DNC video: ‘The Romney-Ryan-Akin Platform for Women’

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

The Democratic National Committee unveils a new slogan — the
"Romney-Ryan-Akin Platform for Women" — in a video released overnight (below the fold). Women will remember in November.

UPDATE: About that "doctor" behind the Medieval notion that "women who are raped can't get pregnant" — he is a campaign fundraiser and surrogate who has met privately with Willard "Mittens" Romney. There is a direct link. Steve Benen reports, Romney and Mr. 'Spastic Tubes':

When Todd Akin first scoffed at the notion that rape victims can get
pregnant, he defended himself by pointing to the medical judgment of
someone named Dr. John Willke, former president of the National Right to
Life Committee, who has been pushing this argument for many years.

Indeed, just this week, Willke told the New York Times
rapists don't impregnate their victims because, "This is a traumatic
thing — she's, shall we say, she's uptight. She is frightened, tight,
and so on. And sperm, if deposited in her vagina, are less likely to be
able to fertilize. The tubes are spastic."

Biologically, this is
deeply stupid and wholly rejected by physicians, but politically, it's
also become rather important — and not just because of Akin.

As Rachel noted on the show, Willke has also been a Mitt Romney ally and campaign surrogate. Josh Marshall had this item last night.

The main exponent of Todd Akin's theory that rape victims don't get
pregnant … claims that he got a private meeting with Mitt Romney as
recently as late last year.

The claim comes in an article
just out from The Daily Telegraph (for what it's worth, it's the same
pub and reporter who wrote the 'Anglo-Saxon' piece a few weeks ago which
provided the inglorious kick off to Romney's European tour). As
reporter Jon Swaine explains, Willke was an official surrogate for
Romney back in 2008. Willke claims that he got a private meeting with
Romney as recently late last year and told Willke "we agree on almost
everything" about the pro-life cause.

To reiterate something Rachel mentioned last night, I
generally think it's wise to take reports on U.S. politics from U.K.
newspapers with a grain of salt, but in this case, we're dealing with
easily-checkable claims, some of which we already know to be true.
Willke really was, for example, a Romney campaign surrogate during his most recent campaign.

So, did Romney meet with Willke in October as he claims? And if so, why? The same Telegraph article goes on to say Willke also met with Paul Ryan "several times." What did the two chat about?

For its part, it'd be easy for Team Romney to simply deny the meetings ever took place, but at this point.

According to Wikipedia, Willke earned his M.D. from the University of Cincinnati in 1948, and practiced as a family practitioner for much of his medical career. In case you were curious.