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The GOP-led House advanced their anti-women abortion bill Tuesday, by a vote of 232-193 in favor of the “Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act”.

The fact that the measure was initially approved by a committee made up of 23 Republican men and no women wasn’t helping the GOP escape their “war on women” branding. But after Representative Trent Franks (R-AZ) made a fool of himself explaining that it was okay that Republicans were banning abortion after 20 weeks for rape and incest victims because the odds of rape from pregnancy are “low”, the Republicans decided they’d better put a woman’s face on the matter. This theory relies on their notion that American women are so stupid that they’ll buy anything if it’s packaged properly (see Sarah Palin).

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So, Republicans shoved Representative Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) out in front to be the face of the debate on Tuesday, because who better to sell a bill limiting freedom than the woman who believes that women don’t want equal pay laws. Also, Marsha used to be an “image consultant” apparently, something that no doubt came in handy for her while she faced 33 scolding letters from the FEC.

Poor Franks with Akin on his face had to sit it out. No more limiting freedom glory for Franks.

Rep. Louise Slaughter (D-NY) was outraged that House Republicans got Blackburn to be the new face of their anti-freedom bill, especially since, of course, Ms. Blackburn is not on the all male committee behind the bill. Apparently Marsha can only be trusted to sell the bill, not actually have any input into it.

Slaughter scoffed, “If that’s not a first, I don’t know what is, and if that is not PR I don’t know what is. Such a cowardly move is an insult to the intelligence of women across America.”

If only Ms. Slaughter had heard Speaker Boehner trying to sell his party’s obsession with limiting freedom for women…

When asked why his party was so focused on abortion instead of economy (jobs?), Speaker Boehner pivoted desperately but tripped on his epistemic closure, “After this Kermit Gosnell trial and some of the horrific acts that were going on, the vast majority of the American people believe in the substance of this bill and so do I.”

Actually, unless you watch Fox News or are subjected to people who do, you probably don’t know much about Gosnell. And yet pretty much everyone knows someone who is underemployed or unemployed. Go figure.

The “substance” behind the Republican bill is based on dubious science (aka, the non-science “believed” by conservative voters) that fetuses feel pain at 20 weeks and thus women should be forced to feel pain all of the time.

Perhaps if someone were to explain to Republicans that those fetuses they proclaim to love so much often grow up to be women, they might suddenly care about the pain they force on women. But as Raw Story pointed out today:

Meanwhile, Sen. Bob Casey’s (D-PA) and Rep. Jerrold Nadler’s (D-NY Pregnant Workers Fairness Act (PWFA), which requires employers to offer “reasonable accommodations” to pregnant women, was referred to committee on May 14 and has yet to garner even a hearing, let alone a vote.

That’s a no on caring about fetuses in the event that they are females and a no to caring about pregnant women, who are also known as female fetuses that were born and grew up into adult women.

Two Republicans voted against the Republican efforts to limit individual freedom for women, and five Democrats voted for it. The House is doing their big show vote tonight, because they don’t mind actually working for a few hours in order to stop women from running free in the country.

Not to worry, the Senate will kill this and if they don’t, the President has vowed to veto it. But Republicans don’t care about making this bill law. This was just a political game to appease their base — just another way of running for reelection in 2014 on the taxpayer dime.

We now resume our regularly scheduled programing of Republican scandal mongering on the taxpayer dime, also known as setting up a fictional bad guy to run against in 2014, since the Republicans can’t run on their actual record. But with this brief interruption, they’ve managed to reinforce their image as clueless white men so afraid of women’s power that they’re trying to force women back into the dark ages. Winning.



Image: Nashville Scene