McCain and Viagra

Carly Fiorina, former Hewlett-Packard CEO, has been touted as one of John McCain’s potential vice-presidential picks.

But on July 7, Fiorina exposed herself as either a political airhead or saboteur by handing pro-aborts a wider opening to attack McCain than they could possibly have fantasized.

At a breakfast meeting with reporters to promote consumer-driven health insurance, Fiorina, the Republican National Committee’s inaptly named “victory chairman,” chose an illustration that would seem to make the contrary case for government intrusion.

According to the Washington Post:

[Fiorina] proposed “a real, live example which I’ve been hearing a lot about from women: There are many health insurance plans that will cover Viagra but won’t cover birth-control medication. Those women would like a choice.”

For effect, the woman frequently mentioned as a possible McCain running mate repeated: “Those women would like a choice.”

Silence filled the meeting room at the St. Regis Hotel. “I don’t know where I go after that,” said the moderator, Dave Cook of the Christian Science Monitor.

In fact, liberals have attempted legislative interference on this very point, and McCain opposed it.

In 2003, McCain voted against the Murray-Reid Amendment to the Partial Birth Abortion Ban that would have forced insurance companies to fund contraception, even if Catholic, for instance, and in violation of their beliefs; forced hospitals to provide the morning-after pill, even if in violation of their beliefs; and forced an unfunded mandate on states to expand Medicaid coverage.

In 2005, McCain voted against the $100 million Clinton-Reid amendment to the 2006 federal budget that would have increased Title X funding (of which Planned Parenthood is the largest recipient); increased comprehensive sex-ed funding (specifically exempting abstinence ed); forced insurance companies to fund contraception; and forced the Centers for Disease Control to promote FDA-approved morning-after pills, i.e., provide free advertisement for Plan B.

Here is how NARAL spins those votes:

John McCain voted against legislation that would have prevented unintended pregnancy by investing in insurance coverage for prescription birth control. ….

Since early this year, NARAL has been sounding the alarm that its polling showed independents and pro-abortion Republicans have taken McCain’s “maverick” reputation to mean he bucks his party’s platform and is pro-abortion.

But recently, pro-abortion groups have adopted the deceptive strategy of portraying McCain as anti-contraception.

Apparently, their follow-up polls showed McCain’s simply being anti-abortion has not raised the dander of targeted voters, particularly in light of mounting evidence that Barack Obama is an abortion extremist.

But opposing contraception is a different matter. According to Nico Pitney of the Huffington Post, July 10:

A Democratic Party strategist … said McCain’s two votes against requiring insurance companies to cover prescription birth control have been polled in battleground states and had tremendous resonance with women, including independents and Republicans.

(Polling conducted last month for NARAL … showed similar data: 79 percent of pro-choice independent women and 61 percent of pro-choice Republican women said that McCain’s votes against birth control access raised “serious doubts” in their minds about McCain.)

So Fiorina could not have played more perfectly into pro-abort hands.

On July 10, a reporter asked McCain about Fiorina’s mother of all verbal gifts to pro-aborts.

This prompted “some of the most riveting campaign footage of the entire year so far,” reported MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow. You can view it in its entirety online.

Wasting no time, Planned Parenthood snipped that clip into a painful ad being transmitted via media and the Internet faster than a savage STD:

McCain’s team managed as good a response to Fiorina’s gaffe as possible, according to the Associated Press:

Campaign spokesman Brian Rogers later said Fiorina was describing McCain’s “vision for choice and competition in health insurance.” He said McCain will open insurance markets “for greater variety and competition, allowing women to choose policies that fit their needs. An example is the choice for women to dump a policy that only covers Viagra for a policy that covers their real needs.”

But the opening Fiorina gave pro-aborts cannot be closed, nor can McCain’s initial painful pregnant pauses in response.

All the more reason for McCain to pick up the pace of his recent attacks against Obama – well received, by the way – for his radical abortion support to the point of endorsing infanticide.

The fact is, while Obama has lately been attempting to talk soft on abortion, he will never actually go soft.

Obama takes Viabortionagra every day.