Double Down?

Last week, it was thrust back into the spotlight. A state and a hospital were refusing to grant a woman her last wish. A former Governor declared that women must do better at "controlling their libidos". And a number of G-O-TEA pundits (including a couple former Members of Congress) have resorted to blaming women for everything from extramarital affairs to "bad parenting" (for daring to work outside the home).



Oh, yes. That's right. The G-O-TEA War on Women rages on, and it shows no signs of letting up any time soon.

Not only have they been sinking to new lows to attack progressives who dare to challenge their assertion that "family values" require devaluing women, but they're even resorting to attacking their own. Why? Even when they claim the War on Women is over, they keep fighting. Why is that? Why are they so determined to insult American women again and again and again and again?



Is this what we're to expect from the Republican Party going forward? Is this the inevitable conclusion of their "rebranding campaign"?

But on the self-pitying right, you can never lose by blaming the media for coddling awful Democrats. [Senator Rand] Paul’s [R-Kentucky] brilliant declaration about women winning the war on women was likewise fact-challenged and paranoid. “I don’t see so much that women are downtrodden. I see women rising up and doing great things,” he told David Gregory. “In fact, I worry about our young men sometimes because I think the women are out-competing the men in our world.”

Never mind that women still make less than men and are more likely to live in poverty. Even more cruelly, the man who opposes legal abortion and the contraception-coverage mandate also suggested last Thursday that women who have “too many” children should lose welfare support. “Maybe we have to say, ‘Enough’s enough, you shouldn’t be having kids after a certain amount,’” Paul said Thursday. He backed off a bit on CNN Sunday morning, telling Candy Crowley: “I mused about how you’d have a government policy, but I actually came down saying it would be very difficult to have a government policy,” Paul said.

Only last week reasonably smart people declared that Paul was the beneficiary of Chris Christie’s implosion. The Atlantic’s Peter Beinart called him the new “front-runner,” and Andrew Sullivan endorsed Beinart’s piece, tweeting, “Those who dismiss Rand Paul’s chances are missing something, I think — a revival of true small-gov’t conservatism.”

Believe it or not, Rand Paul now stands a real chance at becoming Republicans' 2016 Presidential Nominee. It remains to be seen whether his recent War on Women remarks will make more Republicans uncomfortable with his likely candidcacy... Or if this will only strengthen his appeal with the 21st Century Know Nothings who comprise the base of today's Republican Party.

And it remains to be seen how much longer these G-O-TEA politicians will continue their War on Women. Will they ever realize the folly of antagonizing over 50% of the nation? Or will they try doubling down (yet again) all the way to Las Vegas in 2016?