Moving Forward At Your Own Perry-il, Part 2

Yesterday I talked about Rick Perry's controversial decision to mandate a vaccine for HPV for schoolgirls in Texas, to prevent cervical cancer among other things (and to line the pockets of his friends).  He was attacked by the left for his uncomfortable relationship with vaccine maker Merck, but he was attacked even harder by the right who screamed that girls in Texas didn't need the vaccine because all good girls are celibate until marriage, and that there was no need for it unless Perry was pushing Texas's nubile young daughters into teen sex.

Perry used the argument that preventing cancer was good.  That was up until yesterday, that is, when he completely reversed himself and ran away from his own record.

A few hours after unveiling his campaign for president, Perry began walking back from one of the most controversial decisions of his more-than-10-year reign as Texas governor. Speaking to voters at a backyard party in New Hampshire, Perry said he was ill-informed when he issued his executive order, in February 2007, mandating the HPV vaccine for all girls entering sixth grade, unless their parents completed a conscientious-objection affidavit form.

Yes, because preventing cancer among women the way we prevent whooping cough or measles is an "ill-informed" decision.  Steve Benen:

Social conservatives have long been opposed to initiatives to combat the human papillomavirus (HPV), which increases a woman’s chances of developing cervical cancer. Merck developed a vaccine that immunizes against HPV infection, and it was approved by the FDA, which led the religious right to fight for restrictions. As the Family Research Council said a while back, the vaccine “could be potentially harmful” to women “because they may see it as a license to engage in premarital sex.”

Let that one roll around in your brain for a moment. A vaccine that prevents deadly diseases is, among some on the right, more harmful because sex is, you know, bad.

Women and daughters should simply submit to their fathers and not have sex.  No sex, no HPV.  Science and medicine that prevent sexually transmitted cancer-causing viruses is for bad girls in Governor Goodhair's Inconsequential America.

At least since he's running for President, that is.