A GOP view of women's health issues: Sometimes a picture really is worth a thousand words

This is the panel of witnesses invited to testify before Chairman Darrell's hearing this morning on the birth-control insurance mandate. Hmm, now what could be wrong with this picture? (Thanks to ThinkProgress War Room.)

by Ken

A friend who's been off politics for a while wrote that he might be ready to get back into it, and in reply I expressed some wonder as to whether that's really a healthful step, and somehow the example I came up with on the spur of the moment was whether he really wanted to reengage himself in the doings of the likes of Darrell Issa. I guess our Darrell was on my mind because I was in the process of trying to work through this latest abomination perpetrated by the career criminal who dabbles in extremist right-wing ideology for its value in enhancing his pursuit of ill-gotten gain.

No Women Allowed

By ThinkProgress War Room on Feb 16, 2012 at 4:53 pm

This morning, Republicans held a hearing on women’s health care. Here’s the panel they brought in to discuss birth control:

[SEE PHOTO ABOVE]

And then Foster Friess, Rick Santorum’s money man, went on MSNBC this afternoon and gave some unsolicited advice on contraception to “the gals.”

Check out his shocking comments:

FOSTER FRIESS: I get such a chuckle when these things come out. Here we have millions of our fellow Americans unemployed, we have jihadist camps being set up in Latin America, which Rick has been warning about, and people seem to be so preoccupied with sex. I think that says something about our culture. We maybe need a massive therapy session so we can concentrate on what the real issues are. And this contraceptive thing, my gosh, it's such inexpensive. Back in my days, they used Bayer aspirin for contraceptives. The gals put it between their knees and it wasn’t that costly.

IN ONE SENTENCE: Republicans may find blocking affordable access to birth control funny, but the GOP’s all-out war on women’s health care is no laughing matter.

THE DEMS' ERROR, SAYS CAREER CRIMINAL DARRELL
ISSA, IS THINKING THE HEARING HAD TO DO WITH WOMEN

For the record, this piece links to Igor Volsky's early ThinkProgress coverage of Chairman Darrell's hearing.

Democratic Women Boycott House Contraception Hearing After Republicans Prevent Women From Testifying

By Igor Volsky on Feb 16, 2012 at 10:52 am

This morning, Democrats tore into House Oversight Committee Chairman Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) for preventing women from testifying before a hearing examining the Obama administration’s new regulation requiring employers and insurers to provide contraception coverage to their employees. Republicans oppose the administration’s rule and have sponsored legislation that would allow employers to limit the availability of birth control to women.

Ranking committee member Elijah Cummings (D-MD) had asked Issa to include a female witness at the hearing, but the Chairman refused, arguing that "As the hearing is not about reproductive rights and contraception but instead about the Administration’s actions as they relate to freedom of religion and conscience, he believes that Ms. Fluke is not an appropriate witness."

And so Cummings, along with the Democratic women on the panel, took their request to the hearing room, demanding that Issa consider the testimony of a female college student. But the California congressman insisted that the hearing should focus on the rules’ alleged infringement on "religious liberty," not contraception coverage, and denied the request. Reps. Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) and Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) walked out of the hearing in protest of his decision, citing frustration over the fact that the first panel of witnesses consisted only of male religious leaders against the rule. Holmes Norton said she will not return, calling Issa’s chairmanship an "autocratic regime." . . .

Issa also dismissed the Democrats’ woman witness as a "college student" who does not "have the appropriate credentials" to testify before his committee. . . .

I wish I could say we've heard the last of this bogus belly-aching about "religious liberty" on the part of the hordes of the Jesus-loathing American pseudo-religiosos. But I'm afraid we're just at the beginning. As to the "credentials" one needs to testify before Chairman Issa's inquisition committee . . . oh, for goodness' sake. Look at the slimeballs he had there this morning.

Poor Jesus. Wherever he is, he must really be weeping.

ANOTHER JESUS-HATING "CHRISTIAN" USES FAKE
RELIGION TO CLAW HIS WAY UP THE POLITICAL LADDER

A reader of my post last night on the Republican war on women, "Off-the-rails Virginia right-wingers ratchet up the Republican War on Women," offered this link for Bruning4Senate, which you're seeing more or less in its entirety. (You can click to enlarge.) Trust me, nothing of substance has been left out. There's no need for explanation, after all, or for that matter even statement of actual belief by this pandering, America-hating pile of puke, an attorney general with unvarnished contempt for the law and respect only for religious delusionaries whose specialty is defecating on the life and beliefs of Jesus. Watch for him soon in the U.S. senate!

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