RN-T.com – ANALYSIS A GOP report shows why Democrats attacked Chambliss hormones comment

ATLANTA – Georgians wondering how Sen. Saxby Chambliss suddenly became national news for an aside in a Senate hearing can find clues in a report issued by the College Republicans.

He could argue the attack is unfair.

After all, Chambliss, R-Ga., is cosponsoring two bills to strengthen the prosecution of sexual assault in the military. And he agrees with Democratic colleagues that commanders should not have the power to overturn a rape reconviction.

When it was his allotted time in the Senate Armed Services Committee hearing to question the chiefs of the military branches last Tuesday, Chambliss used the opportunity to lecture them about the need to reduce assaults.

“There’s also got to be some kind of fear put into these young people that come to every branch of our service the very first day that they raise their hand and swear to defend the Constitution,” he said. “The fear has got to be that that chain of command that we allude to really is serious about making sure that these types of sexual assaults do not occur.”

He created the ruckus with an aside about those young people.

“The young folks that are coming into each of your services are anywhere from 17 to 22 or 23,” he said. “Gee whiz, that’s — the level of — the hormone level created by nature sets in place the possibility for these types of things to occur.”

So, when Chambliss tripped over his own tongue, the Democrats quickly jumped on him. Never mind that he was in the midst of berating the chiefs of the military branches for not stopping it.

Democrats instantly recognized it as another opportunity to paint Republicans as closed-minded, rigid and old fashioned. They lumped it in with a comment by conservative commentator Erick Erickson of Macon who said on CNN “the natural world order” gave males the “dominant role” as breadwinners and women a “complimentary role.”

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So, why were Democrats so hasty to take 20 words out of context from the 784 Chambliss uttered at the hearing?

A day earlier, the College Republicans National Committee offered insight when it issued a report saying the GOP needs to stop coming across as closed-minded and mean.