One Aspect Of Withdrawing From Afghanistan

On Wednesday Ro Khanna was one of the congressional progressives-- Ted Lieu was another-- happy to see Trump announce he was withdrawing American troops from Syria. Ted: "I strongly agree with the President’s decision to withdraw US troops from Syria. Congress never authorized the US to go to war in Syria. While going after terrorists is authorized, both the Obama and Trump Administrations went far beyond the congressionally authorized use of force against terrorists. Moreover, neither Administration had a strategy for Syria. Neither Administration could articulate why American troops were fighting in Syria, what the desired end state should be, nor how we would achieve it. I repeatedly criticized both Administrations for not having a strategy and for taking war actions not authorized by Congress. I am pleased that this unauthorized and failed executive branch war in Syria will finally come to an end."

Ro Khanna called the withdrawal "a good first step toward ending our foreign policy of interventionism and went on to let Trump know we also need to "End U.S. support for Saudi Arabia in Yemen, Withdraw our troops from Afghanistan, Repeal the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force."

Howard Dean was not impressed and he used the classic bullshit argument that liberals-who-like-war have been using as an excuse to stay in Afghanistan for way over a decade:

His dishonest bullshit is not being solved by American military forces deployed in Afghanistan. I've been having this argument with members of Congress-- often well-intentioned friends of mine-- for... I don't know how many years. When I first got to Afghanistan in 1969, having driven in my VW van from London, my strongest immediate thought-- other than how unbelievably strong the hash is-- was that no matter how far I had traveled in space I had traveled much further in time-- straight backward. I was thousands of miles from my parents' home in Brooklyn... and what felt like as many thousands of years back in time. I remember writing to a friend that I was feeling like I was living in the Bible (Old Testament).

Things have changed a little since then. I lived in a "village" (two family compounds off a barely demarcated dirt track) for a winter up in the Hindu Kush where no one had ever heard of the United States (and no one had ever experienced electricity). I'm not sure if they've experienced electricity some 4 decades later but I'd bet you they've heard of the United States.

When you travel to, let's say "exotic" places like Afghanistan, you're better off leaving your cultural judgments in check. There's no way to reasonably compare our cultural standards to the ones that govern their lives. I got used to the concept, for example, of two good cleanings a year-- one in the spring and one in the fall, something very different from the swim, jacuzzi, steam bath and shower I do in some combination everyday here in L.A. Better to just roll with the punches.

You don't ever see the womenfolk in Afghanistan. My closest friend in the Hindu Kush sojourn got married while I was there and I lived in his house and spent virtually all of my time with him for several months. Everyone used to joke that we were brothers. I never saw the girl he married, not once. In the same house! Nor was she-- or his mother or sisters-- at the wedding. Well, that isn't exactly accurate. They had their own party in the women's part of the house. But it wasn't exactly separate-but-equal; just separate.

Big steaming platters of rice with meat and vegetables were brought out by male servants-- actually slaves but no one called them that-- and everyone dug in with their fingers, food rolling down everyone's beards back onto the platters. Yum, yum. When the men were done eating, the leftovers were fed to the servants and dogs, although I don't remember in what order, and then what was left from that was sent to the women. Meanwhile we had song and dance-- the young boys. There was a troupe of them from somewhere who are hired to entertain at parties. They looked like they were between 12 and 16 and they were wearing women's dancing clothes, more or less; they all had big heavy farmer boots on. And they all had their eyes smeared with kohl and some kind of rouge substitute. Everyone was hootin' and hollerin' when they were dancing, kind of alluringly, truth be told. No one was drunk but everyone-- every single person-- was high on hash. At one point the groom's grandfather suddenly jumped up-- apparently unable to restrain himself for another second-- grabbed the youngest, smallest bacha and dragged him behind a building and raped him.

It was gruesome to hear... but it didn't seem to put any kind of a damper on the party at all. The rest of the troupe kept dancing and everyone else just ignored the commotion and just enjoyed the festivities. It's part of their culture. Ten minutes later grandpa and the 12 year old came back from around the building, straightening their clothes. The bacha seemed to have felt his dignity was affronted but he jumped right back into the line and danced away the rest of the evening as though nothing had happened. I'm not sure what happened afterwards but from what I heard, all the boys were raped (more or less).

And although these people definitely have heard of America now, they still enjoy a little bacha bazi as part of their cultural heritage, especially the wealthy men, although wealth is a relative thing and whomever is exercising power gets himself a young bacha or two (or a half dozen) to keep as sex slaves. Frontline did a special on the phenomena by journalist Najibullah Qurasishi. You may find it difficult to watch but it will certainly give you an idea about a not uncommon aspect of Afghanistan, a country the U.S. military is occupying for no apparent purpose and with no apparent positive effect.



The radical fundamentalists in Afghanistan-- we generally refer to them as The Taliban these days-- have no intention of changing their society to meet despised Western mores. I've argued with many women allies about what the U.S. can and cannot accomplish in Afghanistan. Each of them is adamant that a legitimate goal of U.S. policy towards that country should be the emancipation of women. Maybe it should, but it's not going to happen. I remember waking up one morning after one of those arguments and the first thing I saw on my TV screen was a story about how some Talibs had burned down a girls' school. They don't want their girls educated. They want them barefoot and pregnant (but not really barefoot because seeing their naked skin would be a satanic temptation and they might have to stone the woman to death for such an infraction). That was a decade ago, with U.S. troops occupying the country--as they still are.

The same kind of attack on a girl's school happened the week before in tribal Northwest Pakistan, the part the fundamentalists control. Girls in school is subversive to what they see as their way of life. Well-meaning Americans want to change that. In 2010 an issue of Stars And Stripes in a report from Afghanistan, claimed the country is working toward some semblance of gender equality.

In this remote Afghan village, the distance between the school and the compound of its most powerful resident is 100 yards, and thousands of years.

At the school, about 15 girls attend classes alongside dozens of boys thanks to the relative security of the area, which means the Taliban cannot act on its opposition to the education of females, a conviction that has led to the burning or bombing of hundreds of schools in recent years.

Down the road, at the home of the affable Sahib Jan-- the local Afghan Highway Police commander and most respected village elder-- the local women are kept out of sight of visiting U.S. soldiers, preparing a meal for men with whom they are not allowed to eat. Female soldiers are not even welcome to sit in on a meeting of the military contingent, Jan and his subordinates.

“To me, the girls and the boys are the same,” Jan said through an interpreter during the meeting. “We would like to provide an education for both of them,” although Jan would prefer that happen in separate schools, or separate classrooms. “They can become whatever they want to when they grow up.”

That said, when boys are born, “there is celebration,” he said. “When a daughter is born, we are not that happy.”

While Jan says the genders are equal, his views on what equal means are quite different from the Western way: “In our culture, men and women are not supposed to be together.”

That is just one example of the religious, moral and cultural differences that U.S. and coalition officials must accept as they continue their mission in Afghanistan-- that no matter how much Western-style government, political and military influence they wield here, anything approaching equality for women is still generations away-- if it happens at all.

“It saddens me to go to a culture and know, at this point in time, they’re not afforded the same rights,” said Army Spc. Tiffany Hall-- a member of the Female Engagement Team for the 4th Squadron, 2nd Stryker Cavalry Regiment’s Headquarters Troop.

“Maybe one day we’ll get there, but I know that day is not today. We’re doing multiple things to help the community ... better its living situation and get out from under the Taliban foothold. Until we can help that aspect first, we can’t concentrate on getting the equal rights that we would want.

“We have to do one step at a time. It’s a process.”

Does the process end? In a thousand years will the Afghan women have lives like we want them to? And the bachas too?

Republicans Are Shocked Women Don't Like Them

I don't like either of the two freshman that Democrats are sending from the House to the Senate, Kyrsten Sinema (AZ) and Jacky Rosen (NV). But even if I find them both horribly conservative-- and one of them batshitcrazy-- I am glad there are two more women in the Senate. There really ought to be at least 50, although I'd prefer 50 good ones-- like Elizabeth Warren, Mazie Hirono and Tammy Baldwin-- rather than any bad ones.

In the House, there will be over 100 women-- 89 Democrats and 13 Republicans. The Democratic freshman class is filled with outstanding luminaries like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (NY), Katie Porter (CA), Rashida Tlaib (MI), Ilhan Omar (MN) and... I have high hopes for Debbie Haaland (NM), Haley Stevens (MI), Lucy McBath (GA), Kim Schrier (WA) and Jahana Hayes (CT) too. There are at least 33 Democratic women in the freshmen class. As for the Republicans-- one, the right-wing self-funder from West Virginia who barely uttered a peep in the campaign that pitted her name with an "R" against Richard Ojeda: Carol Miller. Sad. Reporting for the Associated Press yesterday, Alan Fram wrote that Republicans are trying figure out why Dems get all the girls and they're stuck with Lindsey Graham, Mark Foley, Patrick McHenry Miss McConnell and Adrian Smith. Republicans, he wrote, are concerned "that Democrats’ lopsided edge among female voters could carry over to 2020, when President Donald Trump will be seeking a second term and House and Senate control will be in play. If the current trend continues, Republicans risk being branded the party of men."

“You will see a very significant recruiting effort occur” for female candidates, said David Winston, a pollster who advises GOP congressional leaders. “It’s a natural conclusion. An environment has got to be created where that can be a success.”

Evidence of the GOP gender gap was just as clear in the 100-member Senate, where Tennessee Rep. Marsha Blackburn will be the only Republican freshman. If Mississippi Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith wins a runoff later this month there will be record-setting seven GOP women in the Republican-run Senate. But even that record is less than half the class of 17 Democratic women, which includes two freshmen.

The search for answers leads to some familiar places. President Donald Trump’s fraught history with women, combined with the #MeToo movement against sexual harassment, helped motivate Democratic women to seek office but did not appear to have the same effect with GOP women, politicians and analysts say. More broadly, the president’s brash style doesn’t sit well many female voters or potential candidates.

“Women don’t like the tweets,” said Sarah Chamberlain, president of the Republican Main Street Partnership, a moderate GOP group. “I don’t know how to tone down the rhetoric. If I could have a fantasy, one wish, that would be my one wish.”

Women backed Democratic candidates over Republicans on Election Day by a telling 57 percent to 41 percent, according to AP VoteCast, a wide-ranging survey of the electorate conducted by The Associated Press. Women broke by similar margins in the crucial suburbs, where Democratic victories in swing districts helped power the gains they needed to win House control. Men supported Republicans over Democrats, 51 percent to 46 percent.

Strategists note the issue isn’t just about current personalities; it’s about party infrastructure.

“We as a party have to make recruiting women candidates who can win a high priority,” said Andrea Bozek, spokeswoman for Winning for Women, a fledging GOP group that tries bolstering female Republican candidates. She added, “Unless people in leadership really make it a priority, I don’t think it will happen.”

A record number of women ran for the House as major-party candidates this year. But Democrats outnumbered Republicans by nearly 3 to 1, according to AP data, and Democratic women were more likely to win their primaries.

Of those contenders who ran in November, 183 were Democrats, the most ever, according to the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University. Fifty-two were Republicans, a near-record but a fraction of female Democrats running.

That partisan imbalance was aggravated by Democrats’ superior campaign infrastructure for helping female candidates.

Winning for Women, created in early 2017, says it spent more than $1 million helping female candidates for the recent election. That and other GOP groups assisting female candidates couldn’t match Democrats’ 33-year-old Emily’s List, a well-financed organization that poured tens of millions into primaries and general elections and provided recruiting, training and other services to female candidates.

“Democrats have been doing a much better job of getting women elected,” said Debbie Walsh, director of the Center for American Women and Politics.

Asked to explain her success against other female candidates’ defeats, West Virginia’s Miller sent an email lauding Trump and other Republicans and GOP women’s groups and saying “liberal special interests” had spent heavily to defeat Republican women. Officials at the White House and the GOP did not provide answers to requests for comment.

Republicans have displayed a sensitivity this year to their overwhelmingly male numbers. That includes hiring a female prosecutor to question Kavanaugh’s chief accuser, Christine Blasey Ford, when she testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee and its all-male Republicans.

Within days of the elections, Republicans vaulted women into congressional leadership positions.

Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY), daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney, will be No. 3 House GOP leader next year, that chamber’s highest-ranking Republican woman ever. Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, will be vice chairwoman of the Senate GOP conference, a lower-tier post, making her the first Republican woman in a Senate leadership job in eight years.

Cheney said Republicans must better communicate that their policies on national security, the economy and health care are best for men and women. She called it “fundamentally offensive and paternalistic” to think women’s votes are driven by their gender.

Asked on CBS’ Face the Nation last week whether Trump’s rhetoric alienated women, Ernst said, “We could do a better job of communicating clearly that we support women.”

Not with a clueless mysogynistic ape like Trump as their leader they can't.

What Would Freud Do? by Nancy Ohanian

More Women In Congress Isn't Just A "Nice" Thing-- It's CRUCIAL For This Country's Success

Two of the most important Senate races this cycle pit women against each other. One of the Senate's most progressive Democrats, a courageous reformer with a fantastic voting record that spans a career as a state legislator, a congresswoman and more recently as a senator, Tammy Baldwin, is up against a conservative Republican, Leah Vukmir, in Wisconsin. My lens on this race frames an outspoken progressive against a Trump-enabling reactionary. The woman-thing is removed as an identity politics factor. Another identity politics factor may or may not be in play: Tammy has always been upfront about being a lesbian.

Over in Arizona, there are also two women competing, both congressmembers looking to ascend to the Senate. Kyrsten Sinema is running as a Democrat, although she votes more with the Republicans than anyone would ever expect from a Democrat. She is the head of the Blue Dogs and has the single worst voting record of any Democrat in the House. You think Joe Manchin, Joe Donnelly and Heidi Heitkamp are bad? Just wait 'til this monstrosity is in the Senate. Her opponent, a mainstream conservative Republican, Martha McSally, is worse. Again the identity politics factor is removed and again there's a wiggle here because Sinema self-identifies as LGBT.

Without the "women thing" as a determinant for identity politics voters, it might make for a race where voting records-- readily available-- become more meaningful than anatomy, not a bad thing. The Senate needs more women members and I didn't pick the word "needs" randomly. I want to tell you why I chose that word. At worked at a company a long time ago where senior management would meet once a week for house and hours and hours. There were no women-- and eventually there was one woman-- and it was, among other things, dysfunctional and not in the best interests of the company. Forget about anything like "fairness" for a moment. Senior management of a company cannot make good decisions-- CANNOT-- without diversity. Without diversity you fail-- that simple. This is not a "bleeding heart" observation. Quite the contrary. There have been lots of studies that have shown how important diversity is in decision making. Companies need to take it serious and eventually mine did, which gave them an enormous advantage of our competitors who were more male-dominated. This Forbes article from last year, New Research: Diversity + Inclusion = Better Decision Making At Work, explains that "inclusive teams make better business decisions up to 87% of the time" and why "decisions made and executed by diverse teams delivered 60% better results." Believe me, that isn't just true in business.

This week, NBC reported that 100 women may be elected to the House in November-- with a very disturbing caveat: "the wave is being driven entirely by Democrats; on the GOP side, the number of women serving in office is expected to dip.

Keep in mind that there are plenty of woman v women races in the House, just like the two I mentioned in the Senate above. In Washington state, for example, an outstanding progressive leader, Lisa Brown, is facing off against a Trump/Ryan puppet in Spokane, Cathy McMorris Rodgers, the top-ranked woman in the GOP leadership. (Her Trump affinity rating is a startling 97.8% of the time!)

NBC makes the point that if the 100 women are elected in the House, it will "put more new women in the House than in any prior election." That's a positive good for many reasons-- but especially for the country.

Between 30 and 40 new women are poised to enter the House next January, shattering the previous record of 24 set in 1992's "Year of the Woman." And much as pundits interpreted 1992's wave as a backlash against Clarence Thomas's Supreme Court confirmation, 2018 is now clearly a backlash to President Donald Trump's election.

Trump's victory over Hillary Clinton didn't just launch the Women's March; it set off an avalanche of Democratic women running for Congress, many of them first-time candidates, ranging from former Navy helicopter pilots to former CIA officers. Of the 254 non-incumbent Democratic nominees for the House, an unheard-of 50 percent are women, compared to 18 percent of Republicans.

Currently, there are 61 female Democrats and 23 female Republicans serving in the House. But after November, Democrats could expand their ranks of women by more than a third. Meanwhile, the GOP's ranks could shrink by up to a third.

Democratic primary voters have made clear they feel the best way to send a message to Trump is to send a woman to Congress: In Democratic House primaries featuring at least one man, one woman and no incumbent on the ballot, a female candidate has won 69 percent of the time. In the same situations on the GOP side, a female candidate has won just 35 percent of the time.

Keep in mind, not every woman candidate is any good. Some are more like Kyrtsen Sinema than like Tammy Baldwin, BUT... in races that pit women against Republicans? There's no contest. Even the worst, most reactionary female Democrats running for House seats-- say, Kathy Manning in North Carolina, Gretchen Driskell in Michigan, Ann Kirkpatrick in Arizona, Elaine Luria in Virginia-- are absolutely better choices than their Republican opponents (male or female).

Let me go back to the Senate races for one second, actually just this one in Tennessee which pits a woman against a man. The man is a fairly conservative, though not dogmatic, former governor, Phil Bredesen (D). The woman is an extreme right fanatic, very dogmatic, Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R). She's currently one of the worst members on Congress-- absolutely dreadful by every possible metric. On top of that, she's one of Trump's top picks for the Senate anywhere in the country and is running a campaign that explicitly vows to protect him from impeachment. You going to vote for the woman candidate against the male in this instance?

Trump And The GOP Rev Up Their War Against Women Again

Trump, Rapist by Chip Proser

The headline of the new Kaiser Family Foundation poll tells us a lot about America: Poll: Two-thirds of Americans Don’t Want the Supreme Court to Overturn Roe v. Wade. Two-thirds is a lot. But one third is the hard core Trumpist base. 67% of the American public do not want the Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade, although 53% of Republicans do want to see it overturned. (81% of Democrats don't want to see it overturned and neither do 73% of independents.)

The poll found some other factors that should play a role-- even a decisive role-- in the 2018 midterms. "While not at the top of voters’ concerns heading into the midterms, most voters (56%) do say it is at least 'very important' for candidates to discuss issues that primarily affect women."

When this group is asked to say in their own words what issues they mean, about four in 10 (44%, or 25% of all voters) mention issues related to equal pay or fair employment. This is twice as many as those who mention reproductive health issues including abortion or contraception (20%, or 11% of all voters).

In addition, substantial shares of voters say that a candidate’s position on certain policies that mainly affect women will influence their vote.

For example, six in 10 (60%) voters say they would be more likely to vote for a candidate who supports increased workplace protections against sexual harassment and assault, and a majority (53%) say the same about a candidate who supports a law requiring paid parental leave. Democratic voters and women voters are more likely to favor candidates who support each of these positions than are Republican voters and men voters... Half (49%) say they are more likely to support a candidate who is a strong supporter of the #MeToo movement, while just 7 percent say they are more likely to vote for a candidate who does not address the issues raised by the movement.

...Most of the public (57%) say they oppose new Title X regulations proposed by the Trump Administration that would block federal family planning funds from going to organizations like Planned Parenthood, which also provide abortions, even though the money can’t be used for abortion. Nearly four in 10 (38%) say they favor those proposed regulations.

Despite polling, Trump and the Republican Party are absolutely determined to appoint a Supreme Court Justice who will fly in the face of every single finding above, especially, of course, overturning Roe v Wade. It is Trump's top litmus test (likely just behind personal fealty to himself). Early yesterday, CNN reported that the plan to overturn Roe is rolling along.

Over the past year, state legislatures in Iowa, Louisiana and Mississippi have advanced strict limits on abortion that some lawmakers believe could trigger a successful challenge to the landmark 1973 Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion nationwide.

"I think it's virtually certain that some or all of those laws will wind up before the Supreme Court," said CNN legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin. "And they will get a much more favorable reception with any of the judges on President Trump's list of 25 possible nominees."

When Trump ran for president in 2016, he pledged to appoint "pro-life" justices to the Supreme Court, while his running mate, now-vice president Mike Pence, said that he hoped to see Roe v. Wade end up on the "ash heap of history."

Trump's first Supreme Court pick, made after Senate Republicans blocked President Barack Obama's pick to fill a Supreme Court vacancy, was Neil Gorsuch, who has been a reliable conservative vote. Trump said he will pick from a list of 25 conservative candidates.

Trump's opportunity to replace Justice Anthony Kennedy, who had voted to uphold Roe in 1992, is "exactly what we had hoped for," said Jim Carlin, an Iowa Republican state senator.

"With (Kennedy) as the swing vote, I don't know that we would have had the capital on the Supreme Court to reverse Roe v. Wade," Carlin said. "If we were to get another conservative justice to the bench at the Supreme Court, I think our chances are much, much higher."

"Anything that we can do to soften the blow of Roe v. Wade or weaken it or dilute it, it's up to us to do that," said Lawrence Bagley, a Louisiana Republican state representative.

...In the end, the Supreme Court doesn't have to entirely overturn Roe v. Wade to leave the legal standard substantially weakened or even effectively gutted, said Steve Vladeck, a CNN Supreme Court analyst and professor at the University of Texas School of Law.

"The Supreme Court could do quite a lot of damage to the right recognized in Roe without ever formally overruling it, simply by upholding state laws that make it harder and harder for women to obtain abortions without banning them," Vladeck said.

That idea could be tested in Arkansas.

The 2015 state law says that any physician who "gives, sells, dispenses, administers, or otherwise provides or prescribes the abortion-inducing drug" shall have to have a contract with a physician who has admitting privileges at a nearby hospital.

The Supreme Court last month refused to take up an early challenge to the law, which cleared the way for it to take effect in mid-July, but did not say if the law is legal or not, leaving that to a lower court to determine. Earlier this month, a federal judge imposed a temporary restraining order on the law, setting the stage for the case to potentially return to the Supreme Court at some point in the future. Planned Parenthood has said that the law is both medically unnecessary and would effectively ban medication abortion in the state.

Elizabeth Nash of the Guttmacher Institute, a reproductive rights research organization, said the Arkansas law "conflicts with Roe by imposing an undue burden on a patient seeking an abortion."

In Mississippi, after Republican Gov. Phil Bryant signed the bill banning abortion after 15 weeks, the Center for Reproductive Rights filed a lawsuit in federal court challenging it as unconstitutional and a federal judge temporarily blocked the law from going into effect. Louisiana's 15-week law is also on hold pending the outcome of litigation in the Mississippi law.

The Center for Reproductive Rights points out that in recent years, the Supreme Court has declined to review a number of lower court decisions striking down abortion bans prior to the point of viability.

"The Supreme Court has repeatedly upheld the right to abortion over many decades and it has done that with many justices from appointed by many different administrations," said the group's senior director of litigation, Julie Rikelman.

State lawmakers pledge to keep trying.

"Until the Supreme Court chooses to touch on that issue again, you're going to continue to see states push the edge and push the envelope on pro-life protections," said Louisiana state Rep. John Stefanski.

"I think inevitably we're going to come up with something that I believe the Supreme Court is going to have to take a look at again," the GOP lawmaker added.

If what I think is going to happen in November happens, Republican lawmakers are going to be too busy looking for new jobs to put too much time into their systematic attack on women's rights. All of the Blue America-endorsed candidates agree on a broad agenda of strengthening and expanding women's rights and complete equality, women like Rashisa Tlaib (MI), Katie Porter (CA) Kara Eastman (NE), Ellen Lipton (MI), Alexandria Ocasio (NY), Lisa Brown (WA) and Jess King (PA), as well as the male candidates, Randy Bryce (WI), Alan Grayson (FL), James Thomson (KS), Tom Guild (OK), Jared Golden (ME) and Kaniela Ing (HI). The actBlue 2018 congressional thermometer on the right is one way to help support these candidates' campaigns. If you've never clicked on it, please give it a try. We're coming right up to being just 4 months away for what could well be the most important midterm election in any of our lives-- and you may hear that every two years from the DCCC and from candidates, but in the dozen years Blue America has existed you've never heard that from us before.

Kara Eastman is the progressive Democrat running for the Omaha congressional seat held by Trump rubber stamp, Don Bacon. And while they disagree on Choice, the contrast between the two candidates on almost every key issue is remarkable. "Immigration and campaign finance are two of the major issues that separate us as candidates," Kara told me earlier."I will not take corporate dollars from controversial for-profits like GEO. But this group has given the maximum political contribution to Congressman Don J. Bacon. And they directly grow their business from detaining immigrants at our borders. According to the Sun-Sentinel, GEO has empty beds in facilities and already operates detention services for ICE and the U.S. Marshals Service. They are 'likely to benefit from President Donald Trump’s executive order that ended his controversial policy to separate parents and children who are caught entering the country illegally'... I strongly back pay equality for women, pre-K education that allows mothers to stay in the work force, and strong domestic violence legislation. I also firmly believe women's reproductive freedom and access to healthcare are crucial components of women's lives and contribute to stronger families. Therefore, I support all Democrats who are committed to these values and who will fight to ensure our constitutional rights and that Roe v Wade stays the law of the land."

Katie Porter is the best of the Orange County candidates running in the cycle after Hillary swept the county and took it away from the GOP for the first time since FDR. "My opponent Mimi Walters has repeatedly stood with Paul Ryan and Donald Trump in their efforts to ban a woman's right to choose," Katie told us yesterday. "I  will always protect a woman's right to choose.  I believe, like women and men across the country, that access to quality, affordable healthcare, choice, and birth control are fundamental rights-- and that we must defend them at any cost."

James Thompson is running for the Wichita area congressional seat (KS-04), occupied by Trump enabler Ron Estes.James, an attorney, gets the last word on this today: "A concerted effort is underway to abolish the rights so many have fought for, and in some cases died for, in this country. Chief among those are the rights of women. We did not just lose the office of President in 2016, we lost the Supreme Court and the federal judiciary, which has often been the last bastion of strength against an overreaching conservative agenda. With the election of President Trump, and complete lack of any intestinal fortitude by our Senate, we lost the ability to replace not just Justice Scalia but apparently also Justice Kennedy, who is set to retire in July. President Trump is also picking approximately 200 new federal judges. The loss of these judicial seats and subsequent decisions sure to come will reverberate throughout our country’s history. Ultra Conservatives across the country are foaming at the mouth in anticipation of overturning Roe v. Wade with a new conservative majority in the Supreme Court. In addition, further attacks are sure to come in an effort to roll back protections against sexual harassment, domestic abuse, and equal pay. If ever there were a time to stand up and fight for the rights so long fought for, now is the time. We must demand passage of the Equal Rights Amendment, and staunchly defend against any encroachments upon women’s bodily automony. We must shout from every mountain and valley that women’s rights are not for sale and are every bit as important as men’s rights. Equal means equal, or equality means nothing at all."

The Worst Democrat In Congress Is, I'm Sorry To Report, A Woman

Not second worst or third worst

The worst Democrat in Congress, chair of the Blue Dogs, is Kyrsten Sinema. Kyrsten is a woman. Of the 78 Democrats rated "F" by ProgressivePunch 15 are women. Any list of the worst Democrats in the House would have to include, Kyrsten Sinema, of course, as well as Stephanie Murphy (Blue Dog-FL), Cheri Bustos (Blue Dog-IL), Jacky Rosen (NV), and Kathleen Rice (New Dem-NY). ProgressivePunch rates 37 House Dems "A." 16 are women and this cycle only 3 members of Congress have 100% perfect crucial vote scores, two of whom-- Jan Schakowsky (IL) and Barbara Lee (CA)-- are women. It's hard to say who the best member of Congress is, but any list of contenders would have to include Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), Katherine Clark (D-MA), Jan Schakowsky (D-IL), Barbara Lee (D-CA) and Judy Chu (D-CA). All of these people I've mentioned-- both the best and the worst-- are women, the biggest identity group in American politics. And then there's Debbie Wasserman Schultz. What can I say?

In Pennsylvania last week, there were really good women candidates who defeated really bad male candidates. And that's excellent. But what happens when a terrible woman candidate beats an excellent male candidate? That happens too-- and that isn't so wonderful, is it? (It may be to EMILY's List, which has a business model it's concerned about.)

That said, Lauren Gambino, writing for The Guardian Sunday asked if the wave of females House candidates lead to a tsunami of wins for the Democrats. She starts with a candidate from not just the female identity group, but from the military identity group. (Again, there are great veterans running and far less than great veterans running. VoteVets doesn't distinguish much. "This should anger you greatly," Jon Soltz, their chairman wrote yesterday. He was pissed off about an ad running against Amy McGrath, a Marine combat fighter pilot running for Congress in Kentucky. "[H]er opponent released an ad on Friday night attacking her for not living in Kentucky for much of her life. "Why... well, because she was overseas serving our country, fighting in wars. The ad also includes the line, 'In fact she moved here from Maryland just last year to run for Congress.' Yeah, it's true... because she was teaching at the US Naval Academy in Annapolis." I can see why Soltz was pissed off.

By the way, McGrath is a mediocre candidate and, if she wins-- unlikely-- she'll make a dreadful member pf Congress. Her opponent is not just worse than she is... he's way worse than she is. And he's from another identity group: LGBTQ... also Blue Dog. What a mess. "Every once is a while," wrote Gambino in The Guardian, "a voter will approach Amy McGrath, a first-time candidate for Congress in Kentucky and a retired Marine fighter pilot, and tell her they won’t support her because she is the mother of young children who need her at home. 'I always point out that the incumbent who serves in the seat has young children the same ages as mine,' McGrath said. 'But I can’t imagine they would say that if I was a man.' ...[It] illustrates the challenges women still face on the road to Washington even as record numbers of them prepare to run."

There are 408 Democratic and Republican women still in the running for the US House of Representatives, compared with 167 in 2016 and 159 in 2014, according to Rutgers University’s Center for American Women and Politics (CAWP), which tracks women in elective office.

The wave of women running also have more diverse backgrounds and résumés. Many are political newcomers, spurred by the rage of losing a presidential election to a candidate with a history of berating women and the #MeToo reckoning against sexual assault and workplace harassment.

“For years, women have had to walk this fine line between being capable and being likable,” said Erin Loos Cutraro, the CEO and co-founder of She Should Run, a nonpartisan organization that seeks to increase the number of women in elective office. “But with this massive groundswell we’re seeing women from all backgrounds run as themselves.”

At least two women running for governor-- Kelda Roys in Wisconsin and Krish Vignarajah in Maryland-- have run ads featuring them breastfeeding their babies while discussing their political platforms. Nadia Hashimi, who is running for Congress in Maryland, promised voters less “mansplaining.” And Sol Flores, who lost her bid for Congress in Illinois, shared her story of sexual abuse in a campaign ad, promising: “I’ll fight as hard for you in Congress as I did to protect myself.”

[No need to mention Flores only got 21.6% of the vote and was beaten by a much better candidate, Jesus "Chewy" Garcia. She's the woman candidate and what else could possibly matter? Next up: another mediocre candidate running against an accomplished man, Duwayne Gregory, who's actually gotten stuff done while she... hasn't.]

“It feels like we have this support system in women running across the country,” said Liuba Grechen Shirley, a first-time Democratic candidate for Congress in New York.

This month, Grechen Shirley, the mother of two young children, won approval from the Federal Election Commission to use campaign funds for childcare. Two dozen members of Congress and Hillary Clinton sent letters of support for her request.

“This ruling will allow more women-- and men-- to run for office,” she said, adding: “Our babysitter is a staff member in the same way that our field director and finance manager are staff members.”

As women storm the ramparts of the Democratic party, female Republican candidates are fewer in number. Of the 408 women still running for the House, 305 are Democrats and 103 are Republicans, according to CAWP.

Still, Republicans boast an impressive and unusually large crop of female hopefuls, said Andrea Bozek, a spokeswoman for Winning for Women, a new political organization that aims to be the conservative counterweight to Emily’s List.

“Our goal is to build a lasting momentum that’s not just contained to a year,” Bozek said. “We want a lot of ‘years of the woman’.”

She noted that the top two Republican fundraisers last quarter were women: Marsha Blackburn, who is running for Senate in Tennessee, and Martha McSally, who is running for Senate in Arizona. And the only two women elected to Congress since Donald Trump took office have been Republicans: Karen Handel in Georgia and Debbie Lesko in Arizona.

Women, yes, but-- with the exception of McSally, a mediocre mainstream congresswoman-- also dangerous right-wing insane people. You like Trump? Then you'll love Blackburn Handel and Lesko who don't differ from much policy-wise, just personality, character and Physiognomy. All that said, this is important:

Whatever happens in November, the quest for a more representative democracy will still be far from realized. Women currently comprise 19% of the House of Representatives and 23% of the Senate, shares that are unlikely to swing significantly even if more women are elected. And the women in Congress are disproportionately Democratic and white.

“Let’s absolutely celebrate the women who are on the ballot but let’s also look at who’s not there,” Cutraro said. “This is just the beginning-- we still have so much more work to do.”

The results of the early primaries show that women aren’t just running-- they’re winning.

More than 50 women filed to run in Texas. Nearly half of the candidates who finished first in the Democratic primaries were women, including two Latinas who are likely to head to Congress in November. In Nebraska, Kara Eastman bested a former congressman to win a primary to represent a congressional district in Omaha. Meanwhile, the Democrat Jane Raybould will face off against the Republican senator Deb Fischer, in one of several general election races featuring or likely to feature two women.

Pennsylvania, a state with an all-male Congressional delegation of 20, stands out as a particularly bright spot for women this year. Last Tuesday, voters selected female candidates in seven primaries held in the state’s newly redrawn congressional map, three of whom are running in districts favorable to Democrats.

But for all the enthusiasm and energy, political observers warn it is too early to declare 2018 a “year of the woman.”

“We’re really hopeful that we’ll see gains for women in November,” said Kelly Dittmar, a political scientist at CAWP.

“But we’re being careful about the extent to which this wave of women running will translate into a tsunami of women winning in November.”

The route to Washington is complicated by several factors, Dittmar explains.

More Democratic men are running, too, which means primary races are crowded. Plenty of Democratic women are running in the same districts as each other, such as in Texas, where a handful of races featured as many as three female candidates. This means that women will be eliminated in the primaries.

Perhaps the biggest hurdle for women this election cycle is that many are running against incumbents, who almost always win re-election. More than half of the female candidates running for House and Senate hope to unseat sitting members of Congress.

Ten states have held primaries so far this election cycle. Of the 125 women running for the House of Representatives in those races, nearly half-- 60-- have won, according to CAWP. But a large number of the Democratic primary winners will go on to face incumbents in safely Republican districts.

Even if 2018 falls short of being a historic “year of the woman”, the wave of female candidates has already changed attitudes to running, organizers say.

For decades, organizations like Emily’s List, the fundraising juggernaut dedicated to electing Democratic women who support abortion rights, have tried to narrow a so-called ambition gap by encouraging women to run for office and providing them with the resources to do it. Traditionally, those conversations require a degree of coaxing. But since the 2016 election, the phones have been ringing with women putting themselves forward.

“What’s so inspiring is that we have so many women who have crossed over that first obstacle: desire to run,” Stephanie Schriock, the president of Emily’s List, told reporters at the group’s national conference earlier this month. “Once that seed is planted, it doesn’t stop growing.”

It's easier to babble about identity politics than it is to look for signs that will tell you who will be a better candidate in Congress. There can be, for example, no doubt what Kyrsten Sinema will be in the Senate if she wins. She's the worst member of the House-- the worst-- and she would be fighting a battle with Heidi Heitkamp, Joe Donnelly Claire McCaskill and Joe Manchin, if they make it through the midterms-- for the title of "worst Democratic Senator." Not a peep about anything remotely like that in The Guardian piece. It's a difficult thing to report on. Which is why we need better reporters. I just decided to count how many women are on the Blue America endorsement list of 2018 congressional candidates. There are 20 candidates in total. 9 are women and 11 are men. Damned! I wish it was 50-50. We need to try harder. Do you look at gender or any other identity group when you decide to contribute to a candidate?

The Women's March Is Crucially Important, And... And But...

I don't go in for identity politics at all. Voting for someone because they were born a woman, gay, of any particular religion, Asian or black, for example, is not my cup pf tea. Nor is voting for someone who is a veteran, a scientist, a doctor or part of any age group. Take women. Women make up 51% of the population but just 22% of the Senate and 19% of the House. That's outrageous. And that's why when when two candidates-- one man and one woman-- are equally good, I'll vote for the woman. But, not all women candidates are good candidates or good political leaders. Some are absolutely horrible in fact. Look at the House. Arguably, the very best member of the House is Pramila Jayapal, a woman elected from Seattle. Katherine Clark (D-MA), Judy Chu (D-CA), Jan Schakowsky (D-IL) and Yvette Clarke (D-NY) have fantastic voting records too. And you want to find incredible leadership and courageousness in Congress? Look no further than Elizabeth Warren in the Senate and Barbara Lee in the House. Bad news though. The absolute rotgut worst Democrat in the House is a woman: Kyrsten Sinema, the head of the Blue Dogs who represents a nice blue district in the Phoenix area. And she isn't the only Democratic woman who is so horrible that no one who believes in Democratic values should support her. Stephanie Murphy (Blue Dog-FL), Cheri Bustos (Blue Dog-IL), and Jacky Rosen (NV) have amassed voting records that no one but Paul Ryan and EMILY's List could possibly like. In the Senate, the worst Democrat is Heidi Heitkamp-- yes, my friends, even worse than Joe Manchin. And who voted to throw the DREAMers under the bus-- or in this case onto a bus headed for Mexico or El Salvador-- Friday night? Heitkamp and Claire McCaskill (as well as Manchin and Joe Donnelly).

Among candidates for Congress this cycle, people such as Nina Ahmad (D-PA), Katie Porter (D-CA), Jenny Marshall (D-NC), Lisa Brown (D-WA), Jess King (D-PA), Antoinette Sedillo Lopez (D-NM)... are simply the best people running for Congress. It's stupid to call them the best woman candidate when they are just the best candidate, period. I remember how Joni Mitchell used to curse critics at reviewers who called her the "best woman songwriter." You can't imagine how offended she was by that. She was the best songwriter-- end of story. How about that? Those candidates are not the best women candidates; they are the best candidates. Period. You could say Nina Ahmad is the best woman candidate born in Dacca and, technically, you'd be correct. It makes more sense to say she's the best candidate running for Congress. Someone might want to argue with you-- maybe, say, proponents of Randy Bryce or Marie Newman, who might say one of them is better-- so fine, make the argument... but it's not about anyone's plumbing.

Another awesome congressional candidate, a woman, running in the Houston area, is Dayna Steele. She's amazing and would make a fantastic member of Congress with a unique and much-needed perspective. Yesterday she emailed he supporters about the woman's march: "One year ago, I marched with my husband and youngest son in downtown Houston. Expecting to see maybe 500 people, I was stunned to find over 30,000 women, men, and children. That scene repeated itself all over the world, where people gathered to take a stand.  When the march was over my young son asked 'What good will this do? What will you do moving forward?' After much thought and counsel, I decided to run for Congress. Today, with the government shut down because folks like Brian Babin won't do their job, I’m marching again with my husband and youngest son, this time as a candidate for the 36th district of Texas. If you support women’s rights, equal rights, healthcare for all, quality public education, DACA, CHIP, and making people‘s lives better, I’m asking you to support our campaign today." Support her here.



"Activists," wrote Michelle Price and Anita Snow, "are returning to the streets a year after a million people rallied worldwide at marches for female empowerment, hoping to create an enduring political movement that will elect more women to government office... A rally Sunday in Las Vegas will launch an effort to register 1 million voters and target swing states in the midterm elections. The 2017 rally in Washington, D.C., and hundreds of similar marches created solidarity for those denouncing President Donald Trump’s views on abortion, immigration, LGBT rights and more. Afterward, a wave of women decided to run for elected office and the #MeToo movement against sexual misconduct became a cultural phenomenon. 'We made a lot of noise,' said Elaine Wynn, an organizer. 'But now how do we translate that noise into something concrete or fulfilling?' Linda Sarsour, one of the four organizers of last year’s Washington march, said Las Vegas was slotted for a major rally because it’s a strategic swing state that gave Hillary Clinton a narrow win in the presidential election and will have one of the most competitive Senate races in 2018. Democrats believe they have a good chance of winning the seat held by embattled Republican Sen. Dean Heller and weakening the GOP’s hold on the chamber."

Too bad [male] puppetmasters Harry Reid and Chuck Schumer handpicked one of the worst Democrats in the House, Jacky Rosen, as the Democratic candidate for that Senate seat. I'd vote for a pool of puke on the street before voting for Jacky Rosen. And the DCCC just endorsed a garbage candidate for Rosen's seat in the House, an incredibly wealthy, Mafia-connected socialite-- and Pelosi crony-- Susie Lee. If you want horrible-- albeit horrible without a penis-- you've got two to support right there in Las Vegas. And then you can feel like you've been cheated next year when they start voting like Heitkamp and McCaskill.

Instead, we should be putting our energy into electing great candidates-- many of whom are women-- who are shunned by corrupted slime like Reid and Schumer and the DCCC. Another Blue Dog in the House who is beyond horrible is Chicagoland walking garbage pile Dan Lipinski. He joined Paul Ryan to speak at the counter-rally against Choice on Friday. And his opponent is not just better than he is; his opponent is fantastic and someone who will make Congress a better place. Oh, and she happens be a woman: Marie Newman. Robin Marty, writing for Right Wing Watch wrote about that anti-Choice movement's rally and the horror of what's behind it. This is a lot more salient than electing crap candidates in Las Vegas.

When tens of thousands of abortion-rights opponents gather in Washington, D.C., this week to protest the 45th anniversary of Roe v. Wade, many will be lobbying the Trump administration and Congress on measures that they hope will chip away at and ultimately lead to the repeal of Roe. But a smaller group of activists are taking a much more direct approach to their efforts to stop legal abortion. Quietly, the anti-choice “rescue” movement has been trying out new tactics to test the limits of the FACE Act, the 1994 law that stopped them from physically blocking the entrances of abortion clinics in order to deny women access.

“Rescues” or abortion clinic sit-ins, are nothing new to the anti-abortion movement. In 1991, as many as 500 protesters a day gathered in front of abortion clinics in Wichita, Kansas, blocking patients from entering the buildings. The anti-abortion “rescue” movement was at its height then, with thousands gathering at national events to shut down clinics, while dedicated local activists focused on regular daily or weekly “rescues” that involved barricading elevators, blocking the vehicles of abortion providers, even locking themselves to buildings, cement blocks or cars so they couldn’t be removed from the premises.

The FACE Act put an end to almost all of those tactics. Signed into law in 1994 by Democratic President Bill Clinton, FACE (Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances) made it a federal crime to physically obstruct a clinic entrance or use force, threat of force or intimidation against anyone attempting to provide or procure an abortion, or to intentionally damage or destroy the property of a reproductive health services facility. (FACE’s rules also applied to anyone trying to block access to a place of worship.)

The FACE Act brought a quick end to the rescue movement as it existed in its heyday, ending the ability of anti-choice activists to physically prevent women from accessing abortion. But the strength of the law depends on how aggressively the federal government is willing to enforce it. In the five years that the FACE Act was in effect under President Clinton, the administration used it to file charges in 46 criminal or civil cases. During the two-term presidency of Republican George W. Bush, on the other hand, the Department of Justice had a 75 percent drop in criminal FACE Act violation charges, and filed just one civil case in eight years. Aggressive enforcement began again with the election of Democratic President Barack Obama, whose administration prosecuted 11 criminal and nine civil FACE Act violations in his first term alone.

With another Republican president in the White House-- one who anti-abortion groups worked zealously to get elected once they accepted the fact that he would be their inevitable nominee-- it is still unclear how aggressively the Department of Justice will enforce the FACE Act. Last year, the Trump Justice Department showed that it was willing to prosecute the most flagrant FACE violations after the radical anti-choice group Operation Save America attempted an old-school clinic blockade in Louisville, Kentucky. Police arrested 11 anti-abortion activists associated with Operation Save Americain May after they sat and directly blocked the front doors of the only abortion clinic in the state. Ten of the activists were ultimately charged with civil FACE Act violations, and a temporary restraining order was issued to keep them from the clinic property when they returned for a national event two months later. A full trial on the charges will occur this spring.

Whether the Trump administration will pursue less clear-cut cases remains to be seen. In response, anti-abortion activists appear to be nibbling around the edges of the law, trying out new strategies to test how far the Justice Department will allow them to go.

...More anti-abortion activist groups are staging marches and protest events like this outside abortion clinic doors to thwart patients from obtaining legal abortion care. If a patient approaching a clinic for medical care is confronted with a sea of thousands of protesters, that can hardly be seen as anything other than intimidation of a person attempting to access an abortion. Yet these marches, because they are currently being organized in a permissible way in public thoroughfares, often come with the assistance and tacit support of local government and law enforcement agencies.

While the Trump administration is in power, it remains very unlikely that we will see many activists charged with FACE Act violations-- that is, unless we see more blatant Operation Save America-style clinic-door blockades like we saw in the spring of 2016. But as for, more tentative steps into potential FACE violations pacifist clinic trespasses, city-issued and permitted mass marches and similar tactics-- it is safe to expect these to multiply, especially as federal authorities stick their heads in the sand and local law enforcement provide little more than wrist slaps in response.

And considering that this was how the original rescue movement grew from local nuisance to a national threat to access, that could be the most alarming development of all.

This is Dan Lipinksi's world. Last Thursday, when the Republicans brought up the enabling legislation for another of their ugly and vicious anti-Choice bills, the so-called Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act, only two "Democrats" voted with the Republicans to allow the bill to move forward, vile Blue Dogs Dan Lipinski and Collin Peterson. The DCCC will never quit Dan or Collin. But supporting Marie Newman and helping her replace Lipinski is a far more effective way to bring about real change than backing Reid's, Schumer's and the DCCC's godawful women candidates in Nevada. We're not asking you to support Marie Newman because she's a woman-- although I'm happy she is and that's a crucial part of who she is-- but because she is the best candidate and because will make Congress a better place because of what she's got between her ears. If you click the ActBlue congressional thermometer on the right, you'll find Marie Newman... and a whole slew of awesome women candidates-- and awesome male candidates. These are the people we should be supporting if we want a better country, not Jacky Rosen, not Kyrsten Sinema and not Susie Lee.

The choice couldn't be more clear

Midnight Meme Of The Day!

-by Noah

Surely, this meme expresses an idea whose time has come. Think of it, since Republicans long to always "put women in their place" and tell them exactly what they can and can't do with their lives, their health and even their bodies, suppose every American woman tried to take advantage of our nation's lax gun laws and armed themselves, ideally to the teeth. What would all those angry, fearful white men do? They just might start second guessing their 2nd amendment arguments. They'd be beside themselves, trembling with fear. Might even the NRA kooks start gasping? Hmmm, probably not, as long as the money keeps coming.

Imagine a world... where every women does just like the guys in open-carry states, and never leaves home without the trusty semi-automatic. Imagine a world... where the local diner, Walmart, or, say, pro-choice demonstration, is chock full of women openly armed to the max like modern day Amazon or Viking warriors. They could even tell the guys, "Hey, if you can carry around a penis substitute, I certainly can!" Or, how about, "You talk about penis envy, I've got your penis envy right here, bozo." Suppose the next "Million Women March" was held in a state where Open Carry is permitted. Can you see an emergency session of that state's legislature?

As the ever-escalating ease of obtaining legal guns, legal or otherwise, grows, I can see this idea of women arming themselves to protect their rights, reproductive and otherwise, really taking hold in America. I can see those models on HSN and QVC modeling with guns of all sorts. Lady Luger's anyone? Coupons in the weekly shopping mailer? I see a future of grocery store cross promotions. Buy two jars of Hellman's Mayo or Hamburger Helper and get a 9mm pistol, half off! Public demand can do this. Women do have power! So, why don't they start calling for more guns?

To be fair, and I'm always fair, the blame for a lack of gun control doesn't solely rest at the feet of one party in this country, even if one party is solidly made up of nihilistic true believers who don't seem to mind bullets flying all over the place. A way too large percentage of republicans will even tell you, with a straight face no less, that tragedies like Newtown didn't really happen, are hoaxes, or even "false flag" events.

Many Democrats often go along with the NRA on the issue of gun control, too, even if only out of cowardice and alleged "political expediency." Still, I think there's no harm in putting the idea of, say, making it even easier for every American woman of voting age to obtain a registered firearm or two, or three, or four, or more, many more, without background checks, of course. What harm could there be in that?

Republicans would have a dilemma. They would have to choose between being the fearful little rodents that they really are inside; worried about every woman in the country packing heat, or, reversing course and calling for what they would suddenly call "common sense" gun regulation. Gone would be the excuses that no gun control is needed because an assailant can kill you with a knife just as well as with a gun. You know damn what will pop into the minds of cretins like Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell, Donald Trump, or "Ted" Cruz if you suggest giving every woman a machete instead of a gun.

Wanna take this one step further and really terrorize your crazy Republican uncle? How about suggesting that, if things keep going the way they are, every African-American male of voting age, registered or not, will soon have a gun, registered or not.

Girls Just Wanna... Kick Ass?

Kyrsten and Pramila, the worst and the best Democrats in Congress-- both are women

Yesterday, Danielle Kurtzleben reported on an NPR study that found women see female lawmakers as being more competent and having more integrity. She reported that "Women tend to think more highly of female legislators on a variety of measures. With men, though, it depends on party; Republican men have reservations about the women representing them, whereas Democratic men in some ways rate women more highly than men."

On the whole, women tend to view a female representative as being more competent, having more integrity and representing the district well. They also tend to approve of female legislators more.

Meanwhile, men, on the whole, don't view women and men very differently on these measures.

But these attitudes don't hold steady across parties-- Republican women in particular get a boost from fellow women.

"Women rate female Republican legislators more positively than they do male Republican legislators," the researchers write, "but neither women nor men rate Democratic legislators differently based on their gender."

Specifically, Republican women members of Congress got a 10 to 11 percentage point boost in the areas of "approval" and "representing the district well" among women respondents.

Costa and Schaffner also broke down the data based on the party and gender of the respondents.

"While Democratic men evaluate women legislators more favorably, the opposite is true for Republican men," the researchers write. "Republican men are the one group who provide lower evaluations of female elected officials."

Republican men rated women lower in the areas of competence (by around 6 percentage points) and integrity (by just over 7 percentage points).

Potentially related to all of this is the finding that women are less likely to engage with their legislators than men are. In particular, the researchers found that women are less likely to contact female Democratic members of Congress, and that Democratic women are likewise substantially less likely to contact members of Congress.

One guess the researchers had here is that "if women trust that their interests are more often prioritized by female legislators, they may see less of a need to contact them."

And it's possible that some female respondents perceived Democratic women in particular to be focused on things like equal pay and paid family leave, which are often considered "women's issues" and are policy areas that Democratic politicians often champion.

How does this manifest itself in the real world? Well, the single best member of Congress-- as measured by the current session's crucial vote scores. There are 19 members of Congress who have perfect 100% scoresi including 6 freshmen. Of the 19 members, 7 are women and 12 are men. The full list:

• Nanette Barragán (D-CA)
• Karen Bass (D-CA)
• Katherine Clark (D-MA)
• Elijah Cummings (D-MD)
• Mark DeSaulnier (D-CA)
• Adriano Espaillat (D-NY)
• Jimmy Gomez (D-CA)
• Raul Grijalva (D-AZ)
• Pramila Jayapal (D-WA)
• Ro Khanna (D-CA)
• Barbara Lee (D-CA)
• John Lewis (D-GA)
• Jim McGovern (D-MA)
• Jerry Nadler (D-NY)
• Frank Pallone (D-NJ)
• Mark Pocan (D-WI)
• Jamie Raskin (D-MD)
• Jan Schakowsky (D-IL)
• Nydia Velazquez (D-NY)

Some really great women there, that's for sure... and lots of others have nearly perfect scores this session as well: Yvette Clarke (D-NY), Linda Sanchez (D-CA), Judy Chu (D-CA), Sheila Jackson-Lee (D-TX), Robin Kelly (D-IL), Louise Slaughter (D-NY), Gwen Moore (D-WI)...

But now let's look at the bottom of the congressional barrel. No Democrat even comes close top Arizona sociopath Kyrsten Sinema, who isn't just an arch-reactionary and criminally corrupt, but is also severely mentally disturbed and in need of psychiatric treatment. She's a woman-- and she is the only Democrat on the House Financial Services Committee to have accepted over a million dollars in bribes last year from the banksters she's supposed to be overseeing. Her crucial vote score is a shocking 20.0, the lowest of any Democrat I can remember. Currently there are 6 Republicans voting more progressively than Sinema. And if you look at the Democrats in Congress voting against progressive initiatives more frequently than supporting them... there are 18 and only 3 are women: Sinema, Stephanie Murphy (Blue Dog-FL) and Jacky Rosen (NV). Here's the full list from worst to merely putrid:

• Kyrsten Sinema (Blue Dog-AZ)- 20.0
• Collin Peterson (Blue Dog-MN)- 25.71
• Henry Cuellar (Blue Dog-TX)- 28.57
• Tom O'Halleran (Blue Dog-AZ)- 31.43
• Josh Gottherimer (Blue Dog-NJ)- 31.43
• Dan Lipinski (Blue Dog-IL)- 34.29
• Stephanie Murphy (Blue Dog-FL)- 41.18
• Charlie Crist (Blue Dog-FL)- 42.86
• Tom Suozzi (NY)- 44.12
• Jacky Rosen (NV)- 45.71
• Scott Peters (New Dem-CA)- 45.71
• Sean Patrick Maloney (New Dem-NY)- 45.71
• Ron Kind (New Dem-WI)- 45.71
• Gene Green (TX)- 48.48
• Raul Ruiz (CA)- 48.57
• Dave Loebsack (IA)- 48.57
• Lou Correa (Blue Dog-CA)- 48.57
• Ami Bera (New Dem-CA)- 48.57

As for the Republican women in Congress, they're generally no better than the Republican men in Congress, though there are too few of them to make a good statistical evaluation. There are 124 Republicans with a ZERO crucial vote score for the current session. And of them 12 are women: Diane Black (TN), Marsha Blackburn (TN), Susan Brooks (IN), Liz Cheney (WY), Virgina Foxx (NC), Kay Granger (TX), Karen Handel (GA), Mia Love (UT), Cathy McMorris Rodgers (WA), Martha Roby (AL), Ann Wagner (MO), Jackie Walorski (IN) and Mimi Walters (CA). Talk about extreme! There are only 19 Republicans who voted over 10% of the time for progressive legislation or positions. And of the 19... 3 are women: Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (FL), Barbara Comstock (VA), Elise Stefanik (NY), each of whom represents a blue-leaning district. Maybe gender isn't the best way to figure out who to vote for in elections.