At this year’s annual winter meeting of the Republican National Committee, the assembled partisans have focused on rebutting the perception that they are waging a “war on women.”

It is not going well.

Speaking to committee members on Thursday, former Arkansas governor and failed presidential candidate Mike Huckabee made the following attempt to prove that Democrats are the ones with an anti-women agenda:

“I think it’s time Republicans no longer accept listening to the Democrats talk about a ‘war on women,'” Huckabee asserted. “The fact is the Republicans don’t have a war on women, they have a war for women, to empower them to be something other than victims of their gender.”

“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,” Huckabee declared. “Let us take that discussion all across America, because women are far more than the Democrats have played them to be.”

Video of his remarks is below, via NBC News.

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Huckabee’s speech immediately drew condemnation from Democrats, including White House Press Secretary Jay Carney, who told reporters on Thursday, “I haven’t seem that report, but whoever said it, it sounds offensive to me, and to women.”

Meanwhile, in news that seems unlikely to help Republicans narrow the gender gap that has plagued them in recent elections, Huckabee is reportedly considering a 2016 presidential run.