Spray tan and finger-wag enthusiast Jan Brewer is doing something very non-Brewerish — she’s backin’ the hell up offa Planned Parenthood in Arizona.
What?!
I KNOW.
Via Robin Marty at RH Reality Check:
Surprisingly, Brewer refused to do it.
“We went down that route last year. We lost,” reporter Howard Fisher of the Capitol Times reports her saying. According to Fisher, “The governor said she sees no reason to pick a new fight now—only to get slapped down again in court.”
Well golly, Jan. Way to go.
Sitll, you’ll have to excuse me if I decline to give her too much credit. Our favorite leather-faced governor doesn’t have a whole lot going on upstairs. For all we know, she just doesn’t want to waste state funds relitigating a lawsuit they already lost because she has other plans for the money — like searching for all those decapitated heads that the Messican cholos are littering all throughout the desert, after they cross the border, take our jerbs, and chop off our goddamn heads.
Stay vigilant, Arizonians. Arizonans? Meh.
***I wrote about Arizona’s attempt to defund Planned Parenthood last year. Read all about it here and here, if you’re so inclined.
[via RH Reality Check]
[cross-posted at ABLC]
oldster
Well, if she is like most conservatives who see the light, then the cause is simple:
someone very close to her, probably in her immediate family, needed to have an abortion.
And all of a sudden, she takes a much more liberal view of the matter.
See Sen. Portman’s recent evolution on gay rights, for instance.
Patricia Kayden
A bit of good news. At least she understands that the courts can reign her in.
ranchandsyrup
I’m surprised. I’m also surprised that brewer has it in her to surprise anyone.
Origuy
Is our wingnuts learning?
Schlemizel
to paraphrase a true American genius:
Is our governors learning?
Gin & Tonic
@Patricia Kayden: Rein, not reign. Sorry, but this is a pet peeve of mine.
Grammar Police Badge #189
karl
@oldster: A possibility, but with absolutely no evidence.
More likely, as Brewer has always been more of a business shill than a moral majoritarian, is that she’s following her real constituency here — the chamber of commerce — now that there’s no election looming.
maya
Wise idea looking for those heads in the desert instead. Might lead to a new tourist sports attraction – ‘Zona Bowling.
Frankensteinbeck
Perhaps she found being slapped down by the courts embarrassing and doesn’t want to go through it again. The delicacy of their feefees is a major conservative motivator.
karl
@ranchandsyrup: She surprised a lot of us after replacing Napolitano by trying (briefly) to be more of a centrist. Our always insane Republican legislature came down hard on her and she quickly went even wingnuttier than in the old days. And when the last election came around she got even worse.
jon
The Arizona AG’s office needs all the money it can to stop the immense, Western Civilization-on-the-brink threat of the city of Bisbee recognizing civil unions.
ranchandsyrup
@karl: didn’t follow that closely back in the early days of her administration. Thanks for the expanded view.
muddy
C’mon, you don’t get a face like that with spray tan. That’s the real thing, give her credit.
Mnemosyne
My guess is that she talked to Rick Perry and said, “Wait, how many new babies are you guys gonna have to pay for now that you killed Planned Parenthood?” As others have said, she does seem to be more money-based than morals-based, so having an extra few thousand mouths to feed would have a pretty big impact on her decisions.
beltane
@Mnemosyne: And Brewer also seems to be more of a racist than a Godbotherer so this was not so much of a surprise. Not only would she have to pay for a lot of extra babies, she’d have to pay for a lot of extra brown babies.
RobertDSC-iPhone 4
Nice job, Desert Barbie.
Mnemosyne
@beltane:
At this point, I’ll grab onto any faint sign of common sense coming from a Republican, no matter what it’s based on.
And for those who ask what the difference is between this and Cole lovin’ him some Rand Paul, I will point out that Brewer actually took action using her office rather than just making a speech that sounded real good.
MattR
The top headline at Think Progress is currently “In Just Three Months, States Proposed An Astonishing 694 Provisions About Reproduction” That covers the 1st qtr of 2013 and includes sex ed, contraception and abortion. (Here’s a link to the actual study)
David Hunt
@oldster:
I highly doubt it. Or let me be more clear. I don’t have the slightest clue about the abortion decisions of anyone in Brewer’s immediate family, although someone in that group having an abortion wouldn’t surprise me. What I doubt is that it would change her opinion one whit.
I read numerous accounts of abortion providers of finding themselves doing the procedure for women who spend large amounts of time outside clinics trying to keep someone from getting an abortion. The providers know this because the women tell them. It almost never changes the women’s opinions. Their abortion is necessary and good. They’re not like all those sluts who go around killing their babies so they can have all-night orgies.
If someone in Brewer’s family had an abortion I don’t believe it would change her policy choices. I think that she’s just not up for re-election and doesn’t need to through a boatload of money (and time) on something that’s already been litigated.
Yutsano
@muddy: That is primo sun-dried leather on her face right there. You see it all over the Valley of the Sun. One would think desert dwellers would know how to read SPF on a bottle or something.
BArry
“For all we know, she just doesn’t want to waste state funds relitigating a lawsuit they already lost because she has other plans for the money…”
No, there’s not a GOP politician in the country who doesn’t spend like a drunken sailor on anything that *they* want.
johnny aquitard
Maybe she finally dried the hell out. I heard the brain of a drunkard begins to function again once she quits the sauce. What’s left of it, at any rate.
muddy
@Yutsano: At her age, there wouldn’t have been sunscreen when she was young.
J.D. Rhoades
“We went down that route last year. We lost”
Since when has that ever stopped them?
muddy
I remember using Coppertone as a kid. Then when they started using spf numbers it turned out that rated a 4. Still, it was better than nothing. I don’t remember people getting into sunscreen a lot until well into the 80’s.
Altho I have to say she does look like someone that would go to tanning beds to “get a base”.
shortstop
@efgoldman: Yeah, but nobody used it then. She’s got at least 25 years on me, and we didn’t use it when we were kids. And my parents were the fretful type who fussed constantly about our health.
shortstop
@muddy:
Doesn’t she? The fact that she walks around with a deep tan in 2013 pretty much establishes her cluelessness on this front.
Mnemosyne
@shortstop:
I think my parents used it on me, but I have the kind of skin that burns after 5 minutes of direct sun, so it was more to prevent a nasty burn that I would be whining about for days than for any health reasons.
Yutsano
@shortstop: I was born in 1972, and my mom used it on me in Hawai’I but only because I was a baby. In California my brother and I never used it. But my mom thought our Native genes would keep any really bad burns from hqppening. I know that when I’d get back from San Diego (I used to spend every 4th down there, good times!) I’d look like an Israeli. Funny thing is my hair gets darker when it gets more sun. But yeah there was a whole generation that rarely if ever used it. And my Welsh Canadian friend gets skin cancer. What a funny world.
raven
@Yutsano: I have a scabbed nose in all my school pictures in Califorina. They were taken at the start of school and we lived at the beach and on the ballfields all summer with zip protection. I have a MD friend and she is married to another Nam vet. She said, “It’s not whether or not you’re going to get skin cancer it’s just a matter of when”. Double whammy.
jon
Meanwhile, in Bisbee….
Dickish response ensued.
Cacti
Wow.
This might be the most sensible thing Jan has done in her entire tenure.
Patricia Kayden
@Gin & Tonic: You got me.
ottercliff
What was the name of that movie she was in back in thirties where she screams “I’m meltinggggg”?