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“... know better than to make such incendiary remarks”

During his initial Senate campaign Tom Coburn remarked: “lesbianism is so rampant in some of the schools in southeast Oklahoma that they’ll only let one girl go to the bathroom.” and still won by double digits.

Seems to me Republicans were able to avoid any problem from Akin’s initial remarks and the Dems wasted monry and time trying to ecploit it without success- when they should have been expending that time and money on other issues.

Heck, Rove may be intentionally making comments like that quoted in an effort to help Akin LOL!
His time has passed but he’s no dummy.

I take your point. However, the existence of lesbians is well known by the general populace & related issues have been discussed at length. People would already have known what Coburn was talking about. OTOH, very few people knew about the relationship between pregnancy rates, and forcible rape, before Akin’s remarks. Also, there is a lot of disagreement about the veracity of his remarks (not just from partisan opponents). Akin was wrong to start spouting off about such matters during the election. It appears that even right-to-life advocates were caught off guard by his remarks. No experienced politician just spouts off about a novel idea, without ensuring some backup from supporters. At least, no politician that actually cares about winning. (The election, and the greater battle against abortion). If he left the GOP, there would be no loss — the reverse can't be said for certain.