Yes, yes, we all know that the Republicans are the exclusive owners of values, which they invented all by themselves by reading the CliffsNotes version of the Bible and also some bumperstickers about Ayn Rand.
But the disastrous duo on the Republican ticket this year might have a slightly more difficult case to make this time around.
First, there's Mitt Romney's health care plan in Massachusetts, the one that is strikingly similar to Obamacare, except for one major detail. See if you can spot it.
But that's nothing compared to the
$75 million investment in Stericycle, a "medical-waste disposal firm" that disposes of, among other things, aborted fetuses. The investment was made by Bain Capital, with Romney very involved in the process and his signature on documents filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
In other words, Mitt Romney made money off abortions. In the hierarchy of Republican crimes, that's a notch below failing to genuflect when saying the words "Ronald Reagan."
But Mitt Romney isn't the only problem on his ticket; he and his little buddy Paul Ryan don't exactly see eye-to-eye on just how much to love fetuses and hate the women who carry them. Ryan, for example, co-sponsored the Sanctity of Human Life Act to federally define a fertilized egg as a person. Romney thinks it should be left to the states. (Well, except for when he's saying he'd support a constitutional amendment. But he's flip-flopped on that so many times, it's obvious Romney would prefer not to talk about it at all.)
As Stephanie Mencimer at Mother Jones notes, "that one piece of legislation he supported is so extreme that it would have turned Romney's children into criminals" by outlawing in vitro fertilization. That would have been bad news for Mitt's son, Tagg:
In May, Romney's son Tagg became father of twin boys thanks to help from IVF and a surrogate mother. Tagg's son Jonathan was also produced this way. Two of Tagg's brothers reportedly have struggled with infertility issues and resorted to IVF as well. It's hard to imagine that Romney will score any points with voters by tapping a running mate whose anti-abortion views are so extreme that Romney's own kids can't live with them.
The problems don't end there, though. Paul Ryan is quite fond of citing his Catholic faith as a justification for his radical ideologies. Except that the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, as well as many Catholic scholars, have bluntly denounced Ryan's anti-poor budget, as well as his misunderstanding of Catholic doctrine:
“Our problem with Representative Ryan is that he claims his budget is based on Catholic social teaching,” said Jesuit Father Thomas J. Reese, one of the organizers of the letter. “This is nonsense. As scholars, we want to join the Catholic bishops in pointing out that his budget has a devastating impact on programs for the poor.” [...]
“I am afraid that Chairman Ryan’s budget reflects the values of his favorite philosopher Ayn Rand rather than the gospel of Jesus Christ,” said Father Reese. “Survival of the fittest may be okay for Social Darwinists but not for followers of the gospel of compassion and love.”
Ryan's
response didn't exactly win the hearts of minds of the Church:
“These are not all the Catholic bishops, and we respectfully disagree,” Ryan said.
Of course, according to Republicans in Congress, you
can't "respectfully disagree" with the bishops because you are then violating their religious liberty and ending democracy and freedom as we know it.
It's pretty difficult for Romney and Ryan to use that beloved Republican tactic of claiming exclusive moral authority in an election. Those so-called "values voters" aren't likely to be won over by a ticket that profited from abortions and has been officially denounced by the Catholic bishops for not understanding Jesus. Polling shows Catholic voters prefer Obama over Romney, and adding Ryan, officially a bad and clueless Catholic, to the ticket isn't likely to help.
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