What’s a lifetime of utter misery and millions of dollars in medical costs against the purity of a Republican position during election season? Not much, according to Marco Rubio.
Sen. Marco Rubio said Saturday that he doesn’t believe a pregnant woman infected with the Zika virus should have the right to an abortion — even if she had reason to believe the child would be born with severe microcephaly.
And that’s no big deal, according to Trump surrogate Scottie Nell Hughes.
Hughes agreed that microcephaly was a “devastating disease,” but added that children with birth defects were “nothing new.”
“We don’t have the research, we don’t know what Zika is going to do,” she opined. “And Sen. Rubio is doing the correct thing. One out of every 33 babies in the United States right now is born with a birth defect.”
Birth defects happen all the time, so what’s the big deal if thousands more children are condemned to lives of abject hardship and their parents cast into unending torment? Republicans are perfectly willing to cast these children and their families into flames of despair. Because empathy doesn’t enter into it. Physical pain and emotional devastation are not a concern. Simple human decency is not a factor.
Not when it comes to being “pro-life.”
"Obviously, microcephaly is a terrible prenatal condition that kids are born with. And when they are, it’s a lifetime of difficulties," [Rubio] said. "So I get it. I’m not pretending to you that that’s an easy question you asked me. But I’m prolife. And I’m strongly prolife."
When you recognize that your political position will have desolating, lifelong impact on hundreds, possibly thousands of families, but still choose to hide behind your ideology? “Pro-life” isn’t the right term.
“Vile” might work. “Appalling and contemptible” are close. But pro-life? No. Not even in the same ballpark.