While the community that cares about women was appropriately appalled by Rush Limbaugh's misogynistic attack on a woman who spoke out in favor of women's reproductive rights, the right wing rallied around Rush. As the mouthpiece for the right wing, Fox "News" mounted a defense of Rush that consisted of attacks on Sandra Fluke's credibility and alleged licentious behavior. Truth was the first casualty. Bill O'Reilly brayed about not wanting to pay for Fluke's birth control which isn't an issue unless he has health insurance from Georgetown. Fr. Jonathan Morris claimed that Fluke wants government funded (not what she said) birth control to pay for all the sex she's having (she didn't speak about herself). Hannity and Kirsten Powers played the moral equivalency game by attempting to say that Limbaugh's sexist comments were no worse than Bill Maher's. Yesterday, on Fox & Friends Laura Ingraham defended her soul brother of hate. In addition to playing the now right wing standard "tu quoque" game, she also disparaged the women of "The View," and made the jaw dropping claim that there is no GOP war on women. But Laura's a devout Catholic who wears a great big cross so we know that she tells the truth!
Ingraham claimed while Catholics are involved in the fight against the HHS contraception mandate "it's not a Catholic issue; but Catholics are involved, for sure." She claimed that this "is about every employer in the United States having to pay for services that are not medically necessary that other people want for free." (Factcheck - birth control pills are used to deal with a number of women's health issues which include, in some cases, preventing life threatening pregnancy.) She referenced a law journal article, written by Sandra Fluke, "that seems to indicate" that if the government doesn't pay for sex change operations they could be charged with discrimination. She asked what other things will be mandates and snarked that "if you don't get it for free you're not getting access" and asserted that "the new lexicon of the left is that access means you get it free." Factcheck - Fluke's article is about the discrimination faced by those who seek coverage for a gender reassignment surgery because their health insurers believe it's not medically necessary.
Gretchen Carlson moved into moral equivalency mode. She looked "at the other side of the fence" and mentioned that both she and Ingraham have been called similar things, "pretty frequently" by liberal commentators (who is calling Gretch a "whore?") and asked if there is a "double standard."
It was go time for Ingraham. She claimed that "most women" know that "the idea that this is a war on women that's just like the old line that the left always goes to when they're losing the debate substantively, they say that the Republicans have a war on African Americans, war on gays, war on Latinos, war on women they don't want to talk about the presidents record so this is what they're doing." She veered into the "they-do-it, too" Limbaugh defense: "Now it's all Rush Limbaugh's fault. We know that the left routinely does this." (four days of extensive attacks?) She claimed that she laughed when Ed Schultz insulted her because that's "the sort of thing that happens when a person makes a verbal slip, is losing the argument, is frustrated." (So Rush is "losing" the argument?) She said she accepted his apology and didn't lose any sleep.
She mentioned that the women on "The View" laughed about Schultz (which Laura also did); "but when Fluke goes on the View, it's all isn't this a tragedy and isn't this horrible." She whined that people want Rush "driven from the air" and that "this is about free speech (hate speech?) and ideas." She complained that those who are targeting Rush's advertisers are "going after" him because "he really effective." Gretch said that she wished that both sides of the fence wouldn't use that word. Ingraham responded: "It's unfortunate and Rush clearly said that. But they're saying that his apology isn't genuine because he needs to cut off part of his right limb and hand it to them."
As a devotee of the free market, Ingraham should realize that customers have the right to complain and media outlets have the right to fire employees for incendiary comments. She doesn't seem to have a problem with "The Million Moms" "going after" JC Penny for their employment of the gay Ellen DeGeneres. But no war on minorities and women? Scuse Me? GOP voter ID and immigration laws specifically target the minority community. The GOP's attempts to stop gay marriage and even bullying programs are part of their war on the LGBT community. The war on women is real as shown by the record number of anti-choice legislation that has been proposed in this year alone. The first thing the new GOP led House did was to try to defund Planned Parenthood. The Republicans are losing support among women because of this war. It's so bad that even GOP Senator Lisa Murkowski has decried it. While the Catholic and (one assumes) celibate Laura doesn't have to be concerned about being violated with a transvaginal probe, many women are irate. War on women - Ya Think!?
Video available at Mediaite.
No wait a sec….
I wonder why Sen. Grothman did not propose making filing for divorce equivalent with child/spouse abuse? That might actually affect men as much as women, ya know.
Look: It’s in Ingraham’s best interest to play the moral equivalency game. She was tweeting on the weekend that she’s still waiting for her phone call from President Obama for being called a slut. This also makes her look as important as Sandra Fluke, who just happens to speak more truth than she does.
With all my love,
Aunty Em