tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28102666.post7123706993478405271..comments2024-03-14T13:25:20.613-05:00Comments on Boston 1775: Rape as a Cause of the American Revolution?Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28102666.post-32729932233835050842012-09-29T12:11:12.063-05:002012-09-29T12:11:12.063-05:00Being a new reader of J.L. Bell's excellent Bo...Being a new reader of J.L. Bell's excellent Boston 1775, I was surprised to see Akin-esque ridiculosities here, these ones supplied by his wife. Surprised, because I’ve been aware of his idiocy for years -- it’s amazing to see it spread all over the place now. <br /><br />I ran to oppose Rep. Akin in a congressional campaign in 2008, and am all too familiar with his butchering of history and time-warped worldview(s). Evidently, his wife carries the same backward attitudes and is just as guilty of saying wacky, ridiculous things. Rep. Akin is an embarassment for us here in St. Louis County. <br /> <br />As an aside, one of the reasons for the Akins political touchstone to often revolve around the Revolutionary Era, is not as much birthed from an understanding of how future-focused, or progressive the Founders really were (they think of the Founders as being politically identical to tea-party conservatives), but more to the fact that for years, every Fourth of July, the Akins would throw an outdoor cookout party at their home with our favorite social luddite-rep dressed in tri-corn regalia. They got skin in the game. He owns a tri-corn, so he knows what made the Founders tick, right? <br /><br />Sadly, their knowledge of what forces were at play during the Revolutionary Era is probably about as good Akin’s knowledge of woman’s reproductive system. Most assuredly, they are big fans -- big -- of crypto-historian David Barton and “Wallbuilders”.<br /><br />Here is a short list of some of his more memorable historical perversions and/or strained logic, an excerpt from a piece I wrote for IVN:<br /> <br />"Akin is no stranger to the realm of making such statements—he has actually tallied up quite a lengthy roster over the years.<br />“Global warming is highly suspect,” said Akin to a group of Tea Party activists in 2011. “And I have doubts about the constitutionality of Medicare.”<br /><br />While running to oppose Rep. Akin in a 2008 Missouri congressional race, I was shocked to wake one April morning and see him waxing hyperbolic political rhetoric on CSPAN’s Washington Journal. He was repeating a universally discredited canard—summoning the image of an electro-magnetic pulse (EMP) nuclear weapon exploding over Kansas as a justification for “why we’re there” fighting overseas. Mind you, this was 2008—not during the drum-up for war in 2002-03.<br /><br />In 2007 he said about the Iraq War: “Could you picture Davy Crockett at the Alamo looking at his Blackberry getting a message from Congress? Davy Crockett, we support you. The only thing is we are not going to send any troops.”<br />Everybody’s been guilty of misspeaking, suffering from foot-in-mouth disease, but Akin’s legitimate rape comment was not a flub or gaffe, per se. His rhetoric and statements over the years reveal an ideology that is anti-science and anti-government."Byron DeLearnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28102666.post-3876403823571593442012-09-29T08:45:15.283-05:002012-09-29T08:45:15.283-05:00Gotta worry about families where _everything_ remi...Gotta worry about families where _everything_ reminds them of rape. I don't think I'm going to let my kids play with their kids -- they might pick up a distorted view of the world.Chauceriannoreply@blogger.com