It's only ok to have an abortion if you have a mistress.

[doggie]

well well it is gutter politics to call him out on it even though it is against his beliefs. poor guy so abused Abortion is always ok if it will keep you out of trouble.

WASHINGTON -- A pro-life, family-values congressman who worked as a doctor before winning election as a Tea Party-backed Republican had an affair with a patient and later pressured her to get an abortion, according to a phone call transcript obtained by The Huffington Post.

The congressman, Rep. Scott DesJarlais of Tennessee, was trying to save his marriage at the time, according to his remarks on the call, made in September of 2000. And, according to three independent sources familiar with the call and the recording, he made the tape himself.

DesJarlais, who was provided a copy of the transcript by HuffPost, did not deny its contents, but in a statement released through his campaign characterized it as just another sordid detail dredged up by the opposition. "Desperate personal attacks do not solve our nation's problems, yet it appears my opponents are choosing to once again engage in the same gutter politics that CBS news called the dirtiest in the nation just 2 years ago."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/1 ... 53136.html

[Minerva]

He'll be all "I've changed my mind and accepted Jesus since then so it's okay!!!!1!" But seriously, the Tea Party sure knows how to pick sketchy candidates. According to Wikipedia, this creep is still practising medicine, too.

[shesinsane]

Let me get this straight, pointing out a politicians absolute hypocrisy is now "gutter politics"? I'm sorry, but if your platform is Desserts Are Evil and you get caught forcing your mistress to eat cake, the people deserve to know.

[doggie]

the family values part is what I love because we can see him showing us what it is all about, I love how all these conservatives show us family values.

[Mela99]

UGH.

Hypocrisy is painful.

[SayNoToMullets]

It's not irrelevant to the nation's problems when the people in government say one thing and do another. It does raise the question of what else he might be lying about.

[Minerva]

It's not irrelevant to the nation's problems when the people in government say one thing and do another. It does raise the question of what else he might be lying about.

Especially when guys like Frothy are running on a platform of "look at my family, it's any social conservative's wet dream!"

[PennySycamore]

Now, now his behavior is IOKIYAR. (It's OK if you're a Republican.)

All abortions are wrong, according to this crowd, except the one YOU or you girlfriend (daughter, wife) need. Then it's A-OK.

[pixydust]

Now, now his behavior is IOKIYAR. (It's OK if you're a Republican.)

All abortions are wrong, according to this crowd, except the one YOU or you girlfriend (daughter, wife) need. Then it's A-OK.

MY abortion is the only righteous abortion! The rest of you are whorish baby killers!

[emmiedahl]

Pressuring a girl to get an abortion is not *pro-choice*. To me, this is just more evidence that fighting abortion is about taking away a woman's autonomy. This douchebag is actually a very consistent douchebag; he thinks he calls the shots with other people's bodies.

[BravaAmica]

Now, now his behavior is IOKIYAR. (It's OK if you're a Republican.)

All abortions are wrong, according to this crowd, except the one YOU or you girlfriend (daughter, wife) need. Then it's A-OK.

I wish reporters would ask this representative such questions. I think the press plays too nicely with idiots like this guy. Put him on the spot.

[Cannelle]

Aaaaaaaaaaaaand of course it's Tennessee. This place is such a mess.

One of the creators of the county branch of the Tea Party was caught soliciting prostitution from an undercover officer last year, along with two other dudes from Nashville. Fun guys. (And our local guy is, of course, married and has kids.)

[Anise]

Pressuring a girl to get an abortion is not *pro-choice*. To me, this is just more evidence that fighting abortion is about taking away a woman's autonomy. This douchebag is actually a very consistent douchebag; he thinks he calls the shots with other people's bodies.

Good point.

It is much much more than hypocracy. :shock:

[Kaylee]

MY abortion is the only righteous abortion! The rest of you are whorish baby killers!

This is so common. :( I can think of 4 people off hand I've known personally who were vocally anti-abortion but who had them when they needed one.

For those who haven't seen it yet - "The Only Moral Abortion is My Abortion" http://mypage.direct.ca/w/writer/anti-tales.html

I'd never really thought about it, but emmiedahl made a good point about it being not so much about opposing abortion as about taking the choice away from the woman. The women I mentioned above were all under pressure from either the father, their family, or the attitudes of their church and community to abort so nobody knew about the pregnancy (and, I suspect, in some cases so it wouldn't come out that she'd been having sex with the man who got her pregnant).

[Deleted03]

This is so common. :( I can think of 4 people off hand I've known personally who were vocally anti-abortion but who had them when they needed one.

For those who haven't seen it yet - "The Only Moral Abortion is My Abortion" http://mypage.direct.ca/w/writer/anti-tales.html

I'd never really thought about it, but emmiedahl made a good point about it being not so much about opposing abortion as about taking the choice away from the woman. The women I mentioned above were all under pressure from either the father, their family, or the attitudes of their church and community to abort so nobody knew about the pregnancy (and, I suspect, in some cases so it wouldn't come out that she'd been having sex with the man who got her pregnant).

+1

Had a friend using her temperature as birth control, got pregnant twice and aborted both times was bitching to me about those women she saw in the clinic that were using abortion as birth control. O_o

[Guest Anonymous]

If men could get pregnant, I doubt abortion would ever have been an issue in the first place. But I do find this funny, even though it isn't. Just goes to show, right?

[Gil]

So to recap:

Threat to the institution of family: two committed people of the same sex marrying and raising children together.

Threat to the institution of family: a woman making her own reproductive choices.

Family values-approved: Impregnating the woman with whom you're cheating on your wife and then making her get an abortion.

[Guest Anonymous]

Wait wait wait. Maybe I'm still needing more coffee, but is he saying a woman who wants an abortion needs to get a man to claim he was cheating with her?

[YPestis]

It's the same attitude that people like "Joe the Plumber" that welfare is bad except when his family needed it because they "really" needed it (vs everyone else who were just lazy bums).

I believe pro-lifers come in all stripes. Some are pro-life because they honestly believe that all life starts at conception therefore abortion ends a life. Others are pro-lifers because they see it as letting "promiscuous" women "get away" with it, or providing women with too much autonomy. It's as if a women should bear children either as public punishment for premartial sex or as 'reward' for being a good wife. Pregnancy is not a choice, it's something determined by men or as a punishment.

I feel the former type of pro-lifer is more amenable to birth control access, to helping single parents and adoptions. The later type of pro-lifers are the ones who want to make abortions illegal, birth control illegal and they want to make each step of single motherhood difficult. It's those type of people I'm not surprised at when they want their mistresses to have abortions, or their daughters to have abortions. To them, abortion is not about life, it's about control and convenience for the men.

[Librul]

Yep. I can have one but you can't.

One of my HS friends had an abortion in her Jr. year. She has concealed that from her family and presents herself as the most self righteous of the teaparty, prolife, anti-choice, Frothy-ites that ever lived. Her pietistic, holier than thou FB posts "How ANY woman could kill, murder her precious little fetus is beyond comprehension" always makes me do a double-take. Her stance is...bewildering. She had an abortion because she was completely unprepared to deal with it, but she will vote to deny any other woman that right. Frothy's wife...same type of scenario. She had an abortion. Not evil for her, she NEEDED it. Evil for you. You don't.

[E Street Fan]

But the new transcript and other revelations from court documents paint a more damning picture of a man who was a serial philanderer willing to push one of his lovers -- whom he met as a patient with a foot problem -- to terminate a pregnancy, even when he suspected he was the father.

Isn't having a sexual relationship with a patient a violation of medical ethics? (Please correct me if I'm wrong.) If so, how did he not lose his license?

[bananacat]

This isn't surprising at all. The man wants control over women, just like every other person who wants to outlaw abortion. He wants to have a wife who is dependent on him and he wants control over her uterus so she'll have exactly as many kids as he wants from her. And he wants to have a mistress that he can control and force to have an abortion so he doesn't get publicly shamed for the affair. Everything from slut-shaming to paying women less ties into the Patriarchy's attempt to make men owners of women. They don't care about abortions; they care about women having control over their own bodies. But if he can create a society where his mistress will be a social pariah, then he can do whatever he wants and coerce her into abortion for his own benefit.

Anyone who thinks these people only care about the fetuses is hopelessly naive.

[Guest Anonymous]

Isn't having a sexual relationship with a patient a violation of medical ethics? (Please correct me if I'm wrong.) If so, how did he not lose his license?

Big violation. Patient has to turn doctor in.

[PennySycamore]

If men could get pregnant, I doubt abortion would ever have been an issue in the first place. But I do find this funny, even though it isn't. Just goes to show, right?

This reminds me of a quote of Flo Kennedy's that I love:

If men could get pregnant, abortion would be a sacrament.

For those of you who don't know, Flo was an feminist African-American woman lawyer. I was privileged to hear her speak at UGA in the fall of '74 and then attend a meeting of the Athens chapter of NOW with her afterwards. She was a real firebrand and I miss her terribly.

FWIW, the widow of a Baptist preacher here in Greenville used to have a bumpersticker with that quote on her car.

[kb2]

Big violation. Patient has to turn doctor in.

Anyone could turn the doctor in, but the situation probably wasn't broadcasted until now.

ETA: Also, I've heard a lot of pro-life arguments that claim most/all (depending on the amount of hyperbole being used) abortions are coerced, and this just makes me think that argument is a big pile of projection.