I don’t know if the “War on Women” Republicans are accused of waging is an overstatement or not, but I do know they are doing things that suggest they have an irrational hostility toward women. It all centers around anti-abortion laws being enacted in Republican controlled state legislatures and a bill the Republican controlled House of Representatives is expected to pass today. The essence of all of these laws passed and/or proposed is to eliminate a woman’s right to choose.
I believe abortion is a serious issue that deserves thoughtful discussion, debate, and action by responsible political leaders. Like it or not, Roe v. Wade is the law of the land, but the application of that decision has yet to be settled law. Is it a matter of unlimited freedom of choice or does government have a right and responsibility to place reasonable limits on that choice? People of good will and sound thinking can and do hold opposing views on how those questions should be answered and then made into public policy.
The problem for the Republicans is that people of good will and sound thinking are not leading their fight against abortion rights. Instead they have people like Todd Akin (former Representative from Missouri) and now Trent Franks (R-AZ) leading the charge. But the Republican problem runs deeper than ridiculous comments by the likes of these men. It is, instead, rooted in the disrespect and disdain Republican legislation shows for women. This is the real story about what is happening.
Take one quite unambiguous example. Several legislatures have passed laws that require a woman seeking an abortion to undergo a useless, needless vaginal ultra-sound examination. These laws are wrong on so many levels, but at bottom all of them reflect a complete lack of trust in the ability of women to make this decision for themselves. Forcing anyone to undergo a medical procedure they do not want to have is not only absurd, it runs against the grain of the number one mantra conservatives make all the time, that they don’t want the government telling them how to live their lives. Talk about hypocrisy.
In my most cynical moment I could say that the backlash from women voters Republicans will continue to experience because of these ill conceived and ill-fated laws couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch. But more is at stake here than the crash and burn actions of Republicans across the country. More important is the institutionalizing of an attitude toward women that insists they need men to protect them from themselves, that they cannot be trusted to manage their own lives or make good decisions for their own lives, that when women disagree with men about personal decisions the will of men must prevail.
I don’t know if you have looked at what is going on in and around the world today, especially in our own country, but from my perspective it borders on lunacy to suggest the men who are running things are doing a good job. Quite the opposite, really. The state of the world is an unequivocal argument for having more women in seats of power. Sadly that requires the men who are already sitting there to recognize they need help and to admit that women are intelligent, capable, and without the need to be taken care of by men.
If anyone needs taken care of, needs to have someone make decisions for them because they cannot make good ones for themselves, it is Republican male politicians. Indeed, I think they need the women of America to save them from themselves. Otherwise they will discover when it is too late that having the foolish day in the sun they are having because they hold the power to do stupid things was destined from the beginning to end badly for them. I cannot imagine there will be many women voters around to help pick up the pieces.
