Wednesday, January 25, 2012

Santorum to Rape Victims: "Make the Best of the Situation"

While as noted in the previous post I'm not thrilled and enthusiastic about Obama, the GOP presidential clown car continues to provide an endless supply of reasons why NOT to vote Republican (over and above the party's decidedly anti-gay agenda). Leading the lunacy is Rick "Frothy Mix" Santorum who has unbelievably said that rape victims should be denied abortions and "make the best of a bad situation." I am not pro-abortion, but heaven forbid that if one of my daughters or some other female family member I loved was raped that Frothy Mix would seek to force her to give birth to the rapist's child. Think Progress looks at Santorum's latest batshitery:

Standing steadfast as the most socially right-wing candidate in the GOP presidential field, Rick Santorum has repeatedly touted his extreme anti-choice position, which dictates that abortion should be uniformly illegal, even in cases of rape or incest. He even suggested that physicians who provide abortions to such victims should be criminally charged.

Last Friday, CNN’s Piers Morgan asked Santorum to clarify his reasoning behind such a callous position. Insisting that “it’s not a matter of religious values,” Santorum explained that sexual assault victims should “accept this horribly created” pregnancy because it is “nevertheless a gift in a very broken way” and that, when it comes down to it, a victim just has “to make the best out of a bad situation“:

SANTORUM: Well, you can make the argument that if she doesn’t have this baby, if she kills her child, that that, too, could ruin her life. And this is not an easy choice. I understand that. As horrible as the way that that son or daughter and son was created, it still is her child. And whether she has that child or doesn’t, it will always be her child. And she will always know that. And so to embrace her and to love her and to support her and get her through this very difficult time, I’ve always, you know, I believe and I think the right approach is to accept this horribly created — in the sense of rape — but nevertheless a gift in a very broken way, the gift of human life, and accept what God has given to you. As you know, we have to, in lots of different aspects of our life. We have horrible things happen. I can’t think of anything more horrible. But, nevertheless, we have to make the best out of a bad situation.

The problem with Santorum’s sense of humanity is that it doesn’t seem to extend to the victim. . . . What’s more, Santorum’s argument forces a woman in these circumstances to share his religious beliefs and “accept what God has given to [her.]” A woman may very well share his belief and decide to carry the pregnancy to the term, but the fundamental point is that that should be her choice — not the government’s, and certainly not Santorum’s.

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