Drop That Fetus In The Bucket, Now!

Virginia state legislator John A. Cosgrove of Chesapeake, VA, a Republican who wears the unmistakable moustache of another historic maniac with similar social-planning tendencies, proves again that whatever female hole Republicans can find for "big government" to intrude into, they will attempt to pass a law for access.

To wit: the recent HB1677, "Report of Fetal Death by Mother," which sought to criminalize women who suffer miscarriages "without medical attendance." Under the bill, miscarrying Virginians would be criminals if they fail to report the "fetal death" to local law enforcement within 12 hours. Consider how this would work: You lose a child at three or eight or whatever weeks, by tragic misstep or biology. The fetus dies. You and the husband weep. Or perhaps you weep alone. You don't tell anyone. Not even a girlfriend.

But under the proposed Virginia law, you are required to inform a stranger with a badge and a gun of this event, filling out forms and more forms and perhaps heading to a precinct with said stranger to fill out more forms. You must name place of occurrence, your education, the sex of the fetus, your marriage status, your previous "deliveries," the date of your last normal menses, physician's estimate of gestation, the weight of the fetus, when the fetus died-information that normally no one but you and your doctor should know.

If you fail the regulation? As a Class 1 misdemeanor under Virginia law, the alleged crime would suffer the same punishment as statutory rape; arson; bomb threats; and carrying a concealed weapon while intoxicated. You could go to jail for up to a year. HB1677 was recalled from committee last week after wide criticism. But it signals yet again that the new cultural "Republicanism" has become at once socialist and nihilist in its attempted management of human affairs-but armored of course in the shine of "moral values," as are all fanatic political movements. It appears that among Republicans, the idea of government only works where it can either meddle in the most private affairs, such as love and conception, or in the lifelines of big businesses that make bombs or steal from shareholders and customers, but being "too big" to fail-the airline industry, for example-enjoy renewed profits as their failures are "socialized" onto the rest of us through tax breaks and bail-outs.

Consider another example of fetus worship. In Spokane, WA, a judge last December ruled that a pregnant woman whose husband had been beating her could not get a divorce-because she was pregnant. The child was not to be "illegitimized," the judge told reporters. Meanwhile, the Republican cult steamrolls on in its attempt to destroy the New Deal and the Great Society, which again amounts to a perverse equation: In the womb, you will love the new life; once born, cut all benefits. Republicans still don't seem to grasp the irony.