January 26, 2024

On Thursday, the Wisconsin State Assembly convened to discuss a bill which would limit abortion to 14 weeks instead of the current 20 week window. Republican lawmakers made incredible leaps of illogic and twisted themselves into pretzels in trying to justify this unpopular bill.

For example, State Representative Joel Kitchens claims that his experience in veterinarian medicine and having performed thousands of ultrasounds on animals makes him the residential expert on "mammalian fetal development" in the Assembly. Let's just ignore the fact that there are two nurses, who treated human patients, also in the Assembly. Kitchens apparently feels that his expertise in "mammalian fetal development" also makes him an expert in medical ethics. Because apparently, he feels that putting an animal to sleep is equitable to stopping a pregnancy which is endangering the mother or involves a 12 year old girl who was raped by her father.

But wait! There's more! There's always more.

Look at State Representative Ron Tusler, who tried to use examples from the Bible to justify making women carry babies even if it is dangerous to the health of the mother. He cited Elisabeth, the mother of John the Baptist, was allegedly 88 years old when she was pregnant with him. He then quickly pivots to Mary, who was allegedly a teenager when she was pregnant with Jesus. Tusler then added that her pregnancy was dangerous because Jewish law at the time dictated that she should be stoned to death. Does anyone want to inform him that she was married to Joseph?

Bonus points for you if you were able to keep from cracking up at Democratic State Representative Christine Sinicki, who was standing behing Tusler shaking her head and looking on in disbelief at what she was hearing.

Then there is also State Representative Amanda Nedweski, who is a member of Mothers for Threesomes, saying that if a woman gets pregnant outside of rape or incest, well, it's her own damn fault. It should be noted that Nedweski authored the original bill and purposely did not include the exceptions of rape or incest, apparently because she thought that a 12 year old girl, who she deemed not mature enough to read certain books, is old enough to make such life-altering decisions on her own.

Now, if the bill even makes it through the Senate, Governor Tony Evers has already repeatedly vowed to veto it. But if Evers were to sign it, it would still have to be ratified by the voters before it became law. Thus the Republicans have adapted the angle - believe it or not - that they are upset that Evers is afraid of listening to the people on this issue.

This is the same group of people that actively participated in Trump's efforts to overturn the 2020 elections. These are also the same people who chose not to listen to the people last April when they overwhelmingly elected Supreme Court Justice Janet Protasiewicz and wanted to overturn that election by impeaching her.

The idiocy and hypocrisy of these Republicans are enough to make one's hair hurt.

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