March 11, 2017

U.S. Rep. John Shimkus (R-Anthracite) knows exactly two things.

First, that men were put on this Earth to go deep under the Earth and mine coal, which is perfectly safe whether you breathe it, eat it, drink it or burn it to Make America Great. And, second, that women were put on this Earth so that coal miners can breed more coal miners. Circle of life, you see.

You know what? I was wrong. Representative John Shimkus knows one more thing: that the voters of Illinois' 15th congressional district are goofy enough in the head to elect someone like Representative John Shimkus over and over again.

 Maybe it's all the coal butter they put on their coal-cakes in the morning before they have a hot cuppa coal before driving lil' Nicoal and Coalton Junior and off to school.  Who knows?  But they keep electing the guy, and he keeps saying and doing remarkably dumb-as-f*ck things like this.

Yeah, around here, everybody knows that Shimkus is about 4/5th Gohmert and 1/5th coal ash, but since we've got people like Danny David, Luis Gutierrez and (my former Congressperson) Jan Schakowsky in the House, and stalwart Dick Durbin and fierce Tammy Duckworth in the Senate, usually people are discrete enough to forgive us our Shimkuses.

But not today!
From the Chicago Tribune:

U.S. Rep. John Shimkus's foot finds warm welcome in mouth

...

Rep. John Shimkus's foot isn't exactly a stranger to his mouth.

At times, it seems to have set up camp there.

But even allowing for the downstate Republican's storied history of gaffes, Shimkus's questioning Thursday of why men should pay for prenatal coverage when they cannot become pregnant had folks scratching their heads.

"What about men having to purchase prenatal care?" Shimkus said at a congressional committee hearing about Obamacare. ""I'm just... is that not correct?" Shimkus said. "And should they?"

The, er, unchivalrous, comments quickly went viral, with supporters of the Affordable Care Act patiently — and not so patiently — explaining to Shimkus how babies are made. They also pointed out that risk-pooling in insurance only works because people who are unaffected by one condition pay for the treatment of others, in the expectation that they will get help when they need it, too. Men's treatment for erectile dysfunction, for example, is subsidized by women's insurance premiums.

Shimkus's office did not return calls seeking comment Friday...

So next time you have to talk to him about insurance or health care, you have to remember that anything you want Shimkus to understand must be analogized to coal.

You see, Representative Shimkus, a man's beefhammer is like unto a coal-chisel which must be kept in good working order if America if to be Great Again.  And that's is why Viagra is covered.

Now a lady's baby area is much like a coal mine. Dark and mysterious, but potentially full of treasure...

Crossposted from Driftglass.

Note: Many sources are quoting Nancy Metcalf's excellent answer to the "why should childless men pay for prenatal care" question.

Health insurance, like all insurance, works by pooling risks. The healthy subsidize the sick, who could be somebody else this year and you next year. Those risks include any kind of health care a person might need from birth to death—prenatal care through hospice. No individual is likely to need all of it, but we will all need some of it eventually.

So, as a middle-aged childless man you resent having to pay for maternity care or kids' dental care. Shouldn't turnabout be fair play? Shouldn't pregnant women and kids be able to say, "Fine, but in that case why should we have to pay for your Viagra, or prostate cancer tests, or the heart attack and high blood pressure you are many times more likely to suffer from than we are?" Once you start down that road, it's hard to know where to stop. If you slice and dice risks, eventually you don't have a risk pool at all, and the whole idea of insurance falls apart.

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