House Republicans on Tuesday make their most concerted effort of the year to change federal abortion law with legislation that would ban almost all abortions after a fetus reaches the age of 20 weeks.
The "Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act," expected to pass by a comfortable margin late Tuesday, would be a direct challenge to the 1973 Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision that legalized abortions up to the time a fetus becomes viable. Fetal viability is generally considered to be at least 24 weeks into the pregnancy.
By the by, only after an uproar spurred by remarks from Rethug Rep. Trent "Beans N." Franks (Misogynist-AZ) did House Rethugs modify this DOA bill to exempt cases of rape and incest (!). Mighty white (male) of them! (Though, we must add that there's at least one Stupid Party female trying to get in on the week's festivities.)
But that's not all! In order to make his case for the bill, we have Rethuglican/ Stupid Party Rep. Michael Burgess (Wanker-TX) offering his insights on fetal pain, thusly:
They stroke their face. If they’re a male baby, they may have their hand between their legs. If they feel pleasure, why is it so hard to believe that they could feel pain?[Errrg! Had to take a shower after reading that! Back to the blog.]
Perhaps Rep. Burgess was engaging in a little projection there, but the introduction of such a godawful thought (into a process that can best be described as legislative wanking) shows just out of touch and out of the mainstream this collection of loons in the Rethuglican caucus really is, and that they still haven't a clue what the priorities are for women, much less the nation, in two damn thousand thirteen.
Also: how's that Rethuglican rebranding coming along?
