As News Hounds Priscilla has pointed out, Fox has been exploiting the criminal case against abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell to advance its anti-abortion agenda and its “liberal” media victimhood. But nothing, in my opinion, has matched the howler of Congresswoman Marsha Blackburn – whose voting record earned her a 25% rating from the NAACP and 0% from NARAL – going on The O’Reilly Factor and pretending to be acting out of concern for minority women. Bill O’Reilly – who has his own dubious record on minorities and women – gave her a pass.

As Priscilla noted, the Gosnell case is actually a poster child for the need to keep abortions legal and accessible to poor women. She wrote about a previous discussion of the case on The Five (whose panel also developed a sudden interest in minorities):

While those “pro-lifers” on “The Five” are concerned about poor, minority children, they don’t seem to be as concerned about poor, minority women who went to Dr. Gosnell because Medicaid doesn’t cover abortion and Gosnell offered low prices. Thanks to “pro-lifers,” abortion is becoming less accessible and affordable. “Pro-lifers” want to shut down Planned Parenthood and that will mean that poor, minority women will have less access to contraception and that, in turn, will result in more unplanned pregnancies and more unsafe abortions like those done by Gosnell. But the pro-lifers on “The Five” care about poor, minority babies - women, not so much!

In other words, we can probably expect even more abortion butchers preying on minority women as the result of the kinds of restrictions on abortion that folks like Blackburn and Bill O’Reilly salivate over.

So it was hard to know whether to laugh or cry when Blackburn held up “poor women in minority neighborhoods” as one of her concerns for joining other members of Congress in leaning on the other networks for not covering the case enough.

Are they not covering it because it is poor women in minority neighborhoods or is it because they ideologically and politically are trying to cover abortion practices even in cases such as the Gosnell house of horrors?

…What we want to make certain is that there is justice for these victims and that this practice is ended.

At least O’Reilly – famous for his long smear campaign against abortion Dr. George that continues even after Tiller was assassinated – didn’t seem to buy the BS about any interest in minority women. He led her away from that subject to attacking the news outlets. “They don’t want to cover any story that puts abortion per se in a bad light. And I think that’s what this is all about from your point of view,” he said suggestively.

Even if what he said was true (and I dispute that it is), I thought we were supposed to celebrate the fact that we have a diverse media that is free to cover whatever they want. Since the Constitution seems not to take into account that Fox News has been elected Chief of America’s Media Police, maybe it’s time to amend the First Amendment.

Blackburn would probably vote in favor. She agreed with O’Reilly about the media before moving along to throw in attacks on Planned Parenthood as somehow being involved in “ridiculously unsafe, mass-market style abortion clinics.” Plus, she worked in a swipe at President Obama for speaking at a Planned Parenthood fundraiser (which he has now canceled).

O’Reilly promised “a major Factor investigation” on Monday.

If Blackburn and O’Reilly really cared about minority women and children they’d spend a lot less time undermining their welfare by attacking abortion rights and monitoring their reproductive behavior and spend a lot more time focused on how to improve their well-being once the fetus leaves its mother’s uterus.