Republican Exemplifies De Facto Republican Position on Abortion
By 
In a move that will go down in the annals of Washington as “predictable,” the staunchly pro-life Rep. Tim Murphy might be pro-life when it comes to his voting record; today, he voted in favor of the House’s 20-week abortion ban. But he isn’t exactly pro-life when it comes to his own personal pursuit of consequence-free extramarital sex.
The Pennsylvania Republican’s “no abortions except for my mistress” stance was revealed today, when the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette successfully unsealed the divorce proceedings of Shannon Edwards, the formerly married woman with whom Murphy was having an affair until recently. Murphy admitted to the affair in September. Edwards, a forensic psychologist—it’s all so Shondaland!—exchanged texts with Murphy earlier this year wherein she implied that the anti-abortion legislator had personally encouraged her to have an abortion during a pregnancy scare.
In response to an anti-abortion post on the Congressman’s Facebook page in January, Edwards texted, “And you have zero issue posting your pro-life stance when you had no issue asking me to abort our unborn child just last week when we thought that was one of the options.”
It’s not just that Murphy is trying to take away a critical freedom from American women based on alleged moral arguments he obviously doesn’t believe. It’s that he can do so safe in the knowledge that irrespective of the legal regime any woman he knocks up will have access to safe abortions. The only question is whether this should be extended to all women, that the answer is quite obviously “yes.”