Last March, after an election cycle that featured one Republican candidate opining on “legitimate rape,” another candidate labeling pregnancies resulting from rape a “gift from God,” and a vice presidential candidate that wanted to treat terminating that pregnancy as a homicide crime, the Republican National Committee urged the GOP to back away from offensive rhetoric towards women. Republican candidates, the RNC urged, “need to use language that addresses concerns that are on women’s minds in order to let them know we are fighting for them.”
Just when you might be tempted to succumb to the delusion that Republicans actually give a damn about the poor, the sick, minorities, Liberals, Democrats, women, ad infinitum, ad nauseum (it would be shorter to just say anyone who’s not White, Christian, Conservative, and male) something like this crops up. At the recent California Republican Party convention, one of the vendors thought it would be a great idea to sell buttons that honestly reflect how Conservative feel about Hillary Clinton (and Liberals). The evidently very popular booth disappeared eventually, but only after reporters asked convention organizers about it. Republican officials will officially disavow such offensive memorabilia and claim the vendors were outliers and not officially sanctioned…and they’ll expect us to believe it. Right…if we can somehow manage to look past the vein of misogyny and sexism that runs through the Conservative movement and the GOP for lo, these many years. We’re somehow supposed to believe that a party whose actions belie their claims of concern for those not like them, and who’ve endeavored to deny voting rights to minorities and control of reproductive functions to women?
When you live in a world framed and defined by Fox News Channel, I suppose it makes sense that you’d expect Americans to do what they’re told and believe that Republicans actually give a damn about them. It’s like the story of a Texas oil man who, when caught in flagrante delicto with another women, told his wife, “No, I’m not having an affair. Who are you going to believe- me or your lying eyes?” When you look back at recent history, and compare actions with words, it’s not difficult to understand why “Republican integrity” is an oxymoron.
The booth wasn’t shut down because of the buttons being sold. It was shuttered because Republicans were caught in a moment of unfiltered honesty. When your record includes an unbroken history of disdain for those not fortunate enough to have been born White, Conservative, Christian, and male, it’s tough to credibly deny what most of America already knows. They care for women only insofar as they’re necessary for sexual gratification, child bearing, and homemaking. This is the party that once talked about being the “Big Tent Party.” I suppose that’s what happens when you lack the self-awareness and/or the honesty to recognize that your “Big Tent” shelters liars and hypocrites.
Keep on electing Republicans, America, and this is what you’ll get.
