A vote against this bill was not a vote that women should pay for their own rape exam testing. The provision on rape kit testing (Section 2005) related to whether the feds would reimburse the states for rape exam testing and provided that for the states to be eligible for reimbursement, the states had to have paid for it or reimbursed women for it. It did not shield women from paying for rape exams. It was about whether the feds would reimburse the states.

Again, it was a horrible and draconian bill that is largely responsible for our misguided reliance on over-incarceration and McCain's vote against it, while not made for the correct reasons, was not a vote that women pay for their own rape exams.

Of all the reasons to attack McCain, this isn't one of them and it's a silly reason to link McCain into whatever failures Gov. Sarah Palin has on that issue. He may have a record of poor votes on issues related to women, but using this 1994 crime bill, and the cost of rape exams in particular, as one of them is just silly.