An Obama campaign mailer in Virginia accuses Paul Ryan of having supported “parental rights for rapists” and Mitt Romney of wanting to outlaw all abortions–even in the cases of rape or incest. It is yet another symbol of how Obama’s campaign is trying to scare women and wage a culture war in the final weeks of the campaign to appeal to female voters, especially in Northern Virginia.
The flyer, which was tweeted by a Virginia resident, says: “Get the facts about Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan’s records on women’s health.”
It accuses Romney and Ryan of wanting to “cut all federal funding for Planned Parenthood” and states that Romney, as governor, “supported a state bill that could have put doctors in prisons for performing abortions.”
It notes Romney backed a proposal to outlaw all abortions–even in cases of rape or incest–even though Romney has stated numerous times that he would allow exceptions.
And it claims Ryan “co-sponsored a bill to redefine rape only as ‘forcible rape’ and he supported parental rights for rapists.”
These misleading tactics are not working for the Obama campaign as women, who are more concerned about economic issues, have propelled Romney into the lead in national polls.
In 2008, Obama won women voters by 13 points over John McCain. In 2012, Obama had a double-digit lead among women voters before his first debate against Romney. In the month after the debate, Romney has largely erased the 16-point gender gap. If Obama does not win the women’s vote by a wide margin, especially in Northern Virginia, he has no chance of winning the election.
In recent weeks, the Obama campaign, unable to run on a record of accomplishments or ideas, has seemed desperate, trying to inject birth control or abortion into nearly every debate. This week, the campaign had Lena Dunham, of HBO’s Girls, cut a video in which she compared voting for the first time for Obama to losing one’s virginity.
And throughout the campaign, as Obama’s campaign has incessantly claimed Republicans want to wage a “war on women,” it has hyped up Sandra Fluke, the Georgetown law student who testified before Congress that government should pay for everyone’s birth control pills. It has also tried to make comments about rape by Republican Senate candidates like Todd Akin and Richard Mourdock into national campaign issues.
The mainstream media has willingly aided the Obama campaign’s in pushing its “war on women” themes. However, independent women voters, according to the most recent polling, are not buying what the Obama campaign is selling.
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