Yes "Women's Issues" Is Still A Thing-- And MUST Be

In 1968 Phillip Morris launched a brand and marketing campaign targeting women... for death-- Virginia Slims: "You've come a long way, baby," which later morphed into "It's a woman thing." Women HAVE come a long way since then, a very, very long way. And women have more real economic and political power now than ever in recorded history. When a clown like Jeb Bush comes out and declares, in public, that unwed mothers should be publicly shamed, women count that against him. He's still collecting tens of millions of dollars from fat cats who want to see him get into the White House, but to women voters... he's dead, and his campaign is floundering and moribund. Bush: "Infamous shotgun weddings and Nathaniel Hawthorne's Scarlet Letter are reminders that public condemnation of irresponsible sexual behavior has strong historical roots."

Last week Ilyse Hogue, president of NARAL, and Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, penned an op-ed for The Hill focusing on Scott Walker's personal war against women. Walker, they wrote, "has lied to women and he has lied to workers. And those lies have consequences. They have hurt Wisconsin's women, families and workers... When women do better, the economy does better. When the economy does better, women do better. Women and workers are in this together, literally."

None of the Republican candidates are even remotely acceptable on women's issues. And a few days ago 3 George W. Bush-appointed judges backed up GOP tactics for closing women's clinics and thwarting pro-Choice rulings that go back to Roe v Wade, a ruling that came 5 years after Phillip Morris started running those Virginia Slims commercials!

In 1977 Barbara Mikulski was elected to Congress from Maryland, and 10 years later she won a statewide seat for the Senate. When she retires next year, one of the most powerful voices on behalf of women and issues crucial to women and families will disappear from the U.S. Senate. Blue America would like to make sure a voice just as compelling and just as powerful takes that seat, and the candidate has already been tested-- Rep. Donna Edwards, Maryland's most progressive and most outspoken political leader, and the chair of the House Democrats' Women's Caucus.

We asked Donna if women's issues still need to be watched over so carefully in 2015. Haven't we gotten beyond the outmoded conservative mentality that places women in an inferior position to men, instead of one based on achievement and equality?

"It's startling to see the lack of voices of women and mothers-- especially those of color-- represented in Washington," she told us. Donna:

As a single mother who raised a black son on her own, I worry deeply about the issues of race, education, economic opportunity, and justice that impact all our communities. And as a woman, I worry about issues like equal pay for equal work, the rights guaranteed by Roe v. Wade being chipped away by Tea Party Republicans, and childcare costs that are crippling far too many families.

We need to have serious discussions about our communities all across our country-- especially those that have been historically overlooked or feel left behind. Communities where there are not enough jobs. Where young people feel a sense of hopelessness because they lack economic opportunities. And where people feel like they don't have allies in the fight for progress.

Here's the thing-- we can make a difference. These issues could be addressed head on by ensuring more mothers, more women of color, and more women of diverse economic backgrounds are in seats of power. That's why this fight is so important.

And that's why Blue America has endorsed Donna, once again, and why we're asking you today to consider contributing to her grassroots campaign, where she faces a gaggle of less progressive men.

Brandan Boyle-- Bipartisan When It Comes To One Thing: The Republican War Against Women

I'm no fan of conservative-leaning New Dem Allyson Schwartz. Earlier today, I mentioned in passing how she was one of the bought-out Wall Street shills who voted with the GOP for Bush's anti-family bankruptcy bill. But there is one area where no one can deny Schwartz's heroic stature and that's when it comes to women's issues. She has been staunchy pro-Choice and a leader in the fight for women's health issues, no small matter. It would be tragic if one of Philadelphia's most ardent opponent's of women's health, an ambitious state legislator dear to the heart of the corrupt party machine, Brandan Boyle, were to follow Schwartz into Congress and wreck the best thing about her legacy.

As we've been warning, Boyle is an anti-Choice fanatic with a horrifying record to prove it.

Boyle is as anti-Choice as any misogynistic Republican freak from rural Georgia or Texas. Boyle isn't passively anti-Choice; he's a fanatic and an activist and a danger to American women. Colleen Kennedy laid it all out for Keystone Politics readers.

State Representative Brendan Boyle (D – 170) is one of dozens who helped to pass Act 122, a law that has resulted in the closure of five women’s clinics so far, since its enactment on December 22, 2011. This wasn’t a shocking move for Boyle to make; he has been a legislative supporter of the pro-life lobby all of his political career, but what is shocking is that his anti-choice record has gone largely unnoticed in the 13th district congressional race. He is the only pro-life candidate in a race in one of the most left-leaning districts in the country, thanks to gerrymandering.

In 2004, Democrats for Life of America listed Representative Boyle as a “Pro-Life All Star” on their website, a title which today is reserved for conservative democrats like Senator Joe Manchin… In April 2011, Brendan Boyle was a prime sponsor of HB 1314, a bill that is similar in architecture to the bill State Senator Wendy Davis famously filibustered, launching her into the Texas gubernatorial race. HB 1314 required all physicians performing abortions in Pennsylvania to receive surgical privileges from a hospital within 30 miles of their clinic. In other states where this law has been on the books, clinicians have had trouble getting privileges, due to the conservative activist role that some hospital administrators have taken to block their medical privileges.

In accordance with this Pennsylvania bill, those who were found performing an abortion without such privileges would be fined and charged with a third degree misdemeanor, risking their ability to continue to practice medicine. The bill was so extreme that it did not even make it out of committee, a huge reason why many in the general public do not know of Boyle’s advocacy for the bill.

Then in December 2011, of course, Representative Boyle voted in favor of SB 732, which was passed as Act 122. Its legislative supporters assured the public that it wouldn’t close any clinics, but instead, make them safer for those using them. It included provisions that mandated all clinics as “ambulatory surgical centers”. This basically means that expensive renovations would be required of all health centers, regardless of any history of safety issues or structural flaws in a facility. It’s what reproductive choice advocates call TRAP laws, or the targeted regulation of abortion providers. Its sole purpose is to make it impossible for clinics to remain open under the weight of pointless red tape and renovation costs.

No medical associations, medical professionals, or reproductive choice advocates supported the bill, all whom are charged with lobbying for the safest possible outcomes for patients, but plenty of anti-choice legislators seeking to eliminate abortion access all together helped to make this bill law. They used the media frenzy over the Gosnell murder trial to misinform the public about clinics, and it worked. Since Act 122′s enactment, five clinics have closed.

She concluded by warning that Boyle's law "has returned Pennsylvania to the days before the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision, in which abortions still occurred, but the safety of women seeking them was not valued. As you know, Blue America has endorsed Daylin Leach-- you can donate to his campaign here-- and Boyle's anti-Choice fanaticism isn't the only reason to make sure Daylin wins this race. Boyle is completely in the pocket of the anti-public school/pro-voucher forces, who have been funding his political career. Slimy anti-education dirtbags Joel Greenberg and Jeffrey Yass have maxed out to him and Boyle has been taking campaign cash from 2 of the worst anti-education outfits, the misnamed Students First PAC (Michelle Rhee's group) and Democrats for Education Reform.

Yesterday, Daylin released a new campaign ad, which you can watch up top.

"As a woman, as a mother, and as a grandmother, I know that Brendan Boyle in Congress will be bad for American women everywhere," said Diane Payne, a Northeast Philadelphia resident and retired teacher, featured in the ad. "We can't risk electing someone to be our next Member of Congress who will side with the Tea Party in Washington when they try to defund Planned Parenthood again or make it harder for women to get the healthcare they need.

  "While Boyle seems to have recently flipped on issues of abortion rights, and now is saying he supports a woman's right to choose, I don't think we can trust him, and I for one don't believe him. That's why I'm supporting Daylin Leach-- because he is the only candidate with a proven track record of standing up for choice and for women's health."

“Since before I was elected to office, and throughout my time in the Legislature, I have been a proud advocate for women and women’s health," said Daylin Leach. "I am proud of the work I have to done and the fights I have waged for women's rights, and look forward to continuing the fight in Congress.”

In April 2011, Boyle was a prime sponsor of HB 1314, which contained key parts of the same bill Texas bill that State Senator Wendy Davis fought against. (the bill did not get out of committee in the PA House). The bill requires all clinics that provide abortions to have admitting privileges to hospital within 30 miles (the same as the Texas bill) and imposes new fees on clinics, as well as slapping doctors with a third degree misdemeanor, which includes up to a year in prison, and $5,000 in fines. 8 months later, Boyle was back as a backer of the Republican War Against Women, this time voting in favor of SB732 (later called Act 122) which became law. This Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers, or TRAP legislation, forces all abortion clinics considered ambulatory surgical centers. So far, Boyle and his anti-women cronies have used it to shut down 5 facilities in Pennsylvania-- and the he PA Catholic Conference, an advocacy group for anti-choice legislation, thanked Boyle in 2011 for his vote on it.

You can thank Daylin Leach for voting against it and for championing women's health, Choice and equality. This primary is less than 3 weeks away!

Women Have Achieved Equality In Some States But Are Still Second Class Citizens In Others-- Take Virginia

In a comprehensive new study of the state of women in America, the Center for American Progress gets into great depth about how women are faring in terms of economic security, leadership and health. The differences between the states are startling. Less startling is how badly women fare in Republican-controlled states.

There are 10 states that were ranked "F," 3 ranked "D-" and 3 ranked "D." I'm sure it won't surprise any DWT readers that all 16 of those states voted for Mitt Romney last year (as did the 4 states with scores of "D"). The failed states, from bad to worse, ranked by how badly women are treated are:

• Missouri- D+
• Kentucky- D+
• Montana- D+
• Nebraska- D+
• South Carolina- D
• Idaho- D
• North Dakota- D
• Kansas- D-
• North Carolina- D-
• Tennessee- D-
• Georgia- F
• Indiana- F
• South Dakota- F
• Arkansas- F
• Texas- F
• Mississippi- F
• Alabama- F
• Oklahoma- F
• Utah- F
• Louisiana- F

And, of course, the 10 states ranked "A" or "A-" are all blue states: Maryland, Hawaii, Vermont, California, Delaware, Connecticut, Colorado, New York, New Jersey, and Washington. Virginia used to be a red state but has been trending blue. It's a classic purple state. The situation for women, statewide has improved and is much better than it is in any other state that was part of the Old Confederacy. The overall score is C+ and the state ranks 23rd best for women in America. Wednesday night the Democratic gubernatorial nominee, Terry McAuliffe went after Virginia's misogynistic Attorney General, Ken Cuccinelli, the GOP candidate, on women's issues.

Democrat Terry McAuliffe sought to hone in on issues that might widen the polling gap between him and his opponent, Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli (R), among women voters, during a gubernatorial debate on Wednesday night.

During multiple questions by moderator and MSNBC host Chuck Todd, McAuliffe tried to paint Cuccinelli as a conservative extremist who's out of touch on women's issues and gay rights.

"He sponsored personhood legislation that would outlaw most forms of contraception, would make the pill illegal," McAuliffe said. "He's referred to gay Virginians as self-destructive and soulless human beings. He was one of only three attorney generals when the Violence Against Women's was being reauthorized in the United States Congress-- 47 attorney generals signed the letter-- violence against women, not controversial. He is one of three that refused to sign it. It has been a pattern."

McAuliffe then linked Cuccinelli's stances on these issues as harmful to Virginia's economy, pointing in particular to a large government contracting company Northrop Grumman Corporation, which employs more than 40,000 employees in the Washington, D.C. area.

And that polling gap referred to above... as Rachel explained in her MSNBC piece up top, women voters "prefer McAuliffe by a 24-point margin over Cuccinelli... The challenge for Cuccinelli is stark: Nearly half of all voters view him unfavorably, and they trust his opponent as much as or more than the Republican on every major issue in the race, according to the poll. On trust to handle issues of special concern to women, McAuliffe leads Cuccinelli by 23 points."

Protecting Women's Health Stands Above Politics

Women are not an interest group. There are two ways to look at it though. The Democratic way (above) and the Republican way (below). "Yes, We Plan" features Julianne Moore, Mary J. Blige and Q-Tip. We've got to keep moving forward!

Joe Pitts-- An Existential Threat To The United States And Why He Must Be Defeated... Why We Must Defeat Him

Stupak-Pitts... one down, one to go

At 2pm (EST)-- 11 here on the West Coast-- Blue America will formally endorse an extraordinary progressive Democrat running for Congress in southeastern Pennsylvania, Aryanna Strader. Karoli will be hosting the live blogging session with Aryanna at Crooks and Liars and Karoli's perspective primarily covers why Blue America is so excited about Aryanna as a person and a leader. To help DWT readers understand exactly who Aryanna is up against, we asked Anne Enke (AnneofCarversville.com) to give us an idea of who, exactly Joe Pitts is. Anne is a Fortune 100 women's lifestyle and product design consultant and a key executive of Victoria's Secret for 10 years. Within weeks, Anne will launch her new GlamTribale.com jewelry collection, with 5% of revenues earmarked to support Planned Parenthood PA and another 5% to buy sanitary napkins for African girls who have none. Anne intends to build a
nonpartisan network of women and men dedicated to electing prochoice women to Congress. She recently moved to Philadelphia from New York City. Please visit Anne Enke’s Spittin’ Out the Pitts Campaign on Facebook: http:// www.facebook.com/pages/Spittin-Out-The-Pitts/343245912415214/ What follows is her story, an essential part of America's story-- much more than just a report of who and what Joe Pitts is.

When PA 16th district Representative Joe Pitts became the head of the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Health after the 2010 mid-term elections, some American women knew we were in for a rough ride.

Congressman Joe Pitts has been an anti-abortion advocate for decades and an avowed foe of Planned Parenthood. The only form of sex education Pitts will endorse is the failed program of abstinence. And of course, Pitts is anti-gay marriage.

Finding a Voice, Taking a Stand

In the fall of 2009, American women and the men in our lives certainly took our right to contraception and other reproductive health services for granted.

Yes, the anti-abortion debate swirled constantly around us. The tone was shifting but still not in a truly frightening way. My group was being called murderers of countless innocent children for having used an IUD as my favored method of birth control.

The voices that had stalked me for a year in the 70s, threats marking me for death and putting me in police protection for a year in Buffalo, New York, grew more pronounced. In the late 70s, I walked away from a career in journalism after decapitated animals, bloody knives and my hanging rope arrived daily.

When my masked stalker finally flew across the windshield of my car on a cold fall night, I fought for my life, gunning the accelerator in self-survival mode. Sobbing on the phone to the now well-known and very supportive lieutenant of my police department, I explained that I didn’t know if my pro-life stalker was dead or alive in the parking lot.

My crime? As an American woman in a free country, I did not understand supporting the Supreme Court Roe decision on a TV panel would put my life at risk.

Luckily, I am talented in business and was able to redirect my career, once I understood that being a journalist who agreed with Supreme Court decisions was reason to kill me. I was young then.

Rationally and perhaps arrogantly, I did not believe then or now, that my life is equal to that of a fertilized egg.

In the fall of 2009, I was more involved trying to end the barbaric flogging of 40,000 women a year in Sudan for wearing loose-fitting gabardine trousers, than to seriously worry about the United States banning birth control.

My focus changed abruptly as the cold, autumn weather moved into Manhattan.

Hijacking the Affordable Care Act

I heard the word ‘incubator’ uttered by Bart Stupak when referencing some technical mumbo around the amendment proposed by the C Street Democrat and his Republican partner Joe Pitts to the Affordable Care Act.

The said incubator wasn’t some life-saving machine for a baby born prematurely. The incubator under discussion was part of Mitt Romney’s shiny objects discussion. The mama machine was a living, breathing, average American woman for whom having a baby should be a major life decision.

The incubator was an American female citizen who votes. She was my sister, your daughter, the woman you love deeply, my best friend, and your mom.

Listening to American women citizens being referred to as incubators on the steps of the nation’s capitol, I felt for the first time to be a nonperson in my own country.

As a nonperson, I made the decision to reengage in the political process and tough journalism, at whatever the cost to myself.

I’m supporting Democratic candidate Aryanna Strader in her bid to unseat Republican Joe Pitts in the 16th district of Pennsylvania, because I believe in personhood for American women, men and children.

Knowing in advance that I will be criticized, it is time to say on behalf of millions of American women, that my life is not equal to that of a fertilized egg.

The very idea that Joe Pitts wants to give a multi-cell egg the same legal status as me terrifies me-- and not because I an un-American.

Up to Our Eyeball in Vaginal Probes

As American women, we are up to our eyeballs in vaginal probes, ultrasound legislation, and state mandates on exactly how our faces will be positioned to watch the ultrasound.

Our lives are details in the fine print. If we don’t like the government taking physical control of our heads and vaginas, we can close our eyes, suggested Pennsylvania governor Tom Corbett. Or we can leave this country. Good riddance to bad rubbish!

Republicans would call this physical takeover of women’s bodies fascism in another country. In America they call it divine-right nation patriotism, an obligation to obey a higher calling than city, state and federal laws and Supreme

Court decisions.

Joe Pitts works for God first, the people second and he will tell you that in no uncertain terms.

When Joe Pitts introduced HR 358 “Protect Life Act” in the fall of 2011, it was promptly renamed the “Let Women Die” bill, because it allowed hospitals that receive federal funds to turn away a woman suffering a miscarriage and requiring an abortion to save her life.

In a country where our Republican-led Supreme Court, ruled that women have a right to privacy that gives them access to contraception and early abortion, Joe Pitts HR 358 “Protect Life Act” sought to turn back this law further.

Presently, a woman suffering a miscarriage must be transferred to another hospital by a Catholic hospital that refuses to help her.

In one out of six hospitals in America-- health institutions now run by the Catholic bishops-- a grown woman with three kids and a loving husband would not be transferred to another hospital to save her life under HR 358. The bishops consider that act enabling an abortion for which punishment is hell.

The mother’s life meant nothing except condolences and prayers for her family’s healing in HR 358. Better a mourning husband and three kids with no mother, than an aborted fetus, is the Catholic Church’s position.

In less dramatic circumstances, a woman can’t have her tubes tied after giving birth, as a permanent form of birth control in these same Catholic hospitals. It is not her body to control, but rather that of God and the Catholic bishops.

Joe Pitts and his HR 358 bill reaffirmed the obvious to growing numbers of American women. The reality is that American women who are preoccupied with family, jobs and making the mortgage payment in a dreadful economy must now deal with government intervention into the very physicality of our bodies.

Stand here. Spread your legs. Shut up, woman. You have no rights; we’re focused on your fetus. This is now the American way in our Republican House of Representatives.

The man Joe Pitts, who chairs the committee that governs the life of every woman in America, is not focused on women’s health. He is focused on projecting your fertilized eggs. For the life of me, I don’t understand how-- in good faith-- laws are being written in this country that allow women to die, with the full knowledge that her fetus can’t survive without her.

A Measly 3% of Women

Pushing back against a chorus of outraged American citizens, the Joe Pitts crowd protested that only 3% of abortions in America are really and truly to save the life of the mother.

Let me share the same information with you through another lens. Guttmacher Institute estimates about 1.2 million annual abortions in America.

Can you imagine any other piece of legislation in Congress like Joe Pitts’ HR 351 that would slough off the deaths of 40,000 American women each year by denying them a legal, life-saving procedure in our hospitals?

Don’t tell American women with functioning brains that there is no Republican-led war on women-- with Joe Pitts at the front of the parade.

How many women dying in America’s emergency rooms are too many for the Joe Pitts crowd to say “Wow, guys. Maybe if it’s 50,000 women at risk, we should pull back. “ Would 75,000 women influence Joe Pitts? 100,000 women a year?”

Do American women need to take a reality check that we incubators with serious health problems are just collateral damage on your road to a theocracy?

Sanctity of Whose Life?

Do not talk to me about sanctity of life, because you are not focused on mine, as a living and breathing citizen of this country. These egregious anti-personhood for women laws wear no political label and apply to Republican, Democratic and Independent women alike.

I say that American women deserve a representative who supports our right to live in a state of safe guarantees of being treated in American hospitals. She is entitled to a happy, sexually fulfilled marriage that doesn’t require her to keep an aspirin between her legs at night, for fear of getting pregnant.

Whether you are Republican, Democrat or Independent, it’s time to stand for personhood for women as a higher priority than the alleged federal and state rights of fertilized eggs and zygotes-- a concept totally rejected by a Republican US Supreme Court four decades ago.

Next Up: Contraception

If you think only abortion rights are at stake, think again my friends. Pitts is committed to ending women’s rights to most hormonal contraception. In a Pitts world, you’re on the rhythm method – and I honestly don’t know if he seeks to regulate that aspect of the martial union or not.

Joe Pitts is a co-sponsor of the Life at Conception Act HR374, introduced on January 20, 2011, a bill that strikes at the heart of legal contraception.

You may know it as a personhood bill and you should be shaking in your sneakers over this legislation, also. Mitt Romney supports this bill.

In the midst of a really serious recession in America, where women and especially young, unmarried women should be having fewer babies or none at all, Joe Pitts wants to remove all impediments to pregnancy.

Incubators don’t decide when they want to have a baby. They provide life support 24 hours a day.

Joe Pitts wants to define life’s beginning as the moment when a human egg is fertilized, and seeks to do it under the 14th amendment, putting his vision of human rights directly opposed to the current legal interpretation of the 14th amendment. Women now have certain rights over their own bodies including birth control, as part of judicial interpretation of the 14th amendment.

It gets worse.

Utah’s Miscarriage Is A Felony Bill

Personhood bills make the state the enforcer of women’s bodies all through their pregnancy with potentially devastating consequences.

A bill passed by the Utah House and Senate in February 2010 made it a crime-- a felony-- for a woman to have a miscarriage, as a result of “reckless behavior.” Lawyers agreed that a pregnant woman could be prosecuted for not wearing rubber-sole shoes on a rainy day, if she slipped, fell and suffered a miscarriage.

A courageous Republican governor refused to sign the Utah bill, knowing there weren’t enough votes for an override. Joe Pitts would support that bill.

South Dakota’s Justifiable Homicide Law

In South Dakota, a bill was introduced to make it justifiable homicide for one family to kill another one, in the act of abetting an abortion. It would be legal for a man to kill his wife, if she took their 15-year-old daughter to a Planned Parenthood clinic in Minnesota to get an abortion. Joe Pitts would support that bill, which was withdrawn after bloggers like myself went into a digital orbit of
screams.

The Joe Pitts crowd talks about how America has changed and they long for the good old Ozzie & Harriet days when everyone knew their place.

I agree that America has changed, but in a different way.

Increasingly women are being hunted all over America, as if we are not persons, not citizens with our own right to life.

The Silencing of Independent-Thinking American Women

Last week in Michigan, an elected representative, Lisa Brown, was silenced and called out of order for asking government to stay our of her vagina, when the word “vagina” is used in the legislation three times. Lisa Brown lost her right to free speech. It’s not on the record, but Joe Pitts probably supports that action-- and Michigan’s most restrictive to women’s rights legislation in the country.

Last weekend in Virginia, the newly-formed, financially successful Women’s Strike Force, founded by Republican Katherine Waddell as a bipartisan coalition to support pro-choice candidates in Virginia, was not allowed to sponsor a table at the state Republican convention. Organizers said the application was never received.

By now, American women know where we stand with the Joe Pitts crowd.

Bearing Dead Fetuses in Georgia

A few months ago, women were compared to cows in Atlanta, as a smarty-pants legislator explained that requiring a woman to carry a dead fetus until it aborted naturally was no different than what he witnessed on his own farm. Nature isn’t always fair but God never gives women a burden that we can’t bear.

The utter dehumanization of woman’s physical beings, with the state of Georgia’s demand that she carry a dead fetus in her body was abhorrent, frightening and disgusting to most American women.

The nightmare that women have witnessed in America in the last two years is only beginning.

My challenge isn’t that we wake up to what might happen to women in this country. I challenge all of us to believe that this bad dream will only escalate, as America grinds to a bureaucratic, political battle standoff that demands the unthinkable: return America to the 50s in order to execute God’s grand plan.

Whether the majority of American citizens want to live this way is inconsequential.

The people’s rights, and specifically women’s rights are not the concern of the Joe Pitts crowd. Lancaster district 16’s representative openly admits that he is a steward of the unborn, a greater priority than his own constituency.

Is Joe Pitts a Theocrat?

Being a responsible writer, I will say that there is no clear answer to this question.

There is no doubt that Joe Pitts is committed to ending abortion rights in America and he is prepared to sacrifice a large number of American women’s lives to achieve that goal.

Whether Joe Pitts-- like avowed dominionists Michelle Bachmann, Sarah Palin and Rick Perry-- believes in an American theocracy with the Bible being the source of law and order is unknown.

Since the late 1970s, Joe Pitts is a core member of The Family, a highly-- secretive elite Christian organization that consists of men in power worldwide.

Jeff Sharlet, called by Ann Coulter one of the stupidest journalists in America, lived in one of the Fellowship Foundation’s properties in Virginia and wrote the book The Family: The Secret Fundamentalism at the Heart of American Power.

The anti-gay, anti-abortion, pro-free market ideology of The Family operates according to what they call “totalitarianism for Christ,” says Sharlet.

The group’s organization reflects standard right-wing fundamentalist politics; and its leaders praise Joseph Stalin, Adolf Hitler and Pol Pot for the way they demanded complete loyalty.

There are no evident denials of this assertion by Sharlet about The Family but rather efforts to create context. Stalin and Hitler are extolled because of their abilities to persuade the general populace to follow their beliefs. These guys are admired for running a tight ship.

Family members who are willing to speak-- and that’s not many-- stress that the powerful people associated with The Family come from different faiths and are believers in the power of prayer.

I read Sharlet’s book earlier this week and it is a major who’s who of movers and shakers in the world. The assertions of regular prayer groups at the Pentagon and the Department of Defense are undisputed facts.

It was the job of Joe Pitts to turn that Republican-focused organization around, introducing family values and an anti-women’s rights agenda into The Family’s sphere of consideration.

I’m compelled to admit that Hillary Clinton has ties to The Family, and I would be remiss not to point out that fact.

Given the Secretary of State’s recent critique that American extremists like Joe Pitts are out to control women, I can’t honestly say that her associations with The Family have dampened her fight for women’s rights.

In Clinton’s words:

Why extremists always focus on women remains a mystery to me. But they all seem to. It doesn't matter what country they're in or what religion they claim. They want to control women. They want to control how we dress, they want to control how we act, they even want to control the decisions we make about our own health and bodies.

Yes, it is hard to believe but even here at home we have to stand up for women's rights and reject efforts to marginalize any one of us because America needs to set an example for the entire world.

Daily Beast writer Lisa Miller agrees that The Family invites criticism because they maintain a closely guarded database of membership, issue no cards, and collect no official dues. When a journalist asked Michigan’s Bart Stupak about his connections to The Family and living at C Street, he replied “We don’t like to talk about that.”

Values Action Team

On arrival in Congress, Joe Pitts became chairman of the Values Action Team (VAT), a subgroup of the Republican Study Committee dedicated to coordinating legislation with the Christian right.

Tom DeLay organized the VAT after Focus on the Family founder James Dobson threatened to lead a walkout of religious organizations from the Republican party over its lack of action on curtailing abortion, school prayer, restricting gay rights, and school voucher aid.

After a federal judge ordered the removal of the Ten Commandments from the Chester County courthouse in 2002, Congressman Pitts issued a statement saying “I think that religion and the Ten Commandments in particular should have a role in our public life.”

Pitts supported the Ten Commandments Defense Act HR 2045, which sought to return all rights to display the 10 Commandments on public buildings to the states.

In 2009 Pitts joined a friend of the court brief filed by Pat Robertson’s American Center of Law and Justice that recognized “the undeniable truth that our freedoms come from a source higher than the state.”

On the face of it, no individual position taken by Joe Pitts condemns my worst fears about him-- that he is a theocrat. He has me terrorized enough without my making up stories about him.

These unfolding, unsettling revelations about Pitts and his determination to let thousands of American women die unattended in America’s emergency rooms if their lives are in danger comes within the larger context of religion in American politics.

Religion and American Politics

The Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life reports that in 1996 Americans were united with 42% of Republicans and Independents, and 44% of Democrats saying that churches and other houses of worship should keep out of politics.

In a March 2012 poll, 44% of Republicans still embraced that view, while 60% of Democrats and 58% of Independents say that churches are too involved in American politics.

51% of the Pew-surveyed public says that religious conservatives have too much control over the Republican Party, while the same poll found that only 41% believe secular liberals have too much control over the Democratic Party.

Another recent Pew Research report cites a plummeting decline in the belief in science among social conservatives, and we’re not only talking about evolution versus creationism.

Joe Pitts and “Christian Reconstructionism”

When one of my advisers on writing this essay about Joe Pitts sent me to his last-minute, cancelled appearance at a November 2002 conference on “Christian Reconstructionism,” I was stupefied.

“Christian Reconstructionism” seeks to impose Biblical law on America.

Did Joe Pitts just accidentally agree to take the podium because he was charged by his Values Action Team mission to outreach with all religious conservatives?

Did Joe Pitts not do his investigative homework or were Christian Reconstructionists well known to him as friends?

The Congressman suffered a terrible embarrassment a few weeks ago, with a belated response from his office to questions about Israeli-Palestinian relations.

The form letter from Joe Pitts’ office told his constituent:

"With the global war against terrorism, it is now incumbent on Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Palestinian Authority (PA) Chairman Yasir Arafat to clamp down on Palestinian extremists that have perpetuated violence and to restart a peace process that has collapsed.”

Anyone with an ounce of knowledge about foreign affairs knows that Arafat has been dead for eight years and Sharon has been in a coma for six.

Is lack of attention to detail the reason why Joe Pitts had accepted an invitation to speak at a conference of the National Reform Association in Ephrata, Pa?

Adherents of this religious-political agenda favor establishing a rigid “Christian Reconstructionism” religious state in America. This form of theocracy is one of the most radical forms of Dominionism-- which says that Christians have a God-- given right to rule all earthly institutions in every nation of the world.

Republican candidates Michelle Bachmann and Rick Perry embrace Dominionism. Christian right leader Ralph Reed has denounced it. Mike Huckabee is very closely linked to the Christian Reconstructionist movement.

Pitts bowed out as a speaker at the November 2002 event, only after Americans United for Separation of Church and State asked him if he really wanted to lend credibility to a group that “advocates extreme polities that run counter to our Constitution and the American way of life.”

The Rev. Barry W. Lynn was referring to the fact that one of Christian Reconstructionism’s chief advocates Rev. William Einwechter argued in a 1999 article that juvenile delinquents should be stoned to death. Another speaker at the event, Gary DeMar, asserted in a 1987 book that gay people, abortion doctors and people who seek abortions should be executed.

According to these religious beliefs the inflexible anti-abortion Joe Pitts was prepared to stand at the Ephrata, Pa event with a group embracing the execution of one in three Catholic women-- if the law was retroactive-- or almost 10 percent of American women.

This is not the view of men who believe in personhood for American women.

Isn’t it a bit chilling that Rev. Lynn was the one to persuade Joe Pitts to cancel his speaking engagement with the Einwechter-DeMar crowd with a public challenge?

On the subject of stoning American citizens, Daily Beast writer Michelle Goldberg wrote in January 2012 about Ron Paul’s Christian Reconstructionist Roots, which he doesn’t openly discuss.

This entire conversation seems preposterous-- except that once state legislatures are telling American women that we must bring a dead fetus in our body to term, anything is possible in America. All bets are off, and I don’t recognize the country I grew up in-– a town of 1000 people in Minnesota.

Stoning is Reconstructionists’ preferred method of execution because it is both biblical and fiscally responsible. Rocks are, in Christian Reconstructionist leader Gary North’s words, “cheap, plentiful, and convenient.”

Finding a True Spirit of Justice

2002 was the year that George Bush Attorney General John Ashcroft ordered that curtains be draped over the naked breast of Spirit of Justice.

Lady Justice was commissioned in 1933 from sculptor C Paul Jennewein, along with the bare-chested, male counterpart Majesty of Law who was not curtained.

Many progressives and independents raised their eyebrows in 2002, mocking the irony of Ashcroft’s order to cover up the Spirit of Justice-– at the US Department of Justice.

Today John Ashcroft teaches Constitutional Law at televangelist Pat Robertson’s Regent University School of Law.

It’s the job of leaders like John Ashcroft to raise the academic credentials of the institution once rated a fourth-tier school by US News & World Report.

Every war needs revolutionary patriots and the law students of Regent University are deeply committed to a makeover for America.

Yes, John Ashcroft is another core member in The Family, writes Jeff Sharlet. John Ashcroft and Joe Pitts are long-time close friends, according to numerous Google citations.


Aryanna Strader: Estrogen Meets Testosterone

Why must the vast majority of Americans who believe there is too much religion in politics gamble with the future of women’s lives in a political environment that puts fertilized eggs on a higher list of respect than our own lives?

It’s my goal to shift PA’s 16th Congressional Race between Joe Pitts and Aryanna Strader into the national limelight, asking you to contribute to her campaign.

Only a comparatively small group of PA voters will decide the fate of millions of American women this November.

I respect the complexity of picking a candidate that truly represents the hearts and minds of this beautiful countryside and hardworking farmers and patriotic American families.

To better understand Aryanna’s community of voters, I will be meeting many of you on July 22 at Lancaster’s Food and Spirits Festival. My business partner and I will showcase a collection of ‘Spittin Out the Pitts’ Jewelry, created in support of Aryanna Strader’s candidacy and fundraising efforts.

There is no confusion about Democratic candidate Aryanna Strader. She does not belong to secret societies and wouldn’t be invited to join The Family. I doubt we will find her in Uganda, fomenting the execution of homosexuals, an action well-documented against evangelical ministers believed to be associated with The Family.

Aryanna Strader is a dream woman candidate, one of the most focused, goal-oriented, self-disciplined people I’ve met in a very long time. My own focus has been largely job creation and entrepreneurial success in America. But I know a great political candidate when I meet one.

The youngest of 10 children in a poor family, Aryanna rose above her roots to become a highly-decorated Iraqi veteran with strong support from Lancaster County’s Quaker community.

Aryanna is happily married with two children Donovan and Camryn, an MBA-credentialed wife and business partner to husband Dan Strader, and mom to their Shetland Sheepdog Brownie.

Did I tell you that Aryanna Strader is 29 years old? Quite frankly, the woman makes me dizzy. Aryanna is-- well-- magical, and a magnificent, earnest representative of the people of the 16th district.

Imagine PA’s conservative 16th district delivering the youngest member ever elected to the House of Representatives-- and a woman at that!! You will rewrite the history books.

Donors Needed

We are grateful that Blue America has chosen to elevate Aryanna’s visibility in her critical race to unseat Joe Pitts this November.

Many of my readers are Republicans and Independents, not only progressive Democrats. I consider myself to be an Independent and have been a registered Republican many years of my life. There is no place for women like me in today’s Republican party.

My appeal is to women and men across America to help fund Aryanna Strader’s race.

If you intend to vote for Mitt Romney but identity with the Republican women and men of Texas who are on record saying they will fund Planned Parenthood, rather than let Rick Perry shut down the organization, I ask you to contribute to Aryanna Strader’s campaign.

Defeating Joe Pitts will send a strong message to the Republican party about America’s priorities. Controlling women’s bodies should not be at the top of America’s to do list.

There is no reasoning with the far right wing, no compromise as in the years of the Hyde Amendment. Republican Joe Pitts has given me no choice but to become a maverick for American women.

Join our Spittin’ Sisters campaign to send Aryanna Strader where she belongs: the House of Representatives in Washington, D.C.

DC Blue Dogs Show Their Hand In North Carolina

Few Democrats-- and none from North Carolina-- voted more frequently with the GOP since the 2010 elections than fumbling Blue Dog Heath Shuler. It made him so unpopular among Democrats in his western North Carolina district that polls showed that he would be defeated by progressive Asheville City Councilman Cecil Bothwell. So, Shuler, a bigot and religious fanatic who voted with Republicans against equality for women and against equality for the LGBT community, decided to scale back on his plans to become Speaker or senator or governor or something big. Instead he'll settle for something rich-- as he trundles over to K Street to take up the mantle of a sleazy lobbyist. Lee Fang wondered yesterday if Shuler is engaging in bribery by negotiating for a lobbying job with the corporate shills at the Majority Group while he's still in Congress. It's one of several Blue Dog-oriented lobbying firms that launders corporate cash into political campaigns for Democrats who will get in bed with anti-family interests-- perfect for Shuler.

One way corporations and special interests rule Washington is by promising lucrative salaries to lawmakers and their staff members. Once a public official makes a deal to go to work for a lobbying firm or corporation after leaving office, often with the promise of a million dollars or more in salary, he or she becomes loyal to the future employer. Thus, a special interest can essentially buy out the lawmaker, gaining not only access but the ability to influence votes and other policymaking power while the lawmaker is still in office.

...Congressman Heath Shuler (D-NC) is a prime example. Shuler, a leader of the Blue Dog caucus of big business-friendly Democrats, announced that this term will be his last a few short months ago. As Politico notes, he is already talking to lobbying firms that may want to hire him as an influence peddler:

Shuler, for one, isn’t wasting any time assessing his options. The conservative North Carolina Democrat has met with several groups with Washington offices in an effort to see if he might be a good fit. [...]

One of the organizations taking a serious look at Shuler is The Majority Group, a lobby shop founded by former Rep. Walt Minnick (D-Idaho), according to sources. Rob Ellsworth, a former legislative assistant of Shuler’s, is a co-founder of the boutique lobbying firm.

The Majority Group, one of the lobbying firms courting Shuler, currently represents the beef industry, a foreclosure servicing company called FCI Lender Services, as well as bank holding companies with business in health, life, and real estate insurance.

And while Shuler meets with lobbying firms openly interested in hiring him, the congressman continues to play a pivotal role in shaping the laws we all live under.

At least he's out of Congress-- or soon will be. Shuler's ProgressivePunch score this session is 38.55. That means crucial votes during 2011 and 2012 he voted with Cantor and Boehner over 60% of the time. And he has a chief of staff he wants to leave in his place to continue his work against the middle class and working class families who live in the district-- and, of course, to be available for all the lobbying he plans to do.

Shuler endorsed his staffer, Hayden Rogers, and last week the Blue Dog caucus came right in after him. That means the countdown for a check from Steny Hoyer and the nod from the DCCC can't be far behind. The flawed theory behind conservative Democratic support for Rogers is that the district is very conservative and that Rogers will have the best chance to beat the Republican. The problem, of course, is that conservatives in the district will support the Republican and that the only way for a Democrat to win in the newly gerrymandered district is to offer a vigorous alternative to the toxic, failed Republican agenda. But conservatives would rather lose with Rogers than win with Bothwell.

Democratic voters showed their regard for the Blue Dogs in 2010 when more than half of them were either defeated at the polls or forced to retire rather than be defeated. Since then, many of the most extreme right members of the Blue Dog caucus have announced their departure from electoral politics-- like Shuler. Rogers was Shuler's campaign manager before he was his chief of staff. Before that he was roommates-- at Princeton-- with Lyle Menendez, who was convicted with brother Eric in the 1989 shotgun slayings of their parents in Beverly Hills, Calif. Rogers worked for Lyle Menendez at the restaurant he bought after getting his parents’ life insurance money. Rogers hasn't been indicted for being part of the murder plot and he refuses to discuss his relationship with the Menedndez brothers.

Rogers may not be a murderer but he's a typical corrupt conservative careerist hack. The Democrat likely to beat him in the primary is Cecil Bothwell, who has been endorsed by Blue America . They couldn't be further apart on issues or approach. Last week Bothwell addressed women's health issues, issues where Rogers finds himself in bed with the Republicans (of course). Bothwell:

I am the only candidate for congress in North Carolina’s 11th Congressional District, in either party, who has taken strong positions in favor of women, women’s rights and women’s health.

I entered the primary race in March of 2011, when the incumbent Blue Dog Democrat Heath Shuler voted to defund Planned Parenthood. Though I had taken exception to many of Shuler’s votes against our President’s proposals (and continue to be disappointed), his vote against an organization that provides essential health care services to tens of thousands of women in North Carolina alone, and to their families, was my last straw. To add insult to injury, during that same week I learned that Rep. Shuler was co-sponsor of an amendment that would have redefined rape under our health care laws to only include violent rape by a stranger. Date rape, marital rape and incest would no longer qualify.

I had to wonder what planet he came from.

(Note: In September I was honored to serve as the volunteer auctioneer for an art auction to benefit Planned Parenthood here in WNC.)

In a larger sense, my view is that human beings have a right to make their own health care decisions, and only a woman has a right to make reproductive choices for herself. It is a wonderful thing when two parents make those decisions together and the man involved elects to stick around and share responsibilities, but we all know that model fails over and over again.

More than half of the babies born to women under age 30 find themselves in single parent households. And the biological truth is that a man’s involvement in baby-making is very brief. It is the mother who endures nine months of pregnancy with its attendant risks. It is the mother who is almost universally the principal caregiver and nurturer, and often the nutrition source as breast feeding has come back into general popularity. It is the mother to whom courts have historically assigned custody in the event of divorce. (Though the law has swung toward shared custody, in no small part because many men prefer not to pay child support.)

Women must be accorded the full right to determine their future plans. Men should attend to their own responsibilities around baby making and then sit down and shut up. The all-male panel of experts convened by Republican legislators, to testify concerning contraceptives would be laughable if it weren’t so frightening. Old men seem ever eager to tell young women what they can or cannot do. And as a woman I met in Bryson City observed, “If they can prevent you from having an abortion today, they can just as easily force you to have an abortion tomorrow.”

Another of my proposals goes further in the area of valuing families. I believe we should provide a stipend to a mother for the first three years of her first two children’s lives. The parents would be required to participate in self-organized parenting groups (somewhat like current baby-sitting co-ops) in which one of the parents and the children would participate on a regular basis-- to share ideas, information and skills. The intent is to permit more time devoted to nurture and interaction during those critical formative years when much of our socialization occurs.

To those who’d argue that this is too expensive, my reply is that it would let one parent step out of the work force, thus opening up employment for the unemployed who are currently receiving benefits. Better socialized children are better students, less likely to disrupt the education of others in their classes, more likely to finish school, and less likely to end up in prison. My argument is that we are shifting the expense to where it actually does some good, instead of simply paying people who are out of work, or paying to imprison people later.

Sunday Cecil Bothwell's younger brother died suddenly and Cecil is spending some time with their 90 year old mother trying to comfort her. Please help Blue America keep the small donations coming in for his campaign while he's grieving and off the trail. Last week the Bothwell campaign held a Family Fun Night Funder in a small town in District 11, with three bands, jugglers, face painting, balloon animals, pizza and beer with a suggested $15 donation at the door (kids free). One farm couple showed up with empty pockets, but offered two dozen eggs in lieu of admission which the campaign happily accepted. Meanwhile, Hayden Rogers was hosting a $2,500 a plate steak dinner, 250 miles east in Raleigh, the state capital. Bothwell quipped, "I guess with WNC ranking #3 in hunger in the United States, we both felt a need to feed our constituents."

Should I like "The Good Wife" better than "The Middle" because Josh Charles is a mensch and Patricia Heaton's a jerk? Of course not, but . . .

In this past week's episode of The Good Wife, "After the Fall," Will was actually enjoying his forced leave from Lockhart Gardner until he was descended on by both his sisters, Sara (Nadia Dajani) and Aubrey (Merritt Weaver, so wonderful as Nurse Jackie's Zoey), who promptly decided that he "needs someone," or maybe even already has found someone -- enter Kalinda (Archie Panjabi). Diane (Christine Baranski) is sure happy to see him back in the office.


"We get lumped in with lunatics."

-- actor-director David Hunt, husband of actress Patricia Heaton

by Ken

To minimize likely confusion, let me straightaway answer the question I posed in the post title: No, of course my recently heightened personal feelings about these two actors isn't going to make me like either show more or less. I have a feeling, though, that there will be some spillover in the respective pleasure I get from watching the actors (not to be confused with watching their shows).

We'll come back to that, but first I think a quick word is needed to David Hunt, in response to the above-quoted cry from the heart, quoted yesterday by the uncredited writer of HuffPost Celebrity's "Patricia Heaton Apologizes For Joining Rush Limbaugh's Attack On Georgetown Student Sandra Fluke,"which was an add-on to a declaration of his wife's in a PopEater interview last year, in which she told Rob Shuter "that she has many gay friends and doesn't oppose gay marriage, Patricia gets frustrated being automatically lumped together with other conservatives." And --

"We know for a fact there are some people who have said they wouldn't want to work with us because of our politics," [Heaton] said, with her husband David Hunt adding, "We get lumped in with lunatics."

Gosh, Dave, that must be terrible, getting lumped in with lunatics. Who would want that? But say, as long as we're on the subject, did you read these (now-deleted) tweets of the missus?

"Hey G-Town Gal: Plz let us also pay for your Starbucks, movie theater tickets and your favorite hot wings combo deal at KFC! Anything else?"

"Hey G-Town Gal: If your parents have to pay for your birth control, maybe they should get a say in who you sleep with!" Instant birth control!"

"If every Tweaton sent Georgetown Gal one condom, her parents would have to cancel basic cable, & she would never reproduce -- sound good?"

"Hey GTown Gal: How about only having sex on Wednesday? (Hump day!)."

"Hey G-Town Gal: turn your underwear inside out! Then u only have to do laundry every 2 weeks—saves on detergent & trips to Laundromat!"

The premise, you see, is that the Hunts are victimized because, as the HuffPost Celebrity scribe put it, "Heaton has never hidden her conservative views from typically left-leaning Hollywood." Of course there is some superficial truth to the image of "left-leaning Hollywood," but only superficial truth. The people who yammer about it never, ever look an inch or two below the surface to see an industry that is as deeply and fiercely reactionary as any in the country.

There are no doubt lots of reasons why some people in Hollywood don't want to work with other people in Hollywood. I wonder if it's ever occurred to Patricia and David that maybe people don't want to work with them because they're assholes. That's Just a theory I'm throwing out, but "asshole" might be a kinder description than "lunatic" for the person who sent out all those tweets.

As noted, the tweets have been deleted -- not because our tweetybird sees anything wrong with the substance, but because she now sees them as "disrespectful."

After feeling the backlash, on March 3, both Limbaugh and Heaton issued their own apologies. Heaton deleted the tweets and apologized to Fluke for her comments .

"re @SandraFluke Mea culpa Sandra! Wasn't being respectful 2 u re my tweets as I hope people wd b w/me. Don't like you being dissed -so sorry," she wrote and again on March 5th she reiterated the apology to her followers. "I apologized to Ms Fluke last week. I may not agree with her views but I didn’t treat her with respect and I'm sorry. I was wrong. Mea Culpa."

Well, good for her for apologizing. It does seem kind of a shame, though, that it took the shitload of grief dumped on her to awaken her to her unfortunate disrespectfulness. Apparently in the course of all that tweeting -- and tweeting and tweeting and tweeting and tweeting -- it never once occurred to her that, well, what actually happened might happen.

I loved the lead on that Huffpost Celebrity post, by the way:

Yet another publicist is likely cursing the invention of Twitter after The Middle star Patricia Heaton joined Rush Limbaugh's attack on Georgetown Law student Sandra Fluke.

By contrast, this tweet -- quite brilliant, I think -- was sent out by actor Josh Charles in response to the appalling homophobic blithering of onetime Growing Pains teen throb Kirk Cameron, whose parents were played by Alan Thicke and Joanna Kerns.


I guess Pat was trying to be witty in her rants tweets. Josh managed without visible effort to be not only funny but charming as well as blunt. Smartly done, Mr. C!

I was already a huge Josh Charles fan, dating back to his spectacular work on Sports Night, the lamentably short-lived (damn that gutless ABC -- oh wait, that's Ms. Heaton's network, isn't it?) comedy written by Aaron Sorkin. One happy result of this episode is that I'm seeing other fans of Sports Night crawling out of the woodwork. Which is only fair. That show was so good for its two seasons that if you were to make a short list of the greatest series in TV history, no matter how short the list got, you couldn't leave off that show about a nightly sports-news show produced by Isaac Jaffe (Robert Guillaume) and Dana Whitaker (Felicity Huffman) and anchored by Casey McCall (Peter Krause) and Dan Rydell (Josh C).

Nobody writes better for actors than Sorkin, and the cast assembled for the show was all but unimaginably brilliant. Given the caliber of the company he was keeping, it says something that Josh C may have done, week in, week out, the most memorable work on the show. To focus on only one of Dan's plot lines, his pursuit of, then winning of, and then loss of Rebecca (an absolutely radiant, mesmerizing Teri Polo) was one of the most beautifully imagined fictional relationships I've ever encountered -- and this on a show that itself included as well the altogether extraordinary relationships between Casey and Dana and between Sports Night staffers Natalie (Sabrina Lloyd) and Jeremy (Joshua Malina).

Sports Night's ill-fated Dan and Rebecca (Teri Polo)

Even the best actors are dependent on their material, and while Josh has worked a lot since Sports Night, and I've never seen him do anything that wasn't first-rate, I haven't seen him do anything that made comparable use of his talents -- except maybe for his season of HBO's In Treatment -- until The Good Wife, another show with an amazing ensemble cast, and writers (overseen by creators Michelle King and Robert King) who know how to write for good actors.

I've made no secret of my fondness for The Good Wife, most recently (I think) here. I notice that I early on I wrote that the show --

has passed some of my toughest tests: Not only do I look forward to it each week, but I'm now pretty regularly watching it in real time rather than trusting to the DVR for time-shifting, and so far I've been really sorry as each episode ended.

Three seasons in, that's even more true.

I like The Middle too. But I notice that this is a show I almost always entrust to the DVR, and I don't usually pounce on recorded episodes. I know I've still got the last new February sweeps episode sitting unwatched. When I get to it, I'll probably wonder why I stalled, but the fact will remain that I did. It's not because of Pat Heaton's politics. It's Frankie Heck I"m watching, after all, not Patricia Heaton. Just as on The Good Wife it's not Josh Charles but Will Gardner (along with all the other characters, of course) that I'm watching.

At the same time, I'll probably get even more of an extra kick out of being able to watch Josh Charles, who gives evidence of being a mensch as well as a terrific actor.

#

So Rush has "apologized," but has he really hit the limit to how far he can go? I wish I believed it

I'm not much of a petition-signer myself,
but here's the Credo Action petition link.

by Ken

Well, it's something that Rush went far enough that he's had to apologize. As the AP reported this evening:

Limbaugh apologizes to law student for insult on sex, says he intended no personal attack

By Associated Press, Updated: Saturday, March 3, 7:46 PM

WASHINGTON -- Conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh apologized Saturday to a Georgetown University law student he had branded a “"slut" and "prostitute" after fellow Republicans as well as Democrats criticized him and several advertisers left his program.

The student, Sandra Fluke, had testified to congressional Democrats in support of their national health care policy that would compel her college to offer health plans that cover her birth control.

"My choice of words was not the best, and in the attempt to be humorous, I created a national stir," Limbaugh said on his website. "I sincerely apologize to Ms. Fluke for the insulting word choices."

The thing is, Rush is "forced" to apologize frequently, but it never matters, because his listeners know he has his fingers crossed. Intended no personal attack? What could possibly be more ridiculous? Of course he intended a personal attack, as personal as possible. His attackee belongs to two of the groups he loathes most: non-Right-thinkers and women. He meant to vilify and demean her, and his listeners know it, and they love it. "My choice of words was not the best"? Well, perhaps, but only in the sense that those words have caused him some minor embarrassment. Rush is one of the media's more careful word-choosers.

You probably also got this e-mail from Credo Action Political Director Becky Bond:

Tell Limbaugh's advertisers to stop supporting his unforgivable attacks on women.

Dear ---------,

When Sandra Fluke, a Georgetown Law School student, testified before Congress to protest rightwing attacks to limit women's access to birth control, Rush Limbaugh called her a "slut" and a "prostitute."

Here's what Limbaugh actually said:

"What does that make her? It makes her a slut, right? It makes her a prostitute. . . She wants to be paid to have sex. She's having so much sex she can't afford the contraception." [New York Daily News, March 1, 2012]

Unfortunately, what Rush Limbaugh says matters. He has a bigger audience than any other commercial radio host in the country, and what he talks about on air has the power to drive the Republican agenda -- an agenda that is already obsessed with radical backslides of womens' ability to protect their own health. [Wikipedia]

Tell Rush Limbaugh's advertisers: Stop Supporting Rush Limbaugh's attacks on women. Click here to automatically sign the petition.

Sandra Fluke's testimony before Congress included important points about why access to affordable birth control is so crucial, including the story of a friend who had lost an ovary because she couldn't afford the birth control needed to manage her ovarian cysts.

Rush's unforgivable translation of that was "slut" and "prostitute." Sandra Fluke rightly has called Rush Limbaugh's comments "an attack on all women." [New York Daily News, March 1, 2012] We agree.

Every American enjoys the right to free speech, but that doesn't mean that advertisers who are accountable to their customers should pay people like Rush Limbaugh who make such appallingly hateful and sexist comments.

Already the mattress retailer Sleep Train has pulled its advertisements, explaining in a Tweet: "We are pulling our ads with Rush Limbaugh and appreciate the community's feedback." [Politico, March 2, 2012]

Rush's other advertisers need to hear from us loud and clear — if you advertise on Rush Limbaugh, you are supporting his reprehensible attacks on women. . . .

And so on.

In a follow-up e-mail this evening, the Credo Action team says:

Thanks for taking action.

Here are some ways you can spread the word to make advertisers on the Rush Limbaugh show know there is a price to pay for financially supporting Rush's unforgivable attacks on women.

If you are on Facebook, click here to post the petition to your Wall.

If you have a Twitter account, click here to automatically tweet:
Tell Rush Limbaugh's advertisers: Stop supporting Rush's unforgivable attacks on women: http://bit.ly/x51N7Y @CREDOMobile

You can also send the following e-mail to your friends and family. Spreading the word is critical, but please only pass this message along to those who know you -- spam hurts our campaign.

Thanks for all you do.

--The CREDO Action Team

There's even " a sample message to send to your friends," with the subject line "Tell Rush Limbaugh's advertisers: Stop supporting sexist attacks on women." Sorry, I can't find an on-line link, but maybe you can find it from one of the Credo Action links in this post.

I'm kind of at a loss to know what to say. As I've suggested in the title of this post, I'm sure there is a limit beyond which Rush can't go but I'll be damned if I know what it is. That is, beyond that venerable prescription: being caught in bed with a dead girl or a live boy. Short of that, I just don't know.

Why? I guess because the very act of listening suggests that you prize nothing more than his particular smorgasbord of lies, ignorance, immorality, and indecency. So why would you recoil from intimations that your hero is just the tiniest bit dishonest, ignorant, immoral, or indecent? These aren't his potential Achilles heel, they're what his listeners crave, it's what they tune in for.

Oh sure, a few advertisers might be embarrassed into slinking away, at least temporarily. But for advertisers who lust after Rush's audience, the raw meat he throws his listeners probably makes his hold on them more valuable, and I mean in a literal dollars-and-cents way. After all, it's what makes hate-talk radio a viable commercial proposition, and nobody makes it more viable than Rush. It very well may be that when he's at his worst from the standpoint of people with even a modicum of knowledge and decency, he's actually at his most compelling commercially.

I guess it's a good thing that the president has stepped in. From the Washington Post:

Obama calls Georgetown law student attacked by Rush Limbaugh to offer support

By David Nakamura and Paul Kane, Published: March 2

President Obama called a Georgetown University law student on her cellphone Friday in an attempt to seize the political high ground in the national debate over contraception.

Framing the issue squarely as a fight for women’s rights, Obama called Sandra Fluke to express solidarity after she was vilified by conservative talk-radio host Rush Limbaugh for her public support of the administration's health-care rule. The rule requires employers to provide free contraception to women as part of their health insurance coverage.

In an interview with The Washington Post, Fluke said Obama was concerned about her in the face of what he called Limbaugh's "very inappropriate" remarks. "He expressed concern for me personally," she said. "I assured him I was doing okay despite the personal attacks."

Fluke said she viewed the Limbaugh remarks, and others like them, as an assault on women’s rights. "I realized very quickly what this was -- an attempt to silence me and to silence all women," she said. . . .

But the extreme Right has so messed with the brains of Rush's listeners that this is likely only to confirm them in, even stoke, their reflexive Obama-hatred. I guess the idea is that less extreme Right-leaning Americans will be peeled off, and the crazies will be isolated. It's a neat theory; I just don't see any evidence for it. As Becky Bond says in her e-mail:

[W]hat Rush Limbaugh says matters. He has a bigger audience than any other commercial radio host in the country, and what he talks about on air has the power to drive the Republican agenda -- an agenda that is already obsessed with radical backslides of women's ability to protect their own health.

The propagandists of the Far Right, including the engineers of the Right-Wing Noise Machine, may have unbounded contempt and limitless loathing for the suckers who make up their captive target audience, but they've proved themselves masters at manipulating them.

Still, you keep thinking, there must be a limit. And maybe I'm wrong. I have been in the past when it came to assuming that people like Rush could, practically speaking, get away with just about anything. Having no access to the mindset of a person who would listen to more than 30 seconds of Rush's lying filth, I may simply be disqualified from diagnosing what might constitute that famous "too much." Maybe this diatribe on sluttitude is it. I wish I were more convinced.

#

WILL Women Remember In November?

Blue America is supporting independent-minded New Hampshire Democrat Carol Shea-Porter for Congress against corrupt teabagger Frank Guinta. The crazy teabaggers who seized control of the New Hampshire legislature last year are passing a ton of ALEC bills and the latest, HCR 39 just cleared the State-Federal Relations and Veterans Affairs Committee. It urges Congress to privatize Social Security. Carol, of course, adamantly opposes this. Guinta is a big fan-boy of the idea. But today Carol has a different kind of guest post for us, one we've all been very concerned about this week. Please take a look and afterwards (or before; up to you), please consider making a contribution to Carol's campaign here.

The GOP Birth Control Patrol

-by Carol Shea-Porter

If moderate Republicans mistakenly believe they and their party are stuck in a Saturday Night Live skit, who can blame them? Their Republican leaders’ intrusion into matters that are none of their or the government’s business just doesn’t seem real. Would one of their top two candidates for President really rail against contraception? “One of the things I will talk about that no president has talked about before is, I think, the dangers of contraception in this country,” Santorum promised in a chat with The Caffeinated Blog. “Many in the Christian faith have said, ‘Well, that’s okay. Contraception’s OK.’ It’s not okay because it’s a license to do things in the sexual realm that is counter to how things are supposed to be.” The other candidate, Mitt Romney is unwilling to stand up for women, even though he described himself as pro-choice in another life and race.

The Republican Congress decided to hold a hearing to determine whether the Obama Administration was trampling “freedom of religion and freedom of conscience,” even though President Obama had decided that insurance companies, not religious institutions, would pay for birth control for employees who worked in a faith-affiliated school or hospital and chose to use contraception, which costs about $50 per month. (The original rule just exempted Churches and other Houses of Worship.) The Congressmen invited five men for the first panel, and refused to let the woman whom the Democrats wanted to testify speak. Five men talking about birth control issues without women at the table does sound like a Saturday Night Live skit, but sadly, it was real.

While Republicans were talking or listening to men talk about birth control, our Republican members of Congress were posturing, claiming that the Obama Administration was violating religious freedom. They failed to mention that New Hampshire has had a law requiring insurance coverage for contraception, without any religious exemptions, since 1999. It was passed by 120 Republicans and 121 Democrats and two Independents, back in the days when Republicans in the NH State House worked with Democrats for the good of the state and the people. Those legislators apparently agreed with what President George H. W. Bush said in Congress when he was a GOP Rep: “If family planning is anything, it is a public health matter.”

The congressman from NH-1 has repeatedly said that if a woman needs an abortion and her life depends on it, he would deny it and let her die. No exceptions, not even in cases of rape or incest. He voted for HR 358, which would allow hospitals that receive federal money to deny an abortion to a woman, even if she would die without one.

One would hope that he would give a woman a fighting chance and at least let her prevent conception in the first place, but he has doubled up against women. He is a cosponsor of HR1179, Respect for Rights of Conscience Act. This bill would allow “a health plan to decline coverage of specific items and services that are contrary to the religious beliefs of the sponsor, issuer, or other entity offering the plan or the purchaser or beneficiary… without penalty.” What does this mean? While these men are trying to prevent coverage for contraception, it actually means much more. It means your boss might be against mental health coverage, so you don’t get any. Or your boss might be morally against anyone having more than two children, so he or she won’t cover your third pregnancy. Maybe your bosses are completely against alcohol or cigarette consumption, so drinkers and smokers get no coverage.

What is the reason for all of this? Why do these men want to shut out access to birth control, something that almost everyone wants, needs, and uses? Why do the few who believe that it is a mortal sin want to make everyone else follow their beliefs? Don’t others have First Amendment rights also? And why would politicians throw themselves into the role of enforcers?

It is puzzling. Maggie Gallagher, President of the Institute for Marriage and Public Policy and a Santorum supporter, writes that he “needs to show he can put the contraception issue to bed. Now. In Politico, former Bush White House Political Director Sara Fagen said, “As a general rule, when you’re in a bucket talking about women’s health and morality that’s not a space you want to be in long term.”

Politicians are politicians, not Preachers. In November, women will remember who thought otherwise.