The fact that she would make women pay for rape kits is obscene. It leaves me, one mouthy dame, speechless and sick inside.

The reason it doesn’t make sense to have the perpetrator pay is simple: In the U.S., only 50% of rapes result in an arrest, and of those, only 16% of those who are actually charged with rape are convicted and made to pay for their crime (in other words, serve a prison sentence). This means that the vast majority of rape victims have no identified perpetrator to be billed for a rape kit.

(statistics sourced from: http://www.pcar.org/about_sa/stats.html)

Because tax payers pay for all the testing and equipment required to investigate other crimes like murder, assault, robbery, and poaching.

If she really cared about the expense to the government, she’d charge people who were robbed or assulted, she’d charge the families of murder vicitims, she’d make moose pay.

Oh wait, she does that last thing too.

yes the perpetrator should ideally be charged, but what if charges aren’t pressed, or the perpetrattor is found Not guilty? I like Palin, but I certainly do think she should answer questions regarding this story. I find it hard to believe she’s really that insensative, she does need to explain herself though!

A real victim restitution fund, funded by criminals doing productive labor in prison, could pick up some of the burden. There are almost insurmountable political obstacles to that ever happening.

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think about that, its not a medical test. Its forensic evidence collection. Insurance companies footing the bill for a police investigation? isnt that why people PAY TAXES, for city services like fire and POLICE.

Under Sarah Palin’s administration, Wasilla cut funds that had previously paid for the medical exams and began charging victims or their health insurers the $500 to $1200 fees. Sarah Palin had a direct role in this and there for knowledge that and no plausible deniability about the issue. This is confirmed by the Wasilla budget documents available online

http://www.cityofwasilla.com/index.aspx?page=136

To all you doubting Thomas types you might want to check out Jacob Alperin-Sheriffs piece here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jacob-alperinsheriff/sarah-palin-instituted-ra_b_125833.html

He did a nice investigative piece with links and interviews with Plains former police chief. She knew she was dong this to victims of a violent devastating crime. That’s not the kind of heartless, money motivated, anti womens issue person i want a heartbeat away from the presidency. i can only image what shes do to save a couple bucks in that position.

Possession of a vagina doesn’t someone a women’s candidate, their position on the issues does. The more we learn about her, the more i worry about the future of women’s rights and issues in this Country if she were to be elected and the more I’m personally dedicated to working to get the other guy elected.

Jenny

Aside from the fact that you missed my point, which was we shouldn’t be adding victims to the pile, the current justice system we have works haltingly when it works at all, and in any event offers little or no real justice to victims. Giving a rapist jail time, where he will likely end up raped himself, and maybe killed, then if he survives, be stigmatized and desocialized forever may satisfy our bloodlust, but it does nothing to provide restitution to the victim.

Some states have restitution programs, but the majority just put them in jail (if they can find and convict them ) to rot, incurring fantastic expenditures to be paid by the taxpayer, while benefitting the victim not at all. In the current system “everyone pays” for poor quality justice from a monopoly provider. Maybe it’s time we started to look for more progressive solutions.

Don’t write Palin off so breezily – there are a lot of women and men who feel as she does, maybe even enough to tip the election. Don’t be fooled. The Palin pick was an inspired choice on the part of the evil cadaver’s handlers (don’t think for a minute he’s that clever, but THEY are).

What happened, you ask? Roe v Wade happened. If you were an evil genius trying to figure out a way to come up with an issue so toxic that it would poison every campaign since, you could do worse than having nine unelected old me in black robes write an absolutely absurd legal fiction and with it complete the abrogation of democratic government begun under Wilson.

As out and out squeamish as I am to admit to any authority setting abortion policy, this was about the worst way it could have been done. You can trace the utter polarization of national politics to that event. The Democrats finally found their ring of power, the Republicans found their biggest, ugliest scarecrow ever.

The best thing that could happen to us is an honest discussion on the issue, it would be the absolute worst thing for the two major parties because they would have to stop treating the electorate like malleable children and actually work for the benefit of the people.

In the adult system of government, the police provide equal protection for everyone. If you’re the victim of a crime, the police do their best to help you, regardless of how much money you make. Even if you, west, or you, Seth, were raped, the foundational ethics of adult law would mandate the police to do their best to find and punish the perpetrator, and place no additional burden on you, the innocent victim of a crime.

In the baby system of government, everyone pays their own way for saftey. I suggest that, if this is the form of government you prefer, you move to Russia, China, Columbia, or one of many other wonderful countries. The police will be happy to take your money in return for protection.

Damn Reagan and the Evangelicals for making sex ed a dirty thing! And if Barack Obama’s 17 year old daughter came home unwed and pregnant, the election would be over in a heartbeat.

Rape does in fact fall under the category of “sex and sexual stuff” as you so eloquently put it.

I live in Alaska. It was not an isolated incident, it was a city policy in Wasilla for years to charge the rape victims for their rape kits. Former governor Knowles changed the policy statewide for good reason and Sarah Palin’s appointed chief of police publicly opposed the change. Palin never took a stand on the issue but didn’t support it either. Ostensibly because as a pro-lifer she took issue with the emergency contraception that was offered as part of the kit after the exam and didn’t want the state to pay for it.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/politics/election2008/2008-09-10-rape-exams_N.htm

That really doesn’t work out to being as good as I thought it would be.

Thanks