Virginia Lawmaker Doesn’t Get Laid Because Of Ultrasound Bill
Virginia has just emerged from a contentious battle over a law that would mandate all women seeking abortions get invasive, transvaginal ultrasounds- and Del. Dave Albo attempted to lighten the mood on Friday by volunteering his own humiliation for everyone’s amusement. On the floor of the Virginia House, Albo jokingly recounted how the graphic rhetoric of the ultrasound debates thwarted a recent attempt to seduce his own wife, complete with bow-chicka-wow-wow soundtrack; but women’s health advocates and even general government critics aren’t laughing .
Apparently, the delegate had put his son to bed, poured his wife some wine, hit his “theme music,” and then turned on his big screen TV to find the Redskins (an aphrodisiac to Mrs. Albo?), when his own face appeared onscreen. It was a news report, and “the gentleman from Alexandria”– Democrat Dave Englin– was speaking graphically about transvaginal ultrasounds and accusing Albo of hating women.
At the end, Albo’s wife tells him, “I gotta go to bed.”
“If the gentleman’s plan was to make sure there is one less Republican in this world, he did,” joked Albo. He “demanded” an apology, and Rep. Englin reportedly obliged.
But internet commentors have almost universally panned Albo’s performance. Women’s health advocates are furious that Albo would joke about a law that many perceived as legalized rape, especially with his juvenile “trans v” phrasing.
“If you can’t say the word ‘vagina,’ you shouldn’t be making laws about it,” said one popular comment on Gawker.
Many others were just upset that an elected official would act so casually in a formal capacity. And Albo’s decision to joke about his big screen TV and being “really rich” in the middle of a recession didn’t endear him to anyone.
Personally, I think complaints are overblown considering the worst of mandate had already been scrapped; Albo doesn’t seem to have diminished or wasted anything as this particular debate is all but finished.
Furthermore, Albo’s comments were downright good-natured when compared to the abusive, hateful venom that much of his party attempts to pass off as “satire,” or the horrible things that are routinely said or implied about women seeking abortions. Albo clearly did not target women or his liberal opponents, but his own student-council-vice-president awkwardness.
More important than any single issue facing the US today is our capacity to work through our differences, a capacity that seems to be rapidly disappearing in a culture of “gotcha” media warfare and perpetual outrage. There are many, many things to be upset about in the current fight over women’s health, sexual health, and healthcare for the disadvantaged, but Del. Albo’s comments are not one of them.
What do you think? Did Albo disrespect the debate?
You make several valid points. It’s certainly true that when compared to the rhetoric of other politicians in the women’s rights debate, Dave Albo’s buffoonish performance is tame. So why have 175,000 people and counting viewed this performance on You-Tube? And of the tens of thousands of viewer comments on that and other sites featuring the video, why are so few of them making your point that he’s just being goofy? Indeed, you can scroll through pages before you find a single person not expressing genuine outrage. It’s a combination of reasons-First, Albo’s personal skeeviness oozes through the screen and leaves you wanting a shower. Second, you can tell he really doesn’t think its a big deal that he and his colleagues just barely failed in mandating a procedure that meets Virginia’s statutory definition of rape (and in case you hadn’t noticed, women and those who love them tend to take rape pretty seriously). Third, that ultrasound bill about which Albo was joking is just one a dozen transparently misogynistic and racist bills Albo’s colleagues have introduced this year, and his timing, in the midst of the national birth-control debate, could not have been more off. Fourth, folks recognize that Albo’s clownishness, while presented in a uniquely failing way, is not uncommon among our current state legislatures, which have made modern politics a cynical joke. Finally, what kind of person tells such tales about their wife in the chamber of the oldest legislative chamber in the western world?