One of the top GOP right wing/Fox News memes is that there is no war on women and that all the anti-choice bills and attempts to defund Planned Parenthood are righteous attempts to save us women from our silly and slutty selves. The reality, however, is that there is a concerted effort to deprive women of the reproductive rights and chief among those who are trying to do this is Virginia gubernatorial candidate Ken Cuccinelli. His numbers, understandably, are abysmal among women. So given that Fox News is the first stop for on any Republican rehab tour, it wasn't surprising to see him on Fox & Friends where he was interviewed by new friend, Elisabeth let-the-poor-die-of-heat-exhaustion Hasselbeck who, in effect, provided him with his very own Fox News campaign ad.
Friday's Fox & Friends was my first observation of Hasselbeck doing a complete interview. I've gotta say that her performance makes former friend Gretchen Carlson look like the Rhodes Scholar that she was. While Carlson's delivery was dramatic (ranged from very compassionate to fiery) Hasselbeck's delivery had no range whatsoever. But then when the intent is to promote the agenda of the guest, who needs range?!
Anyway, Hasselbeck started with piece by reporting that the Virginia gubernatorial campaign has "taken a negative turn with an ad just weeks before the election that's attracting national attention." The chyron reminded the viewers about this evil Democratic negativity: "On the Attack, VA Gubernatorial Week Goes Negative." In promoting the right wing meme that poor "Cooch" (a nickname that's a tad ironic given his anti-choice position, if you know what I'm saying) is the victim of this negativity Hasselbeck ran an ad that Democratic candidate Terry McAuliffe "unleashed" on poor Ken in which he "attacked" poor Ken's stand on abortion.
The ad shows a woman ob/gyn talking about because how her job is to "protect the health of women," she's offended by Cuccinelli's position on making abortion illegal even in cases of rape, incest, and to protect women's health. Politifact rated it mostly false because Cuccinelli's position is that abortion should be banned except in cases where the women's life would be in jeopardy. (Ain't that a treat!) Hasselbeck asked for his response and the "Cooch" was off and running.
Cuccinelli accused his opponents of having "no positive vision" and "all they're left with is trying to scare women." He affirmed his scary "pro-life" record. As Planned Parenthood states, in rebutting his statements on Fox & Friends, Cuccinelli has "advocated for extreme and dangerous so-called ‘personhood’ legislation, which if enacted, could have interfered in personal, private medical decisions relating to birth control, access to fertility treatment and Virginia’s targeted restrictions on abortion providers, which have dangerous implications on a woman’s ability to access health care." He alluded to another ad which "goes after contraception" and then claimed that "we're not going to touch contraception." (The ad, rated as half true, is a reference to Cuccinelli's support for a 2007 "personhood" bill that would have outlawed some forms of birth control)
He accused McAuliffe of being a liar and whined about being out spent. Lizzie said "right" and vigorously shook her head in agreement. He continued to smear McAuliffe with the claim that McAuliffe is lying about how he invested in the death of terminally ill patients. "Right," said Hasselbeck. If anybody is a liar it's Cucccinelli because the AP had to retract a story that made this claim.
Hasselbeck brought up his bad rating with women and then, ta-da, gave him the opportunity to redeem himself. He then spent the rest of the time talking about how awesome he is. Lizzie continued to agree with him. He bragged about how he was the first AG to fight Obamacare which, not mentioned by Hasselbeck, actually provides more benefits for women including new pre-natal benefits. Cooch's last statement was a howler considering Ken's anti-choice agenda: "The government is coming to get in between the decision and the doctors and what they're allowed to do in treatment."
Elisabeth Hasselbeck is no Gretchen Carlson. But I guess we should give Lizzie some credit for being able to say "yes" but beyond that, we're not talking a Pulitzer - but then this is Fox & Friends...
There’s only a few days left before the special election (Wed) in NJ to pick a senator to replace Frank Lautenberg.
If you haven’t heard of Lonegan, it’s not surprising, since he’s so far to the right of the worst right wingers. This cretin wants to abolish any form of social welfare, including SS, SNAP, Medicare… anything that helps older or less fortunate people. He wants to lock up homosexuals. He’s totally against abortion for any reason whatsoever (even impregnation by a tentacled alien). I could go on and on… but you get the idea.
He just got in the in-person endorsement of the former half governor of Alaska (half-balked Palin).
Hannity’s had Lonegan on both his radio and TV air many times.
So it figures that Pisselbeck will join the fray. Maybe Seanny will give her orders. Hannity — though a realist that Lonegan doesn’t have much chance of actually beating Cory Booker — can’t stop singing his praises.
Maybe that would be a good club act: Slanthead and his Neanderthal ancestor!
