Virginia's Bob McDonnell respects women's inability to understand pregnancy

>>> a bad week for would-be republican vice presidents . we just talked about the blunt amendment, the republican's anti-contraception amendment that failed today in the senate. and democrats are really excited for republicans to keep talking about. technically, it is not just called the blunt amendment, it is called the blunt/rubio amendment. so if somebody's going to wake up in the republican party and realize that being the anti- anti- birth control party maybe isn't the best way to make a run for the presidency, the blunt/rubio anti- birth control amendment probably is not going to help marco rubio 's chances at being picked for vice president. similarly, this didn't get much national notice, but at the end of the last week, the ousted republican secretary of state in indiana was sentenced for voter fraud . he had been convicted of six felonies, including voter fraud , and he's the guy who runs elections in the state of indiana . mitch daniels , the republican governor in indiana , had refused to appoint anybody permanently to replace this guy once he was convicted of voter fraud . the governor saying that if the felony convictions could get knocked down to misdemeanors, maybe, then he would be happy to reinstate this guy to run indiana 's elections. ultimately, late last week, the republican secretary of state did not get his felony convictions busted down to misdemeanors, so he can't get back into office. and now indiana might get a democrat installed in the secretary of state's seat instead. but mitch daniels saying he wanted to put a convicted voter fraud felon in charge of the state's elections, that probably does not help mitch daniels ' vice presidential chances either. which brings, of course, to the other great milk toast hope for the vice presidential running mate. that would be the forced ultrasound guy from virginia .

>> you said, again, on this show that you thought that tsa pat-downs were invasive and an infringement on people's civil liberties . how can a pat-down at an airport more invasive than come peming, forcing women to go through this medical procedure to have an abortion?

>> it's the manner, from what i understood about this coverage, that the manner these pat-downs were beneath the dignity of the passengers, and there were other ways to complete that.

>> i can hear them screaming when you're talking about the dignity of the traveling public, what about the dignity of women?

>> i believe this is something that helps respect the dignity of women by making sure that they've had all the information.

>> nothing respects a women's dignity like forcing her into a state-mandated medical procedure designed to show her pictures of the fact that she's pregnant, because the state government assumes that without those forced pictures, a woman can't understand that.

>> but, mark, it does not in any way affect what choice the woman will make. it simply says ultrasounds will be given, provided to the woman, and then she is fully free to decide what she should do.

>> "what she should do." she doesn't have a choice, and neither does her doctor, over whether or not that ultrasound is done to her. that decision will be made by governor bob mcdonnell , because he knows what that woman needs. doesn't matter what the doctor says. bob mcdonnell may not have a license to practice medicine, but this is not practice for him, this is government. and in bob mcdonnell 's virginia , it is government that decides what medical procedures you get.

>> on the hpv virus , the mandatory vaccination for the hpv, you allowed parents to opt out. why not add an opt-out provision for this?

>> well, mark, all i can say is that this measure is going through the general assembly . i do think in it's current form it is a good policy.

>> in other words, there will be no opt-out. you will have done to you what governor mcdonnell wants done to you. that's governor bob mcdonnell of virginia , one-time vice presidential hopeful, talking with mark seagraves on wpot radio this week. we actually played some mark seagraves and bob mcdonnell audio speaking on the same subject on last night's show, and when we played that, we thought that audio was from this week. turns out, that was from an earlier interview when it first became clear that this ultrasound thing was going to pass in virginia . and in fact, our mistake only serves as further proof that what bob mcdonnell does as governor now is answer questions like this.

>> you talked and complained earlier in this show about the white house and the federal government placing unfunded mandates on the states. this is an unfunded mandate on women. who is going to pay? what do you support? the idea of having a woman have to take a sonogram before getting an abortion? is that something you would support? when you were here last month, you were in favor of the transvaginal ultrasound . a lot of people believe that this is a decision that should be left to the patient and the doctor. not to lawmakers. what is this something that you feel that politicians know better than the patient and the doctor?

>> this is what bob mcdonnell 's life is like. this is what it's like this month, this is what it was like last month too, this is what it's likely to be like from here on out. and that's why larry sabita, the acknowledged dean of virginia politics , today told the lynchburg, virginia , paper that bob mcdonnell 's vice presidential chances are over. "he's been hurt by this. i'm of the theory that most things don't matter, but every now and then, something happens that changes people's perceptions for a lengthy period. we just had it." "he should have anticipated this. this is not rocket science . do you think his people in advance could not have analyzed that this could have blown up in his face? it's obvious." "the economist" magazine also writing about bob mcdonnell no longer be viable as a vice presidential choice. "the fact that mr. mcdonnell had not foreseen a public backlash to the vaginal ultrasountd requirement seems to some to illustrate his tone-deafness and inattention to detail." his vice presidential possibilities are threatened by a seemingly inability to control the excesses of his party. and the local issues columnist of "the washington post " this week says that "in preparing to sign this ultrasound bill, the second anti-abortion measure he will have signed in a year, mcdonnell has, quote, probably sacrificed whatever chance he had of being picked at the gop vice presidential nominee ." "assuming that the republican presidential candidate is mitt romney , it would be much harder for him now to tap mcdonnell as a running mate. the two of them would immediately have to devote time to defending the ultrasound bill." the columnist robert mccartney reports a republican source saying, "i think the moment in the sun is over." "the ultrasound controversy was probably very unhealthy to the calculus that romney will make at the convention. together with bob mcdonnell 's 1989 masters thesis , this creates a second object of ridicule." not wanting to be an object of ridicule, like bob mcdonnell now is, may even be affecting the way that these bills, that bills like this are progressing in other states, in republican-led legislators around the country. pennsylvania , you will recall, has another one of these bills that is just like the original virginia transvaginal ultrasound one, except in some ways, pennsylvania 's is even worse . pennsylvania 's calls for a mandated ult e ed ultrasound of sufficient detail, that it is likely a forced vaginal ultrasound. the ultrasound has to be pointed at your face during the procedure, although the governor of the state of pennsylvania will allow you to avert your eyes. that's the loophole. you are allowed to move your eyes while the state forces a medical procedure on you. the pennsylvania bill, though, has stalled. we've been trying to track various reports on this since the controversy erupted in virginia and elsewhere, but it appears that this bill in pennsylvania has lost at least six of its co-sponsors now, and now the sponsor of the pennsylvania bill is looking for a lifeline, telling "new york times" that she did not have plans to revise her bill in light of what's just happened in virginia , but she says, if governor tom corbett , the republican governor tom corbett were to ask for changes, just as the virginia legislature heard from their governor, that would be a consideration. we called governor corbett's office today in pennsylvania to find out if he's going to wade into this the the way that bob mcdonnell did, thus changing his life forever. governor corbett has not returned our call on the subject, and we do not expect him too, frankly. although i would love it if he would. what do you say, gov, do you want to nuke your vice presidential chances too? come on. there's