Republican Steve Pearce of New Mexico is widely perceived to have hurt the GOP party as a whole by espousing some controversial views about the role of the wife in his new memoir, Just Fly the Plane, Stupid!

The Washington Post reported on the GOP's troubles with garnering female support in the country, saying that: "Mitt Romney suffered from one of the biggest so-called "gender gaps" in recent history in the 2012 election -- an election in which two GOP Senate candidates might have cost their party a seat because of comments about rape and pregnancy."

Republican Mike Huckabee has said, "If the Democrats want to insult the women of America by making them believe that they are helpless without Uncle Sugar coming in and providing for them a prescription each month for birth control because they cannot control their libido or their reproductive system without the help of the government, then so be it."

"The wife is to voluntarily submit, just as the husband is to lovingly lead and sacrifice," he wrote in his book while citing the Bible. "The husband's part is to show up during the times of deep stress, take the leadership role and be accountable for the outcome, blaming no one else."

To be fair to Steve Pearce, he is a Vietnam War veteran who believes in the chain of command as well as the structure of the family unit. He explains that it is a matter of social roles, not of inferiority or superiority.

He is Baptist, and says in practice his wife does submit to his leadership although she is a major part of decision-making. The book of Ephesians says that wives should submit to their husbands in everything, but Pearce draws the line at a husband dominating every aspect of the family life.