Former Congressional Rep Todd Akin, Very Republican-Missouri, famous solely for being the guy who said “if it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down,” has regrets.
He has regrets about saying that ridiculous and insulting thing?
Oh no. No no no. He has regrets about apologizing for saying that ridiculous and insulting thing.
Sean Sullivan at the Washington Post tells us about the regrets.
Akin explains himself in a soon-to-be-released book, “Firing Back: Taking on the Party Bosses and Media Elite to Protect Our Faith and Freedom.”
Let’s pause for a second to admire that string of clichés. Bosses, media elite, faith, freedom; enemy enemy, good good. Imagine what the book must be like.
Politico obtained a copy early and reported on a passage in which Akin suggests that he shouldn’t have apologized in a TV ad.
“By asking the public at large for forgiveness,” Akin writes, “I was validating the willful misinterpretation of what I had said.”
Akin ran for the U.S. Senate in 2012. He stoked widespread controversy that derailed his campaign when he remarked in a local interview: “First of all, from what I understand from doctors, [pregnancy from rape] is really rare.” He added that “if it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down.” He later apologized in a television commercial, saying, “I used the wrong words in the wrong way, and for that I apologize.”
But now, well, he’s realized that he didn’t use the wrong words in the wrong way and that his duty to protect faith and freedom from the party bosses and the media elite requires him to say he was right the first time.
Ok. He really meant to say that raped women don’t get pregnant because the female body has a way to prevent that from happening. Sly, scary, powerful women, eh? Be afraid.
Akin, when you’re best known for saying something mind-numbingly idiotic, it’s not a good idea to claim that you actually believe the idiocy, especially after you admit it was idiocy.
Kind of hard to misinterpret what he said, willfully or otherwise. He said what he said.
And did we miss THIS guy? I did O_O
This guy clarifies that there must be a stipulation that a woman who has been raped has to report her violation to the authorities within 48 hours. Let’s all pile on the victims, shall we? So, according to him, any discussion of pregnancies after the 6-month mark can’t involve rape or incest, as these would have been required to have been reported long before the victim could know that she was pregnant. Nice all around.
That article goes on to demonstrate that studies show between 5% and 6.4% of raped women will become pregnant, resulting in somewhere between 3,200 and 50,000 pregnancies per year.
That’s an awful lot of unwanted babies O_O
Say, does anyone remember the name of that politician, years ago, perhaps in the early 1980s, who said that, for women pregnant because of rape, being forced to carry the pregnancy to term and deliver a baby would actually serve a vital “healing” function for these traumatized women? I remember it clearly, but the Republican party lately has been such a crapfest, all I can find are more recent examples. And there are a LOT of them O_O
Any misrepresentation could only have been an improvement.
TW for stupid rape & anti-abortion ideas
Blanche Quizno
I can’t say I recall, but it sounds awfully familiar. A lot of pro-life groups hold exactly this position, though. (Plus, you know, another act of violence doesn’t cancel out another, or abortion doesn’t un-rape a woman…)
I don’t see why he regrets anything. It’s not as if “I used the wrong words in the wrong way, and for that I apologize” is a real apology.
Blanche Quizno
Yeah, I really can’t think of any reasonable positive interpretation of that.
If I had a spare million dollars, I’d offer it to anybody who could come up with one. (I probably wouldn’t offer the million for that, but still.)
At least he didn’t claim it was out of context.
I couldn’t remember who is Todd Akin, so I went to Wikipedia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Todd_Akin
and had a shock of recognition
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockwell_Day
Is there a pod-factory somewhere producing these … people?
Current Missouri Senator Claire McCaskill is smart. During the Republican primary, she spent money to get Todd Akin as her opponent. She was doing pretty well against him, in this conservative state, before he said that awful thing.
She also spoke sternly to Dr. Oz.
He hasn’t thought there might be a connexion?
chiagu: NNgggyyaaaagh! Imma have nightmares now.
Crip Dyke @#9
Coffee, meet monitor.