February 15, 2012

Norquist Wants a Rubber-Stamp President

February 15, 2012 Buck Banks

We just need a president to sign this stuff. We don’t need someone to think it up or design it. The leadership now for the modern conservative movement for the next 20 years will be coming out of the House and the Senate.

— Grover Norquist, quoted by David Frum, making the case that Mitt Romney would be an acceptable Republican nominee.

Santorum Confuses Sex with Contraception

February 15, 2012 Buck Banks

It’s not okay because it’s a license to do things in the sexual realm that is counter to how things are supposed to be.

— Rick Santorum, quoted by Time, on why he wants to fight the “dangers of contraception.”

Santorum Says Obama Admin Wants Female Catholic Priests

February 15, 2012 Buck Banks

Don’t you see how they see you? How they look down their nose at the average Americans. These elite snobs!

— Rick Santorum, quoted by the Idaho Statesman, arguing that the Obama administration thinks it can force the Catholic Church to hire women priests.

Based on Negative Ads, Romney Wins

February 15, 2012 Buck Banks

If this race does come down to who can run the most negative ads… and beat them into submission with those negative ads, we can stop the campaign now. It’s Mitt Romney.

— John Brabender, media strategist for Rick Santorum, quoted by The Hill.

Big Government Republicans in Virginia Vote to Outlaw Contraceptives, Require Vaginal Probes for Abortion-Seekers

February 15, 2012February 15, 2012 Jon Ponder

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A new personhood law has passed in the Republican-controlled lower house of the Virginia legislature and is expected to sail through the Republican-controlled state Senate. Virginia’s right-wing extremist governor, Bob McDonnell, has signaled he will sign it.

Human egg at the moment of fertilization

Like similar proposals that were defeated in Mississippi last year by 16 points and in Colorado by 46 points in 2008 and by 42 points in 2010, the Virginia bill defines personhood as beginning at the moment of conception, and so would redefine both abortion and contraception as murder.

In addition, Virginia Republicans in both houses of the legislature passed a law earlier this month that requires women seeking abortions to submit to a trans-vaginal ultrasound probe before the procedure. Neither the woman nor her doctor can countermand the administration of the probe, which requires vaginal penetration and which serves no medical purpose.

Unlike the referenda that failed in Mississippi and Colorado, the bills in Virginia are going through the legislative process and, assuming the personhood law passes the state senate, both will become law upon signing by Gov. McDonnell.

McDonnell is said to be on the short list of prospective candidates for the GOP vice presidential slot, if Mitt Romney becomes the party’s nominee.

[…]

Day: February 15, 2012

Norquist Wants a Rubber-Stamp President

We just need a president to sign this stuff. We don’t need someone to think it up or design it. The leadership now for the modern conservative movement for the next 20 years will be coming out of the House and the Senate.

— Grover Norquist, quoted by David Frum, making the case that Mitt Romney would be an acceptable Republican nominee.

Santorum Confuses Sex with Contraception

It’s not okay because it’s a license to do things in the sexual realm that is counter to how things are supposed to be.

— Rick Santorum, quoted by Time, on why he wants to fight the “dangers of contraception.”

Santorum Says Obama Admin Wants Female Catholic Priests

Don’t you see how they see you? How they look down their nose at the average Americans. These elite snobs!

— Rick Santorum, quoted by the Idaho Statesman, arguing that the Obama administration thinks it can force the Catholic Church to hire women priests.

Based on Negative Ads, Romney Wins

If this race does come down to who can run the most negative ads… and beat them into submission with those negative ads, we can stop the campaign now. It’s Mitt Romney.

— John Brabender, media strategist for Rick Santorum, quoted by The Hill.

Big Government Republicans in Virginia Vote to Outlaw Contraceptives, Require Vaginal Probes for Abortion-Seekers

Poetic Justice

Verbatim

“One woman at a rally in New Jersey told me last week that she was ‘nauseously optimistic.’ That may capture a lot of people’s last-minute jitters.”

— Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD), quoted by Axios, on what Democrats feel ahead of the midterm elections.

“I think Congress made a mistake not protesting turning the Rose Garden into what looks like the entrance to Liberace’s bathroom.”

— Former President Bill Clinton, quoted by The Wrap.

“Boy, they are scraping the bottom of the barrel. It feels like a real desperation play to me, because it has got zero basis in the law.”

— Republican election law expert Ben Ginsberg, quoted by Politico, on the Trump administration’s effort to invalidate Alaska’s election results.

Numerati

3,824

$1.4 billion

-35 points

31%

63% to 38%

KFF Poll: “With the 2026 midterm campaigns in full swing and early voting about to begin, there is a wide enthusiasm gap between partisan voters, with Democratic voters 25 percentage points more likely than Republican voters to say they are ‘more motivated’ than usual to vote (63% vs. 38%).”