

Huckabee, Republicans woefully out of touch

3:02 PM, Feb. 10, 2014  |  Comments
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So what did Mike Huckabee say, and what did he mean? And if you don't know, I am referring to his recent speech where he got to use libido in a sentence.

MSNBC used Huckabee's words to portray him as a buffoon, and the Republican Party as still very wrong about women. Right-wing media shot back that Huckabee was misquoted. Outside of a few tweets, left-wing media got it right. Though he framed what he said as being the Democrats' point of view, in fact it was clearly what Mike Huckabee believes, or at least what he will be saying this season to stir up possible Republican primary voters.

And what is the issue? The ACA mandates the purchase of insurance, and in most cases, these policies are not inexpensive. Also for most plans, the person must fulfill a sizable deductible before any benefits are paid. For a family of four, if the woman who wanted birth control were healthy they could easily have to pay up to $5,000 (premiums and deductibles) before a single dollar was reimbursed.

So to encourage preventive care the ACA created a list of treatments, tests and so forth that policies must cover up front, before the deductible. The list includes colonoscopies, mammograms, chemotherapy to prevent breast cancer and birth control pills. Birth control pills are part of preventive care for most adult women under 50, and to be frank, it is a lot cheaper that the cost of having a baby.

Nor is there anything new in mandating that insurance coverage include birth control. But the right has made an issue anyway, and the Catholic Church has seen fit to make noise as well.

In his speech, Mike Huckabee chose to present affordable access to birth control as if it was about female libido - that with the current ACA policy, Democrats are showing that they don't trust women enough to control their libido. But even suggesting that tells you all you need to know about the Republicans and their notions about women. Birth control was never about female libido, but was in fact much more about male demand. In any case, it has always taken two to tango.

Terence McKenna


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