According to Politico, Republican pressure on Todd Akin to withdraw will continue to intensify:

Rob Jesmer, executive director of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, underscored that effort in a private email to Senate chiefs of staff earlier this week, urging them to “keep up the pressure over the next several weeks.” One method, he suggested, was if senators publicly pressure Akin to step aside or directly lobby Akin and his son Perry Akin, who is his campaign manager.

One way to do this is for members to call or email Todd directly and explain to him that every movement is bigger than one person, and that for the good of all that he believes and has fought for, it is important that he step aside,” Jesmer wrote in the email obtained by POLITICO

But there’s more:

… Persistent chatter among Missouri political operatives is the possibility that Akin cuts a deal with Ann Wagner – who is running for the House seat he is vacating. The idea: allow Akin to continue serving in Congress so he can keep his seat and give Wagner a chance to take on McCaskill. Wagner didn’t rule out the possibility of a Senate run in a Thursday statement that criticized Akin’s comments.

The Politico article also floats a few other names of potential replacements, notably, for the first time I’ve seen it, that of Jo Ann Emerson, along with (ho-hum) John Brunner and Sarah Steelman. But it’s really tthe idea of switching races with Wagner that raises such a nauseating stench. First they tell us that Akin’s so befouled himself that the GOP presidential candidate himself has to implore him (Akin) to step down. Just about every GOP pol in the country has expressed the same, apparently requisite, horror and outrage. But when all’s said and done, they’re still willing to let ol’ Todd run for the House of Representatives?  

It’s nasty, but, from the point of view of pragmatic politics, I suppose it’s understandable.  Akin winning or loosing a race for a seat in what will probably remain a GOP-dominated House, no matter what, won’t hurt the party’s ambitions nearly as much as letting him stall the GOP drive to take back the Senate. So, if we can believe Politico, Official GOPdom may be willing to cut their losses and make peace with the obdurate Akin. The only people who would lose should this deal come to pass would a few odd souls who care about good government more than they care about the election prospects of the Republican party.

Senator Claire McCaskill demonstrates complete disdain for the 10 point lead that Rasmussen is trying to foist off on her:

@clairecmc

Rasmussen poll made me laugh out loud. If anyone believes that, I just turned 29. Sneaky stuff.

I usually take Rasmussen with a pinch of salt as well, but one can’t help wondering just why McCaskill’s so vehement about their results – especially since their bias seems to be running the wrong way. Remember the day. I can almost guarantee you it’ll be a cold day in July when you hear another politician trying to diss a poll that gives him/her a ten point lead.

Of course, we’ve also got a poll from Public Policy Polling (PPP), taken directly after the Akin flap, that shows no change from a month ago – Akin in the lead by one point.  This poll, however, excited some scepticism based on the sampling technique. Jim Geraghty of the National Review Online suggested that its sampling skewed toward Republicans. Of course, in this case, PPP would be showing a bias that contradicts the common perception of its sympathies.

And don’t forget, though, there’s noise that Akin is basing his decision to stay in the race, at least to some extent, on an internal poll that found a breakdown similar to that of PPP.

Todd Akin thinks that it’s the liberal media that’s been trying to get him to drop out – or so he tweets:

Todd Akin ‏@ToddAkin

I apologized but the liberal media is trying to make me drop out. Please stand w/ me tonight by signing my petition …

You’d think that if a fellow actually apologized for expressing his dishonest, stupid and harmful beliefs in an inelegant way, why then things would be all ginger-peachy. Just goes to show you how mean that liberal media actually is. Just think, if we didn’t know better, it might actually seem like it’s the entire Republican power structure running away from him like he’s radioactive.

Somehow, I bet we’ll hear more of this whining as brother Todd tries to hijack the wallets of the Christian right-wing in order to take up the slack that was left when the fleeing GOPers took their former financial bounty away. Of course, I’m betting that if Akin sticks it out and calls their bluff, the RNC and Crossroads GPS will soon kick their millions back in and start up the get-Claire machine within a couple of weeks. What’re they gonna do? If McCaskill wins, Democrats likely keep the Senate.

Of course, now that the GOP’s got Akin well marinated, he’s ready and primed for the McCaskill tenderizing treatment. Which is to say, baring the unspeakable, sooner or later, his goose is gonna be cooked.

Addendum: Read former State Senator Jeff Smith’s list of eleven reasons Akin didn’t and won’t quit. Best quip:

Missouri politicians who have in the past tried to negotiate with Akin describe it as sort of like trying to negotiate with Ahmadinejad. He is a zealot, in every sense of the word.

So Roy Blunt finally decided that the chorus condemning Todd Akin had reached sufficient decibel level that he could safly join in. Not all on his lonesome, however, but safely ensconced in a group of other of Missouri’s mainline GOP establishment, former U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft and former Senators Kit Bond, John Danforth and Jim Talent, who, jointly, want us to know that:

We do not believe it serves the national interest for Congressman Todd Akin to stay in this race. The issues at stake are too big, and this election is simply too important. The right decision is to step aside. …

Blunt, it seems, is also willing to let it be kown that, as a very influential Republican, he has spoken to Akin privately several times since he (Akin) managed to put the GOP’s anti-women policy proposals in the spotlight, “urging” him to, basically,  get the hell out of Dodge.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, the GOP has been preparing its 2012 electoral platform. And guess what? Except for the pseudo-medical mumbo-jumbo that half of the GOP probably believes – at least when safely in private – there’s almost no light between what Akin was saying about abortion policy and what the rest of the GOP wants to enshrine in the document that is intended to encapsulate what they stand for:

CNN reported on Monday that the draft of the GOP’s official 2012 platform calls for a federal ban on abortion with no exception for rape and incest survivors — the same policy Akin was trying to defend when he asserted that victims of “legitimate rape” have a natural bodily mechanism that prevents them from getting pregnant.

Nor could there be when you stop to think about it. After all, the VP pick, Rep. Paul Ryan, very publicly joined Brother Todd to promote legislation that would have denied federal funding for abortions in the case of “forcible” rape – a somewhat more precise way to say what Todd meant when he was talking about “legitimate” rape. Ryan has also sponsored “personhood” legislation that would effectively give the full panoply of legal rights to a fertilized cell, while denying the rights of the woman involved in hosting it.

And even worse, the personhood part of this radical anti-abortion brew has been endorsed by Mitt Romney. Arguably, the “personhood” strategy is even more dangerous than the “forcible rape” ruse to limit abortions. Some critics hold that personhood legislation could be used to even ban contraceptives. Of course, all that was before Akin’s ineptitude turned up the heat, and Romney’s campaign decided that he’d better forget about his former pandering to the radical anti-abortion base and pretend to be “moderate” – at least for now.

The real question for Messrs. Blunt, Ashcroft, Talent, and Bond is to ask how they can unload on poor, dim Akin and still support the GOP platform this year. And then we will want to know if Roy and his pals will ask Romney and Ryan to once and for all, forcefully repudiate their past, embarrassing radicalism – or step down for the good of the party?

The wait begins. For what it’s worth, I’m betting Akin stays in the Senate race. Why do I believe this? I don’t know how to say this delicately, so here goes:  Akin’s dumb as a post and so embued with a self-righteous sense of God-directed mission that what passes for common-sense in the everyday world of politics can easily roll off his back. It’s hard to imagine that, after winning the primary, he’ll go back on what he seems to think is God’s plan to bring the true believers to the Senate where they can turn back the tide of unsanctified – at least not without a big fight. I’m betting that for Akin it’s God and self-delusion that will come before the good of the his party. But you never know …

Nevertheless, what is true is that the ball’s in Akin’s court. His first step was to make a little propitiatory video to tell his supporters what a good guy he is and how sorry he is about generating a negative PR firestorm. It’s fair to say that this tactic may be generating just as much negative response as positive – Akin’s folks were forced to shut down the comments on YouTube. A typical comment:

When it’s a illegitimate apology, my brain finds ways to shut the whole thing out.

But it’s still a waiting game. Ed Kilgore strikes the dominant tone in the left blogsphere:

… And now, having pretty much depleted their arsenal, anxious Republicans are waiting on him, powerless in the end to dispose of him instantly as they want to do. The timing is terrible, since this rare peek into the churning minds of antichoicers coincides with the Republican Convention Platform Committee’s quadrennial rubber-stamping of a position on abortion identical to Akin’s.

It’ll be an interesting day. But at the moment, it’s Todd Akin who’s in the driver’s seat.

TPM’s Pema Levy weighs in:

Since Missouri is a red-leaning state where Akin previously held an edge over Democratic Sen. Claire McCaskill in the polls, it’s not inconceivable that Akin could recover and go on to win the seat. … .

What will prove more difficult is winning back the support of the GOP establishment. If Akin stays in the race, it will be with the support of the Christian right, who stood by during the fallout Monday, but likely without his party’s infrastructure behind him.

TPM’s Josh Marshall suggests that the situation is more complex than it might seem:

For Akin, there’s a different problem. Yes, a lot of Missouri Republicans don’t think he said anything wrong. And most of those who do still don’t want to vote for Claire McCaskill. But consider that Republicans across the country have gone on record saying that Akin is an offensive idiot who isn’t worthy of being a senator. Over time that’s going to be a hard burden to carry through 10 weeks, especially if you start out at a tie.

Jonathan Bernstein offers an analysis of the pluses and minuses of the money situation that Akin faces:

… if the Republican Party network is united against Akin, then there are not going to be any positive cues, and there are not going to be any ungodly sums of money. On the other hand, if some party groups, including a significant subset of the GOP-aligned partisan press, stick with Akin, then he very well could benefit. …

The problem with all this insightful political analysis, though, is that it doesn’t take account of just how delusional right-wing cranks like Akin really are. It’s possible, that the Party aparatus may make him see reason. Heck, it’s even possible, given the vein of irrationality in current Missouri politics, a strain that produced Akin in the first place,  that he could stay in and – horrors – win. Right now I betting that the pull of the miraculous will be stronger for Brother Todd  than the voice of reason. Akin has always demonstrated the super hubris only ever manifested by humble servants of the fundamentalist Christian God.

Grab the popcorn; we’ve got a couple months left until November and GOP court jester Todd Akin will evidently be around during the whole time so we can count on a few more big belly laughs between now and then. Akin discussed his decision go on with his campaign, despite his recent “legitimate rape” gaffe. with with fellow right-wing fantasist, Mike Huckabee on Huckabee’s radio program:

According to Talking Points Memo (TPM), Akin also made the following statement:

I also know that people do become pregnant from rape and I didn’t mean to imply that that wasn’t the case, […] It does happen.

So why did he say the opposite? Does he mean that he knows it now, but he didn’t yesterday? TPM also noted that Sunday Akin tried to excuse himself by saying that he meant “forcible” rape, and not “legitimate” rape, from which I suppose we should infer that his apologies are directed at the true believers and consist of no more than his mea culpas for failing to use the requisite code, and thereby embarrassing like-minded, but more discrete members of his party.

Want to talk about chutzpah though? TPM also reports that the supposedly contrite Akin finished his interview not only by invoking 9/11 (a lesson he must have learned during the Bush years), but he even asked GOPers calling on him to step down to donate money to his campaign. You see what I mean about two more months of unending – if mindless – entertainment?

UPDATE:  Hell hath no fury like the wrath of wingers exposed as charlatans. Which is to say, Akin’s SuperPAC support has already started drying up, and the chorus of GOP condemnation is growing steadily mightier. Just about the only person – apart from Dana Loesch – who thinks Akin should stay in the race is Claire McCaskill, who piously observes that national GOP has no right to dictate to Missourians who elected Akin fair and square. Charitable of her, isn’t it.

UPDATE 2: As per TPM, Todd Akin now “stands alone,” no GOP suppot, mega pressure being applied to get him out before tomorrow’s deadline. But would support re-materialize if he sticks in there? Otherwise, GOP loses Senate for sure. Stay tuned …

UPDATE 3: There are rumblings that Akin’s caving, getting ready to quit. Will he or won’t he? The suspense builds … . Possible replacements:

… include three former senators: John Ashcroft, Jim Talent, and Kit Bond. Other names being mentioned include former Ambassador Ann Wagner, who is running for Akin’s now-vacant seat; and Auditor Tom Schweich

Or – wait for it – maybe John Brunner.  Wasn’t he intended to be the anti-Akin in the first place – old,white, male and utterly, safely predictable? The only Republican left out of this list is Sarah Steelman. Wonder why?

After releasing what TPM characterized as a “tepid” response to the Akin “legitimate rape” statement yesterday, Romney seems to have finally decided which way the wind is blowing, and today issued a far more forceful statement:

“Rep. Akin comments on rape are insulting, inexcusable, and, frankly, wrong,” Romney told National Review. “Like millions of other Americans, we found them to be offensive.”

Many commentators have noted, however, that the substance of Akin’s comments about the exception for rape have been endorsed by both Romney and his VP choice, Paul Ryan. In fact, Paul Ryan, was fairly full-throated in his support of legislation that would have limited federal funding for abortions to cases of “forcible” rape, another way to talk about “legitimate” rape. The seeming contradiction is raising questions among the faithful, as indicated in this tweet:

Kyle Luebke ‏@kylejl89

@streitfeldcnn I wonder why #Ryan supports banning it in cases of rape then. Is #RomneyRyan trying to hide their true position?

Ed Kilgore captures the fine points of the GOP dilemma that has been forced to the forefront by Akin’s bumbling:

The enduring significance of Akin’s “gaffe” (which meets the Kinsley Gaffe definition of an utterance that reveals the pol’s true feelings) may be to force anti-choicers in one direction or the other: towards the morally repugnant view that rape and incest victims need to be forced to carry pregnancies to term, and the morally inconsistent position that a zygote’s status and rights depend on the circumstances of its conception. Defining away rape won’t cut it any more.

Of course there is a third way and it is the path that  our recent experience tells us we can expect the Romney/Ryan team to choose: obfuscate and create confusion. It seems to be working as far as their dishonest effort to claim that it’s actually the Obama Administration that will cut Medicare.  This strategy suggests that there’s no compelling reason to try to be intellectually consistent, which is in line with the Romney campaign’s decsion to keep the candidate’s actual positions as hazy as possible; as a Romney campaign staffer declared:

Campaigns that are about specifics, particularly in today’s environment, get tripped up

Evidently, Todd Akin didn’t get that memo. Sadly for him, the “specifics” he dredged up are spurious, pseudo-medical sounding garbage that have been used by anti-abortion fanatics for decades to imply that all women who get abortions are sluts. The task his gaffe sets for  for the rest of us? We can try to get some clarity from Romney and Ryan about where they really stand on women’s welfare issues, with the all-out zealots or the politically cautious zealots.

I guess it was only a matter of time until St. Louis’ shrillest contribution to the world of punditry, Dana Loesch, would chime in on Rep. Todd Akin’s claims about the biological impossibility of rape victims becoming pregnant (h/t The Turner Report):

Seems to me like Akin was trying to fit medical explanation into a soundbite. Not the best statement, but some are stretching it majorly.

As Randy Turner notes, it wasn’t a soundbite, but an interview with a sympathetic interviewer. Nor, my poor benighted Ms. Loesch, is there a credible “medical explanation” behind Akin’s absurd claims. Evidently, Todd isn’t the only one to fall for junk science claims that happen to be ideologically convenient.

Loesch’s outrage about the treatment Akin is receiving is, however,  understandable when you realize that she thinks the belief that a rape victim should be forced to carry her rapist’s child to term on a par with attempting to discourage the use of infant formula. As Turner notes, among other of her inane efforts to shift attention to the horrors of left-wing policy, Loesch tweeted in response to criticism of Akin (whose facebook page has, incidentally, been deluged with angry comments):

Michael Bloomberg wants to treat moms who use formula as criminals in NYC. What was that about “creepy old men.”

Of course, Loesch is also guilty of hyperbole here since Bloomberg’s proposed regulation of infant formula would not prohibit its use by women unable to breast feed or just determined to bottle feed. While women may be inconvenienced, nobody would be “criminalized.” Is it asking too much that these folks try to be accurate when they’re attempting to trivialize the major faux pas of their dimmer colleagues?

For years Rep. Todd Akin said one outrageous thing after another and it was largely ignored. There’d maybe be a little blog chatter and a small newspaper article or two; it’s unlikely that many of his constituents even knew about his latest dumb pronouncement. Running for statewide office, however, is a different kettle of fish altogether and the fact that Akin may not only be a tad too far out there, as well as lacking in the skills to disguise that fact, has become apparent even to some of his fellow travelers. Following is a sample of some of the fallout from today’s Akinism:

“Akin On ‘Legitimate Rape’ Comment: ‘I Misspoke'”. Offers the Akin team’s efforts at damage control. TPM notes, though, that Akin fails to address the “legitimate” rape comment.

“Conservative Activists Call On Akin To Quit Race After ‘Legitimate Rape’ Comment” and “Growing Number Of Conservatives Call On Akin To Withdraw After ‘Legitimate Rape’ Comments”Sample twitter comments: “Todd Akin ought to step the heck down,” “I know I’m about to piss someone off, but Akin’s team isn’t up for this kind of fight,” and “I think we may have a Torricelli situation here.”

Akin “Outburst Will Put Pressure On Romney-Ryan”. This article notes that Akin’s comments are already being tied to Ryan’s support for restrictive abortion legislation:

The Obama campaign was already mobilizing an effort to highlight Ryan’s abortion views before Akin’s explosive comments. That effort will likely get an early kick-start Monday morning, as Sen. Claire McCaskill, Akin’s opponent, sits down with MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.”

“McCaskill Calls Akin’s Rape Comments ‘Beyond Comprehension'”:

It is beyond comprehension that someone can be so ignorant about the emotional and physical trauma brought on by rape,” said McCaskill. “The ideas that Todd Akin has expressed about the serious crime of rape and the impact on its victims are offensive.

And there were those who wondered why McCaskill’s people were so jubilant when Brother Todd won his primary.

UPDATE:  The Huffington Post gives us the Romney camp’s response to the publicity Akin has directed their way – which is that, of course, they support abortion in cases of rape.  Sadly, though, in the case of Ryan at least, that just isn’t true. As HuffPo points out, Ryan was a big advocate of the “it-isn’t-rape-unless-it-hurts” HR3 last year, not to mention a co-sponsor of a “personhood” bill that would have endowed human zygotes with full legal rights. Of course, obfuscating Ryan’s position with regard to abortion should be a cinch for a duo so determined to sow confusion about their controversial policy proposals.

Every politician slips once and awhile. Many tend to be more regularly gaffe prone, and lots of current Tea Party types have some pretty questionable opinions. But, so far as I know, only Rep. Todd Akin (R-2), Claire McCaskill’s senatorial election opponent, manages to say something foolish and offensive on just about every day of his campaign.  His latest: women who are victims of “legitimate” rape, rarely get pregnant:

Talking Points Memo (TPM) summarized the offending comments:

First of all, from what I understand from doctors [pregnancy from rape] is really rare,” Akin told KTVI-TV in an interview posted Sunday. “If it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down.”

Akin said that even in the worst-case scenario – when the supposed natural protections against unwanted pregnancy fail – abortion should still not be a legal option for the rape victim.

“Let’s assume that maybe that didn’t work, or something,” Akin said. “I think there should be some punishment, but the punishment ought to be on the rapist and not attacking the child.”

And then TPM noted that, contrary to Akin’s junk science beliefs:

A 1996 study by the American Journal of Obstetricians and Gynecologists found “rape-related pregnancy occurs with significant frequency” and is “a cause of many unwanted pregnancies. The study found an estimated “32,101 pregnancies result from rape each year.”

Almost as striking as Akin’s emphasis on “legitimate” rape, and his credulity when it comes to biology, is his belief that abortion in cases of rape has something to do with punishment. His failure to even entertain the idea that forcing a woman to carry her rapist’s child to term might be damaging to her welfare only underlines how insignificant the welfare of women and, in cases of rape, the unwanted child, is to anti-abortion fanatics.