In the wake of Rush Limbaugh calling Sandra Fluke a “slut” there has been no end to furor. The Washington Post, in full piety mode:
IN A DEMOCRACY, standards of civil discourse are as important as they are indefinable. Yet wherever one draws the line, Rush Limbaugh’s vile rants against Georgetown University law student Sandra Fluke crossed it. Mr. Limbaugh is angry at President Obama’s efforts to require the provision of contraception under employer-paid health insurance and the White House’s attempts to make some political hay out of the policy. His way of showing this anger was to smear Ms. Fluke, who approached Congress to support the plan, as a “slut” seeking a government subsidy for her promiscuity.
So what do they recommend?
What we are saying is that Mr. Limbaugh has abused his unique position within the conservative media to smear and vilify a citizen engaged in the exercise of her First Amendment rights, and in the process he debased a national political discourse that needs no further debasing. This is not the way a decent citizen behaves, much less a citizen who wields significant de facto power in a major political party. While Republican leaders owe no apology for Mr. Limbaugh’s comments, they do have a responsibility to repudiate them — and him.
WaPo wants the Republican Party to repudiate Limbaugh.
In an astonishingly honest article, Kirsten Powers elucidates a litany of abuse on the part of the left wing media:
During the 2008 election Ed Schultz said on his radio show that Sarah Palin set off a “bimbo alert.” He called Laura Ingraham a “right-wing slut.” (He later apologized.) He once even took to his blog to call yours truly a “bimbo” for the offense of quoting him accurately in a New York Post column.
Keith Olbermann has said that conservative commentator S.E. Cupp should have been aborted by her parents, apparently because he finds her having opinions offensive. He called Michelle Malkin a “mashed-up bag of meat with lipstick.” He found it newsworthy to discuss Carrie Prejean’s breasts on his MSNBC show. His solution for dealing with Hillary Clinton, who he thought should drop out of the presidential race, was to find “somebody who can take her into a room and only he comes out.” Olbermann now works for über-leftist and former Democratic vice president Al Gore at Current TV.
Left-wing darling Matt Taibbi wrote on his blog in 2009, “When I read [Malkin’s] stuff, I imagine her narrating her text, book-on-tape style, with a big, hairy set of balls in her mouth.” In a Rolling Stone article about Secretary of State Clinton, he referred to her “flabby arms.” When feminist writer Erica Jong criticized him for it, he responded by referring to Jong as an “800-year old sex novelist.” (Jong is almost 70, which apparently makes her an irrelevant human being.) In Taibbi’s profile of Congresswoman and presidential candidate Michele Bachmann he labeled her “batshit crazy.” (Oh, those “crazy” women with their hormones and all.)Chris Matthews’s sickening misogyny was made famous in 2008, when he obsessively tore down Hillary Clinton for standing between Barack Obama and the presidency, something that Matthews could not abide. Over the years he has referred to the former first lady, senator and presidential candidate and current secretary of state as a “she-devil,” “Nurse Ratched,” and “Madame Defarge.” Matthews has also called Clinton “witchy,” “anti-male,” and “uppity” and once claimed she won her Senate seat only because her “husband messed around.” He asked a guest if “being surrounded by women” makes “a case for commander in chief—or does it make a case against it?” At some point Matthews was shamed into sort of half apologizing to Clinton, but then just picked up again with his sexist ramblings.
Matthews has wondered aloud whether Sarah Palin is even “capable of thinking” and has called Bachmann a “balloon head” and said she was “lucky we still don’t have literacy tests out there.” Democratic strategist Jehmu Greene, who is the former president of the Women’s Media Center, told Fox News’ Megyn Kelly in 2011 that Matthews “is a bully, and his favorite target is women.” So why does he still have a show? What if his favorite target was Jews? Or African-Americans?
But the grand pooh-bah of media misogyny is without a doubt Bill Maher—who also happens to be a favorite of liberals—who has given $1 million to President Obama’s super PAC. Maher has called Palin a “dumb twat” and dropped the C-word in describing the former Alaska governor. He called Palin and Congresswoman Bachmann “boobs” and “two bimbos.” He said of the former vice-presidential candidate, “She is not a mean girl. She is a crazy girl with mean ideas.” He recently made a joke about Rick Santorum’s wife using a vibrator. Imagine now the same joke during the 2008 primary with Michelle Obama’s name in it, and tell me that he would still have a job. Maher said of a woman who was harassed while breast-feeding at an Applebee’s, “Don’t show me your tits!” as though a woman feeding her child is trying to flash Maher. (Here’s a way to solve his problem: don’t stare at a strangers’ breasts). Then, his coup de grâce: “And by the way, there is a place where breasts and food do go together. It’s called Hooters!”
Please read the entire thing.
Don Surber adds more:
What about President Obama? He has never repudiated Bill Maher for myriad of similar offenses including calling Sarah Palin the C-word and the T-word. Instead of demanding that Bill Maher apologize, Barack Obama accepted a million bucks from him. Just what will Bill Maher get in the second term from President Obama for that million?
In fact, liberals rallied around the free-speech rights of Bill Maher when he praised the 9-11 hijackers as heroes and added, “We have been the cowards, lobbing cruise missiles from 2,000 miles away… Staying in the airplane when it hits the building — say what you want about it, it’s not cowardly.”
So there it is, clear as day. The new decency standards.
If you’re a conservative commentator, call a woman a “slut”, you need to apologize and Republicans are supposed to repudiate you.
If you’re a liberal commentator and you call a woman a “c*nt”, a “dumb twat” and proclaim that the 9-11 hijackers are heroes, not only do you not have to apologize, Barack Obama will take a million dollars from you.
And Debbie Wasserman-Schultz will appear on your show!
If the President of the United States can embrace misogyny, then so should we all.
Exit question- If Obama called Sandra Fluke after Limbaugh’s comments, why didn’t he call Palin after Maher’s comments?
DrJohn has been a health care professional for more than 30 years. In addition to clinical practice he has done extensive research and has published widely with over 70 original articles and abstracts in the peer-reviewed literature. DrJohn is well known in his field and has lectured on every continent except for Antarctica. He has been married to the same wonderful lady for over 30 years and has three kids- two sons, both of whom are attorneys and one daughter on her way into the field of education.
DrJohn was brought up with the concept that one can do well if one is prepared to work hard but nothing in life is guaranteed.
Except for liberals being foolish.
Hi Aqua (#100):
Just curious.
1. When was the contraception coverage in Georgia first mandated?
2. What was the governance of Georgia at the time the contraception coverage was mandated? Who was in charge?
3. When was the bill to get rid of the mandate first brought up?
– Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach CA
Larry, not to jump into your questions to Aqua above, but since I was the one that informed him about Georgia being one of the states with a mandate back on Feb 13th, here’s some answers to your questions (in addition to Aqua’s, no doubt).
1: When was the contraception coverage in Georgia first mandated?
…. as I told Aqua back then, according to Lexus Nexus, 1999
2: What was the governance of Georgia at the time the contraception coverage was mandated? Who was in charge?
… Democrat Roy Barnes, No clue as to the political balance in the General Assembly then. GA state website only goes back to 2000.
3: When was the bill to get rid of the mandate first brought up?
… Obviously, according to Aqua’s link above, this year. Why? Because apparently so many, like Aqua, had no idea this existed in this law until this bruhaha beamed some light into state laws. Just like federal Congressional members rarely read bills, and haven’t a clue what they are enabling with enactment, apparently neither do the State lawmakers.
A perfect example of this is all the BS that is bubbling to the surface in the wake of O’healthcare.
So if you are attempting to portray this as tacit approval of infringement of 1st Amendment rights at the state level, and only now being anti-Obama, you are incorrect. It comes down to absolute surprise that such a bill passed, with little media attention during the process. Not being aware is not the same as approval. And this is the reason that churches, such as Belmont, only got into the legal fight late. They didn’t realize this was a mandate with their coverage until they had to change or reevaluate plans, and tripped over reality.
So I wouldn’t suggest you attempt to make this an ODS debate, Larry. Aqua, a GA resident, was not only surprised, but immediately wrote to his state legislative representatives to complain when he learned of it. That conversation is the reason he figured I’d want an update on what Georgia was doing, now that they are in the know.
And oh, BTW Aqua, thanks for the update. Better late than never, yes?
Hi Mata, Thanks, that’s helpful.
To my knowledge, however, Roy Barnes wasn’t a noted radical socialist, anti-religionist, out to declare war on the Catholic Church. The truth is that, in the 28 states which have these mandates, none of them were political decisions, just as the present mandate wasn’t a political decision. In the case of “O’Care,” as I’ve pointed out before, it wasn’t some idea dreamed up by administration radicals; it was the unanimous recommendation of the doctors on the Institute of Medicine panel which studied the relevant health care literature for months before coming up with the recommendation.
Maybe you (used generically, as in you F/A readers) don’t agree with the mandate, for whatever reason, but it’s just wrong to go using this to try and make a point that Obama has no respect for religion, First Amendment Rights, the Catholic Church, or whatever else.
This is not some under the radar issue, by the way. These mandates have been challenged in the courts and they have been the target of conservative groups for many years. The fact that Aqua wasn’t aware of it before speaks to the fact that it was never viewed as some sort of full scale attack on Catholicism, until it got associated with Obama. It was never even a front burner issue for the Catholic Church (which has opposed these mandates in the courts and in state politics) until it got associated with Obama.
– Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach CA
Larry, all the decisions – whether state or federal – are most certainly “political” decisions and focused on including every little thing in coverage. This, of course, drives up premiums.
On the flip side, *most* of the state mandates provided thought to infringement on Constitutional rights, and therefore included exceptions. Somewhere in the number of six or so did not. Neither did our Congress or POTUS with the passage of O’healthcare.
As for Obama’s culpability in this. You might want to rethink that statement, Larry. It’s downright ironic that Obama, touting himself always as the “constitutional scholar”, doesn’t direct his HHS to provide Constitutional exceptions from the get go. It is his responsibility to oversee the regulatory agency (HHS in this case) in their specifics in implementation. Therefore it does make me wonder just what country’s “constitution” he is, supposedly, a “scholar” of…. because it sure ain’t this one. So absolutely not… a POTUS who is supposed to be intimately versed in our Constitution has no feasible excuse for allowing such regulations from an agency under his direct control.
It’s also a further embarrassment that Congress, with a majority of members that are (in theory) lawyers, seem to know so little about our Bill of Rights.
As you know from the previous threads, I have already pointed out these mandates are not new, and have had some challenges in the courts. I have also stated that it is only in the states that this battle should be taking place… that Obama and Congress have no rights to mandate anyone, or any insurance provider, do anything.
But what is becoming more and more apparent is that few people really know what is covered in their insurance plans, or what is in bills that pass without media scrutiny. Only when media attention is shined on the glaring flaws do people take action.
It’s also just as apparent that both state assemblies and Congress pass bills regularly without reading. These bills, their size and scope, are simply out of control at all levels of government.
Hi Mata, Let’s argue this from a purely constitutional point of view. I know that you don’t think that the government should have any role in running health care, but let’s go beyond that and just argue the constitutionality of the contraception coverage mandate.
Firstly, what is the mandate (as modified, in response to the protests)?
Insurance companies are mandated to provide contraception coverage, as a separate contract/rider, between the insurance company and the citizen in question, and only upon request of the citizen in question. The Church related institution (CRI) has nothing to do with it. It’s a two way contract, insurance company and citizen, which is outside of the contract which the employer has with the insurance company.
Now, the CRI complains that, somehow, it’s their premiums which do end up paying for the contraceptives, but that’s not really the case. These are big insurance companies, which write policies for lots of employers and individuals, in addition to the CRI. Many of these plans/policies cover not only contraception, but abortion, as well. Most private health care policies do cover these things, including the former Republican National Committee insurance plan, until this was brought to their attention, in an embarrassing fashion.
So, if the CRI’s premiums somehow trickle through the insurance system and end up buying contraceptives for their employees, then these same premiums also trickle through the insurance system and buy not only contraceptives but abortions, for other beneficiaries insured by the particular insurance company, if you actually go following the money trail. Some beneficiaries make money for the insurance company. The premiums from these beneficiaries pay for the losses to beneficiaries who end up using more services than is covered by the premiums they pay. It’s a real stretch to turn the actual reality of what is being mandated (that insurance companies agree to enter into private contracts with beneficiaries for coverage of contraceptives, outside of the contract between the insurance company and the CRI), into some sort of violation of the First Amendment Rights of the CRI.
You should also be aware that the constitutionality of these mandates (at the state level) has already been challenged in the courts and has been found to pass constitutional muster.
What about the constitutional rights of the employees, under the 14th Amendment? Their rights to equal protection under the law. What right does the CRI have to abridge their 14th Amendment rights?
– Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach CA
Responses, Larry
First we need to separate central (federal) govt from state government, Larry. States do have a right to mandate guidelines for insurance providers doing business in their states. But not that is contrary to our Constitutional rights.
With that said, it’s not much of an improvement for us to debate the O’healthcare mandate… as modified to accommodate for religious exceptions. So to be honest, I’ve not kept up with the O’modifications and concessions (but I’m checking them now). As I’ve said before, for me to put a stamp of approval on a compromise is akin to the old adage, “We’ve already determined what you are, madam. We are now just haggling over price.”
Personally, I think this whole bit was deliberate on Obama and HHS’s part. Rather like the swap meet sales man who wants $10 for an item, so he charges $20 in order to let the buyer think they are getting a deal with the item at half price. Additionally, it throws the GOP candidates off the path of real issues, and into areas where Obama knows he can easily demonize them as women haters and wanting to take the nation back into the dark ages.
I really don’t want to get off tangent on the “money trail” scenario you travel. That simply muddies already muddy waters. So let me unmuddle it, and see if you can ask the question again without all these side tangents. And for the sake of the argument, let’s assume that I believe the federal government has the authority to dictate minimum insurance coverage standards nationwide. (cringe…)
There is still no way for any law to demand that any religious institution, or religious individual, purchase coverage in a product that is against their tenets under the 1st Amendment. The way that the states with exceptions, and religious institutions get around it is that they may offer it in tiers… a base plan that doesn’t include that coverage, and the individual who wants the coverage purchases the rider at their own costs.
The other way they can get around it is to self insure – meaning they are creating a product NOT for sale to others outside their own business.
Either one of these methods is acceptable.
Larry, I can’t even begin to go that direction unless I, like you, want to equate insurance or health care as a “right”. I do not, and it is not. Therefore there is no constitutional “right” to have any minimum insurance coverage provided to you – free or otherwise – under our Constitution or any Amendments.
Now, that said, let’s assume I work for an employer who is not a state defined “religious institution”, but who has a personal belief that birth control and contraceptives are unacceptable. That employer cannot deny me access to that coverage. And, in fact, if the state mandates any insurance company doing business provide that coverage, that employer would have to take the same steps as the church… self insure. Which brings me to your other statement I want to address:
Larry, I have no idea what you mean by that statement. The state laws have been challenged, but not necessarily for the same argument. Churches have challenged no exceptions, and won. Pharmacists have challenged not being forced to dispense contraceptives they object to and, thus far have won.
In my comment #78 on another thread, I already ran thru many of the different lawsuits, and AG opinions, on this subject. None uphold a state mandate without exceptions provided, but some state that employees of those not working for a defined “religious institution” cannot be denied because that infringes on their rights.
I don’t disagree that me, as an employer who is not self insuring, cannot force my beliefs on my employees. And in fact, any group plan I purchase on the market has to meet the state mandates.
It all comes down to how the state decides to handle exceptions, and the specifics of each individual lawsuit. So frankly, I don’t know what “lawsuit” you are referring to.
To my knowledge, there isn’t a single lawsuit I’m aware of that opines the state law and mandate is very constitutional without conscience and religious exceptions. Yet you imply (or perhaps just erroneously think) that there is such a lawsuit?
My suggestion is you provide the link to whatever lawsuit you’re thinking of.
As far as this on a federal level.. it’s a different animal all together. No state mandates force employers or insurance companies to provide a prescription plan in their package when it’s not included already. This is what O’healthcare is doing. According to Mediaite and Obama’s quoted explanation of the “compromise”:
First of all, there is no “free” anything in medical. There is cost transfer every where in the system, and somebody ends up paying. If the insurance company for a religious institution has a group plan at “x” rate, and half of the employees want the “free” contraceptives, then the insurer is going to find a way to raise that premium to cover the costs. You have to know this.
My second objection is that ANYTHING is mandated for “free”. That’s horse puckey right out of the gate. If someone wants contraceptive coverage as an insurance rider, it should be paid for by that individual. That way the individual buys their coverage, and the religious institution’s group plans are not slapped with a premium increase for the cost shifting.
Lastly, I’m pretty uniform about this. I don’t believe that contraceptives and items of this ilk – and including routine doctor check ups – should be in insurance coverage at all, and should instead be paid for out of pocket and encouraged by tax exempt HSAs instead.
Insurance should be offered in tiers and riders, so that people can piece meal and customize a plan, starting with a very shaved down base plan that is available from any carrier on a national level. (No, not mandated by the feds, either… each competitive company should create their own “base” plan, and let the free market work). Then start adding riders for specifics… i.e. various packages of prescriptions, riders specific to your state, rider for things accidental injuries like broken legs, another tier for illnesses that take longer to run their course, and catastrophic for the long term or terminal illnesses. When you think of it, most of the young won’t utilize catastrophic for the majority, and at my age I sure don’t need contraceptives.
There is nothing about O’healthcare that cures the problem of the cost of health care. All they did was try to control the price of premiums instead, and this just drives it up.
I will say that considering hospitals/doctor operate on the wrong parts of the body about 40 times a week (according to AARP, anyway), I’m probably with you on the performance based payment for medical. I’m just not with you that it should be payments made by the government. The feds have no constitutional right to be in either the insurance, or pension business.
Crimson
you are not gifted to tell anyone to apologize, ore stfu,
you did not apologize when you said to someone you’re a fucking liar,
on another POST, so you mean the rule is ; do as I tell you but not apply to you,
check it up DUDE
@Crimson recants:
WTF are you talking about? What does the feds limitation of authorities, and infringement on states rights have to do with your bizarre and unrelated tangent of hating blacks and sickle cell treatments?
And what “2000 ruling” are you talking about?
Civil rights act prevents discrimination, Crimson. It has nothing to do with any insurance policy coverage specifics. It is not a constitutional “right” for any individual to be provided with insurance or even health care. It most certainly isn’t discrimination if a policy doesn’t cover sickle cell treatments.
The only way that would be unconstitutional is if an insurance company provided a policy that did include that coverage, but excluded it if you were black.
You really aren’t very bright, are you?
Oh dang… that “not very bright” gets even more interesting. Apparently Crimson is talking about an opinion of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in 2000.
The EEOC is not a court or part of the Judicial Branch, Crimson. It is part of the administration’s law enforcement agencies. In fact, you can take the EEOC to federal court, once they’ve made your hurdle their complaint process first, of course… As they say, you cannot take a federal agency “directly to court”.
Many have done that, i.e. when a federal court took EEOC to task for their “sue first, ask questions later” litigation process. Or the courts reining in the EEOC’s “fishing expeditions” in investigations looking for discrimination by employers. Or last year with the federal court ordered the EEOC to pay $751,942.48 for attorneys fees, expert fees, and court costs to a private employer, PeopleMark after they filed a class action lawsuit and couldn’t prove squat.
This is your “ruling”?? LOL
What that EEOC opinion essentially said that if a plan offered maternity benefits, or contraceptives for medical reasons other than birth control, they could not deny it if it was desired/used for birth control. What it did NOT say is that all insurance plans MUST have a prescription drug plan that includes contraceptives.
This has nothing to do with the federal government mandating what must be in any policy coverage nationwide. In fact, any of the state mandates apply only to plans that include prescription drugs plans. They do not mandate that employers must provide a prescription drug plan. And the federal government most certainly has no constitutional authority to mandate that insurers provide prescription drug plans nationwide… let along provide free coverage.
I repeat, you really aren’t very bright, are you?
While I was trying to find all these imaginary lawsuits a few here want to cite… without citation, of course… Larry I thought I’d try to find what gave you the impression that contraceptive mandates, without conscience or religious exceptions, was Constitutional. So I snooped around the the CA Supremes via Lexus Nexus, and can only conclude you find some triumph in the Catholic Charities v California, decided in 2004.
California has religious and conscience exceptions. Oregon’s appears to be similar, if not identical, to CAs. So again, it has to do with whether a institution is considered eligible for that exception.
In the case of Catholic Charities, they are an independent non profit. They minister services not just to Catholics, but all the public. Had it been just Catholics, they would have fit the description.
Their employees are not necessarily members of the Catholic Church, so they didn’t fit that description.
And they are not an official arm of the Catholic Church. Therefore they didn’t make the grade, according to CA law.
This brings several points to mind:
1: That those of conscience or that minister to religious need to follow their state mandates progress carefully, or lobby to correct them if they find something unduly offensive. However I have no disagreement with the Catholic Charities opinion.
2: This is no way proves that a mandate without religious or conscience exceptions is Constitutional
3: That this is totally unlike the O’healthcare mandate – which requires prescription drug plans must be included as base coverage. In fact, Catholic Charities could have gotten around the problem in the ways I mentioned above. Either self-insuring, or simply dropping all prescription drugs from their health plan.
@Crimson: you do realize you defeated yourself in your first sentence when you said people have no basis for making any judgement whatsoever about the woman in question… I’m a bit ignorant so could you please explain to my what basis exists for comments such as:
Sarah Palin a “bimbo,” Laura Ingraham a “right-wing slut,” S.E. Cupp should have been “aborted by her parents,” Michelle Malkin a “mashed-up bag of meat with lipstick,” Secretary of State Clinton “flabby arms,” 70 year old writer Erica Jong an “800-year old sex novelist,” Michele Bachmann labeled “batshit crazy.”
Is the air too thin in your obama-ite perch for you to respond?? … or is what semblance of a thinking apparatus you possess too “brain washed” for objectivity??
RUSH LIMBAUGH
IS 100 PER CENT SMARTER AND CLASSIER THAN BILL MAHER,
THERE IS NO COMPARISON WHATSOEVER, AND HAVE ANY ONE NOTICE HOW OBAMA IS VISIBLE IN THE MEDIA LATELY, SO STRANGE COMPARE TO LAST YEARS IN OFFICE,
WHERE EVEN HIS OWN EMPLOYEES COULD NOT GET A INTERVIEW FROM HIM ON IMPORTANT AFFAIRS, JUST TO SAY THE ELECTION TIME GET ALL THE CRITTERS OUT, JUST LIKE WHEN SPRING IS COMING,