That's an interesting accusation, especially since Dent's last Congressional opponent refused to take a stand on Obamacare until after the Bill had already passed.
As it turns out, and unknown to me until just a few moments ago, Dent did take a position on this issue that Sunday. "Rush Limbaugh's remarks were beyond inappropriate and need to be repudiated. They were over the top, outrageous and insulting. His apology is appropriate and I hope it will put an end to this sordid matter."
Dent also asks all of us, whether on the left or right, to drop the "incendiary rhetoric."
In the meantime, Media Matters reports that 46 advertisers have dropped Limbaugh.
24 comments:
Keep in mind the majority of those '46' advertisers that Media Matters say dropped sponsoring of Rush Limbaugh were local sponsors across the country.
I am not saying Rush doesn't get a piece of local spots (no idea if he does), but the national sponsors are the big money makers.
Say, by the way, how is CARBONITE doing in the stock market this week, hmmmmmm?
Dent is on Rush's side on the substance of this issue. He thinks your boss should be allowed to refuse to cover your birth control if he has some specious "moral" objection. That is because he thinks it's slutty to use birth control, like the rest of his colleagues in the House GOP.
Carbonite stock has bombed and Bill Maher's donation to Obama is fine, despite calling Sarah Palin a cunt. Where was Charlie when that happened? Likely calling Sarah the same thing, privately, as he remained silent, publicly. Charlie is disingenuous.
Does Geeting think it was OK to call Sarah Palin a CUNT and still have his $1million donation accepted? If so, Geeting is a cunt, despite his well known affinity for the other appendage.
That shouldn't offend you, right John?
Geeting,
Thanks for telling me what other people think. I can't wait to read what other people think about you.
Geeting demonstrates exactly what Dent is talking about - incendiary rhetoric.
Would love to see whet your blog would be like if all anonymous posters jumped ship.
Charlie and the worthless pols radiating from the mushy middle want everyone to STFU and kumbaya, so they can go on about the business of feeding at the public trough ad infinitum. The letter after their name is irrelevant.
Be nice, don't pay attention to the men behind the curtain, compromise (everything you believe in) for the sake of getting along, and watch the red ink flow and the culture die.
Geeting is, indeed, a Co-ed at the University of North Texas, but at least he believes in SOMETHING, and doesn't test the wind each day. I have more respect for a known, bitter and vile enemy than one cloaked in the veil of compromise and civility who would sell you out for his/her own personal gain.
Who cares how he, or Rush, or Maher says it? Fire back and stand for something.
Enough with the facade of civility. How the hell do you think we got in the mess we are in?
You back my boondoggle, I'll back yours, we'll have a drink and play a round. That's how.
-Clem
Every day that I and other women are under attack, I find it more disingenuous to hear from men calling for civility. For starters, Limbaugh's "apology" was a farce and calling it "appropriate" is nowhere near accepting responsibility.
In 2011, Congressman Dent voted for the Stupak-Pitts ammendment, voted for the FY11 CR which reinstated the global gag rule, defunded planned parenthood, eliminated Title X Family Planning, eliminated funding to the UN Populations Fund, and reinstated the DC abortion ban. He has also voted in favor of the No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act, which waaaaaay overreached from the Hyde Ammendment, including penalizing small business owners or other individuals who purchase private health insurance that covers abortion. AND he voted for the Protect Life Act, which not only weakens protections for women needing abortions, even in medical emergencies, but also undermines coverage of many other women's health related costs, including contraceptives, in state health-insurance exchanges.
I don't feel like heeding a call for civility from someone with a voting record like his, it sounds a little bit too much like men who try to silence women's voices by chastising us for being unladylike if we speak the truth.
Also, since one of your anon commenters can't seem to get over it, I'll state for the record that Bill Maher is a complete joke among many liberals, myself included. He is a known misogynist, racist, and complete reactionary bigot - his calling Sarah Palin the C word is hideous, inexcusable, and completely par for the course of his sexist anti-woman rhetoric, which he spews to a (thankfully) limited premium-cable-network audience on a weekly basis. I am not an HBO subscriber, but if I was, I would write to them to state my displeasure that they continue to give him a platform from which he can spew his ignorant, worthless opinions.
However, all of that said - two wrongs don't make a right, and you don't get to cancel out or excuse Rush Limbaugh's 3-day attack on a private citizen by pointing the finger at other misogynist assholes and saying "but, they do it too!" The response that I, and I suspect many others, would hope to see, is that EVERYONE can work harder to call out and condemn hateful, anti-woman speech and rhetoric whenever it rears its ugly head in public - which, I can assure you, is pretty much on an hourly basis, so there's no shortage of opportunities on either the right or the left.
I realize the first paragraph of my comment is confusing - I do not mean to say that Congressman Dent is responsible for Rush Limbaugh's comments, what I meant to say is that calling Limbaugh's apology appropriate is nowhere near holding him accountable. If Congressman Dent is going to make a statement, he should have acknowledged that Limbaugh's apology was inadequate and also acknowledged that women everywhere are being attacked in similar ways, all the time, because of the kinds of hateful, body-shaming policies that he has voted for in the past.
As if you couldn't tell that I am fired up about this, I want to also make explain that one of the reasons I have been commenting on these last few blog posts here concerning the ongoing issues of women's health and the disgusting public discourse around it is that I have been exposed to this kind of anti-woman rhetoric on a regular basis for my entire life, and have been the target of it for much of my adult life.
In addition to offline real-life misogyny that affects me regularly, I was called vile things on this very blog by the COS for a "D" state senator 5 years ago, and he continued to collect a taxpayer-funded salary until at least 2011. On my own blog, you, Bernie O'Hare, called me a prostitute for making an offhand comment about hoping I could find a date who would buy me dinner at a restaurant in Jim Thorpe, and on the LV Poliblog, I was was gaslighted repeatedly by you and other bloggers when I tried to call out homophobic and misogynistic comments being made by George Maniatty and other bloggers. I was also sent anonymous threatening and derogatory emails for the duration that I "poliblogged" that eventually let me to shut down my own blog, delete my posts elsewhere, and virtually stop commenting on political blog posts in fear for my personal safety.
I am not even close to the only woman who has experienced similar treatment in the LV Blogosphere. So even in this little tiny microcosm of the world, there is so much work that could still be done to make this a space where those types of exchanges don't happen. Bernie, you, I'm sure, want to be an ally to women and not an attacker - I see it in your posts and comments. I've seen it in the past when I've commented about your tendency to include commentary (even flattering) about the looks of women in public office or government jobs and you've responded with an open mind. I've seen it when BK threw his slurs at me and at Sam Bennett and you were one of the first to condemn them. So imagine how much more hurtful it was when you, a supposed ally, turned and attacked me yourself. I say it now only in the hopes that you will be more conscientious in the future and that in addition to hopefully a few of your readers becoming enlightened by your posts, that you also learn from the dialogue.
In any event, I appreciate you hosting these exchanges in the first place, since not many men care to devote their platform to "women's issues" in the first place.
Well, if you seriously deleted my last comment, I take back what I said.
oooooo Capri stamps her little lib feet and demands we pay for her birth control...because....wait for it...we're "men" and evidently can't possible know what it's like to have to pay for your own rubbers.
what horseshit
feel sorry fo her husband IF she is married
She's not saying we need to pay for her health care.
Capri, I did not delete you. I do delete trolls.
Capri, I just noticed your comment in my spam folder and published it. That happens sometimes. I was in bed when you posted, dreaming of sugarplums.
Do we really want to live in a country where at any given time anyone of us could be accused of be offensive and maybe sued? Too many are over sensitive and just wait to pounce on anyone who has a moment of freedom of speech. Remember sticks and stones? Nowadays we prop up the victim which are many. As a woman I see too many men acting like the soap opera actors I always have avoided. I expect it from woman but thankfully not all feel so victimized. As we see through it only takes one and look out. Enough with the drama. It is effeminate in men and exhausting in woman. And no one in the spot light apologizes until a stink is made.Who cares if the apology is accepted. As far as Rush, he will be fine in spite of all of this. As it should be.
Bernie -
You source Media Matters? What a joke!
They're hardly an impartial source.
Thanks Bernie for fishing my comment out of purgatory.
And to the anon at 8:32 - I'm so glad for you that you don't feel you've been victimized or attacked for your gender. But I don't feel that its exhausting to speak about my experiences, to share information about voting records, or to state my opinion.
I am however, exhausted when people tell me that I shouldn't because its unwomanly, or, in your case, exhausting because I'm a woman. I'm exhausted by being reading that my outspokenness is such an offense that my husband deserves the pity of strangers. And those are only the things that have exhausted me since 2 am this morning!
As for the claim about me wanting others to pay for my health care - well, personally I have pretty good private health insurance, so in this instance, that's now what's happening. But on the overall scale of this discussion, I do believe that "women's" health care needs should be covered under both private and public insurance plans. I think its shameful that they aren't.
To take it to an even more macro level, I will say that I constantly hear people on the left and on the right talk about how they shouldn't have to pay for things they don't agree with. This is an idiotic red herring in any discussion about government spending or about private industries like insurance that rely on the magnitude of its customer base for the business model to work.
I could probably list about 900 things I don't want to pay for that my taxes are used for or that my insurance premium pays for, but guess what? That's the price we pay for being able to call the fire department when there's a fire and know that they're not going to stop to see if we've paid for fire department service before they put out the fire in our house! Just.... get over it. You pay for services you don't use or that you disagree with so that you can get the services that you do need and do agree with even though someone else doesn't need it and doesn't agree with it.
get over this: fire services and the like are local services and if you want your municipality to provide them, fine......but we're talking about FEDERAL spending here, which was, in more rational times, limited in scope by the Constitution. I'm guessing you think that is silly old document with no relevance to today's issues
Its no secret the republicans are in trouble with an inner fight between moderates and the far right.I would vote for Dent way before a Santorum.Lately the conservatives are focused on womens issues and health care.Cant wait to hear them on mens issues on the moral side. No sex before marriage? No birth control or maturbation because it goes againts conservative and religious teachings.If that happens Santorums poll numbers will drop to 0.Whats next, no medical help for alcholics or drug addicts because many feel the problem is self inflicted and they dont wanna pay for others.How about people who are obese and smokers.Personally dont want moralists in politics.Let them be the clergy.
Too little, too late=Dent.
Capri you are exhausting. You complaining and self centeredness is quite apparent. Nice well adjusted people have to stay away from people like you. You use up all of the air in the room speaking about yourself and your views of what is wrong in your world. Even when you say something that others could agree with they will hesitate just because they do not want to feed into you. I'll just bet you hardly ever come up for air and 9 out of 10 of your sentences start with "I" and or end with "me." I am a woman and have worked with numerous woman my whole life and thank God the majority of them were a pleasure to spend time with. We have learned to weed you from our gardens. We have to so we can stay a positive force for ourselves and our families and friends. I don't mean to be rude but you are a drain.....Wake up.
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