It seems ABC's This Week is continuing their goal of becoming Fox-lite with the inclusion of Lou Dobbs on the panel this Sunday. Can't we get Paul Krugman back to refute some of George Will's hackery instead of being treated to guests like Dobbs, and Laura Ingraham and Dana Loesch? Dobbs did his best to play the "blame the media" game here by claiming that it's the press that drummed up the outrage over Santorum Super-funder Foster Friess' remarks that women could "put an aspirin between their legs" as a means of contraception.

Sorry Lou, but it's not just the media trumping up whether his remarks were truly offensive. They were offensive to anyone that heard the remarks because women don't want to be made ashamed for having sex and told to keep their legs shut in the year 2012. They also don't want someone lying about the cost of contraception and the availability to women of all income levels.

Both Dee Dee Myers and Clarence Page did a good job here of explaining exactly why Friess' remarks don't reflect well on the Santorum campaign, not that he seems to be needing much help these days with all of the other offensive remarks he's already made on the topic of women's reproductive rights and health.

Transcript below the fold.

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Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum took a page from former House Speaker Newt Gingrich's playbook on Friday and lashed out at CBS News for asking him about a major supporter who dismissed the need for contraception by saying women could put an aspirin "between their knees."

"This is someone who is a supporter of mine and I'm not responsible for every comment a supporter of mine makes," the candidate told CBS host Charlie Rose. "It was a bad joke. It was a stupid joke. It's not reflective of me or my record on this issue. ... This is the same gotcha politics that you get from the media."

"Nobody said you were responsible," Rose explained. "They said, how would you characterize it and what had you said to him, not that you were responsible? It's to understand how you differ from what this person said."

"This is what you guys do," Santorum charged. "You don't do this with President Obama. In fact with President Obama, what you did was you went out and defended him against someone who he sat in a church for -- for 20 years -- and defended him that, 'Oh, he can't possibly believe what he listened to for 20 years.'"

"It's a double standard," he continued. "This is what you're pulling off, and I'm going to call you on it."

Rose noted that as late as last October, the former Pennsylvania senator had said birth control was "not OK"

"One of the things that I will talk about that no president has talked about before is I think the dangers of contraception in this country, the sexual libertine idea and many in the Christian faith have said, you know contraception is OK," Santorum told Caffeinated Thoughts at the time. "It’s not OK because it’s a license to do things in a sexual realm that is counter to how things are supposed to be."

While the candidate did not deny that statement, he told Rose that his "public policy" belief was that birth control should be available.

"I've also supported abstinence-based education because I believe that is a healthier alternative," he added. "I've been a very strong promoter of that. I think that premarital sex and particularly sex with young girls is a very dangerous and at-risk behavior ... I do stand behind the idea that abstinence is the best alternative and I've support that with a program called Title XX within the government."

Gingrich has also made an art form out of attacking the media throughout his presidential campaign.

During a CNN-hosted debate in January, the Georgia Republican blasted moderator John King for asking if his second wife, Marianne, was telling the truth when she claimed he had asked for an “open marriage.”

That performance is largely credited for helping him to win the South Carolina primary.

I'm still just flabbergasted that the Republicans are doubling down on the idea that running on an anti-contraception platform and basically calling women who want to use birth control sluts, as Santorum Super PAC funder Foster Friess more or less did this Thursday during his interview with Andrea Mitchell, and that somehow is a good idea for them to make some electoral gains in the upcoming election.

Chris Matthews has been pretty terrible with a lot of his coverage on the issue and carrying a lot of water for the Catholic bishops, between his interview with Melinda Henneberger, or having the gay Tory Andrew Sullivan on as some expert on women's reproductive issues later in the week.

He made up for it a bit today with the inclusion of Rep. Jackie Speier and Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton on his panel to discuss Darrell Issa and his Congressional hearing on "the intrusion of government into religion" and got some of their feedback on how women are being used as a political punching bag by the right.

All I can say is that when someone has finally over reached to the point where you've even lost Chis Matthews on the issue of abortion and contraceptive rights for women in America, you've lost that battle.

Matthews warned that candidate Rick Santorum had better do something quick to fix the mess that his funder Friess made on Mitchell's show, or he's going to lose every woman voter out there. I would apply that same logic to anyone who wants to vote for any Republican period that supports taking us back to the 1950's with these battles that should have long been over with women having a right to use contraception, or to anyone that actually ever considered voting for Rick Santorum before this dust up.

Jackie Speier made a really good point that is not included in the video above, and that was asking if the Catholic church has any objection to vasectomies for men being covered in health care plans, since that's a form of contraception as well. I'm guessing the answer is no, since they only seem to be concerned about the right for someone to control their own reproduction and bodies if it means keeping those uppity women in line who haven't learned their place yet.

Lawrence O'Donnell had on Santorum's Super PAC funder Friess that same night and I don't think he really did his candidate a whole lot of favors here. His response to O'Donnell asking what he meant with his statement to Mitchell was basically, it was a joke and Rick Santorum really does believe in providing contraception to women, even though he couldn't explain his statements contrary to that.

Video below the fold from O'Donnell's show.

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It's just weird to hear a billionaire like Foster Friess go on and on about how attractive Rick Santorum is because he's such a "blue collar candidate." I'm not sure Friess really has a clue as to what a blue collar worker is, and I seriously doubt he has any love for them unless they're spending their hard-earned money to beef up his bottom line.

Friess, as you might recall, was one of those present and mentioned at the Koch gathering where Charles Koch thanked the members of his "millionaires club" for donating over one million dollars to the conservative cause.

In this segment with Neil Cavuto, Friess goes on about how Rick Santorum is such a blue-collar, down to earth guy, and is a Reaganesque figure. This is somewhat contradictory to Santorum's actual background. He grew up in the suburbs and was raised by a nurse and a psychologist who worked for the Veterans Administration. He went to college, got involved in politics and never worked a blue collar job in his life that I can find.

It appears to me that Santorum has managed to live a life where wealthy patrons financed his political rise (and fall), and after he left office, he went to very blue collar jobs as a Fox News commentator and lawyer.

Friess, however, is hedging his bets as any good investment mogul would. He's got Romney in the wings just in case his bet on Santorum doesn't pan out.