Posted by marindenver on 01/28/11 at 07:55 PM • Permalink

What the OL crowd (the non-Chicagoans, at least) didn’t understand is the power of the Chicago political machine (city Dems), even with a favorable shift in demographics for that district. Lipinski’s father was a member of the Machine in good standing.  He and the Machine rigged the path for the son to take this office (he had to leave academia, and move from Tennessee, to do so). Archpundit provided some background to this guy in this 2007 post.

Other than maybe putting a bit of a scare into Little Lip (e.g., see this OL post - once you get by the annoying pop-up bleg), all the efforts to support primary challenger Mark Pera were for naught. Here’s an after-action report from on-the-ground participants (Prairie State Blue blog).

As near as I can tell, just as Obama helped Donna Edwards become my new rep in MD-4 (yay!) by bringing out so many younger voters, he may have hurt Mark Pera in IL-3, due to the quirky dynamics of local Chicago politics, including the fact that BHO himself came out of that machine.  The PSB post linked above tries to address that a bit.

It’s gonna take someone from that area to even figure out what is going on in IL-3, let alone working out how to dislodge Little Lip, assuming that is even a practical possibility.

Minor tweak to previous comment - the big party machine there is formally known as the Cook County Democratic Organization (Wikipedia), which includes Chicago and much of the surrounding area.

Like I said, Chicago stuff is not my bailiwick.  But their politics is utterly fascinating, as well as brutal and - to me at least - intricate and often mysterious.

Heh.  The photo of Little Lip accompanying this TPM post is creepy in its own right, but now that you mention it… yup.

By the way, that TPM post says that Lipinski’s office ain’t answering calls, or returning messages, about his support for this legislative abomination.  I’d like to think he’s worried about getting push-back within his own district, but only he and his Cook County Machine pals know for sure.

Okay, it’s too early to tell if he will actually “walk it back” in any significant way, but Cook County machine DINO Lipinski clearly realizes he’s kicked a hornets’ nest, and has come out of hiding. We’ll need to study/amend this proposed bill through the legislative process, yadda-yadda…

While assembling the previous comment, should have remembered to add B-J front-pager Kay’s fascinating observation about how legislative language concerning (restriction of) women’s health rights has devolved.  Kay’s question (bolding is mine):

When did we go from being women to being pregnant females?

                      ...

Is it meant to include the people formerly known as “girls” or is it some brand new poll-tested language intended to divide? The last time I recall using the phrase “pregnant female” I was talking about a hamster.

This actually isn’t entirely correct. Obama has had an uneasy relationship with the local Dem bigwigs for a lot of his career—at least prior to his presidential run. That’s typical for the Hyde Park progressive set. This article lays it out fairly well.

In support of your first comment upthread, regarding the conservative blue-collar nature of some of the old Chicago communities, there is the following from commenter Windyctyprog (over at TPM), a self-described Chicago native raised in Lipinski’s district:

...He is very naive, divisive, dangerous and completely void of compassion or empathy, his worldview completely colored by his religious zealotry. He is anything but impartial in his approach to legislation. I don’t give a damn what his credentials are - my family is from his District, and I have watched him since his old man was in office years ago.

He is a reflection of his District, unfortunately - he is not a very sophisticated thinker, regardless of his education. As we are fond of saying, you can never take the Southside out the person.

All of his education is trumped by his zealotry, his fundamental Catholicism…He’s a fundie, with a fundie approach to everything.

He needs to go, indeed, but his District is comprised of generally conservative (3rd. and 4th. generation) Irish (largest concentration outside of NYC and Philly), Poles and Italians that still cling to their religion, still live generally in their own ethnic enclaves, and have completely forgotten how their ancestors struggled when they got to this country. They are also not very Black or Hispanic friendly, no concentrations of either in his District. His District is a closed society, still ethnically divided and very Catholic Church-influenced. They remain somewhat pro-union there, a lot of small successful trade owners, but institutional bigotry exists - it’s in their DNA.

A moderate Repug could slide in there easily.

He’s just a complete tool - his Father co-opted the democratic voting process and slid this moron in.

Even if he is right (penultimate paragraph) about decent chances for a moderate GOPer in IL-3, such a creature would be forced to tow the line once s/he went to Washington.

Chances for improvement in IL-3 don’t look very encouraging.

I’ve been meaning to pick this book up—it’s by a guy who writes a lot for the Chicago Reader.

And the Reader Obama archives are also an interesting place to browse through, beginning with his run for the state senate.

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