On The View Wednesday, a politically volatile discussion arose over a Texas judge’s decision to uphold an anti-abortion mandate that requires women to see the ultrasound of their fetus before they can terminate their pregnancies. Elisabeth Hasselbeck spoke passionately in favor of the requirement. “To me, it doesn’t make sense why you wouldn’t!” Hasselbeck exclaimed. “Why you would ask for an X-ray for those things or an ultrasound but not in this case? ” “It is such a tremendous decision,” Walters fired back. “I think that in order to even think about having an abortion, to give up a child that is obviously unwanted, that’s why you’re doing it…with so much fear of what you’re doing and guilt…then to have to go and be forced to hear, to see the fetus, to hear the heartbeat, to put more guilt on you, I think is heartbreaking.”

The View‘s Elisabeth Hasselbeck is none too happy with how the folks at NBC handled last night’s GOP debate in Florida, calling the debate “crappy” and accusing the network of displaying an anti-Republican bias.

Herman Cain might be out of the race but that doesn’t mean he’s going away! Following in the illustrious “Oh, are they still here?” footsteps of Christine O’Donnell (yes, she’s still here), Cain has taken to the airwaves to further push the 999 Revolution Solution, a plan which, we assume, won’t involve an actual revolution. Today he appeared on The View‘s first show of 2012 and spoke about his former rivals, taking the chance to defend Rick Santorum’s controversial “black people” comment.

Recently on The View, during a conversation on North Korea’s transition of power, Whoopi Goldberg made comments stating that Communism makes sense “on paper” but doesn’t work once humans put it in practice. Clearly this means that she is a Communist. At least, that seemed to be the message of a segment on The Five where they accused Goldberg of not being condemn-y enough or something.

Just in time for TBS’s annual Christmas 24-hour marathon of A Christmas Story, a few of the stars of the frequently-seen 1983 holiday chestnut joined the ladies of The View.

We don’t usually get two View posts in a day here at Mediaite but, while that fart thing was just BREAKING NEWS THAT THE WORLD NEEDED TO SEE, there was also another interesting moment on the show. Saturday Night Live‘s Fred Armisen appeared to promote the second season of his IFC series Portlandia ( a series where that hilarious one-man show sketch probably would have been better appreciated) and Sherri Shepherd pointed out an issue that’s been a problem almost since SNL‘s inception (and possibly the actual solution to Greg Gutfeld’s conspiracy yesterday); Lorne Michaels needs to hire some more damn black people.

Last Friday, the entire blogosphere went crazy because it was possible that Whoopi Goldberg farted on live TV (what can I say, bloggers just want to go home for the holidays too). Today during the opening few minutes of The View, Goldberg discussed the incident during some of the most ridiculously funny television you’re going to see all week. Seriously, I want every day to start with someone doing a Zapruder film analysis of a fart joke.

Guys, I can’t even. Whoopi Goldberg, the breezy View co-host, added a veritable whirlwind of excitement to the show’s set today when she… Well, when she farted. Yes, there. Typed it. Whoopi Goldberg farted.

Recently for Good Morning America, contributor Elizabeth Hasselbeck reported a story on a growing trend of stay at home mothers supplementing their family’s income by becoming phone sex operators. Today on The View, Hasselbeck and her co-hosts discussed and Whoopi Goldberg revealed that she herself had spent some time on the other end of the phone.

Whoopi Goldberg explicitly dished repeatedly on female “pudenda” in a graphic discussion on porn with the panelists of The View as audience members laughed nervously. “I like porn, I think porn is good for — yes, I do. I think it’s good,” Goldberg acknowledged. “I will tell you what bothers the hell out of me, because this is something that I should have watched over the years. When you see where porn stars are– the women, what their pudendas look like, you can track what other women are going to be doing… there used to be a time when a woman’s pudenda — they looked like women. Then suddenly it became like a landing strip, and then it became bald, and I’m saying what’s wrong with that is they made it what a young girl’s pudenda looks like…it’s bad because I understand you want to do some grooming, but to make yourself look like you did when you were 12 or 13 sends a message to people that you want a kid’s body.”

With the pressure hitting the Herman Cain campaign increasing as his sexual harassment accusations give way to new philandering claims, the debate over whether his personal failings should matter in politics was the topic du jour at The View. Somewhat surprisingly, it was Whoopi Goldberg who seemed to care the least about his personal life, noting that “as long as you are not boning the country,” she didn’t mind the action on the side. And with that, Goldberg got bleeped, and finally has something in common with Ann Coulter.

The View‘s Joy Behar took a swing Monday at Republican presidential candidate Michele Bachmann over her outrage about the song “Lyin’ Ass Bitch” which Questlove and The Roots played to introduce the Minnesota Congresswoman on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon. “They should’ve played ‘Don’t Know Much About History‘!” Behar exclaimed to laughter and cheers from [...]

Despite her time as the GOP frontrunner seeming to fall farther and farther into the past, Michele Bachmann garnered a lot of headlines this past week. And all it took was for someone to call her a nasty B-word on television. That’s right, Whoopi Goldberg called her a “bonehead” on The View.

Wait, what? That’s not the B-word everyone was talking about? Oh, right.

Still, Goldberg was fairly forceful in her conviction that Bachmann did not have what it takes to run the country.

The controversial pepper spraying incident at UC Davis was a hot topic Monday on The View with Joy Behar comparing the police action to the Kent State shootings.

“A lot of people watching are too young to remember Kent State in this country, where the police shot a couple of students,” observed Behar. “It’s outrageous, this type of behavior cannot be tolerated by the police!”

Porn star and notorious reader Sasha Grey appeared Wednesday on The View to defend herself from critics who lambasted the adult film actress for reading to children. “I think there was a lot of sanctimonious media firestorm thrown at me,” Grey exclaimed. “However, I’ve always gone after what i want and I will continue to do that.”

On Tuesday’s The View, Elisabeth Hasselbeck confronted Bill Maher over a joke he made about her in February, suggesting that America send her to Egypt in exchange for Lara Logan. The confrontation was a little awkward and her co-hosts — most notably Joy Behar — kind of left her out to dry.

Yesterday morning, Bill Maher appeared on the set of The View and instead of a convivial discussion about the topics of the day or a promotion of whatever book he was trying to sell, co-host Elisabeth Hasselbeck confronted the provocateur over what she deemed an inappropriate joke in what was a pretty uncomfortable interview. Cut to last night’s setting of The Late Show where host David Letterman asked Maher to explain what happened.

Things got very, very uncomfortable today over at The View thanks to an appearance by Bill Maher. Last February on Real Time, Maher had made a joke that, were Hosni Mubarak to release the then-captured Lara Logan, they could trade him Elizabeth Hasselbeck. At the time, Hasselbeck had been furious, starting a mini feud that an unrepentant Maher seemed to have no interest in fighting.

On The View Monday, the panelists discussed Gloria Cain‘s impassioned defense of her husband over his multiple alleged cases of sexual harassment and her statement that “he totally respects women.” “Can I just point out how much Herman Cain looks like his wife?” Goldberg quipped to uproarious laughter from the audience. “That’s all I could say, I thought she looked just like him! That’s why the kids all look just like them!”

Whoopi Goldberg went after Ann Coulter and her provocative statement that “our blacks are better than their blacks” on The View Thursday. “I didn’t know we were anybody’s blacks!” Goldberg exclaimed. “My God, I thought I was free but damn it! I found out again, somebody’s got my behind!”

Today on The View! Which co-host reveals that she travels with her vibrator in her MAKEUP bag, so as to not draw unwanted attention from the TSA attendant? Which co-host reveals that she eschews the use of a vibrator, opting instead for “this man with equipment.” Finally, which morning talk show loves to share personal sex habits on live television, creating video segments for websites to aggregate in hopes that they will drive traffic?

Hank Williams Jr. has been at the center of a controversy after he likened a golf game between Barack Obama and John Boehner to a meeting between Hitler and Benjamin Netanyahu during an appearance on Fox and Friends. Since then, he has been fired by ESPN as a pregame questioner of the nation’s readiness for football, and has released his own song which raises his middle fingers to to his foes (in particular Fox and Friends and ESPN.) Today he appeared on The View to explain himself in a roller coaster of a segment.

Massachusetts Senator Scott Brown has been taking heavy criticism over a joking reference to Democratic opponent Elizabeth Warren‘s physical appearance, including from House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi. The cast of ABC’s The View weighed in on the controversy today, and took Brown’s side. The discussion included a loose grasp of the facts, and an interpretation of Brown’s comment, from Whoopi Goldberg, that even the most imaginative press flack couldn’t have thought up.

Well its probably safe to assume that Sarah Palin won’t be endorsing Jon Huntsman for the GOP nomination, and not just because they may have different political views within the GOP platform. The former governor appeared on The View earlier today, and was pressed by the Sherri Shepard (and other later Barbara Walters) on if he could survive by running a “nice and civil” campaign. Huntsman first demurred, saying that there was “too much drama and theater in politics” before hitting Palin for “stringing people along.”

Sparks flew on the set of The View on Monday, as the topic of Herman Cain‘s uncensored use of the name “N*ggerhead” in denouncing Texas Gov. Rick Perry inspired one reaction when Whoopi Goldberg quoted him, and quite another when Barbara Walters did. Goldberg seemed to applaud Cain’s choice, and argue against the euphemistic use of “the n-word,” but when Walters quoted Cain (again, uncensored), co-host Sherri Shepherd told Walters, “”I didn’t like the way you said it.”