Yesterday, with blood still on the streets of Las Vegas following the country’s largest mass shooting in history, Congress got down to business. No, not gun control. Not an emergency aid bill for Puerto Rico. Not an overdue push to fund the now-expired CHIP program, so that nine million children can have health insurance. None of that. Instead, the esteemed House of Representatives wanted to remind women in America that they are all second-class citizens unworthy of making their own reproductive decisions. The House passed a ban on abortions past 20 weeks. For what it’s worth, the women seeking abortions at that stage generally are in life-or-death circumstances, whether it’s their own health which would fail if the pregnancy was carried to term, or the fetus would not survive either way. The House bill was openly based on junk science and they passed it anyway, because old white dudes be old-white-dudeing.
So it’s interesting – or perhaps not – that one of the Republican dudes who voted for this terrible f-cking bill was also revealed to be a raging hypocrite today. Meet Tim Murphy, the Republican congressman for Pennsylvania’s 18th district (the suburbs of Pittsburgh). Tim Murphy is 65 years old and married. That didn’t stop him from banging a 32-year-old lady. And when that lady had a pregnancy scare, Representative Tim Murphy urged her to have an abortion. Classic GOP.
Congressman Tim Murphy admitted earlier in the month that he had an extramarital affair with Shannon Edwards, a 32-year-old forensic psychologist. Details about Murphy’s relationship with Edwards have been made public as part of her divorce proceedings — and documents obtained by the Post-Gazette demonstrate the extent of the Republican politician’s hypocrisy in regards to reproductive rights.
In a text exchange between the couple, Edwards called Murphy out for posting anti-abortion statements on Facebook. “And you have zero issue posting your pro-life stance all over the place when you had no issue asking me to abort our unborn child just last week when we thought that was one of the options,” she wrote. Per the Post-Gazette: A text from Mr. Murphy’s cell phone number that same day in response says, “I get what you say about my March for life messages. I’ve never written them. Staff does them. I read them and winced. I told staff don’t write any more. I will.”
The Facebook post Edwards referenced in her text read: “The United States is one of just seven countries worldwide that permits elective abortion more than halfway through pregnancy (beyond 20 weeks). It is a tragic shame that America is leading the world in discarding and disregarding the most vulnerable.”
Murphy, it should be noted, is generally pretty popular in the anti-abortion realm. According to the Post-Gazette, he’s been endorsed by anti-abortion group LifePAC, is a member of the House Pro-Life Caucus, and has received praise by the Family Research Council. He’s also one of 181 other legislators who co-sponsored the 20-week abortion ban being voted on by the House on Tuesday evening.
Yeah, but it’s okay, right? Because he was a family-first Bible-thumper who said all the right things about abortion and women being sluts and he voted the exact way the pro-lifers wanted him to vote, so it’s totally fine that he banged a much younger woman and urged her to get an abortion when she had a pregnancy scare. You know it’s fine because he’s a white dude and it was probably her fault for getting pregnant in the first place, AMIRITE? The truth is, I’m only half joking – the actual true-believers and foot soldiers of the anti-choice movement will “forgive” him precisely because he votes their interests regardless of what he does and says in private. Those people don’t see it as hypocritical at all that on the same day we learned that he urged his mistress to have an abortion, he also voted to deny women in dire health circumstances to also seek legal abortions. That’s just business as usual.
Photos courtesy of Getty.
Stories like these reinforce my view that the GOP are truly soulless and cruel to the core.
+1
I dunno, I see this as more of “what do you expect from any member of Congress”…generally speaking those who seek out this position are usually ppl who are power hungry, fame seeking, narcissistic lying McLiars…policy comes second to personal gain. We elect “politicians”, not public servants.
@kaiko
No, don’t agree. Yeah, we know most all politicians are generally corruptible, lie &/or dribble vague word salads all the time. To the point there should be college prerequisite courses on deciphering political speak. Nevertheless, the GOP has taken their sleazy methods to a degree far beyond the dems.
The dems are more guilty of a lack of engagement and leadership with their constituents. While the GOP made a pack with devil – the far right cultural-conservatives and evangelists to lock-in voting blocks through out the south and mid west. Hence, why they are so successful at winning elections. It doesn’t matter to the GOP if they don’t really agree with the far-right social-conservative agenda. As long as they retain them as a loyal voting block, they will do what ever is required which is to lie, cheat and fabricate false realities to their constituents.
Stories like these reinforce the Republicans “family values” bull sh*t is just bullsh*t they use to manipulate people into voting against their economic interests. It’s so effing obvious I don’t get how it continues to work. Gah.
Upholding “family values” while this man is cheating on *his* wife. And demanding the abortion of *his* child. So hypocritical.
Exactly. The core of the GOP voters are often the ones who suffer the most financially from these policies. But politicians dangle the words “Christian” and “family values” and they get their vote.
yes, the party of guns, cutting people’s healthcare and denying humanitarian relief is the “pro-life” party. staggeringly hypocritical.
Family values = reinforcing male patriarchy.
So true. Abortion is bad until they need it. Healthcare is bad until they have a health scare. Gun control is bad until they get shot – and even then some of them don’t get it. I have to wonder how many of the Las Vegas victims are going to now be bankrupted by their unexpected health care costs on top of everything else…
I’ve lived in the South my whole life. You have no idea how many “pro lifers” have abortions. It’s staggering.
Because their circumstances are special and unlike anyone else’s. The rest of us are just vile sinners no matter what we do.
Yes, the only moral abortion is my own. I actually know of a girl who protested an abortion clinic one day, got an abortion (not at the clinic) the next day, and a week later was back to protesting. I can’t.
If you have time, read the interview of Dr. Willie Parker in Esquire in which he talks about exactly this. I think he said that those people always consider their circumstances to be special.
I read an article once called “The Only Moral Abortion is My Own” or something like that and it pretty much spelled it all out. Just like everyone thinks they’re an above average driver, everyone thinks it’s okay if THEY need an abortion because they have Very Good Reasons, but everyone else is a filthy amoral slut and is using the procedure for birth control because they are too lazy and slutty to either abstain or use birth control.
@Wilma- that was a really powerful, interesting read about a doctor doing incredibly important work. Thank you for recommending.
@Wren, I read that too. Staggering. http://www.prochoiceactionnetwork-canada.org/articles/anti-tales.shtml
What really interests me is that abortion is, statistically, as common amongst pro-life people as it is those for choice, and countries which have extreme bans often have very high abortion rates (the belief is that this is because they also make access to contraception very difficult, with inevitable consequences). The Guttmacher Institute has a lot of data on it all.
Wow. I just… Words fail me.
sickening.
But, sadly, not even surprising from a bible-banging, god-bothering hypocrite.
that wasn’t a bible he was a-banging there, sister
Reason #100001 why I never vote Republican.
I’m right there with you. This sh*t just makes my blood boil. It is 100% why I became a progressive. My 80yr old conservative father is on FB and (against my better judgment) I occasionally respond to some of his bullsh*t. One of his main whining points is, “How did you get so left, when your whole family isn’t?” Because you’re all f*cking pseudo-intellectual hypocrites! I already refuse to speak to one pro-trump brother, dear dad is next on my list at the rate our country’s politics are going. I don’t care if we’re ‘family.’ If you voted for ANY of these as*holes I have no f*cks left to give–I’m done with you. I’ve barely been able to sleep since November. But, the hits just keep on coming…And then the day before the Vegas shooting my father–who was repeatedly referred to Obama as a ‘Kenyan Muslim’ and has called Michelle Obama a ‘monkey’–claimed on FB that BO was ‘incompetent’ and did his ‘best to use race to destroy and divide our country’. Y’all, I LOST. MY. SH*T.
I am so far past, “Let’s discuss things and try to get along with Republicans for the greater good.” F*CK THEM ALL.
Reading this makes me so glad that my parents and brother are progressive sane compassionate people who miss Obama and desperately wanted Hillary to win. I realize some families aren’t quite as lucky when it comes to political ideologies and to an extent just plain old common decency for fellow citizens. I’m sorry. 🙁
I love you. That is all.
Oh man…I so understand your rage. Like I can feel it through my computer screen lol.
My parents and brother are all liberals but I had to stop engaging with a Trump-supporting aunt and uncle– had to do it for my own mental health.
I know this is probably incredibly hard on you but FWIW, I really respect your decision. Self-care during these trying times is an imperative and cutting them off doesn’t automatically mean cutting them OUT. Maybe when 45 is (hopefully) impeached you’ll be able to talk to them again..
I have learned that the base, the die hard red state republicans, do not give a sht about any skeletons these people may have. They would vote for Satan himself if he has a R after his name. Hypocrisy at its finest.
You are absolutely, 100% correct. Unfortunately, I have a number of “friends” who would (and have) voted for Satan because of the R.
Yep-and they pretty much did just that last November.
Poor Satan doesn’t even want to be compared to Dotard45. 😉
They DID vote for Satan’s representative. A vote for Trump is a vote for evil incarnate. I cannot see it any other way, any more.
What a major d**chebag!?!?
Because it’s fine when it’s convenient for you, but not when it’s about women having agency and being real humans.
Is it bad that I kind of love this? It’s just so rare for anyone in Congress’ blatant hypocrisy to be so swiftly proven and so widely disseminated. Will right wing media cover it? Probably not.
In the GOP world, the only moral abortion is their own
Of course he did. That’s what all respectful members of the party of family values do in their spare time. SMH.
Disgusting, but hardly surprising. The wealthy and powerful will always have the option of terminating a pregnancy, all the while denying that option to the most vulnerable in society.
THHHHHIIIIISSSSS all the live long day!!!!!!!
Money and power will always win out, regardless of anything or anyone else.
Cognitive dissonance at its finest.
Awesome.
The Republican Party is full of hypocrisy! The more they shout or condemn an issue you know that they have done it. Of course he wanted his mistress to get an abortion, but then turn around and help pass this law. The Christians who condemn LGBT community are the same ones who are having secret same sex affairs. I once saw this special or show about a once prominent Christian pastor who was found having multiple sex encounters with men. His wife was still with him and I kid you not said that the reason he had done that was because the devil made him do it to stop his great teachings.
“The more they shout or condemn an issue you know that they have done it.”
a-FRICKIN-men, chingona. it’s the whole “look over there!” ploy.
just like the virulently anti-LGBTQ dude, Toe-tappin’ Larry Craig, who got caught soliciting for random sex in an airport bathroom.
Yes-and then they say the accept Jesus as their personal savior and poof! All is right with the world.
I remember when such blatant hypocrisy would lead to resignations/defeats at the polls. Now? Nahhh-single issue voters are just unbelievable.
I’m sure a stunning number of Republican mistresses have had or were told, err, encouraged to have abortions. These politicians would be aborting babies at 8 months if it meant saving their career. The “family values” BS is just pandering to their idiot base. They don’t really believe or want it to apply to them. Wake up Republican voters.
President Tweeter wanted his girlfriend to abort Tiffany. Hard to believe he hasn’t paid for quite a few abortions if he was even partially as active as he claims.
Not even shocked by this story. This is the norm from the party of “family-values”…bunch of hypocrites!
Yes, old white dudes be old white duding but let us not forget that there are women who support this legislation. Women like Representative Diane Black from Tennessee, who proudly proclaims herself a nurse, although she hasn’t actually practiced nursing in decades, and who delighted in pushing for the repeal of the ACA because, in her words on the House floor, she was all about saving the unborn babies. Black was behind the totally unnecessary Conscience Act a year ago and is one of the major proponents for destroying Planned Parenthood.
Good point, but I put her in the same basket as the others. They are all mostly past reproductive age so these laws do not affect their own lives at all. She’s never going to find out at 20 weeks pregnant that the baby inside her will die and she will be forced to carry to term, risking her life in the process.
People have pointed these facts out to her. She doesn’t care. She is pure evil to the core.
Maybe SHE is past reproductive age but won’t someone think of her husband’s mistress?!?
You don’t have to be a white male to support and propagate white male patriarchy. You’re just cut from the same cloth and dumber for it since they’d never let you into the boy’s club at the end of the day, anyway.
my rep voted for this piece of crap bill. my new hobby is trolling his facebook.
Career killer for this shitheel? Nope!
Classic GOP is right. “Abortion is Murder!” (Unless it’s my side chick!)
Of course he did! A typical example of do as I say not as I do
Murphy should resign. But of course because he includes “Christian ” in his bio he can do whatever the hell he wants. Absolute pompous, self important hypocritical jackass.
I await the excuses from the garbage at the FAMILY RESEARCH COUNCIL. Let me guess? ” All sinners fall short of the glory of God.”
Does anyone know if FOX has touched this?
First: This jackass is from my state. He’s always been garbage, so I apologize.
Second: It’s not even just him. There’s another representative who voted for the bill caught doing the same thing years before. Scott DesJarlais has a wife who’s had two abortions and a mistress he pressured to do the same.
Third: The best part of this (and by best, I mean that it made my blood boil) was Murphy’s response that he doesn’t control the pro-life stuff that comes out of his office. Like, literally suggested that he isn’t responsible for stuff that affects MILLIONS OF WOMEN’S LIVES IN THIS COUNTRY.
OF COURSE HE DID. OF COURSE HE BLOODY WELL DID.
I’m not shocked or surprised. EVERY SINGLE ONE of these monkeys, deep down, is only pro-whatever as long as it doesn’t actually affect their lives. Actually, most people are like that. It’s all fine and dandy to be pro-life and lecture to others and posture about how moral you are, but the second, nay, the very nanosecond a pregnancy threatens their position or way of life? Kill it. Kill it with fire. I hate pro-lifers. They save nothing and nobody. They way they act, life is obviously not sacred to them, they just like to say so.
Because anti choicers are monsters. The end. I don’t care if they profes to care about “life,” when push comes to shove and there are actual needs for born humans, they aren’t anywhere.
It’s. about. controlling. women. Look, I get that many women wouldn’t have an abortion; I do not know what I would do in any given situation and I have never needed to avail myself of one, but we cannot vote anti choice. We can’t.
There are many religious people who feel government has to stay out of that decision. It’s just too complex and the woman simply has to be trusted to make the decision according to her own conscience. There are many ways to work to minimize abortions without just forcing women to remain pregnant against their will.
Such concern about “…discarding and disregarding the most vulnerable” when they are working at a fever pitch to strip away the ACA and let sCHIP die a slow and agonizing death.
The cognitive dissonance is just stunning.
He looks like, uh, someone who would have been performing human experiments in the 1940s, central Europe. And apparently just as compassionate.
My god. I went back to look and he really does!
Please tell me his wife left him, his children that he wanted born disowned his disgusting ass and his constituents are seeking his removal for being a hypocritical POS?!!! PLEASE tell me this man gets his!!! Ugh i know not all men but my God!!
The GOP base doesn’t care about family values or religion, if they did we won’t have Drumpf as a president because he has niether! They are the epitome of hypocrisy!
Read more about this guy here
http://www.post-gazette.com/news/politics-nation/2017/10/03/rep-tim-Murphy-pro-life-sought-abortion-affair-shannon-edwards-susan-mosychuk-pennsylvania-chief-of-staff-congress-emails-texts/stories/201710030018
Yes! There’s a whole other poay in how this guy texts while driving a carful of people and has caused turnover of 100 people in his office because he is such a dumb toxic rage-monster.
SO GLAD the lid is off THIS little stink-pot of a story!!!
The right is a lie, and they sold their morality as their strength when they have none. Everything someone else does that they don’t like is wrong but when they do the same thing any excuse is fine for their base. Melania is fine, but if she were a Democrat, then they would have dragged every speck of dirt from her past and shamed her into seclusion. Personally, I don’t care about her previous life, but the hypocrisy is just too much.
Their base has no idea they are being used by wealthy corporate interests but thrown distractions and make them feel superior when everything around them should tell them the opposite.
They have no critical thinking skills. None.
Hahahaha. Don’t you just LOVE the moral majority?!!
This dude should just have “Hypocrite” tattooed on his forehead
Yes. Capital letters.
To say that Rep. Murphy, is a farce and an embarrassment is really too mild. Sadistic, morally decrepit, and cowardly is more like it.
I know this is off topic but I just can’t with men anymore and their ridiculous views about women’s health.
I got into it with a group of male commentators on another site who were talking shit about breast cancer awareness month. They have no idea. They have no clue what we go through as women and honestly I don’t think most of them care. All they care about is themselves.
There has to be a special place in hell for Murphy and his ilk. He is so blatantly evil-looking, I can’t understand what’s attractive about him. There is no amount of money or power in the world worth it.
It was only a matter of time before another phony, holier than thou Republican got called out on their hypocrisy. This is the party of Henry “Youthful Indiscretion” Hyde, Mark “Hiking in the Appalachians” Sanford, Dennis Hastert, who was just released from federal prison this summer for sexually abusing minors, Mark Foley and Larry Craig.
We need more women in Congress. And not the airhead, “vote against your own gender so you can hang with the boys” types. The old rich white guys have got to go.
Amen! Also – love your screen name 🙂
Of course he did. His dick can fall off too.