Romney vs. hypothetical liberal idiocy at NH debate

January 8, 2012 | Filed under 2012 Presidential Race,Mitt Romney,Republicans | Posted by Michael Laprarie

Recently, I disrupted a “Rick Santorum is coming for YOUR UTERUS!!!” discussion thread by posing a few simple questions : Can anyone name a Republican executive (POTUS or governor) who has actually tried to ban contraception or abortion on demand? Or, can you name a single state legislature that has even seriously considered passing such a ban? How did that work out?

I could have continued in a similar vein by asking for examples of Sarah Palin’s efforts, either through legislation or executive order, to turn Alaska into a theocracy, or Rick Perry’s efforts in Texas, or John Ashcroft’s efforts in Missouri, while he was attorney general and governor. The point is clear – chief executives generally do what they were elected to do, based on what their constituents say they want done. They don’t attempt to force personal beliefs on their constituents. Accusing politicians of doing so (or secretly planning to do so) is dishonesty at its worst.

My colleague Rick has already discussed last night’s Republican candidate debate in New Hampshire, where Newt Gingrich made a salient point about the media focusing on “gay rights” while ignoring the fact that the Catholic Church was forced to close down its adoption services in Massachusetts because it declined to accept gay couples as candidates, or that Obama Administration’s new health care rules have placed a heavy burden on the Catholic Church by forcing providers of certain charitable medical services to also provide birth control. Gingrich said, “there’s a lot more anti-Christian bigotry today than there is concerning the other side. And none of it gets covered by the news media.”

Earlier in the debate, Mitt Romney also schooled George Stephanopoulos about asking stupid rhetorical questions:

In another line of questioning, Stephanopoulos asked Romney if he believes “that states have the right to ban contraception, or is that trumped by a constitutional right to privacy?”
Romney responded by questioning Stephanopoulos’ logic and his choice to raise a hypothetical situation that would never happen.
“You’re asking — given the fact that there’s no state that wants to do so, and I don’t know of any candidate that wants to do so — you’re asking could it constitutionally be done?” Romney asked, with a hint of incredulity.
Stephanopoulos, undeterred, pressed Romney again: “I’m asking you, do you believe that states have that right or not?”
Amid a chorus of “boos” from the audience, Romney again parried the impossible hypothetical.
“George, I don’t know whether a state has a right to ban contraception,” Romney responded. “No state wants to. I mean, the idea of you putting forward things that states might want to do that no state wants to do, and asking me whether they could do it or not, is kind of a silly thing, I think.”
The audience applauded.

It’s fascinating to watch liberals, who claim to live in a “reality based community” resort to some of the most outlandish hypothetical conspiracy theories imaginable to whip their own base into a partisan frenzy and smear those whom they do not like. Forget acceptance of dissenting viewpoints and “tolerance”; this is sheer scorched-earth war propaganda. And it’s incredibly dumb. It doesn’t belong in a Presidential debate.

At least we won’t have to worry about the debates this fall, because the media won’t be asking anything that Barack Obama might not be able to favorably answer.

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Posted by Michael Laprarie on January 8, 2012.
Filed under 2012 Presidential Race, Mitt Romney, Republicans.
Tagged with: abortion • birth control • George Stephanopoulos • Mitt Romney • Rick Santorum.

Both comments and pings are currently closed.

jim_m
There is a reason Orwell was able to conceive of the idea of the Thought Police. The left is not concerned with what people will do in office, it is concerned with controlling what people think and punishing them for having ideas that are contrary to leftist beliefs. Merely asking he question is intended to shame people for having a person belief against abortion or contraception.
The purpose is to silence people from expressing their beliefs. The next step is to make it forbidden to speak of such things in public, for a public official to have such beliefs and ultimately to make having such beliefs illegal.

Brucehenry
The famous words, “There you go again,” come to mind.

jim_m
That’s all you’ve got? I suppose that the comparison of the thought police is just too spot on or you to actually provide a cogent response. The fact is that there are a lot of bigots on the left and that the whole political correctness BS was a child of the left. The left wants to shut down thought.
The entire “tolerance” movement is not about actually showing tolerance of things that you disagree with it is about forcing people to accept leftist beliefs. If the left actually believed a single word of what they are cramming down the country’s throat they would show themselves as more accepting of conservative and Christian ideas. But they aren’t. They want these ideas shut out of society. That was the point of the line of questioning in the debate. Too bad you are too far left to see how bigoted your fellow travelers really are.

Stephen
Your lunacy is funny, especially in that you haven’t a friggin clue as to how stupid you really sound.
Sometimes words can’t be found that really describe your stupidity — you just have to “experience it” and move on…

jim_m
If you dispute what I said about the left and its notions of tolerance then go ahead and try to make a point if doing so is within your limited capacity.
Stephen
Your stupidity speaks for itself. It needs no further illumination.
jim_m
Yep.. I’ll file that under “you have no rational response when confronted with your own bigotry.”
Cecil Bordages
I think you summed up Stephen’s and Bruce’s position very succinctly.
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_W6UJJOM4PP4XLSBG6N4LROVSQE Retired Military
”
Your lunacy is funny, especially in that you haven’t a friggin clue as to how stupid you really sound. ”
Jim, you may have to listen to Stephen on the quoted subject. He is after all an expert on the subject matter.

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_YQR6KPYD5XXKZJ4JZXFFKWZX3Y glenn h
Nobody wants to cram ideas down anybody’s throats. Why are Republicans so hostile with their rhetoric? All that “liberal tolerance” is aiming to do is sweep away extraneous emotion from policy debate. The notion is to clear away the pitfalls of fallacious logic and get to the meat of serious reforms.
I think the track record of Republicans cramming ideas down Americans’ throats is far worse. Conservatives motivated by dogma are inevitably clouded in judgement and action. We are a SECULAR society of reasoned people. We are not a theocratic society of Christian fundamentalists.
The notion that anyone, liberal or not, should tolerate oppressive religious fundamentalism is completely unamerican to any well-reasoned person. Religious dogma of any kind has no place in our policy debates. Leave it at the door. It’s spelled out in the Constitution, my friend. Church and state are kept apart by design. That is one of the most fundamental American values. If you don’t like it, then you really don’t like this country. A true Patriot would understand the value of reasoned secular debate.

Gmacr1
Two words – “Politically Correct” – a phrase that defines speech or though deemed to be offensive – to some.

914
The next step?? Tea Party r’s must wear Stars of David to identify them-selves..
Commander_Chico
And so the exaltation and coronation of Romney begins

914
Its ‘Robme!’ And its gonna be a long hot summer!

http://2012.ak4mc.us/ McGehee
No no no. It’s “Romneycare.” Somebody needs to call Mitt out on not pronouncing the third syllable of his last name.

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_W6UJJOM4PP4XLSBG6N4LROVSQE Retired Military
Sincerely doubt it will be called either. More like McCain. I will hold my nose (really really hard) and vote for him because he isnt Obama. Only this time Obama has an indisputeably poor record on umm just about everything that cant be hidden by the press this time.

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_YQR6KPYD5XXKZJ4JZXFFKWZX3Y glenn h
Let’s talk about Obama’s record.
Domestic Economics: Obama inherited the Great Recession from the failed policies of George Bush. He’s been able to turn deep systemic failures resulting from corporate corruption, government deregulation, excessive risk-taking, and special interest cronyism back around into slow but measurable growth. He has accomplished this despite the interference of a Republican Congress that wants to hold the goodwill of the nation hostage in order to protect tax breaks for a few billionaires. Obama has successfully guided the nation through a minefield of economic pitfalls created by the carelessness of the last Republican administration, and has placed our nation squarely back on the path toward recovery. Utterly commendable performance, and history will vindicate him as the greatest economic President since Ronald Reagan.
Foreign policy: Obama has stood strong against Iran, ended the Iraq War, hunted down and killed Osama bin Laden. Those aren’t administration highlights. Those are just the highlights of 2011. In a single year Obama has achieved three milestones that the Bush administration utterly failed to approach in eight years of trying. Obama has also made Afghanistan measurably more secure, although progress is slower than many of us would have hoped. Obama has fostered better relations with our allies, and restored a tarnished American reputation overseas. History will vindicate him as the greatest foreign policy commander-in-chief since FDR.
Social issues: Obama has tackled the deep systemic healthcare problem that has been saddling our nation for three quarters of a century. No other president since FDR’s New Deal has been able to successfully implement such a sizeable and successful overhaul to make government work better for the people who need it. Republicans claim to want to end deficit spending, and yet are unwilling to look at the numbers that support the reality that “Obamacare” is a significant deficit reducer in the long-run. It is a win-win piece of legislation that protects the health of individuals and families and saves our nation billions of dollars of deficit spending over the long term. History will vindicate “Obamacare” as the greatest piece of legislation in a century.
Let’s talk about the problems we face as we enter 2012.
Unemployment: unquestionably the result of failed Republican policies. This recession would never have happened in a properly regulated economy. Cutting regulations and taxes further will only do further damage to the long-term health of our nation. Markets cannot guide themselves. This is the lesson of this recession. Markets must be guided by responsible governance. That is the only path back to full employment and prosperity, and history will vindicate Obama for taking this approach.
The Euro-zone debt crisis: Again, a situation created by the instability of unregulated financial markets and runaway corporate greed. The financial future of the entire world has been compromised by the failed economic policies of the Bush administration. We face a long uphill battle to restore our previous levels of prosperity. History has spoken, the Republican approach has disastrous effects on all of us. It just simply does not work.

Jwb10001
You are the new king of cut and paste democrat talking points congratulations.

Brucehenry
Given that states DID claim the right to ban contraception until 1965′s Griswold v Connecticut, what is so crazy about the question? Rick Santorum has denounced Griswold v. Connecticut, if I’m not mistaken, on the grounds that there is no explicit mention in the Constitution of a “right to privacy.” However, if that right had not been recognized under Griswold, at least one state — Connecticut — might still ban contraception today.

jim_m
OK. So can we now ask democrats whether or not they have changed their mind on slavery? Since the dems comprised the entire Confederate government is it not a air question to ask them today?
Your point is Bullshit. You take a 45 year old decision and you drag it up as if it were pertinent today. As Newt and Romney pointed out, it is not relevant. No one is discussing this today. The whole topic is brought up as a device to bash conservatives a Christians for their personal beliefs with the point being to shame them for thinking in these ways.

Brucehenry
So I AM mistaken that Santorum has denounced Griswold? Recently? Have I not heard 30 years of conservative snark about “penumbras,” including some from (again, if I’m not mistaken) YOU, Jim?
Par4Course
Unlike slavery, which was abolished almost 150 years ago, Griswold v. Connecticut forms a part of current Supreme Court privacy jurisprudence. It was, for example, cited as controlling precedent regarding privacy rights by Justice Alito in a majority opinion in a case decided last January (National Aeronautics and Space Admin. v. Nelson, 131 S.CT. 746 (2011)).
While the Griswold decision was one of the worst pieces of judicial reasoning and writing imaginable, it established Constitutional protection of personal privacy from government intervention. Griswold was uniformly criticized by conservatives in 1965 and formed the basis for Roe v. Wade a few years later, but overturning Griswold would be a setback for individual rights. Every Republican candidate will advocate the reversal of Roe, but that does not mean they would necessarily agree on the reversal of Griswold.
There is, of course, a difference between saying that contraception is within the right or privacy and that the government cannot regulate abortion. George Stepahanopolis would like to conflate the two issues, suggesting that anyone who says that there is no Constitutional right to an abortion would also necessarily grant the states the right to prohibit contraception.

makindescene
You might as well ask are states ready to keep women and blacks from voting.

LiberalNightmare
I continue to wonder why the republicans allow the media to do this to them?
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_IZ5BM5GNLA54OADSWGSXAMA7SY Jay
Steve King – “Covering birth control could make us a dying civilization”
Rick Santorum – Supports Title 10 and believes birth control does great damage to the country. Has gone on record saying “The state has the right to do that [ban birth control]. It is not a constitutional right. The state has the right to pass whatever statute they have. That’s the thing I have said about the activism of the Supreme Court. They are creating rights that should be left up to the people to decide.”
In other words, since it’s not expressly within the Constitution, the state can decide that you don’t have the right to birth control. California has plans against plan B. Other options include the Planned Parenthood’s crusade against zygotes being murdered or defining when life is created and when abortions can be done.
What this does remind me of is when some states actively banned abortions before Roe v Wade. It wasn’t unheard of that a lot of people went to another state to have abortions or used the coat hanger method.
Sure, he can try, but that doesn’t mean he’ll succeed. But this is the problem with his stance. Just when you think he can’t be any further from the mainstream, he finds ways to show how unelectable he really is.

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_W6UJJOM4PP4XLSBG6N4LROVSQE Retired Military
Jay. Your post was halfway decent until you got to the coathanger commnet.
That mime has been disproved hundreds if not thousands of times.
The vast majority of women who died from illegal abortions did so due to unsterile medical conditions and infections. (today a vast majority of people who die from abortions due so from complications mainly due to infections and doctor incompetence vs anything complications caused by the pregnancy – so much for health of the “mother’.
Your repeating of the coathanger mime totally discredits anything else you said.

jim_m
Indeed, much like how that ghoul was able to keep operating in Philly, the left has made any substantive criticism of the abortion business forbidden. That allows far more dangerous conditions to go on uninvestigated.
The only difference is that the left is willing to overlook medical malpractice committed in furtherance of their agenda. They don’t really care about women’s health. They just want to be able to murder babies.

herddog505
You beat me to it. The left has done everything in its power to put Kermit Gosnell right down the memory hole lest people really understand what he and similar abortionists do to line their pockets. If a few poor women die lingering and horrible deaths… well, you can make omelettes without breaking eggs, can you?

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_IZ5BM5GNLA54OADSWGSXAMA7SY Jay
That was merely anecdotal about such situations that came up before Roe v. Wade was finalized. It’s not meant to support the argument at all. Just some of the issues that come up with abortion before the practice was normalized.
Olsoljer
Not sure what you are saying here, but I know for a fact the coathanger method has been used several times to induce abortion. The sight of a young woman lying on a table in the ER bleeding profusely from the vaginal area, coat hangar still in place, is not easily forgotten

http://www.rustedsky.net JLawson
If you take a look at the demographics of France, Greece and Italy, you definitely see there’s a massive decline in the birth rate. If there isn’t a next generation, civilization will have a hard time continuing.

jim_m
I was thinking that too. But also consider the fact that it is very difficult to sustain a growing economy with a collapsing population. It is impossible to sustain the deficit spending the left believes can continue on into eternity without ever greater numbers of people to pay into the system.
Of course the left wants to roll back the calendar to the middle ages and have everyone pushing a plow behind a team of oxen because that will be “green”. No wonder they love the muslims who want to roll it back to the 7th century.

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_YQR6KPYD5XXKZJ4JZXFFKWZX3Y glenn h
Who do you think liberals are? We don’t want to murder babies or stick anyone behind plows. We want to protect individual liberties for women.
And for the record, liberals did not invent deficit spending. Reagan did. Republicans have embraced deficit spending for a generation, and now you want to leave liberals holding the bag for it. The only balanced budget in the last 30 years came under the administration of a Democrat, not a Republican.

http://www.rustedsky.net JLawson
You really don’t pay much attention to actual history, do you? Or even recent economic history? Looking at the actual deficit record, the deficit was shrinking by about $100 billion a year under Bush, after the mess of 2001-2002. (Getting kicked in the economic nuts like 9/11 did will do a number on your economy.) If things had kept on, we’d have been about even in 2007, and maybe running a modest surplus in 2008.
Of course, extrapolating curves is a fool’s game – it requires the conditions that produced the curve to stay the same. There was one big variable in 2006, Glenn.
Do you recall what it was?
http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/spending_chart_1996_2016USb_12s1li111mcn_G0f_US_Deficit_Chart
By the way, care to guess why there’s been NO budget passed since Obama took office?
Here’s a little hint… if you don’t have a budget, it’s a lot easier to overspend. And just WHY don’t we have a budget at this point?
Yeah, the talking point would be ‘Republican Stubborness’… but recall – both the House and Senate had Democratic majorities. They could have overridden any Republican opposition to their budgets.
Care to guess why they didn’t?
http://twitter.com/hrtgt RDM
Let me ask you a question: Who controlled the house of representatives, which writes the spending bills, under Reagan? What was the name of that political party?
And if you like talking about the “Balanced budget of the Clinton years” I wonder if you could tell me who was speaker of the house then?

herddog505
I understand why Romney ducked the question: Stephie was looking to hang the answer ’round his neck in an attempt to paint him as a religious nut who wants women to die from coathanger abortions.
However, the answer is a simple one: no, the f*cking Supreme Court has decided that the states have NOT got that right, based on a mythical “right to privacy” that the justices – somehow – managed to find in the Constitution on that black day in 1973.

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_IZ5BM5GNLA54OADSWGSXAMA7SY Jay
I understand why Romney ducked the question: Stephie was looking to hang the answer ’round his neck in an attempt to paint him as a religious nut who wants women to die from coathanger abortions.
No, Santorum does just fine hanging his own noose around his neck…
Par4Course
The Supreme Court found the right of privacy in the Constitution in 1965 in Griswold v. Connecticut, which held that a state did not have the right to ban contraceptives used by husband and wife in the privacy of their home. The decision is poorly written and reasoned but the idea that their should be areas of privacy immune to government intervention is one that conservatives/libertarians/non-totalitarians ought to support. On the other hand, in 1973, in Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court took the right to privacy a step farther to hold that a woman has a Constitutional right to abort her unborn fetus/baby and, at least during the first trimester, the government has no right to intervene. Contrary to Roe, the right to an abortion is NOT a necessary corollary to a right of privacy. I agree with Romney’s debate answer: forbidding the states from banning contraceptives is working fine and should not be disturbed. In other words, unlike Santorum, Romney advocates the reversal of Roe but not the reversal of Griswold.

Romney vs. hypothetical liberal idiocy at NH debate

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