Obama supporters organize in North Carolina (Christopher Dilts/Obama for America)

Obama supporters organize in North Carolina (Christopher Dilts/Obama for America)

Republicans in several states are pushing laws that would mandate state-sanctioned rape against women seeking abortions by requiring they have a sonogram probe inserted into their vaginas against their will. Meanwhile, in Wisconsin, Republicans are pushing a bill that blames single women for child abuse. One of the bill’s authors, state Rep. Don Pridemore, argues that women should even stay in abusive relationships. “If they can re-find those reasons and get back to why they got married in the first place it might help,” he said. After Georgetown law student Sandra Fluke testified to Congress about a friend’s need for birth control for non-reproductive medical reasons, Rush Limbaugh spent three days trashing her, calling her a “slut,” “whore” or variation thereof a grand total of 53 times, and even demanded she post videos of her having sex online so he could see “what we are getting for our money.” If women had any question about how Limbaugh and his brethren see them, he left no doubts: “Here’s a woman exercising no self-control. The fact that she wants to have repeated, never-ending, as-often-as-she-wants-it sex — given.” Even though 1 in 5 women has used Planned Parenthood services, Republicans have made the organization a favorite campaign-stump target. Indeed, formerly respected anti-cancer charity Susan G. Komen for the Cure destroyed its brand overnight by cutting off funding for the organization at the behest of its conservative leadership. And if all that weren’t enough, Republicans are now opposed to the usually routine reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act, ostensibly because of efforts to expand its protections to undocumented immigrants and same-sex couples. With Republicans, there are categories of women they hate more than others.

In an election year heavily focused on social issues and the economy, Democrats are trying to energize unmarried females who overwhelmingly vote for their candidates while Republicans work to peel them away.

Though single women are among the most Democratic groups in the electorate, recent political history gives Republicans hope: In the 2010 elections, Republican House candidates grabbed their highest share of women's votes in decades, at 49 percent. Single women also were hit harder than others by the recession Obama inherited. So in both parties, the race is on to woo single women, register them to vote and inspire them to show up at the polls.

It's been a busy few months for Republicans.There's more of course, but we all get the idea. So reading stories like this are good for a chuckle:Ha ha ha ha ha! They are working to doHogwash. Democrats are certainly trying to register these single women, but Republicans are doing everything they can to make sure fewer people vote, and they're certainly not going to spend any energy registering single women, who vote up to 75 percent for Democrats. And Democrats got killed in 2010core constituencies like single women sat out the election.

On the other hand, married women do vote for Republican, and some Republicans think they can attract previously married single women if they work at it. The AP asked the GOP campaigns what they would do for one such "no-longer married" woman, Marissa Hannum, who voted for John McCain in 2008 and George W. Bush in 2004.



Romney's campaign responded to that question by highlighting the former Massachusetts governor's success in big business as well as his plan to rein in government spending, cut bureaucracy and restore economic growth. Hannum's take: "I'm reading about a man who's accomplished a lot," she said. But she noted that his statement did not mention women, health care or birth control. "If you're trying to win me, put something in there that has to do with me."

Still, after listening to both Republicans, she suggested their efforts may end up being moot. "Because of how I feel about some of the social issues, at this point, I would definitely vote Democratic over the Republicans," says Hannum, though she left open the possibility that she could be swayed. The GOP has eight months to try.

She also ruled out Rick Santorum because she doesn't hate gay people. So bottom line?The GOP will have far more promising targets.