Republican Presidential hopeful Rick Santorum really dropped a load on CNN last Friday night when he said rape victims should accept their babies as gifts from God.
In an interview with Piers Morgan, the most socially backward conservative candidate in the GOP field remained unyielding in his opposition to abortion, even in cases where rape is involved.
Morgan pressed Santorum on the issue and asked how he would feel if his own daughter came to him begging for an abortion after being raped. Santorum said, “I think the right approach is to accept this horribly created - in the sense of rape - but nevertheless a gift in a very broken way, the gift of human life, and accept what God has given to you.”
He added that rape victims ought to “make the best of a bad situation.”
That's right, Lil' Ricky wants the government to force pregnant rape victims to accept the "horribly created," because "God" gave you this "horribly created"...um, "gift" via a brutal attack against your will.
Because he's a "compassionate conservative." Cough.
Transcript of the segment follows.
MORGAN: On abortion, you did harden your position on that as you got older. Why was that?
SANTORUM: Life. You know, when I decided to run for public life, I was informed very quickly people wanted to know what my position on that was. So I went through the process of trying to better understand the facts.
It became very clear to me that life begins at conception and persons are covered by the Constitution and since life -- people, a human life is the same as a person, to me it was a pretty simple deduction to make. That's what the Constitution clearly intended to protect.
MORGAN: But do you really -- do you really -- let me ask you this. Do you really believe, in every case, it should be totally wrong, in the sense that -- I know that you believe, even in cases of rape and incest -- and you've got two daughters. You know, if you have a daughter that came to you who had been raped.
SANTORUM: Yes.
MORGAN: And was pregnant and was begging you to let her have an abortion, would you really be able to look her in the eye and say, no, as her father?
SANTORUM: I would do what every father must do, is to try to counsel your daughter to do the right thing.
(CROSSTALK)
MORGAN: It's an almost impossibly hypothetical thing to ask you, but there will be people in that position, and they will share your religious values.
SANTORUM: It's not a matter of religious values.
MORGAN: And they are looking at their daughter ,saying, how can I deal with this, because if I make her have this baby, isn't it going to just ruin her life?
SANTORUM: Well, you can make the argument that if she doesn't have this baby, if she kills her child, that that, too, could ruin her life. And this is not an easy choice. I understand that. As horrible as the way that that son or daughter and son was created, it still is her child. And whether she has that child or doesn't, it will always be her child. And she will always know that. And so to embrace her and to love her and to support her and get her through this very difficult time, I've always, you know, I believe and I think the right approach is to accept this horribly created -- in the sense of rape -- but nevertheless a gift in a very broken way, the gift of human life, and accept what God has given to you.
As you know, we have to, in lots of different aspects of our life. We have horrible things happen. I can't think of anything more horrible. But, nevertheless, we have to make the best out of a bad situation.
