Texas is
becoming something of a failed state, I fear.
The brilliance this time comes from state Sen. Bob Deuell (R-So SMRT), whose legislative website says he is “a board-certified family physician.” According to the Facebook post by his colleague Rep. Dukes, Sen. Deuell (who is now one of the R’s in the Texas Senate trying to interrupt Sen. Davis’s filibuster) had this insight during the debate:
Another ah ha moment in the senate during SB5, Sen. Duel [sic] said pregnancy only occurs after “accurate intercourse”. But of course, any other is I assume inaccurate. Hmmmm!
That is a phrase I have never heard before. I have heard of a great deal of different kinds of intercourse, but the phrase
accurate intercourse is a new one. It brings up images of missile defense systems, or a target range, or the world's most metaphorical dartboard. Pregnancy only occurs … after
accurate intercourse. Not inaccurate. No, you need some precision on this one.
He's a doctor, too. He's seen actual patients, I presume. He is aware, presumably, of enough biology to at least avoid accidentally detaching people's limbs when they come to him for their annual flu vaccines, presuming he Believes in vaccines, which is not a given, and yet he is apparently arguing that we need not worry about the implications of further abortion restrictions because only people who accurately do the intercourse thing get pregnant, and therefore … something.
This has been the same debate that featured another Texas legislative genius dismissing rape pregnancies because women who have been raped—"accurately" raped, I suppose will be the new term for it—have access to "what's called rape kits where a woman can get cleaned out." And now Gov. Rick "Three Things" Perry has called another special session so that they can have this debate all over again.
I'm telling you, Texas, I fear for you. This level of legislative dumb ain't natural. You have to be accurately stupid to say things this accurately dumb, you can't just stumble into it. You may want to reevaluate those business-friendly policies Perry keeps going on about, because somebody in that state is dumping something in the water that is turning the majority of the Texas Republican Party into the most pea-brained creatures this side of Gohmert's dog's third-largest tick.
