Palin OK's Charging Rape Victims

Imagine you've been raped. It's devastating. You feel degraded, demoralized, and violated. After the ordeal of reporting it to the police and undergoing a test, you get to go home. Later you find that you've been billed for the rape kit. Suddenly you feel violated all over again.

It's been revealed that vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin charged rape victims or their insurance companies for rape kits needed to help collect evidence of the crime. The following is from the Huffington Post

Despite denials by the Palin campaign, new evidence proves that as mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, Sarah Palin had a direct hand in imposing fees to pay for post-sexual assault medical exams conducted by the city to gather evidence.
Palin's role is now confirmed by Wasilla City budget documents available online
Under Sarah Palin's administration, Wasilla cut funds that had previously paid for the medical exams and began charging victims or their health insurers the $500 to $1200 fees. Although Palin spokeswoman Maria Comella wrote USA Today earlier this week that the GOP vice presidential nominee "does not believe, nor has she ever believed, that rape victims should have to pay for an evidence-gathering test...To suggest otherwise is a deliberate misrepresentation of her commitment to supporting victims and bringing violent criminals to justice," Palin, as mayor, fired police chief Irl Stambaugh and replaced him with Charlie Fannon, who with Palin's knowledge, slashed the budget for the exams and began charging the city's victims of sexual assault. The city budget documents demonstrate Palin read and signed off on the new budget. A year later, alarmed Alaska lawmakers passed legislation outlawing the practice.

Women everywhere should be very concerned about this nominee. There's still much to be learned about Palin's other views, policies and actions. If, as a small town mayor, she would charge victims for rape kits, what would she do as vice-president?