After busily spending an exhausting morning protecting my only child from nefarious, profiteering ‘crony capitalists’ bent on forcibly vaccinating her, I figured I could take a quick breather to discuss the CNN/Tea Party Express debate last night. In fact, I think I owe it to myself, since it made me all shake fist-y and scowling, which causes wrinkles and does not suit. For that alone, several on the debate stage, one in particular, must pay.

The debate started off usual enough, with ample entertaining moments. Huntsman began the mock-worthy moments with a very lame Kurt Cobain reference. I can only imagine that he was trying desperately to score the key GOP hipster demographic. I fully expected him to later say that Jeremy has spoken and Eddie Vedder will be his Vice President pick. He continued with this trend the rest of the evening; lame, irrelevant ‘jokes’ that did nothing but reinforce his pretentious and non-personable personality. His disdain for we rubes is palpable.

Santorum, bless his heart, finally got people to notice that he exists and actually scored an applause line. The applause caused him to look like he was about to wet his pants in surprise. He didn’t quite know what to do with himself. Which was Ron Paul’s vibe as well. Awkwardly out of place, even in his own suit. Can he please get some suits that, you know, fit? I can only guess that  tailors cannot fit suits for elves. Or, most tailors are Jooos!111, which of  course would mean Ron Paul cannot frequent any of their shops. While Ron Paul did come out with the most hilarious, albeit unintentionally so, line of the night (he said he’d bring ‘common sense’ to the White House – if by common sense, he meant absolute insanity) I was rather disappointed that he didn’t double down on his cuckoo pants with regards to a border fence. Last debate, he said that he opposed a border  fence because it wouldn’t keep people out, but our own government could use it to keep people in. Cue scary music. I expected him to now say that a border fence would be used by Governor Perry to corral young girls so that he could forcibly vaccinate them.

Which brings us to the whole tempest thing and the biggest loser of the night: Michele Bachmann.

When Wolf Blitzer uttered the dreaded G Word That Shall Not Be Named, I desperately wished for a vaccine myself at that moment. So that I could cut myself with the needle. I had enough of the absurd Gardisil debate; a debate that should actually be moot since the law never even went into effect and Governor Perry has said time and time again that he made a mistake for which he takes full responsibility. However, it turns out that it was a good thing that it came up again, if only to expose the cuckoo pants and Jenny McCarthyism in our midst. I liked Michele Bachmann. A lot. I defended her over and over, sometimes even indignantly. Argued with friends and people whom I respect greatly in her defense. That ends now. Blatant lying and demagoguing children, born and unborn, is a deal breaker for me and that is exactly what Michele Bachmann did. The only thing I don’t know is whether or not she is actually cuckoo pants or if she’s just lying and using children and the fears of their parents to score political points. It really makes no difference to me; either way, she has shown she is of bad character. She started exposing herself with this statement, offered during the debate itself:

“BACHMANN: I’m a mom. And I’m a mom of three children. And to have innocent little 12-year-old girls be forced to have a government injection through an executive order is just flat out wrong. That should never be done. It’s a violation of a liberty interest.

That’s — little girls who have a negative reaction to this potentially dangerous drug don’t get a mulligan. They don’t get a do- over. The parents don’t get a do-over. That’s why I fought so hard in Washington, D.C., against President Obama and Obamacare.

President Obama in a stunning, shocking level of power now just recently told all private insurance companies, you must offer the morning-after abortion pill, because I said so. And it must be free of charge. That same level coming through executive orders and through government dictates is wrong.

Firstly, I’m a mom, too, if we are all playing the mom card. And I call baloney. No one, not one child, was *forced* to have a ‘government injection’, whatever the hell that is. I dare Ms. Bachmann to find such a child – perhaps she can ask Alex Jones for help in doing so. The law did not go into effect. And even if it had, one could opt-out. Easily, for cripes sake. There was even a way to do it online, to save oneself the oh-so-arduous task of physically signing a one paragraph piece of paper. Is this what our founding fathers fought for? Give me NO 1 paragraph simple Gardisil opt-out form requiring only my signature, or give me death!

Secondly, I’m no doctor but I’m apparently smarter than Ms. Bachmann  – a lawyer who also does not seem to know the difference between ‘hey, this is a stinky idea’ and ‘unconstitutional. Because it seems to me that females who GET CANCER do not get a ‘do-over’. Furthermore, she repulsively equated potentially life-saving vaccinations with the morning after pill – a pill that ends life. She not only used children to score political points, but she also did so on the backs of the unborn. I found this revolting. It is inexcusable and the antithesis of what she claims she stands for. What’s next? Mandatory measles vaccines! They are just like China’s One Child policy! For shame, Bachmann.

Vaccinations save lives. What we call ‘mandatory’ vaccinations exist in every state; children cannot attend school without receiving them. This is not new. We vaccinate to both prevent disease and to eventually eradicate the disease, at least for all intents and purposes. This is called ‘herd immunity’ and eradication of disease cannot happen without it. I don’t know about anyone else, but I’m not a fan of disease and think that trying to eradicate disease whenever and wherever possible is a good thing. The ‘fierce fighter’ Michele Bachmann should understand this. I mean, vaccinations are mandatory in HER state, including immunization for Hepatitis B – a disease that is contracted through behavior. Minnesota doesn’t even offer a parental opt-out. How can this be? Are you encouraging promiscuity in your state, Ms. Bachmann, by requiring girls to get a Hep B vaccine? Are you damaging them and not allowing them any do-overs? Or are you only an outraged mom when it is convenient for you?

Bachmann doubled down after the debate, along with Sarah Palin. Bachmann told a tall tale about a girl who received a vaccine and totally caught the mental retardation:

“I will tell you that I had a mother last night come up to me here in Tampa, Fla., after the debate. She told me that her little daughter took that vaccine, that injection, and she suffered from mental retardation thereafter,” Bachmann said.

She continued: “The mother was crying what she came up to me last night. I didn’t know who she was before the debate. This is the very real concern and people have to draw their own conclusions.”

I have , in fact, drawn a couple of conclusions, Ms. Bachmann. You are a Jenny McCarthyist and you are a liar. Also, not very bright. One is born with mental retardation. You cannot ‘catch’ it nor can you get it from a vaccination. What you can get, without vaccinations, are diseases. All the fear mongering in the world can’t erase that fact. The science is settled.

Unfortunately, Sarah Palin jumped on the Bachmann cuckoo train and lambasted Perry for ‘crony capitalism’ regarding Gardisil and Merck – the only company to make the vaccine. I suppose Governor Perry should have gone into his lab and whisked up some batches of the immunization himself, so as to avoid any seeming impropriety. Governor Palin said the following last night:

She pointed out that at the time Perry was boosting the vaccine in Texas, she was opposing it in Alaska, and she thought Perry’s order was strange “because it just didn’t sound like Governor Perry,” who she thought was against big government.

“I knew even at that time something was up with that issue. And now we’re finding out, yeah, something was up with that issue,” she said.

But wait, what’s this? Alaska accepted federal funds so that all Alaskan girls, ages 9 to 18, could receive Gardisil free of charge? During Governor Palin’s term? Well, free for them. Of course we, the taxpayers, were charged being that it was federally funded. I guess that kind of big government is A-Okay. I’m just a rube, who is evidently also now an Elitist beltway type, but I far prefer if states decide their immunization requirements – and pay for them themselves – than states running to big daddy government for money. That’s ‘crony capitalism’ of the worst and dirtiest sort; getting in bed with the feds required Valtrex, not just a Gardisil vaccine. Worse, Palin’s administration made us all crony capitalists by taking our money and sending it to Merck, the ONLY distributor of the Gardisil vaccine. Forcible collusion!

Enough. Bachmann has shown herself to be ill-informed, at best and a demagoguing liar, at worst. The entire Gardisil controversy is absurd, regardless. The law never went into effect. It does not exist, much like Obama’s Jobs bill. Not one child was forcibly immunized, nor will they ever be. Even ‘mandatory’ immunizations for school, including the Hepatitis B vaccine which Fierce Fighter Moms apparently have no problem with, can be opted out of easily by parents. Well, unless you are in Bachmann’s Minnesota, of course.