Motley Moose – Archive

Since 2008 – Progress Through Politics

Adventures in Googling: “Compassion”

On Sunday, Reince Priebus, Republican Party spokesliar, took to the airwaves to promote the New Republican Party, the one that is nicer to wimmins, not because they care about wimmins but because they realize that they need their votes.

And what better way to get women’s votes than to tell them just how compassionate you are … because women like compassion!!!

But something about his comment made me go to the Googles because I did not understand his use of the word. And look!!

Here, in his own words:

“… we believe that any woman that’s faced with an unplanned pregnancy deserves compassion, respect, counseling, whatever it is that we can offer.”

I think I may have figured out why Republicans claimed the mantle “compassionate conservative” during the George W. Bush years: they don’t know the meaning of the word!!

compassion: deep awareness of the suffering of another coupled with the wish to relieve it.

There is nothing compassionate about requiring women to drive over 300 miles to get a legal medical procedure, nothing compassionate about forced birth, and definitely nothing compassionate about making women choose a back-alley abortion when she is faced with an unwanted pregnancy.

I was not shocked by Reince Priebus, in his role as Republican blatherer, creating a word salad in response to a question. I was shocked that Chuck Todd asked a question that exposed GOP hypocrisy: “One of the things about the Republican party is you don’t like a lot of regulation on businesses, except if the business is a abortion clinic … is that fair?” (poor Chuck, he won’t be invited to the beltway cocktail parties now!!).

Yr Wonkette noticed that the normally smooth Reince – okay, I made that up, if you look up “dweeb” in the dictionary, you see Reince – was a bit scrambley. The inestimable Kaili Joy Gray:

PRIEBUS: No, look, listen Chuck. The issue for us is only one thing. And that’s whether you ought to use taxpayer money to fund abortion. That’s the one issue that I think separates this conversation that we’re having.

Oh reallllllly? Hey, didn’t Priebus just finish saying that the Republican Party is all about helping women and giving them whatever they need, unless what they need is to not be pregnant, in which case, screw ’em because that’s how compassion works? Except now, a whole no seconds later, the real issue is protecting taxpayers (who obviously cannot also be women) from having their precious pennies spent on things they do not like because (a) taxpayers weren’t paying for anyone’s abortions in Texas to begin with, and (b) the Constitution does not allow taxpayers to opt out of funding things they do not like.

When your party spends so much time trying to stop women from exercising their legal rights, it sure is hard to keep track of the excuses, isn’t it? Women’s safety, precious babies, taxpayers, blah blah blah baloney blah.

First, as a Wisconsinite, I apologize for Reince Priebus being anything other than a trivia question: “Who was the campaign manager for failed gubernatorial candidate Scott Walker in the Wisconsin elections of 2010?”. We did everything we could to get people to the polls but came up short (we were not helped by the free pass that the Milwaukee news media gave Walker when they should have been investigating rumors of malfeasance in office and campaign irregularities, malfeasance that cost Walker’s former employer, Milwaukee County, hundreds of thousands of dollars to settle and irregularities that would land six of his cronies in jail). No one anticipated, except the donors he whispered to, that a newly elected Governor Walker would destroy state employee and teacher unions, thereby making him a national Republican hero much like shouter-in-teachers-faces Gov. Bully of New Jersey. Well, that catapulted Reince Priebus into the public limelight and, sadly, to Chairman of the Republican National Committee and onto your teevee.

But we, or WI as we are fond of saying here in Wisconsin, will make amends to all y’all this November by making Scott Walker the answer to another trivia question: “Who is the single-term governor of Wisconsin still waiting for a phone call from the real David Koch?”.

Words have meaning.

And please … don’t assume that we don’t have the Googles.  


4 comments

  1. a·mends (-m ndz) pl.n. (used with a sing. or pl. verb) Recompense for grievance or injury:

    When WI vote, WI win. You’re welcome, America.

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