Completely Unnecessary

Yeah, it didn’t go so well.

According to CNN’s little worm thingie, women didn’t like McCain so much generally, but he really failed in two key areas:

The first was vouchers. It’s a pretty standard conservative talking point, but he might have played it differently.

The vast majority of public school teachers are women (74.5% in 1999-2000 and likely higher since), and they don’t tend to like vouchers much.

Whilst probably striving to draw points of difference between himself and Obama, McCain still might have played up his support of charter schools instead. They’re a bit more palatable from a teacher standpoint.

McCain started out well. In my liveblog, I thought he’d hop right into vouchers, but hit charter schools first. That was a good approach, supporting both and leading with charters.

And then he got wrapped up in Obama’s opposition to vouchers and banged on about how well DC charter schools are working.

But maybe a lot of Clinton supporters aren’t teachers; maybe they weren’t affected by the voucher stuff.

Well, I’m sure the uterus stuff got them on the Straight Talk Express:

I would consider [any judge] in their qualifications. I do not believe that someone who has supported Roe v. Wade that would be part of those qualifications. But I certainly would not impose any litmus test.
…
Let me talk to you about an important aspect of this issue. We have to change the culture of America. Those of us who are proudly pro-life understand that. And it’s got to be courage and compassion that we show to a young woman who’s facing this terribly difficult decision.

Okay. McCain used to hold a sensible anti-choice position (sorry to be all rhetoricy, but he doesn’t get to wear the pro-life moniker anymore as far as I’m concerned). He even tried to get the Republican Party to amend its platform to include exceptions for rape, incest, and the health of the mother in 2000.

I just love the double-speak in the first part of that quote above.  It’s a little unclear what he’s saying, but I don’t think one could argue that he’s saying he would simply ignore a judge’s support of the Roe ruling. As I wrote yesterday, it seems like he’s saying, “I impose no litmus test, but [support of] Roe v. Wade means they are a bad judge.”

Still relatively reasonable. I don’t agree, but at least they were having a fairly rational discussion (about something that almost no one actually changes their vote on).

And then this happened:

I don’t know how you [Obama] align yourself with the extreme aspect of the pro- abortion movement in America. And that’s his record, and that’s a matter of his record.

And then this, complete with ironic finger ‘quotes’ (video here):

Just again, the example of the eloquence of Senator Obama. He’s health for the mother. You know, that’s been stretched by the pro-abortion movement in America to mean almost anything. That’s the extreme pro-abortion position, quote, “health.”

Before I fly off the handle - as I promise you I will do in just a moment - there was a better way to say this.

Some argue that stipulations for the health of the mother go too far in including things like mental health. They argue that this could be used to get around laws preventing abortion by claiming ‘mental health’ for a wide variety of reasons.

Quietly and reasonably arguing that point might not have totally lost him the rest of the (Clinton) women.

Palin is there to pick up (ostensibly) women and the base. Women appear not to have responded to Palin, but the base has. McCain didn’t have to come out swinging on this issue. The reponse, instead, seems to have come from frustration with Obama and the election.

And so, Vagina-Americans* got caught up in McCain’s downward spiral of poor polling numbers and increasingly bitter rhetoric.

John McCain might not have noticed, but those two things are connected.

My own brand of alarmist, hateful screed after the jump.

* - For the record, I might prefer Uterized-Americans.

And now - as promised:

Hey, John McCain, fuck. you.

My ‘health’ isn’t something you get to throw around as an angry, uninformed talking point in a final, vain attempt to drag your base to the polls as the pathetic and absurd campaign you’ve run grinds your last moment of political relevance into the dust.

Only ten percent of the country agrees with your new-found horror of a position (h/t Megan) - which, if polls continue in the current direction, is about the percentage you can expect on election day.

Women die in childbirth. They die being pregnant. Some of them die inside - that’s why mental health is important, too.

It’s not ‘extreme’ to want the living, breathing woman to count for more - or, hell, even only as much as - the fetus inside her.

And, if I can just point this out for a moment, the position now you consider ‘extreme pro-abortion’ is essentially the position you held as recently as April 2007. Saving a woman’s life is ‘health’. But that was, of course, before you threw away your ‘Maverick’ title to try to get yourself elected.

In case it was unclear, I used the ironic finger quotes in my head.

Sorry to sound so dismissive, but we here in the ‘extreme aspect of the pro- abortion movement’ (and by this I mean the majority of Americans) don’t take so kindly to being so hatefully denigrated.

Damn, man, I used to like you. Not, you know, like, vote-for-you like you, but like you.

My fondest wishes to your legacy, which it appears will be a short-lived stint by Sarah Palin in the 2012 Republican primaries.

Shout out to Daphne, who probably didn’t expect this when she asked for more diversion.

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