UK: Women and the GOP

The Guardian

To Republicans, women are simply the sum of their parts

The GOP's adoption of an anti-abortion platform is further indication of a party that has no clue about reproductive life

• Ana Marie Cox

There's no doubt that Todd Akin's stunningly misguided understanding of female anatomy, as seen in his claim that raped women can't get pregnant, represented yet another instance of the Republican party's estrangement from science. But the GOP's refusal to grapple with facts goes beyond biology: there's some very basic mathematics that they appear ignorant of as well.

The polling showing just how unpopular the party's official anti-abortion position (adopted by the platform committee this week and identical to the policy that Akin tried to use junk science to support) is as follows: just 20% of Americans believe abortion should be "illegal in all circumstances", compared to 25% who say that it should "always be legal" and the vast majority – 52% – who say that it should be "legal only under certain circumstances".

Read it at The Guardian:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/aug/23/republicans-women-simply-sum-parts