We Haven't Watched the Videos

When I first heard the reports that the White House had not watched and didn’t plan to watch the Planned Parenthood videos, I was somewhat amazed. I mean, who hadn’t watched the videos or read the transcripts? Seemed somewhat far-fetched to me. Then I thought that maybe this was the Administration’s way of buying time and deflecting any need for initiative. Maybe, I thought, this was another of those, “the President first heard of [fill in your favorite crisis] when he turned on the news,” or some such. They probably only watch CNN and that network didn’t exactly trumpet the contents of the videos, so maybe the whole thing just slipped passed them between the latest Trump joke and blaming Bush for ISIS.

Could be.

Then I realized that it must be somewhat hard to explain to those two girls that their parents nor the federal government considered them real people before they left the hospital. I wonder how that realization comes about – that you were entirely optional to them; not even a person. Just a bag of parts that could just have easily been birthed and then summarily killed at the whim of your mother? Because after all, she is her own woman and can do what she wants with her body. Do what she wants with those non-persons inside her – or even on her breast following delivery. At any point prior to cutting that cord, their mother could have asserted her right to kill them.

And it would have been a legitimate exercise of mom’s feminist identity.

Oh we wouldn't have expected her to kill you herself. No, the idea of a woman choking the life out of a suckling child would have been and still is too barbaric for us. Rather, we would have provided specially trained medical professionals to kill you for her. We think it's cleaner, more antiseptic to have doctors crush your skull, suck your brain out of your head, or tear your body apart while your central nervous system screams in pain.

That's legitimate, that's legal, that's acceptable.

Why we even call that "health care."

So it isn’t really any wonder the White House claims not to have seen the videos. Oh sure, the girls would be told that now – now mom and dad love you, and that would be expected to make them feel better – safer even.

Good thing girls, you made it out of the hospital.

Your parents, Senators Boxer and Warren, Ms Clinton, everyone that works at Planned Parenthood, and the federal government as a whole – and many states think it is entirely appropriate that you may not have.

Because you weren’t real until you escaped.