Seven days closer to the 2012 election, here’s a look at the political week that was….

  • With the news that Rick Santorum would be “suspending” his campaign for the Republican nomination we’ve now switched into the general election season.
  • The general election is going to be really long and silly.  We are only one day in and controversial comments by CNN Democratic commentator Hilary Rosen have led to a back and forth over who has it worse stay at home moms or moms who work and raise kids at the same time.  Rosen’s inarticulate comment about Ann Romney “never work[ing] a day in her life” has set off a firestorm which I’m sure will die out once someone else says something controversial.
  • The rebirth of the “mommy wars” obscures the real issue which is that Mitt Romney has a problem with women voters as a result of his actual policy positions on important issues like women’s reproductive health care and pay equity.
  • Congressman Allen West (R-FL) thinks at least 80 congressional Democrats are closet communists.  No, seriously he said that and apparently modern day McCarthyism is no big deal.
  • This week Arizona became the 6th state to pass a 20 week abortion ban joining Alabama, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Nebraska, North Carolina and Oklahoma.  The ban makes it a crime for a doctor to perform any abortion after 20 weeks which really ends up being 18 weeks since the law states that life begins when the woman last had her period and not the moment of conception.