The right wing lately has gotten very offended — VERY offended — when anyone suggests that what they try to do — from fighting against equal pay for women to holding up VAWA to making it harder for women to get contraception — is waging a "war on women". "We're not waging a war on women," they cry. "How … Read More
Girls: What Sex In The City Should Have Been
I never cared much for Sex In The City. The women were whiny bitches, and not like ANY woman I EVER met in New York City (even the well-to-do ones who could sit around all day having coffee and salad). So, hats off to HBO for venturing into the fray the right way, with Girls, which seems to be, you know, … Read More
Confused Mitch McConnell Says There Is No War On Women
On a local Kentucky radio show today, the Senate minority leader argued that the female members in his caucus agree with him that the GOP’s “war on women” is just “a manufactured issue”: MCCONNELL: There is no issue. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison and Kelly Ayotte from New Hampshire and Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe from Maine I think would be the … Read More
Another Day, Another Abomination Against Women
Now, from Georgia: After an emotional 14-hour workday that included fist-fights between lobbyists and a walk-out by women Democrats, the Georgia House passed a Senate-approved bill Thursday night that criminalizes abortion after 20 weeks. The bill, which does not contain rape or incest exemptions, is expected to receive a signature from Republican Gov. Nathan Deal. Commonly referred to as the … Read More
How’s Susan Komen Foundation Doing? — A Look Back
After their public relations debacle back in February, when Komen attempted to defund Planned Parenthood, things looked really bleak for the womens cancer foundation. But it eventually tried to amend its wrongdoing, the story fell off the front page, and the nation's attention went elsewhere. So has the Komen Foundation recovered? Hardly, according to the Washington Post: Fallout from the Planned … Read More
They Won’t Give Up
The War On Women continues at the state level, with various bills floating around designed to prevent women from having contraception, or having an abortion, or having protection from wife-beaters. It really is unprecedented. This one in particular caught my eye: A new bill moving through the Tennessee House of Representatives would require the state to publish the names of … Read More
More Dispatches From The War On Women
The Republican establishment has seemed more concerned with de-humanizing women than it does with winning the fall election. After Virginia passed its modified ultrasound requirement for abortion access, Republican-controlled state governments in Arizona and Pennsylvania put forward a set of absurd invasions of privacy that smack of the same big-government tyranny that they claim to be so aggressively opposed to. In Arizona, … Read More
Rush Limbaugh GETS An Advertiser!
With over 140 advertisers fleeing from the Rush Limbaugh program, I'm happy to report that at least one group is running toward him, money in hand, wishing to advertise on his show. That group is… oh. Oh, dear. The Westboro Baptist Church (of "God Hates Fags" fame). Oh, well. Any port in a storm, right, Rushbo?
New Hampshire Makes Up Facts About Women’s Health
Across the nation, lawmakers are debating several different anti-abortion bills seeking to make it more difficult for women to have an abortion. One tactic is “informed consent” measures that require women to be given information before an abortion — even if they do not want that information or getting it would violate medical guidelines. Now, the New Hampshire House has passed a bill that, … Read More
Republicans Not Crazy About Protecting Some Women From Violence
The Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) passed overwhelmingly in 1994, and was renewed easily in 2000 and 2005. But it suddenly became a partisan issue last month, when every Republican on the Judiciary Committee opposed it, and it passed in a 10 to 8 vote. The act, estimated to have dramatically reduced domestic violence, funds a broad range of training programs and aid for … Read More
Failures In Moral Equivalence
Shorter Slate columnist Katie Roiphe in "It's Not Just Rush" Although I can't find examples that back up this premise of mine, liberals today do as much slut-slamming as Rush Limbaugh has done. Also, Mary McCarthy and Virginia Woolf were slut-slammed in their day, and a book written in the 1950s insinuated that some college girls are sluts. So there.
Rush: The Final Tally?
Just because people moved past the "Rush/Fluke" kerfuffle doesn't mean that it ended. To date, 140 advertisers have pulled their ads from Limbaugh's show. Many of them came to light after a memo was published from Premiere Radio Networks. Read the details.
Dispatches From The War On Women
State legislatures are busy debating another round of anti-choice legislation (after passing a record number of anti-abortion measures in 2011). But this year, women are speaking up more loudly. To push back against the Republican-backed proposals, Democrats have proposed satirical bills mocking extreme measures bestowing personhood on a zygote and requiring women to have ultrasounds before abortion procedures. And constituents have voiced their … Read More
Silence Is Golden
Without advertisers, Rush's show had a lot of dead air today where commercials should be.