Republican Virginian State Senator Thinking About Running for Congress, Repealing Law Against Spousal Rape

Well that's just swell!

Caution: Commenters point out, rightly, that I am making some assumptions based upon a short clip which is, conveniently enough, absent context. He could have been speaking of the evidentiary difficulty in such cases -- I don't know. I'm looking into it to find out. So far, I continue seeing only the left talking about this, and only citing the video. No one even will say what H.B. 488 was about.

Update: Laurie David's Cervix seems to have found a reference in the Washington Post which clarifies:

From a Wapo Letter to the Editor from Feb 24 2002:

Regarding the issue of whether a woman can be raped legally by her husband, which the Virginia House of Delegates voted recently to change ["Virginia House Backs Bill to Outlaw Wife Rape," Metro, Feb. 8]....

Black and Del. Kenneth R. Melvin (D-Portsmouth) express concern about wives who cry rape falsely. Black says that changing the rape law could put a husband in "enormous fear of the damage to his reputation" in the event that a wife filed a false rape claim.

So yes, in 2002, it appears that Virginia did not yet have a law criminalizing rape by spouse, and the House voted in favor of it. But Dick Black objected to on evidentiary grounds. Commenters are now telling me he ultimately voted in favor of it, despite the concerns he announced.

That ain't gonna fly, people.

The post as previously written follows:

I am getting a little sick of seeing the words "Republican Virginian State Senator" together like this.

Hey Republican Virginian State Senators -- maybe sit this one out a while, huh? You've done enough.

This is going to start a fight, but I think it's a fight that must be had, whether it is upsetting or not.

There are various factions who are pushing fairly unpopular political ideas. They defend doing so by noting these are their "principles" and such.

First, let me say something about these being principles: Fine. We cannot have a fight over principles and expect to persuade each other. People stand their ground on principles, and I can't tell anyone who supports an unpopular position that it is "wrong."

These things are subjective. Yes, they're subjective, not "objective." People always claim their principles are objective, but that fact that Man A and Man B take precisely opposite positions on what each alleges to be an "objective" matter of principle demonstrates they are in fact subjective.

So I can't tell this guy, Dick Black, that he's "wrong" that a husband cannot be convicted of raping a spouse in any way that is likely to persuade him.

One's principles are one's own, and they're hard to challenge and almost impossible to change.

But here is what is objective: Hard cold data -- polls and the like -- that demonstrate that some positions are so far outside the mainstream to be political poison.

We used to be a smarter party about this. But the political fashion within the GOP has become "YOLO" of late. People who are otherwise rational individuals have begun deciding that it doesn't matter if the plank against birth control has 10% support and 88% opposition*, YOLO, whatever, we're going to go down in flames because our principles demand it.

One can take whatever positioned principle one likes. A man who is right does not need a poll to tell him so, or to justify his beliefs. The truth, it is said, makes a majority of one.

But many people seem to be taking that idea to mean that it's now responsible, even virtuous, to remain studiously ignorant of where actual political opinion lay. That is, that only a Coward would bother checking the numbers to see if a particular position had any chance of carrying the day, or, conversely, sinking the entire statewide ticket in a major election.

It is one thing to say "I don't need a poll to justify my principles." That is a correct position to take.

But it is entirely another thing to say "I don't need to be informed about polls at all in making tactical political decisions about who is best poised to actually deliver the bulk of my political agenda." To say that is solipsistic, indulgent, and lazy, in that it makes up a silly false reason for not doing one's homework.

Polls can't tell you what the right position is-- that can only be told by a man's conscience.

But polls can tell you what the winning position will probably look like.

I don't believe this guy will will a primary, so I don't think he'll wind up losing a House seat (or, worse yet-- winning a House seat, and becoming an albatross around every conservative's neck).

But I'm not very certain in that belief. Not as certain as I'd like to be. I'd like to think that grassroots voters are still capable of making sound tactical political decisions. Well, actually, they are so capable. It's just that the will to make sound tactical decisions might not be there anymore.

Sound tactical decisions have become very unfashionable of late.

There are elements of the grassroots which are acting very irresponsibly, almost gleefully reckless like a teenager with the parents away and the keys to the car, calling out "YOLO!" with abandon.

YOLO is not a wise strategy in life and it's no better in politics.

So yeah, I imagine this Don Black character will lose, or be dissuaded from seeking national high office.

But I'm a lot more worried about this than I would be during a non-YOLO! political cycle.

* My error; corrected. I forgot which position polled at this catastrophically bad level. I originally wrote the no-abortion-in-cases-of-rape position polled 10/88; actually, it's the anti-birth control one.

Thanks to Anon Y. Mouse for pointing out the numbers didn't sound right.

Second Correction/Caution: Commenters are cautioning that we don't really know what this guy was talking about -- maybe he was just making a point about how difficult it would be to prove such a rape, not that they shouldn't be contrary to law.

At first I dismissed this, but I realize now there is greater ambiguity than I first thought.

So, I am currently looking for a longer explanation of this particular quote, what he was talking about, what the bill under question (H.B. 488) actually was, etc.

posted by Ace at 04:59 PM

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