I am of course directing my blog
this week at the Missouri Representative for Senate Todd Aiken. If you don’t
know who this guy is, he is the Republican who this week raised two highly
contentious issues that one can only guess Mitt Romney didn’t want to have bought
up with only a few months to go before the November 6 2012 elections. On top of
this he also did this whilst setting his statements against the most ludicrous
and ill-founded science known to man.
Sometimes, I find it hard to
believe that so many in the land of the free are opposed to abortion. To me a
women’s right to choose is a fundamental freedom, and so I often find myself
bemused by the controversy that this causes in the States.
This blog however is not about
the prolife argument. I am not a politician, nor do I wish to be one. I am also
not an American. This blog is about the absurdity of Todd Aiken, and his
comments, and about how he can possibly be taken seriously as a Representative
for Senate following on from what he’s said.
I like to think that the PM and
MPs in this country are relatively intelligent, after all they have important
decisions to make – you know, like what to spend their expenses on! Similarly I
like to think that Congressmen and Senators in the US are intelligent, again
they have important roles to fill – I’ve watched the West Wing, and also that
debt ceiling isn’t getting any lower.
So you’d think, that when voting in
a Representative for Senate or Congress the State doing the voting will want to
choose a candidate that they feel will surely not only represent them well but
who can also do the job. I’m not persuaded that I’d vote for a man who clearly
has no idea how basic biology works, in fact I might want to see a transcript
from his high school days. Did he even go to high school, and if so did take
biology?
Todd Aiken said – with a
certainty that despite his back pedalling has made it hard to retract from; that
a woman’s body would shut down and prevent a pregnancy from happening in the
case of a legitimate rape. Now aside
from all the certified doctors, pharmacists, health practitioners, nurses,
biology teachers, and anyone with common sense in every country around the
world suddenly and collectively saying “huh!” You also heard the same thing
from voodoo doctors, witch doctors, and the whole cast of the TV series Doctors!
I honestly didn’t still think
that it was possible that people still thought this kind of thing, much less
said it out loud. Yet for some of prominence to say it, for someone seeking a position
of responsibility and leadership to say it, well I was astounded and incensed. Not
only was what he said biological balderdash, but I can only assume that it was
also unimaginably hurtful to any woman that has found herself pregnant as a
result of the horrific ordeal of rape
Let’s not forget though, Todd
Aiken made another faux par. He also used the word legitimate when determining when a women’s body would shut down or
not during the course of a rape.
I’m just thinking about our
judicial system now, and I can’t help thinking that the courts have been a bit
slow over the years. In fact what have they been doing? Why have they been
trying to struggle with evidence, and all the difficulties of he said she said.
Judges and Lawyers have obviously never realised that Mother Nature, has already
resolved this highly contentious issue for them. Who needs CSI? All you need to
know according to Aiken is; is the rape victim pregnant?
I shouldn’t be flippant about
this in all seriousness though, because what Todd Aiken has said is detrimental
to all the work that prosecutors, counsellors working with victims of rape, and
anyone who works with victims of rape going to court, do on an everyday basis
to put the people who commit this atrocity behind bars. Yet I have read that
apparently that Representative Aiken is in meltdown. I wonder if that’s the
body’s natural response for when the mouth has made a legitimately stupid
comment.
The title of my blog was; surely,
some people are just too stupid to run for government? I don’t know the man,
and I honestly wouldn’t wish to, but there is a chance that he isn’t stupid at
all. It’s possible that he is instead simply ignorant, but regardless. Stupid
or ignorant, I feel it matters none. To my mind, neither of these seem like the
qualities that you’d want to vote for if you were selecting a representative
for Senate for your State.
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