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Subscribe to RSSST. CHARLES, Mo. – One day after Rep. Todd Akin vowed to stay in the race for US Senate, dismissing calls from across the Republican party to step aside, Sen. Claire McCaskill welcomed Akin back to the campaign by bashing him for abandoning veterans during his years in Congress.
Visiting two VFW halls near St. Louis on Wednesday, McCaskill, the Democrat Akin is hoping to unseat here in Missouri, went through a list of Akin votes that took more than two minutes to recite.
Audiences were mostly male and senior citizen. Survivors of combat in Vietnam – and at least one World War II veteran – looked on beneath baseball caps decorated with military insignia as she accused Akin of blocking bonuses for troops stationed in Iraq and Afghanistan and voting against health care benefits for reservists and national guard members.
“So that’s kind of the list,” McCaskill said of Akin’s voting record. “Now, I don’t have a list like that."
The attack did not include any mention of the recent controversy embroiling Akin.
Sunday, Akin told a television interviewer that women could biologically prevent pregnancies resulting from what he called “legitimate rape.”
The remarks set off a firestorm, but Wednesday McCaskill only alluded to them broadly.
During a press conference outside a VFW home in nearby Overland, McCaskill brushed aside questions about Akin’s future.
“The voters have spoken, and he’s the nominee,” McCaskill said.
“We’re going to draw the contrasts that I think are necessary so that voters know that he’s outside the mainstream, he’s very extreme,” she added later.
Tuesday, Akin let a deadline for withdrawing from the Senate race pass.
Rep. Todd Akin, R-Mo., confirms with TODAY's Matt Lauer that vice presidential candidate and fellow congressman Paul Ryan advised him to step down amid the fallout of comments he made about rape and abortion.
He told NBC’s Matt Lauer during a Wednesday interview on the TODAY show that his nomination was a “decision made by the citizens of our state, not the party bosses.”
McCaskill’s VFW visits were part of a so-called “Vets for Claire” listening tour that the campaign says was arranged prior to the Akin controversy.
A VFW official in Overland asked reporters to hold McCaskill’s press conference outside the building, in order to keep the organization compliant with rules prohibiting political activity by 501(c)(3) charity groups.
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GRAND NO PARTY CONVENTION in Tampa. Perfect choice again, showing the ability to make the correct choices. A city prone to flooding and hold their national convention at the height of hurricane season?
Pick a vice presidential candidate that co-sponsored a bill defining forcible rape? Then when the House co-sponsor Atkins comes under fire for his anti- women remarks, throws the man under the bus. Tampa will pick their pockets, and some will be arrested in the strip clubs and whore houses or skinny dipping in Tampa Bay. I am sure our moral upstanding Representative of Kansas Kevin Yoder, will be Drinking and driving like usual, stripping in front of someones daughter. I hope Tampa enjoys these fine upstanding moral people. The strip clubs are predicting a better business cycle than the Superbowl. Go figure.This from a group that bases their whole exsistance on their godly right to shove the Fuking beliefs down your throat. Maybe it is time for their god to bring about the next flood and drown all these hypocrites. I wonder how many will get arrested for soliciting male prostitutes in airport mens rooms or for child molesting?
The state of Missouri has been in the national spotlight recently because of comments made by Republican Congressman Todd Akin who claimed that raped women rarely get pregnant. After his statements hit the Internet, immediate outrage burned across the country. Akin later apologized, but his statements have rekindled a nationwide debate. One that republicans desperately do not want to have, lest they alienate a wide majority of female voters.
Sharon Barnes, a high ranking state Republican, came to the defense of her conservative colleague who she believes only "phrased it (his statement) badly."
Barnes was quoted by The New York Times saying, "abortion is never an option." Barnes went on to biblically claim that, "If God has chosen to bless this person [the rape victim] with a life, you don’t kill it."
Barnes did not elaborate on her views for post-pregnancy care, or costs.
Barnes has been a figure in conservative St. Louis politics for years, and currently holds all of the following titles according to her Linkedin profile:
The Republican party's candidate for Sheriff of Hillsborough County, New Hampshire, Frank Szabo, recently said that if elected he would use deadly force to prevent an abortion from happening. Szabo contributed to what is nationally a seemingly never ending list of gaffes made by Republican candidates on social issues.
Szabo, a former limo driver, was interviewed locally by wmur.com, and went on the record saying "abortion is murder in my opinion." He went on to say that he would "arrest any doctor who performs an abortion."
As her comments become more known the GOP will attempt to spin Barnes' clout in the party as little, when in reality she is a big player behind the scenes.
I posted this on the initial "Akin commits political suicide" thread however Akin was down by 10 points in the latest polls conducted according to NewsMax.
President Lincoln is rolling over in his grave...Nough said. The "Grand Ole Party"....has finally defiled what he died for. So sad.
Akin or McCaskill