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Updated 11am
THE REPUBLICAN SENATE hopeful Todd Akin is under pressure from his party’s own leadership to quit the race following his claim that ‘legitimate rape’ rarely leads to pregnancy.
The congressman from Missouri has come under increasing pressure following the comments on Sunday with his own party leadership withdrawing financial and political support from his senate race while he was also criticised by President Barack Obama.
In an attempt to revitalise his battered candidacy, Akin has released a television ad entitled ‘Forgiveness’ in which he asks the viewer for their forgiveness and apologises for his use of “the wrong words in the wrong way”.
“The fact is, rape can lead to pregnancy. The truth is, rape has many victims,” he says.
The ad has been published on Politico:
YouTube: ToddAkinTube
Yesterday, speaking at a rare White House press conference appearance, Obama said that Akin’s comments were “offensive”.
“Rape is rape, and the idea that we should be parsing and qualifying and slicing what types of rape we are talking about doesn’t make sense to the American people and certainly doesn’t make sense to me,” he told the press.
YouTube: OFAClips
Earlier Akin had said that he would not quit the race against the incumbent Democrat Claire McCaskill, whom he had a ten point lead over in some polls prior to his comments on Sunday.
“I’m not a quitter. My belief is we’re going to take this thing forward, and by the grace of God, we’re going to win this race,” he told the Mike Huckabee radio programme.
The withdrawal of support from his own party leadership came on top of criticism from the presidential campaign of Mitt Romney, the candidate himself told News 9 in New Hampshire that the remarks by Akin were “deeply offensive”.
“I can’t defend what he said. I can’t defend him,” Romney said in a joint interview with his running mate Paul Ryan.
Despite many in the Republican party firmly distancing themselves from Akin’s comments, the Democratic Party has sought to link Akin to Romney and the GOP’s wider views on abortion.
The Guardian quotes the chair of the Democratic National Committee, congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz, as saying: “The real issue is a Republican party – led by Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan – whose policies on women and their health are dangerously wrong.”
But Akin has some support.
The Family Research Council, a Christian organisation which supports the traditional family unit, has defended him, Politico reports.
The president of the Family Research Council Action Political Action Committee, Connie Mackey, said: “We feel this is a case of gotcha politics. He has been elected five times.
“That community in Missouri, they know who Todd Akin is. We know who Todd Akin is because we’ve worked with him up on the Hill. He’s a defender of life. He’s a defender of families. This is just a controversy built up, it looks as though, to support his opposition.”
Should have been encrypted. Not exactly rocket science these days!
Did the report say the data wasn’t encrypted?
Michael: if it was encrypted they probably wouldn’t be reporting this… You cannot access encrypted laptop – virtually impossible to get anything out of it.
It is encrypted according to this report http://www.highlandradio.com/2014/11/13/hse-confirms-details-of-180-children-were-on-stolen-laptop/
Surely they are password protected…
Password is useless unless it was encrypted.
Who told you that Reg, m8?
Its easy to bypass the password. Encryption is much harder.
Password is ” can’t get sacked “
You can bypass the password with a bootable CD or USB drive Bill. You can even change the Windows password once booted to one of these media.
Microsoft even have a tool that you can do this with – http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee460909.aspx
Boom
Seems like there are enough tools in the HSE already.
i thought it was against the law to remove confidential medical info from place of work these days?
This is Ireland.
Place of work isn’t always stationary.
Quick call John Tierney – he’ll have a consultant to deal with this !
Who’d ye think stole it? I knew he’d find a way to get people’s PPS numbers!
Dope
Given the number of incidents like this in the past, how is sensitive information not stored and encrypted on a central server – with the laptop only being used to access the information without saving it on the laptop. The mind bogglesz
“Steps are being taken to ensure a reoccurrence doesn’t happen again, ie they are doing the same thing they did the last time it happened, nothing.
Place of work NOT stationary agreed, but in a world of thin clients and superfast connection speeds data like this should NOT have been on the hard drive of a laptop encrypted or not.
Super fast data connections in Donegal, from what planet do you come from? :)
IT should have been using safe boot on these machines. Business do. So should gov state bodies. What an utter disgrace.
Crap IT. Did the HSE never hear of “cloud” data storage.
No because their heads are in the clouds.
Yea .. The cloud your data not stored in a safe harbour …..
So what kind of a nincompoop leaves a laptop on view in a car?
It was in the boot.
Oops. Sorry. Missed that bit.
It stated in the article that it was in the BOOTH of the car…
Where is the BOOTH in a car?
deja vu
they should be sacked straight away.
Reading The Journal on my ‘new’ laptop right now.Thank you The Journal for letting me know what I have actually got. Must log on to deep net later.A few quid to be made me thinks.
Have a nap, Hann……
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