It is somewhat old news already, that Jon Kyl went on record Friday morning and lied about Planned Parenthood while the gov't shutdown loomed and the tea party fought to defund the organization. His craven response to being called out on his easily debunked lie shows his true quality. In my own small, ineffectual ways, I mean to make some noise about it, and remind some Arizonans that come next year, we can expect to see candidates just as bad from the Republican party.
From ThinkProgress, this is Kyl on the floor of the Senate making bold and demonstrably false proclamations:
KYL: Everybody goes to clinics, to doctors, to hospitals, so on. Some people go to Planned Parenthood. But you don’t have to go to Planned Parenthood to get your cholesterol or your blood pressure checked. If you want an abortion, you go to Planned Parenthood, and that’s well over 90 percent of what Planned Parenthood does.
The graphs of what the percentages look like in the reality-based community are making the rounds, so Kyl claims 90% and the reality is 3%. Maths is hard.
From Kyl's office, a little while later:
HOLMES: We did call his office trying to ask what he was talking about there. And I just want to give it you verbatim here. It says, ‘his remark was not intended to be a factual statement, but rather to illustrate that Planned Parenthood, a organization that receives millions of dollars in taxpayer funding, does subsidize abortions.’
Not intended to be factual.
Intended to not be factual, IOW.
Euphemistic rhetoric for a lie.
While my initial response was right, it's a fucking lie, you twit, I know full well that no newspaper will post that. So I wrote a letter to the AZ Daily Star and I have no idea if it'll make it in, but I kept it optimally short and sweet to give it a good chance. They may decide that my rhetoric is too much name-calling and refuse it, but what else can I do but call a spade a spade? How can I write a letter about Jon Kyl lying and make it nice? I am tempted to also send it to my old hometown newspaper in PA, just to give them a taste of Arizona quality. But if it appears nowhere else, it should be here.
Planned Parenthood was held hostage in this past week's budget negotiation in Congress. Our retiring senator, Jon Kyl, went on record to lie about it. On Friday morning, Kyl claimed that 90% of what Planned Parenthood does is perform abortions.
The truth is that abortions are 3% of what Planned Parenthood does, and of course the government has nothing to do with it, and does not fund it. The move to defund Planned Parenthood would have killed programs dealing with women's health, cancer screening, contraception, and STD testing and treatment.
When called on this lie, Kyl ran and hid. His office was forced to concede, "his remark was not intended to be a factual statement". This is the quality of candidate for which Republicans in Arizona blithely vote, and in 2012, I am sure we will see a Republican candidate of equal quality.
Maybe I should have found some way to reframe it in terms of freedom. People like freedom. Can't get enough. Hey, Jon Kyl's imminent retirement has liberated him from the petty concerns of factual statements that burden the American people. Good on you, Jon Kyl! Who needs the truth when lies are so much more fun...ah, screw it. Let it stand. I can't help it. I'm not as good at lying as a lifelong Republican. They have the benefit of so much experience.
I called this 'Jon Kyl's quality' not to suggest that he has good quality, one common meaning of the term, but to demonstrate what his true qualities are. Kyl shows himself to be an inveterate and facile liar, and also a craven little cockroach when some light shines upon him. Being a geek/nerd/etc. I am often reminded of a line from the Lord of the Rings when Faramir is given a chance to take the Ring:
The Ring of Power within my grasp. A chance for Faramir, Captain of Gondor, to show his quality.
Jon Kyl shows his quality at times like these, when a rhetorical flourish is worth more than the truth.