I'm getting a little tired of turning on the radio, TV and computer, and hearing about the latest "wedge" issue: contraception. Somehow, unfathomably, the media is giving uptake to the very Catholic bishops who deplore abortion, and their claim that giving someone the option of securing birth control is a violation of religious freedom.
The logic (sic) of the outcry is impeccable. The plan makes a whole host of drugs available, but nobody seems worried that it's going to force people onto narcotics--or Viagra.
It's strange. Some churches oppose any kind of medical intervention, but I don't see the media giving them a lot of space to talk about how their rights are being violated if their insurance provides the option of surgical care. Why not? Shouldn't we give uptake to their prejudice about what constitutes health and medicine? About what medical procedures women should, and should not, be allowed to procure with their employee health insurance?
The only reason this is getting uptake as a "wedge" issue is because of ratings. The never-ending circus of the GOP nomination reality show needs a new plot twist every week. Too bad if this one is playing with women's health, families and liberty. It sells.
Still, it's comforting to know that the GOP candidates embrace this issue at their own peril. Flirting with the delusions of a handful of backward voters, they reveal just how out of touch they really are.
Rick Santorum, showing the inflexible credo that, if elected, he'd like to inflict on us all, says the new law forces the church to participate in a "grievous moral wrong." Seriously? The vast majority of sexually-active adult women, including Catholic women, who happen to use contraceptives, are immoral? And he, who will never in his lifetime have to use a contraceptive to make sure he doesn't get pregnant, naturally, is not?
It goes without saying that Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich, and the whole caboodle at the conservative gathering today can't jump on this extremist bandwagon fast enough. Boehner talks about the "attack on religious freedom," Romney calls it a "violation of conscience."
What's really unconscionable is the way the GOP continually uses women as patsies in its crusade for the White House.
It's bizarre. Catholic hospitals can't refuse to hire women. Nor can they prevent women from having sexual lives. Apparently, though, they want to make sure all the women it employs have babies, and lots of 'em. Or, I guess, abortions.
This isn't extremism. It's absurdism. If the GOP candidates want to subscribe to it, well and good. Only a party that gives credence to a candidate who hides behind his own daughters to deflect criticism about his sexual past would use women in this callous way.
But please, news media, keep it off my screen. You know it's only getting uptake because it seems controversial. Do us all a favor and stop publicizing fundamentalist cant as if it's reasoned argument.