Of course, it played out during another of Sean Hannity’s Obama hate fest radio hours:
Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich harshly criticized President Obama for commenting on Trayvon Martin’s race as he extended condolences to the 17-year-old shooting victim’s parents on Friday. Obama said, “If I had a son, he would look like Trayvon,” a remark that Gingrich said he found “disgraceful” and “appalling.”
“What the president said, in a sense, is disgraceful,” Gingrich said on Sean Hannity’s radio show. “It’s not a question of who that young man looked like. Any young American of any ethnic background should be safe, period. We should all be horrified no matter what the ethnic background.
“Is the president suggesting that if it had been a white who had been shot, that would be OK because it didn’t look like him? That’s just nonsense dividing this country up. It is a tragedy this young man was shot. It would have been a tragedy if he had been Puerto Rican or Cuban, or if he had been white, or if he had been Asian-American, or if he’d been a Native American. At some point, we ought to talk about being Americans. When things go wrong to an American, it is sad for all Americans. Trying to turn it into a racial issue is fundamentally wrong. I really find it appalling.”
That Newt Gingrich doesn’t understand this is a racial issue, that a young black man isn’t safe to walk down his father’s street without being shot for doing so, is indeed a racial issue, is why African Americans and Latinos vote overwhelmingly for Democrats.
My own son just wrote to say he’s ashamed of my position re hoodies-still I feel parents must do whatever they can to keep their kids safe – Geraldo Rivera via Twitter
We live in a country where one 20th century motto was “the clothes make the man.” It’s advertising, but it’s apropos.
See any episode of “Mad Men.”
However, put the hoodie on a white kid and George Zimmerman doesn’t take the shot, because he’s likely not watching him.
But let’s not kid ourselves or be overly pc about this.
Cultural stereotypes pervade our country, with the Young Black Man In A Hoodie Must Be A Thug one of them.
Now widen the lens.
Look at what Pres. Obama has had to endure in a suit and tie, with the trappings of the White House and the voting populace electing him. Yes, America finally has our first African American president, but he’s paying the price for the privilege every day.
Rivera was asked if he’d retract his statement and he said “absolutely not.”
Asked whether he would take back his earlier comments on Fox News in light of the criticism, Rivera told POLITICO in an email, “Absolutely not,” while citing his recently published column on Fox News Latino called, “Geraldo Rivera: Trayvon Martin Would Be Alive but for His Hoodie” that makes the similar arguments that the Fox News host made on the air.
Good for Rivera.
The conversation we’re now having about the hoodie and the prejudice surrounding cultural style versus the stigma attached to it by individuals who don’t understand anything beyond their own world is important.
But let it not divert us from the racism at the heart of this act, made actionable by the N.R.A.’s “stand your ground” campaign.
You’re not going to convince me that George Zimmerman would have stood down if Trayvon Martin hadn’t been wearing a hoodie. It’s just as likely Zimmerman would have interpreted a non-hooded Trayvon as acting strangely as he tried to duck and dodge Zimmerman who was clearly stalking him with felonious intent fueling his vigilance.
But is Geraldo Rivera wrong to warn his son to watch what he wears when he goes out? Love him or hate him, respect him or not, my guess is Rivera knows something about bigotry and racism, so his words are informed.
We don’t have a prison population of non-whites for no reason and it’s not just because of criminals needing to be incarcerated. It’s because our justice system has never been color blind, because it’s fueled by a society founded with slavery.
During remarks from Pres. Obama on his announcement to nominate Jim Yong Kim to the World Bank, he was asked about the murder of Trayvon Martin.
From the White House::
Question: Mr. President, may I ask you about this current case in Florida, very controversial, allegations of lingering racism within our society — the so-called do not — I’m sorry — Stand Your Ground law and the justice in that? Can you comment on the Trayvon Martin case, sir?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, I’m the head of the executive branch, and the Attorney General reports to me so I’ve got to be careful about my statements to make sure that we’re not impairing any investigation that’s taking place right now.
But obviously, this is a tragedy. I can only imagine what these parents are going through. And when I think about this boy, I think about my own kids. And I think every parent in America should be able to understand why it is absolutely imperative that we investigate every aspect of this, and that everybody pulls together — federal, state and local — to figure out exactly how this tragedy happened.
So I’m glad that not only is the Justice Department looking into it, I understand now that the governor of the state of Florida has formed a task force to investigate what’s taking place. I think all of us have to do some soul searching to figure out how does something like this happen. And that means that examine the laws and the context for what happened, as well as the specifics of the incident.
But my main message is to the parents of Trayvon Martin. If I had a son, he’d look like Trayvon. And I think they are right to expect that all of us as Americans are going to take this with the seriousness it deserves, and that we’re going to get to the bottom of exactly what happened.
Thank you.
Conservatives and anti-Obama people will jump on Pres. Obama’s statement, but the problem is that it has the virtue of being true.
Prodded by their NRA masters, lawmakers waved off those predictions as exaggerations. Then they overwhelmingly passed a bill that took the “castle doctrine” to infinity and beyond. The “castle doctrine” used to mean you could use deadly force if someone attacked you in your home. “Stand your ground” not only absolved the homeowner of any obligation to retreat, it extended that concept outside the home.
[...] Gov. Jeb Bush couldn’t sign the bill fast enough.
Seven years later, those warnings so casually dismissed by Bush and the Legislature are taking shape.
In fact, the number of justifiable homicides has significantly increased since the law went into effect, according to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.
From 2000 to 2005, an average of 13 killings by private citizens were deemed justified each year. Between 2006 and 2010 that average increased to 36 killings per year. The highest was in 2009 at 45.
We’re not members of the N.R.A., though my husband has been a gun expert for decades.
I encouraged my husband to get a concealed carry permit many years ago because of where his business took him, out into areas where police were nowhere in sight and he was virtually alone in the dead of night.
Reading the reports, it’s clear Zimmerman’s actions were premeditated. It’s also clear that Zimmerman went hunting even after being told not to pursue. There is no answer to date of what made Trayvon Martin look “real suspicious” to Zimmerman, except one thing, he was black, which is in the 911 tape clearly. That alone is worthy of invoking a hate crime allegation, yet Florida officials have dragged their feet.
Very late last night, because public anger had risen so high, the Justice Dept. announced a full investigation of the murder of Trayvon Martin.
That’s when Florida’s law enforcement, who’d been loping along on their “investigation,” decided to get involved. From the Miami Herald:
A grand jury will look into the shooting death of Trayvon Martin, Seminole County State Attorney Norm Wolfinger said Tuesday.
[...] Wolfinger’s statement followed a decision late Monday by the U.S. Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division and the FBI to investigate the killing of the Miami Gardens teenager by a neighborhood watch volunteer.
Reasonable people can disagree about concealed carry permits.
Reasonable people, however, should agree that a gun is the ultimate power against an unarmed person.
Trayvon Martin posed no imminent threat to Zimmerman.
Imminent threat is the issue when carrying a concealed weapon and you decide to draw it. You must have probable cause, as my husband reiterated to me when we were discussing this case, which was just one of the things the instructor covered in the mandated concealed carry class Mark took.
What proves further felonious intent of Zimmerman is his pursuit of Trayvon Martin even after the 911 operator told him to stand down.
All Mark could say is “that guy is toast.”
It’s telling it took Florida’s law enforcement this long to figure that out.
Video via Think Progress, the remarkable track by Jasiri X.
“Trayvon had a bag of Skittles,’’ Fulton’s attorney, Ben Crump, told Lauer. “(Zimmerman) had a nine millimeter gun. He was almost 80 pounds more weight than Trayvon Martin. This is a situation where when you…listen to those 911 tapes and the three witnesses, everyone in America is asking, when are they going to arrest Zimmerman for killing this kid in cold blood?’’
The 911 tape is chilling (see video), the second call is is reportedly from the man alleged to have gunned down Trayvon Martin.
George Zimmerman, being described as a “neighborhood watch volunteer,” is fortunate he’s not black. If he were he’d be in jail.
Trayvon had left the house he and his father were visiting to walk to the local 7-Eleven. On his way back, he caught the attention of George Zimmerman, a 28-year-old neighborhood watch captain, who was in a sport-utility vehicle. Zimmerman called the police because the boy looked “real suspicious,” according to a 911 call released late Friday. The operator told Zimmerman that officers were being dispatched and not to pursue the boy.
Zimmerman apparently pursued him anyway, at some point getting out of his car and confronting the boy. Trayvon had a bag of Skittles and a can of iced tea. Zimmerman had a 9 millimeter handgun.
The two allegedly engaged in a physical altercation. There was yelling, and then a gunshot.
What made Zimmerman leave his car with his hand gun to pursue a smaller, younger, un-armed black youth?
There aren’t any individuals who own a firearm (myself included) that aren’t told at some point that pursuing someone in the manner Zimmerman did is wrong, illegal, not to mention ripe with felonious intent. You are taught that if someone is in your own home you can defend yourself, but if they flee and are outside you cannot.
Zimmerman’s actions were clearly premeditated.
There is no answer to date of what made Trayvon Martin look “real suspicious.”
The unspeakable motivation of anyone to take a firearm on to the street to confront a citizen screams of a vigilante mentality that ignores respect for human rights, something that plagues our country to its core.
This event also brings to mind the firearms brought to select Tea Party events, with media capturing pictures of people openly carrying pistols to rallies, holstered at their side.
UPDATE:The Washington Post is reporting that the Justice Department announced this evening that the Civil Rights Division, in conjunction with the F.B.I., will do a full investigation of Trayvon Martin’s murder.
There’s no female Republican who would talk like this over a bill that mandates an ultrasound, but also forces a woman to be shown the ultrasound in the middle of a personal crisis you have to experience to understand the magnitude.
All this for a legal procedure.
I understand that religious conservatives don’t get that it’s none of the state’s business to tell a woman what she can do with her own body, but somebody in the Republican Party has to save these people from themselves.
Is there a Republican today who doesn’t understand that if they’d get out of a woman’s most personal decisions they might actually have a chance of beating Pres. Obama?
Everybody understands the point of being an abortion rights opponent, but no conservative should sign on to giving the state power to invade a woman’s privacy and physical space like this.
Conservatism is dead when Republicans use the state to force women to have a physical procedure against her will.
I don’t know how Republicans can miss the the irony of being against government, but yet force women into these positions.
It’s the story no one is talking about, while Paulbots continue to believe.
Now Paul doesn’t even have one single reporter covering his campaign.
Obviously, it’s not just the number of events that are keeping so many other outlets off Paul’s trail altogether. The candidate has just 47 delegates to date and not a single primary or caucus victory to his name. … – Politico
Friendly with Mitt Romney, Ron Paul could get one prize. Perhaps he could convince the Republican Party to spotlight his son in Tampa.
The FDA believes it’s important to find out why men need Viagra before dispensing the little blue pill. It’s important to be sure the cure fits what ails them.
A critic of efforts to restrict abortion and contraception for women, Turner says she is concerned about men’s reproductive health. Turner’s bill joins a trend of female lawmakers submitting bills regulating men’s health. Turner said if state policymakers want to legislate women’s health choices through measures such as House Bill 125, known as the “Heartbeat bill,” they should also be able to legislate men’s reproductive health. Ohio anti-abortion advocates say the two can’t be compared.
The so-called “heartbeat bill” sponsored by Rep. Lynn Wachtmann is another arrow from the right in the war on women, which is causing Republicans to lose steam with the ladies across the country.
But maybe the notion of the “heartbeat bill” was the inspiration, because it’s important for men to have a healthy heartbeat before they start messing around and taking ED pills that could endanger their life.
We’re all concerned about the boys and, because we all know how irresponsible you can be about your health.
As President of the Harvard Law Review in the spring of his final year there, 1991, he aligned himself with Professor Derrick Bell’s dramatic protest for diversity on the faculty of Harvard Law School.
UPDATE:Politico is reporting that this video was first broadcast in 2008. Ben Smith and BuzzFeed got hit from another direction as well, from Breitbart’s Big Government, who is claiming it was “spliced and diced“, which BuzzFeed is denying, saying again they purchased the footage from WGBH, the PBS station in Boston, with the speech shown in its entirety. Big Government’s headline on this story says it all: “OBAMA: ‘OPEN UP YOUR HEARTS AND YOUR MINDS’ TO RACIALIST PROF.”
It happened on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama.
“The first 10 or 20 Negroes were swept to the ground screaming, arms and legs flying and packs and bags went skittering across the grassy divider strip and on to the pavement on both sides,” The Times wrote. “Those still on their feet retreated. The troopers continued pushing, using both the force of their bodies and the prodding of their nightsticks.” – March 7, 1965 – Civil Rights Marchers Attacked in Selma
“A little boy said to his mother; ‘Mommy, how come I’m black and you’re white?’” the joke in the email said. “His mother replied, ‘Don’t even go there Barack! From what I can remember about that party, you’re lucky you don’t bark!’” – Politico
Did Judge Richard Cebull need to “sincerely and profusely” apologize?
“Tonight, enjoy yourselves, because nothing can take the sting out of the world’s economic problems like watching millionaires present each other with golden statues.” – Billy Crystal
The problems with Oscar have nothing to do with the producers having to bring back Billy Crystal to do the impossible, try to rescue them from irrelevancy. It has to do with leaching the present out of art and looking back, always back.
I liked “The Artist,” with flashes of Gene Kelly seen in Jean Dujardin, something I heartily approve. That it was a silent film about an aging male star saved by a younger, wealthier female star, which I’m not the first to notice, reveals the aging reality of Oscar too.
Martin Scorsese inspired by his daughter to craft “Hugo,” a man past mid-life being influenced by the new generation, in 3D no less, somehow didn’t fit the year.
Harvey Weinstein’s tenacious stewardship of “The Artist” is commendable of what can happen when you get behind a film. While the story is a throwback: a drunk has-been burns his apartment to ashes, but is given another chance at the hands of an adoringly rich female star. Cue the Oscar winning score.
As for “The Help,” I loved the performances. Octavia Spencer, whom I’ve written about before, was wonderful to see win. A person of color is an anomaly at Oscar. But the character white-washing in the film, which ironically makes the movie all about the white women in it, is stunningly surreal.
Oscar night is set in yesterday and it feels like it, especially when you look at the big winners this year: a silent film wins best actor, Streep, a silent film wins best picture, and one black actor playing a mammy in white world. Christopher Plummer is close to the same age as Oscar.
Ms. Streep mentioned that people watching might be saying “her again?”, something many ponder annually, if you know anything about Hollywood, women’s roles, and how younger females become older actors trying to break through and up. The best thing Rooney Mara did for her career was end up on best dressed lists.
That’s why “Saving Face”, unnoticed here but is shattering Pakistan taboos on silence, reveals what films can be and why Oscar would be better off if more were.
Amid an aging male silent film star, a mammy movie and other films that don’t break or challenge anyone, including “Iron Lady”, which prefers the great and horrible Margaret Thatcher in her dementia than at her zenith. Oscar has become a night when “The Grapes of Wrath” power of the movies has disappeared and side shows of aerial feats by dancing acrobats of Cirque de Soleil are brought in to keep audiences interested, because even Oscar has lost interest in showing the films on Oscar’s big night.
Oscar’s broken and not even Billy Crystal can fix it, because what’s required has nothing to do with the host. Unfortunately, after one year of going trendy the Oscar poobahs got spooked. So, it’s a night of last year’s films and in memoriam, with actors as real people sandwiched in.
But “Saving Face” got it’s moment and will again in early March when it airs on HBO. So it can’t be all bad, because without Oscar few would know about it.
Angelina Jolie’s leg also got a moment and its own Twitter account. The dress Jolie wore was far more satisfying, because her leg was free, the fabric flowing, the dare in her stance commanding.
There’s nothing coquettish about Ms. Jolie. She dares.
It beat looking at caged breasts astride plunging necklines, or trapped décolletage in strapless numbers that pinch the flesh to pop out, both preferred cheesecake for Oscar and his silent film friends, who are still a bunch of rich white guys.
But in fact, Santorum has grown more popular among women while talking about his opposition to abortion, his disapproval of birth control and his view that the federal government shouldn’t pay for prenatal screenings. A new Washington Post-ABC News poll shows not only that Santorum is doing better among GOP women than he was a few weeks ago, but also that he is less unpopular — and also less well known — among Democratic and independent women than his Republican rivals Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich.
Voters and political strategists alike say Santorum’s rise has less to do with his views on these issues than on his ability to relate to the daily struggles of the middle class.
Rick Santorum’s plus is that he’s honest about his extreme views, with his “I’m a guy from a steel town” economic patter sounding far more fair than the other GOP primary candidates. But come on, that’s not very hard to do.
Women detest Newt Gingrich, with Mitt Romney wholly untrustworthy at this point, after being eviscerated by his opponents, with the scrutiny of Mr. Romney’s changing positions devastating to his brand. However, it’s Romney’s impossibly inauthentic persona that hurts him most when compared to Rick Santorum.
However, nobody has even begun chipping away at Rick Santorum’s views, what he’s said and how hostile he is to modern women, but also the plight of women of new generations. But will Rick Santorum ever be as disliked by women as Newt Gingrich? Not a chance, however, he’ll be very scary when his social views are stripped down to 30-second ads.
Santorum’s real problem, as we saw in the debate this week, is that when he gets the spotlight he withers.
In a general election, Rick Santorum would need Gen. David Petraeus to fend off a 50-state shellacking, but he’s pretty busy over at the C.I.A.
This is a prime example of why polling is a snap shot, but not a predictor of what will eventually develop. Most Republicans would vote for the GOP candidate in November over Obama, no matter who he is. However, suburban Republican women will be very skeptical once team Obama starts using Santorum’s words against him in 30-second ads, with Independents running for the hills or not voting at all.
The rise once again of religious conservatives in the 2012 primary season is a perfect setting for “Clinton,” the PBS American Experience documentary of William Jefferson Clinton’s presidency.
Today’s religious conservatives aren’t the same as they were in the Clinton era, but it’s a reminder of how dangerous their politics are for the country. See the Republican war on women being waged through Santorum’s candidacy, as well as in Virginia, where veep hopeful Bob McDonnell refused to sign the state rape bill, because of pressure coming down from women who aren’t amused at what they’re hearing from Republicans.
Watching “Clinton,” which aired on PBS on two nights this week, it was like rifling through 20 years of my own research, experiences and my own excavation on the way to writing my new book The Hillary Effect: Politics, Sexism and the Destiny of Loss.
It wasn’t until the second night that Lewinsky comes into focus. When questioned on the CBS “Morning Show,” Barak Goodman, director and writer of “Clinton”, was pressed by Charlie Rose and also Erica Hill about the lengthy part of the documentary that focuses on Monica Lewinsky. Before the show even aired I received emails wondering if this was going to be a hit piece because of how intently the Lewinski scandal would be reviewed.
Anyone enamored with former Pres. William Jefferson Clinton has to accept that history will record the Lewinsky scandal as a monstrously stupid act for any president, but with the enemies Clinton had it was exponentially so.
One particular quibble I have with PBS’s “Clinton” is the omission of when the Whitewater frenzy began. American Experience missed an opportunity to make note of the historical importance of Jeff Gerth’s spring 1992 New York Times article on Whitewater that has been thoroughly debunked. It was published before Clinton had even won the nomination, so unless the viewer is made aware of this he or she simply cannot understand how early the hunting of Bill Clinton began.
PBS American Experience did do a tremendous job on interviews starting with Dee Dee Myers, the first female press secretary, Lucianne Goldberg, the broker of the Tripp tapes and confidante of what Goldberg describes as a very angry woman. There is also Christiane Amanpour, as well as Betsy Wright, his powerful gatekeeper, who appears still not over what she considers a betrayal by Pres. Clinton.
John Harris of Politico gives incisive analysis of events, but Harris also makes a point to remind the viewer that Somalia began at Pres. H.W. Bush’s hands, which is no small point coming in the summer before the election. Harris is quoted in a couple of sections in my book as someone who offered contrary analysis at important points in the ’08 primary election cycle as well.
Remembering what presidents leave for their successors to clean up and that inevitably become part of the new president’s headaches is history worth noting. What Bush left Obama economically is a classic example, as is the disgrace of torture and Gitmo.
Surprisingly, Joe Klein, author of Primary Colors, which was originally penned anonymously, and someone who is well known for his standard insider views and harsh Clinton rhetoric as well, offers interesting analysis on the Lewinsky legacy for Clinton. Klein scoffs at the “what might have been” romancing of the Clinton presidency, believing that his record is remarkable regardless.
Bob Reich still sounds like a man mystified how Clinton could have let Lewinski happen.
I’ve always been of the belief that Clinton’s unquenchable thirst for multiple sexual relationships is simply part of his human appetite for all levels of life. It’s a function of being Bill Clinton. You can’t separate the corporeal Clinton from the mind that allowed the man to beat the lawyers through a brilliantly made agreement that led to the 4-hour time-limited deposition where William Jefferson Clinton carved his own narrow escape. His appetites, great and horrible, make him who he is.
And even Clinton hater Jonathan Alter offers declarations of just how badly people in Washington hated the Clintons and wanted them taken down.
American Experience, nor anyone interviewed, goes into the details of Chief Justice Rehnquist stacking the deck with conservative judges who were also Clinton haters. However, the producers do offer a brief citing of William Safire, the New York Times columnist and former Nixon man who went after Bill Clinton before he set his sights on Hillary.
All of this is part of the history collected in my book, because it was the baggage Hillary brought into her own political adventures.
Ken Gormley, the legal expert and scholar who crafted the definitive biography of the Starr vs. Clinton battle, and the man who proved the illegality of Starr’s team bracing Lewinsky, offers the freshest analysis on the Lewinsky matter, which also proves the zeal of Starr and his people.
“Clinton,” the PBS American Spirit documentary tackled what it was like for Clinton during his presidency. It was not a look back from where we stand today, which would surely look at Glass-Steagall repeal, though what people forget today is that it passed Congress by a veto-proof majority. Having it, however, would not have stopped the problem that AIG became. But at the time of Clinton’s presidency, Glass-Steagall wasn’t a problem, because everyone on all sides agreed. All were wrong, as Clinton himself has stated.
Pres. Bill Clinton was impeached by the House of Representatives, but that legacy for Ken Starr and Republicans like Henry Hyde, author of the discriminatory Hyde Amendment, says more about them than Clinton. As Hyde admitted, which I write about in the chapter “Blaming Bill” in my book, it was a clash of cultures, a hatred of Clinton born out of the time he (and Hillary) represented.
The best thing PBS American Experience does in “Clinton” is put into perfect view what we’re seeing unfold in the 2012 Republican primary contest. Religious conservatives giving rise to Mitt Romney’s conservative contortions, Rick Santorum’s Satan squeals, and Newt Gingrich’s hyperbolic ravings, all to appease the religious right.
The ending of “Clinton” talks about Hillary’s rise, as her husband ends his presidency. There is not a better continuation of the last 20 years of politics and what Clinton’s presidency meant for Hillary’s candidacy than my book The Hillary Effect.
“Clinton” captures the presidency of William Jefferson Clinton, with the Lewinsky scandal as much a product of the Republican Party as it was Clinton’s own reckless appetite, which before, in the era of John F. Kennedy and coming amid the sexual revolution, women’s liberation, but before cable and the Internet, was known, yet completely ignored.
If Rick Santorum had stuck to that line he might have had a chance, which comes from CBC “This Morning,” with Charlie Rose and Erica Hill. But his arrogant religiosity just wouldn’t allow it, which is why Mitt Romney is gaining on him in Michigan and why I just don’t believe team Romney will allow the nomination to be pulled from their grasp by the likes of Rick Santorum.
Debate night, number 20, and likely the last?
It comes on Ash Wednesday, which seems fitting given the show’s being run by religious conservatives, with Rick Santorum’s Satan insanity causing Rush Limbaugh to break out his Ronald Reagan tapes today, trying to equate Santorum’s ravings to Reagan’s “evil empire” line.
Gov. Chris Christie, fresh off his marriage equality veto, said today that Santorum’s religious statements are “relevant,” because he’s running for president, but that doesn’t make the subject good for Republicans. From ABC News:
But Christie doesn’t think a debate over religion is a conversation the Republican Party wants to engage in.
“Do I think it’s the things we should be as a party talking about and emphasizing at the moment? No,” he said.
What Santorum’s religiosity would mean for the Executive Branch is another matter.
Largely missing in the discussion of Santorum’s subscription to a supernatural cosmology is the fact that he views American history as essentially a struggle between “true Christians” like himself on the one hand, and Beelzebub on the other, in which the latter has already conquered academia and mainline Protestantism, and is by inference exercising his infernal control via the policies of that noted former academic and mainline Protestant, the President of the United States. – Get The Behind Me, by Ed Kilgore
And in case you hadn’t seen my update earlier, the pressure on Gov. McDonnell has caused him to step away from the religious conservatives in the Virginia legislature, sanity squeezing in, at least for now.
… Thus, having looked at the current proposal, I believe there is no need to direct by statute that further invasive ultrasound procedures be done. Mandating an invasive procedure in order to give informed consent is not a proper role for the state. No person should be directed to undergo an invasive procedure by the state, without their consent, as a precondition to another medical procedure. – Gov. Bob McDonnell Backtracks (full statement)
There is nothing conservative about giving the state power over a woman. Democrats have pushed back in state after state with competing bills against men, with the latest in Georgia.
Sick of the scrutiny, Santorum’s camp is bellyaching about Mitt Romney’s Mormonism being off-limits. From Burns and Haberman:
[S]pecifically religious questioning of Romney is as rare as specific Romney statements about Mormon beliefs. Given the current grilling of Santorum, that is a source of growing frustration to Santorum’s advisers. “Why is Mormonism off limits?” asks one. “I’m not saying it’s a seminal issue in the campaign, but we’re having to spend days answering questions about Rick’s faith, which he has been open about. Romney will turn on a dime when you talk about religion. We’re getting asked about specific tenets of Rick’s faith, and when Romney says, ‘I want to focus on the economy,’ they say, OK, we’ll focus on the economy.”
As I’ve already written, if we’re going to pick and choose what faiths, subjects and questions can be asked of religious conservatives, with some things being off limits, then I call hypocrisy on the whole idea that religious faith should be a part of the conversation at all. Either all questions and all faiths are on the table or none, but nobody’s faith is so special as to be worthy of a pass, that is if we’re actually going to continue picking our presidents through this prism.
More and more people are waking up to the catastrophe Santorum’s candidacy would be for Republicans, with Alan Simpson the latest to weigh in.
“I am convinced that if you get into these social issues and just stay in there about abortion and homosexuality and even mental health they bring up, somehow they’re going to take us all to Alaska and float us out in the Bering Sea or something,” said [former Sen. Alan] Simpson, long known for colorful commentary. “We won’t have a prayer.” … “[Rick Santorum] is rigid and a homophobic…” – Interview with Bob Schieffer, via HuffPost
John Podhoretz, the former New York Post editorial page writer who now writes for Commentary Magazine, has written that yes, Santorum is getting depicted as extreme by the left, but his real problem is a lack of optimism, not the liberal elites.
Talking about the nation in fire-and-brimstone terms without a vision for the future that is based on optimism “is not a path to winning an electorate’s heart,” he told POLITICO.
As for whether it’s fair that Santorum is “getting beaten up?” “Who cares,” he said. “This isn’t about fairness. That’s life. … The notion that Santorum is going to be denied his rightful place as president because the media’s in the tank for President Obama [is wrong].”
Post-debate UPDATE: One of the worst moments for Rick Santorum was when he referred to female soldiers on the battlefield and then mentioned he didn’t want to get into “social engineering.” It was appallingly insulting to those women who have served. He had other really devastating moments. Still can’t believe he got sucker-punched on Arlen Specter. I bet whatever team he has around him can’t either. It was classic seeing Santorum defend himself as a “team player” trying to help his party, which Ron Paul jumped all over. Romney’s going to have a very good Tuesday, with his team saying they’ll win Michigan, which isn’t hard to believe after tonight. Mitt Romney had one moment, however, where he clapped and looked kind of manic to me; there’s got to be some way to use that in an add.
Religious conservatives are underestimating what signing Virginia’s state rape legislation will mean for the career and ambitions of Gov. Bob McDonnell. Perhaps one of the saner Republicans who actually wants to win a national election gave McDonnell a call.
Until this weekend, McDonnell (R) and his aides had said the governor would sign the measure if it made it to his desk. McDonnell, who strongly opposes abortion, will no longer make that commitment.
…Republicans at the Capitol, however, remain optimistic that McDonnell will sign the measure.
“The governor is strongly pro-life, and I think he would hold consistent in his support for this bill,” said Del. Ben L. Cline (R-Rockbridge), co-chairman of the Conservative Caucus.
[...] Victoria Cobb, president of the conservative Family Foundation, which considers the ultrasound bill one of its top priorities, said Tuesday that she and her staff were trying to determine what they need to do to persuade the governor to sign the legislation.
“It is a change as far as I can tell,” she said of McDonnell’s shift.
They’re now looking for a “compromise,” though how you can compromise on state rape, I’m dying to know.
You can’t get elected without women and if Bob McDonnell signs Virginia’s state rape legislation he’ll be in a class of men who’ll make history’s laughing stock list, when the modern era chapter on women’s freedoms is written.
UPDATE: Gov. Bob McDonnell has felt the heat and backs away from the Virginia Republicans’ state rape bill, via Burns and Haberman:
I am pro-life. I believe deeply in the sanctity of innocent human life and believe governments have a duty to protect human life. The more our society embraces a culture of life for all people, the better country we will have. Over the course of my 20-year career in elected office, I have been glad to play a leading role in putting in place common-sense policies that protect and defend innocent human life in the Commonwealth. One of those bills was Virginia’s informed consent statute, of which I was the chief patron in the House of Delegates, finally seeing its passage in 2001. This session, the General Assembly is now considering amending this informed consent statute to include a requirement that any woman seeking an abortion receive an ultrasound in order to establish the gestational age for appropriate medical purposes, and to offer a woman the opportunity to voluntarily review that ultrasound prior to giving her legal informed consent to abortion.
Over the past days I have discussed the specific language of the proposed legislation with other governors, physicians, attorneys, legislators, advocacy groups, and citizens. It is apparent that several amendments to the proposed legislation are needed to address various medical and legal issues which have arisen. It is clear that in the majority of cases, a routine external, transabdominal ultrasound is sufficient to meet the bills stated purpose, that is, to determine gestational age. I have come to understand that the medical practice and standard of care currently guide physicians to use other procedures to find the gestational age of the child, when abdominal ultrasounds cannot do so. Determining gestational age is essential for legal reasons, to know the trimester of the pregnancy in order to comply with the law, and for medical reasons as well.
Thus, having looked at the current proposal, I believe there is no need to direct by statute that further invasive ultrasound procedures be done. Mandating an invasive procedure in order to give informed consent is not a proper role for the state. No person should be directed to undergo an invasive procedure by the state, without their consent, as a precondition to another medical procedure.
For this reason, I have recommended to the General Assembly a series of amendments to this bill. I am requesting that the General Assembly amend this bill to explicitly state that no woman in Virginia will have to undergo a transvaginal ultrasound involuntarily. I am asking the General Assembly to state in this legislation that only a transabdominal, or external, ultrasound will be required to satisfy the requirements to determine gestational age. Should a doctor determine that another form of ultrasound may be necessary to provide the necessary images and information that will be an issue for the doctor and the patient. The government will have no role in that medical decision.
I have requested other amendments that help clarify the purposes of the bill and reflect a better understanding of prevailing medical practices. It is my hope that the members of the General Assembly will act favorably upon these recommendations from our office. We will await their action prior to making any further comments on this matter.
“We all know that this country was founded on a Judeo-Christian ethic but the Judeo-Christian ethic was a Protestant Judeo-Christan ethic, sure the Catholics had some influence, but this was a Protestant country and the Protestant ethic, mainstream, mainline Protestantism, and of course we look at the shape of mainline Protestantism in this country and it is a shambles, it s gone from the world of Christianity as I see it.” – Rick Santorum, 2008 (source: “Up with Chris Hayes”)
We saw what happened recently when modern women were aroused by Pres. Obama’s free contraceptive mandate. Religious conservatism just hit another snag in Virginia, with Transvaginal Probe Bob possibly getting the message. A report from RHRealityCheck:
But after speaking with Jeff Caldwell, McDonnell’s press secretary, it seems the Governor is not so eager to go on the record with his previously-held position.
I asked Caldwell if the governor really intended to sign a bill that met the standard of Virginia’s rape statute. When put in those terms it seemed the Governor’s office balked.
“The governor will review it if it passes and will see what the final language of the bill is,” said Caldwell.
I pressed and asked Caldwell if this is a new position for McDonnell, if he was backing off a bit as his statement suggested. Mr. Caldwell flatly said, “No, he’s generally a pro-life candidate, I don’t think we are being inconsistent.” (Generally?)
Caldwell refused to say if Governor McDonnell would sign the state-sanctioned rape bill or not.
Chris Christie vetoing marriage equality in New Jersey is one man standing against a turning tide that puts him in good steed for the vice presidency, that is, providing Romney wins Michigan. Compare Gov. Christie to Gov. McDonnell, another veep hopeful, and Transvaginal Probe guy Bob looks like the perfect veep for Rick Santorum. Though he could ease the mind of religious conservatives, always ready to commit state violence against women, if Romney ends up winning.
The quest for the Republican nomination has become a contest based on extremes, as in the right-wing primary voter can pick their pet cultural peeve and someone will feed that proclivity.
As serendipity would have it, Joyce Arnold wrote about another aspect of “Wrecking Ball” today. I assign stories, topics and subjects to people who are guest writers here; unlike many other new media sites. Joyce’s beat is obvious, when she’s not railing against the oligarchy and the two party system she’s taking on the points raised so well by Occupy, with her signature “Queer Talk” column on Saturday. However, she and I didn’t plan like-minded posts on Bruce Springsteen’s new album, they simply rose to the top of our minds separately through the same UK Guardian article.
To say I revere Bruce Springsteen’s place in the pantheon of American music is not putting it mildly. We’ll have to wait to hear the whole CD, but the spirit behind “Wrecking Ball,” as described so far, fits a piece of art hitting its perfect political moment in time.
As a deeply spiritual Episcopalian, however rebellious in practice, what Mr. Santorum has been saying on the campaign trail is outrageous, so when I heard the quote above I wasn’t surprised.
In a discussion on “UP with Chris Hayes” this weekend, there was a glaring omission, in my opinion. One of the reasons Protestantism has declined is because of the sexual revolution and women’s freedoms manifesting. Most churches have not bothered to modernize and adjust to the economic and personal shift in women’s lives, which have been tectonic. The rise of women’s economic and personal freedoms has thrown religious institutions into a panic.
It’s notable that Rick Santorum doesn’t mention what the pedophilia catastrophe inside the Catholic Church has done to throw light on the celibacy dictate. With men in the highest positions covering for their own for years, it’s offensive women remain ostracized from Catholic Church leadership simply because they are female. Oh, women are welcome, but only as part of the laity.
Contrary to The Atlantic article that created a furor recently, there are obvious reasons parts of America are getting more conservative, while our country clearly is not. The information in the article coincides with the declining work availability for men and the competition of women, I think, which has spurred a growth in traditional and evangelical church interest, as well as Mormonism, among religious conservatives.
But it’s also about a stacked deck and two political parties beholden to Wall Street and big corporations, big money and inside interests over all else.
It’s about a withering middle class with no strap to stairway to the middle class.
It’s about the place writers, musicians and other artists play in our society, which is an important one when the art meets a political topic that resonates with a moment in history.
“Wrecking ball” is exactly what independent-minded people, no matter the political party, need to take to religious conservatives in the 2012 election season. People who think they have a right to strip women of our fundamental human right to control our own life, which starts with our body. People who think gays are unequal. Religious conservatives who think the First Amendment is for religious institutions, but not the individual.
It’s about a political war on women taking place in state after state that is threatening the freedom of the majority voting populace, which is being waged by religious conservatives who feel they’ve lost a grip on America and want to put us all back in our place.
Last time Phyllis Schlafly and the fundamentalists won. But it’s the 21st century now and this time they won’t. In fact, they’ve already lost, they just don’t know it yet.
TM NOTE: A draft of this column was inadvertently made live during editing process, so rewrite of this piece was public. A Stupid Tech Mistake on my part, apologies.
On a recent political show Bay Buchanan made a comment that the host might be getting a call from her brother soon. There was something in the conversation that teased something was about to drop and yesterday it did.
The modus operandi of these thought police at Color of Change and ADL is to brand as racists and anti-Semites any writer who dares to venture outside the narrow corral in which they seek to confine debate. All the while prattling about their love of dissent and devotion to the First Amendment, they seek systematically to silence and censor dissent.
Without a hearing, they smear and stigmatize as racist, homophobic, or anti-Semitic any who contradict what George Orwell once called their “smelly little orthodoxies.” They then demand that the heretic recant, grovel, apologize, and pledge to go forth and sin no more.
Defy them, and they will go after the network where you work, the newspapers that carry your column, the conventions that invite you to speak. If all else fails, they go after the advertisers.
I know these blacklisters. They operate behind closed doors, with phone calls, mailed threats, and off-the-record meetings. They work in the dark because, as Al Smith said, nothing un-American can live in the sunlight.
I’ve read several of Mr. Buchanan’s books. His latest did not make my reading list, because the subject matter of it and the blurbs provided were offensive to me, so I wasn’t going to spend valuable time away from other reading to include it on a list that grows ever longer by the week. So I can’t opine about what has been written and said about it.
What I think Buchanan is missing in the piece he writes today is that nobody is saying he cannot say what he said. The outcome, however, does render a verdict.
If my book is racist and anti-Semitic, how did Sean Hannity, Erin Burnett, Judge Andrew Napolitano, Megyn Kelly, Lou Dobbs, and Ralph Nader miss that? How did Charles Payne, African-American host on Fox radio, who has interviewed me three times, fail to detect its racism? How did Michael Medved miss its anti-Semitism?
The list of people he names as proof his book isn’t “racist and anti-Semitic” is interesting. It’s just not very long.
Documented in the 488 pages and 1,500 footnotes of Suicide of a Superpower is my thesis that America is Balkanizing, breaking down along the lines of religion, race, ethnicity, culture, and ideology and that Western peoples are facing demographic death by century’s end. Are such subjects taboo? Are they unfit for national debate?
So it would seem. MSNBC President Phil Griffin told reporters, “I don’t think the ideas that [Buchanan] put forth [in his book] are appropriate for the national dialogue, much less on MSNBC.”
I guess the only thing left to do is answer the part in bold above. Certainly, it’s been the goal of many to silence Pat Buchanan and now they’ve done it. It’s inarguable that Buchanan made himself a huge target and if there weren’t people out there offended and willing to marshal themselves to the task he’d still have a job at MSNBC.
Without having read the book, I simply can’t weigh in on the catalyst that finally severed Mr. Buchanan from MSNBC.
When he shows up on Fox News Channel, however, perhaps with Bill O’Reilly, I will be watching. Because I’m curious about anyone writing a book in this country who feels like they’ve been censored, for whatever reason.
Kitty Kelly fought this battle when she released Oprah, though for very different reasons. I read her book, which the media went out of their way not to cover, because the subject of the book wasn’t please.
I will say one thing about St. Martin’s Press, a respected publisher. Over 10 years ago I had a back and forth with one of their editors about a manuscript of mine they were considering for publication. It is my impression from the weird, out of sync dance we did that what St. Martin’s Press looks for most of all is sensationalism and a marketing hook that will drive a book through a media publicity campaign. They love tabloid type copy and topics that will outrage or seduce, as long as it gets press. They’re not alone.
St. Martin’s Press got more than they bargained for on this one and so did Buchanan.
As of the second decade of the 21st century, Patrick J. Buchanan has been told he’s no longer relevant.
The bishops’ opposition to contraception is not an argument for a “conscience exemption.” It is a way of imposing Catholic requirements on non-Catholics. This is religious dictatorship, not religious freedom. – Contraception Con Men, by Garry Wills
Mama’s pleased.
This whole free contraceptive mandate has the First Lady written all over it.
…and maybe we just found out the value of Valeria Jarrett.
Or not, but we know women made it possible for Pres. Obama to stand up.
Nobody starts out looking to get an abortion. But it is legal. It’s a mighty heavy outcome so if we can prevent it we must.
What just occurred has been brewing for a long, long time and is what we’ve been waiting for, which is the end of the most common abortions. The whole delicious design of reproductive goo simply has to merge with contraceptive access, regardless of means.
People have sex.
For pleasure.
Only.
It’s not a coincidence that at a moment of economic breath the free contraceptive mandate would come along. It fits the rhythm.
Sen. Roy Blunt popping up does too. He’s driven by demons to close the dam. It’s so very un-Missourian of him, because like myself, he hails from the state of the mighty Mississippi, the Big Muddy. But Republicans today like to shut off streams and rivers, clog up all natural slopes and fertile ground, swap poison wolves for energy. They’re like adolescent boys of destruction.
Rep. Darrell Issa proved this point and more when he refused witnesses on behalf of women in his all-male hearing titled “Lines Crossed: Separation of Church and State. Has the Obama Administration Trampled on Freedom of Religion and Freedom of Conscience?”
I lived in Los Angeles during the puritanical Reagan era and there were so many underground clubs, cocaine and pills, fast cars and yuppy mafias you couldn’t throw a g-string without hitting one. But Reagan screwed the economic pooch, because it was all built on testosterone.
Then came the Big Dawg. The other side of the track Jack.
The Clinton era was wet and fertile. Even that guy Gingrich who was targeting America’s Bubbah was screwing around, this time on his sick second wife. Everybody was making money, but they were also having lots of sex, too. The kind of sex women like, not just checking off daddy’s list. The poorest still got screwed, because America talks that game better than solves it, but for a while America’s cut overflowed. Even the Big Dawg got off.
Ken Starr wrote bad porn, so the people pilloried the prosecutor.
William F. Buckley said it to Charlie Rose — who else? — once. Conservatives are against things, they oppose, that’s what they do, who they are.
If this contraceptive mandate decision stands, with the White House saying openly they didn’t expect to get all Catholics or the bishops approval, but they’re comfortable with that because this is the right decision, then the moment has finally arrived. The very case I proffered and proved in the chapter “Is Freedom Just for Men?” in The Hillary Effect manifest.
Somewhere between creating it and having the heart to hear the women whispering in your ear you start to know what’s right. You start to learn you won’t get religious conservatives, because they’re against everything, but maybe you don’t need them.
Abigail Adams said that women should not hold ourselves bound to any laws in which we have no voice or representation.
The number of women, regardless of religion, who rely on contraception or birth control is in the 99 percentile.
People have sex.
It’s good for us.
You can’t stop it from happening. But you can come prepared.
Official White House Photo by Pete Souza 10 February 2012
It was done ugly. But let’s not miss this moment.
The furor forced the White House to make a final move Friday, with Pres. Obama starring.
It was insanity, except that Pres. Obama walked into battle with the majority of Americans behind him, including 99% of adult women who rely on birth control in their lives, including for serious medicinal purposes. It was a moment of promise reminiscent of how Obama came into the White House, except this time the media was tearing him apart instead of propping him up. A moment when Obama’s die hard supporters could say, this is the guy I voted for; when people could believe again, if only for a moment.
I’m not one of those people, never have been.
I’ve written innumerable columns about Pres. Obama’s continual inability to find a purpose or policy compass, while channeling Bush on foreign policy decisions and terror policy, over which progressives give him a pass. And one can only imagine if Pres. Obama would have understood the amount of energy and people power behind him when the health care debate began. These issues are real and troubling, with the cumulative compromise and capitulation to the right, including economically, remaining an irreconcilable situation.
That, however, doesn’t negate that the cosmos shifted on Friday.
Let’s skip over the flaws in the strong moral position position. Such as the fact that many states already require employers’ health care plans to cover contraception and that all over the United States there are Catholic universities and hospitals that comply.
Or that the bishops have totally failed to convince their own faithful that birth control is a moral evil and now appear to be trying to get the federal government to do the job for them. We’re rising above all that.
While everyone talked about the Catholic Church, religion and the 1st Amendment, women inside the Administration, dare I say including Michelle Obama, knew that the women employees of Catholic and other religious institutions needed to have their own 1st Amendment rights protected. If not, it would mean the female employees wouldn’t have the same rights or coverage as other women working at a non-religious institution.
Pres. Obama, the constitutional lawyer, knows the 1st Amendment goes both ways and decided to use a scalpel to manifest policy and an implementation that gave everyone what they wanted. A unicorn materialized, wrote Markos Moulitsas.
Except… If anyone heard Sean Hannity on Friday you were in for the laugh of your life, while seeing this will become the fight of the election, at least until they read the polls or turn to make it all about government intrusion, their only hope. There are consequences for adult behavior, Hannity railed, harping against free, free, free birth control. He was actually parroting the Catholic bishop line, which was rooted in being against, though I can’t believe it’s the 21st century and I’m writing this, women having sex for pleasure. Flashback:
“I don’t want to overstate or understate our level of concern,” said McQuade, the Catholic bishops’ spokesperson. “We consider [birth control] an elective drug. Married women can practice periodic abstinence. Other women can abstain altogether. Not having sex doesn’t make you sick.” – Dana Goldstein (h/t Alternet and Amanda Marcotte)
Not having sex doesn’t make you sick.
This coming from a man representing celibate Catholic bishops who are part of a worldwide organization that was guilty of ignoring, protecting and hiding pedophile priests who sexually preyed on young boys for decades and decades; we’ll leave the nuns for next time.
All of this with a backdrop that featured a Super Bowl ad with Clint Eastwood praising the American car company comeback, which was orchestrated by the Obama administration, causing a furor for days. Karl Rove’s reaction precipitating Eastwood making a statement he wasn’t Obama’s guy. Heaven forbid. Even though bailing out the U.S. auto industry, part of our American heritage, ingenuity and genius, is saving part our national soul.
This isn’t working out like the Republicans expected. Not for Mitt Romney either, who is now stuck with one-upping Rick Santorum who is railing about the guillotine.
Now Sen. Roy Blunt, from my home state of Missouri, the same far right religious pack who brought Rick Santorum a win, has announced legislation to deny women the physical, emotional and economic freedoms Pres. Obama just gave them, to appease what ails the right. Republicans are evidently getting ready to fight 99% of the women in this country, including suburban Republicans and independents who use birth control and want their daughters to grow up with that safety net, too.
They’ve obviously snapped. Who wouldn’t? Beaten by Barack Obama. It’s got to be a bummer.
I’m elated.
Obama’s not down, he’s up and he’s just scored the biggest win for American women in a hundred years, ballpark.
Think about it. There’s serious and important history being made here.
For modern women, the stress level is about to be lowered, as are their monthly bills. Think of all the energy and potential to be unleashed. This freedom is personal, emotional and economical, unless Mitt and Rick get the opportunity to repeal free birth control.
Free contraceptive coverage for modern women, regardless of means or status, is what Social Security and other entitlements are for seniors and the poor.
Wait until that sinks in.
The column was originally posted on 2.10, but has been bumped.
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