13 March 2012

Gloria, Jane, Gloria: You Do Not Speak For Me!

The Hush Rush Syndrome

By W. James Antle, III on 3.12.12 @ 6:10AM

The new liberal censoriousness and its growing list of targets.

"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." Believers in free speech and civil liberties, many of them liberals, have repeated this Voltaire quote so many times it has become a cliche.

Some even applied this principle to excess, treating topless dancing the same as political speech and defending neo-Nazis who wanted to march through a community of Holocaust survivors. There is no right to yell "fire" in a crowded theater. But the principle itself is essential to a free society.

Voltaire has since been replaced by Ring Lardner: "Shut up he explained."

Pat Buchanan was hounded off the air in February, ostensibly for things written in his latest book that in fact differed little from views he had expressed for years. MSNBC president Phil Griffin proclaimed the book unfit for the "national dialogue" despite the fact it was a New York Times bestseller.

If ideas with enough reach to land on the bestseller lists are too dangerous, we should not be surprised some liberals believe the radio talk show host with the largest audience should not be heard either. Rush Limbaugh may admire Ronald Reagan, but it is his critics who want sponsors to say, "I paid for this microphone."

"No apology is good enough," read feminist Gloria Feldt's indictment. "Rush must go. Period." What of his 20 million listeners, many of them women, who do not want Rush to go? The right side of the sisterhood must get with the program. "Time for women to make Rush Limbaugh history."

Limbaugh isn't the only one Feldt, a former Planned Parenthood CEO, would like to make history: "It's time for these men, like Pat Buchanan, Foster Friess, and Rick Santorum to climb back under the prehistoric rock from whence they came."

More ominously, Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, suggested Limbaugh should be dropped from Armed Forces Radio. Levin at least paid lip service to the First Amendment. "I would hope the people that run it see just how offensive this is and drop it on their own volition," he maganimously told CNN.

Feminist golden oldies Jane Fonda, Robin Morgan, and Gloria Steinem took the next step in calling for the FCC to "clear Limbaugh from the airwaves." The trio writes, "If Clear Channel won't clean up its airways, then surely it's time for the public to ask the FCC a basic question: Are the stations carrying Limbaugh's show in fact using their licenses 'in the public interest?'"

"This isn't political," the political activists maintain. "While we disagree with Limbaugh's politics, what's at stake is the fallout of a society tolerating toxic, hate-inciting speech." Fonda, Morgan, and Steinem accuse Limbaugh of having "hidden behind the First Amendment."

Calling spectrum a "scare government resource," the three argue there is nothing wrong with yanking the broadcast licenses of stations carrying Limbaugh's show. "It's time for the public to take back our broadcast resources," they conclude. (This also serves as useful reminder of how secure civil liberties are when resources are collectively owned.)

No longer is it good enough to disagree with conservatives. They must be fired from their jobs, separated from their advertisers, booted from the airwaves, buried under a prehistoric rock. The tactics attributed to Joe McCarthy tied to the polemical rigor associated with Jenny McCarthy.

But who are these gatekeepers? The Color of Change, the group which organized against Buchanan, Lou Dobbs, Glenn Beck, and the late Andrew Breitbart, was co-founded by Van Jones, who had to resign from the Obama administration for signing a petition endorsing 9/11 truther conspiracies. Are Jones' views certifiably mainstream and unimpeachably fit for the national dialogue?

One need not agree with anything the criticized conservative commentators have written or said. Concerning the remarks that ignited the firestorm currently embroiling Limbaugh, this writer believes the columnist Jeff Jacoby is right on the money. And in a polarized political climate, this kind of censoriousness is not a strictly liberal offense.

There are also honorable exceptions to the liberal purges. "As we all know, Limbaugh's First Amendment rights aren't involved here -- freedom of speech means freedom from interference by the government," writes the veteran columnist Michael Kinsley, referring only to the boycotts. "But the spirit of the First Amendment, which is that suppressing speech is bad, still applies."

Networks can hire who they want. Advertisers can spend their money as they choose. But there is something unsavory about these organized boycotts and politically motivated pressure tactics. There is something much worse about the government deciding which speech is in the public interest.

If you don't like Limbaugh, Dobbs, Beck, or Buchanan, don't listen to them. If you think they are purveying ideas that are wrong-headed or mistaken, debate and refute them. But among some of the left's self-styled defenders of free speech, personal autonomy, and choice, this old-fashioned liberalism is no longer in vogue.

Democrats should reject Bill Maher's money

By Teri Christoph and Suzanne Haik Terrell, Special to CNN

updated 11:15 AM EDT, Mon March 12, 2012

(CNN) -- As women, feminists, mothers to daughters and activists, we read the recent opinion piece on conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh by Jane Fonda, Gloria Steinem and Robin Morgan with great anticipation. Once we had finished reading, we were left with feelings of amusement, amazement and, yes, agreement.

As women, we agree with them that hate speech and sexism against women is wrong in all forms, on all playing fields. Women who enter the public arena and stand up for their beliefs should be celebrated, whether we agree with them or not. Arguing with their beliefs is one matter; using derogatory terms or hate speech is another. Men who practice this regularly should apologize and change their ways and face the consequences.

As feminists, we read the piece with amazement. Recently, an entertainer, political activist and major donor has referred to women in the political arena with vile obscenities as well as words such as "bimbos," "boobs" and "MILFs."

Bill Maher has advocated, in one case, that someone should "choke this b***h" and argued that voters would prefer to see a female candidate "splayed out on the hood of a car" rather than making decisions in the Oval Office. A recent video produced by ShePAC highlights some of Maher's "greatest hits" against women and special needs children. In 48 hours, more than 250,000 viewed it.

After reading and further researching, we were amazed that Fonda, Steinem and Morgan failed to condemn Maher for his hate speech against conservative and liberal women alike. In their piece, they write that their call to action "isn't political." Giving them the benefit of doubt, we thought, they were perhaps unaware of Maher's history of misogyny. But we were wrong.

Not only have these women not condemned Maher's vile and violent language, they've legitimized it. Both Fonda and Steinem have been guests on Maher's show, both failing to call him to task for his actions. Sadly, they are not alone.

Neither have two former guests on Maher's Hollywood set: Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi and DNC Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz. They haven't had the courage or conviction to condemn his words against conservative women but have both found time to join Fonda and Steinem in the media the past week to do so against Limbaugh.

But mostly, as conservatives, we read their opinion piece in amusement. To us, it's silly to think female voters are going to be swayed by the tired politics these women preach. They don't speak for us, and their politics of the past is being rejected.

Traditional "women's issues" from Fonda and Steinem's era are gone. Women flocked to conservative candidates in 2010 after they saw their children's share of the debt skyrocket. They joined with conservatives as unemployment rose and their hope for the future sank. Women have seen our freedom (including speech) under attack, and we have taken to the ballot box and the campaign trail to put a stop to it.

While we respect all women who stand up for their beliefs, we reject the hypocrisy that these "feminist icons" try to slip past us. When will they put principle over politics and have the courage to condemn Maher's misogyny? We applaud Wasserman Schultz for rejecting this sort of language as not "funny." We agree with President Obama that remarks such as these have "no place in the public discourse." We ask others including Sen. Chuck Schumer and Obama super PAC co-founder Bill Burton to reject Maher's donation of $1 million to support the president's re-election.

By accepting this massive donation, they allow Maher's views into the public discourse and legitimize him as more than just the comedian they pass him off as. Maher is a contributor to the Huffington Post and a frequent political commentator on cable news, and his comedy tour's appearance in Alabama is the main event for an upcoming Democratic party fundraiser. It's clear that he's more than just a comedian. We aren't laughing at any of this -- and somehow, we suspect, neither are Schumer and Burton's wives and daughters.

Maher has made his millions in part with violent verbal attacks against women, hiding behind the guise of "comedy," and now he has given some of that money to the super PAC supporting Obama.

Sunday, we learned that Obama's campaign is spending a substantial amount of money targeting 1 million female voters.

We invite you, Jane, Gloria, Robin, Debbie, Nancy and others to join with us and call on Obama to ask his super PAC to reject Maher's misogynist million.

We're sure you, as decent people, agree with President Obama this tainted money and speech "has no place in our public discourse." Together, we can cross political lines and jointly call on Obama in the name of civility to do the right thing by requesting that the super PAC turn over this money to those hurt by this sort of speech -- a charity serving abused women. We look forward to your response.

Fonda, Steinem, Feminists Beclown and Expose Themselves While Putting Out For Obama

Posted by Lori Ziganto

Monday, March 12th at 8:00AM EDT

Gloria Steinem has once again resurfaced from whatever cuckoo pants mammary tower she’s been hiding in to help pen an absurd opinion piece at CNN calling for the FCC to take Rush Limbaugh off the airways. Because, meany pants. I think it was supposed to be serious. I can’t really be sure because, oh boy, did the hilarity ensue. Her ‘writing’ partners, because it apparently takes three feminists to write one op-ed (collective thinking, baby!) were Jane Fonda (I know! My sides ache, too) and radical feminist author Robin Morgan, also an editor at the ever-inane Ms. magazine.

This op-ed, as well as the actions of some other feminist/Lefty groups, are of great value in one way: They totally expose the Left as subjugators, users and abusers of women. But let’s get the side-splitting article itself out of the way first. The trio of attention-seeking irrelevancy open with quotes they didn’t bother to source. Research is hard. Then they go on to include environmentalists in a list of The Most Vulnerable whom Rush Limbaugh has allegedly ‘attacked’. By attacked they mean people with whom he disagrees. Environmentalists! Who among us hasn’t lamented the plight of the poor environmentalists, aimlessly roaming about the country only to see signs like ‘Environmentalists need not apply”? What happened to all those ‘green jobs’ Obama promised? He is oppressing the environmentalists! Who will think of the environmentalists? WHO?

The three then exhibit a staggering lack of self-awareness by claiming that Rush Limbaugh seeks to “dehumanize” people. Um. Did Gloria Steinem forget that she called housewives “dependent creatures who are still children” and “parasites”? That is the Left’s standard operating procedure. That is what they do, always, and especially with regard to women. This has been proven over and over again and only the willfully ignorant can’t see it. This is followed by the pièce de résistance of the op-ed — they equate Rush with Josef Goebbels. No, for reals. While fascistically demanding that The State’s FCC shut down Rush Limbaugh. While seeking to silence those with whom they disagree – using hysterical lies and propagandist rhetoric – they Godwin themselves with Goebbels. Irony is lost on these geniuses.

They ended with the most hilarious line of all when they claimed ‘this is not political’. Of course it is. Everything they do is political. Perhaps Robin Morgan forgot that she said “I feel that “man-hating” is an honorable and viable political act, that the oppressed have a right to class-hatred against the class that is oppressing them.” She also said ‘Kill your fathers, not your mothers’ – yeah, no ‘issues’ there. And Feminism itself is not about women at all; it’s about serving a political ideology and agenda always. What they fail to realize, being too busy beclowning themselves constantly, is that they are subjugators of women. They are being used – willingly, no less – to help oppress and infantilize women, making them subservient to The State and Big Daddy Government.

They are quite literally saying that women need a Daddy State to come rushing in to soothe ouchy feelings and be their white knight protecting them from icky mean boys. Which is the same thing Fluke said; the woman for whom they are prostrating themselves to Big Daddy to defend. She said that silly little women can’t control anything, let alone their ‘reproductive justice’ (whatever in the heck that is) without someone else rescuing them and, you know, picking up the tab. It’s also the same way they infantilize women by screeching about ultrasound laws. Helpless women are too stupid to see an ultrasound before killing their child because they might be so stupid as to change their mind! Feminist heroine Simone de Beauvoir said “No woman should be authorized to stay at home and raise her children. Society should be totally different. Women should not have that choice, precisely because if there is such a choice, too many women will make that one. “

The horror! Women making choices of their very own? Does not suit. In fact, Gloria Steinem also said that one cannot be a feminist and be conservative and pro-life. We aren’t real women, you see. Real women let others who ‘know best’, like The State, make their choices for them. Or, as another bunch of feminists proved this week, they empower themselves by demanding neither respect, honor nor care. A group called Liberal Ladies Who Lunch has launched a campaign to withhold sex (unladylike language at link) because ‘if our reproductive choices are denied, so are yours.” Idiocy, of course. But there is a larger point that they inadvertently exposed. The founder of the group said the following:

“American men enjoy the benefits of women making their own choices about when to get pregnant. Men get the advantage of free, easy access sex with young women of child-bearing age. It wasn’t like that sixty years ago. If women can’t get reliable birth control, they will just have to keep their legs crossed to prevent pregnancy–even married women. I don’t think anyone wants that.”

Huh. Can you feel the empowerment, ladies? Once again, those on the Left reduce women not only to the sum of their girly bits, but to 25 cent carnival rides requiring no respect just ‘easy and free access’. They throw themselves at pro-abortion men and laud them with tshirts saying ‘I heart pro-choice boys” because, hey, if he knocks you up, he’ll totally drive you to the abortion mill. Who cares if he’s too cheap to pick up the tab for a pack of condoms? We don’t need any respect or care, only Big Daddy Government! No responsibility for you, men. We are just here for your amusement, subservient and willing. As long as you are all pro-abortion-y and treat the children we may create without respect and as disposable, the same way you do us. That’s your legacy, Gloria Steinem. Kudos!

Conservative women can’t be Feminists, says Steinem. Thank Goodness. We’d rather be around men who respect us and honor us. And who aren’t, you know, too cheap to pick up contraceptives if we so choose. We aren’t 25 cent carnival rides. We won’t prostrate ourselves to Big Daddy Government, in fact we want him to get the hell out of our way. We won’t prostitute ourselves for Leftist politicans like Obama, to whom women are an expendable means to a political end. We’d rather think for ourselves and rely on ourselves, with the support of loving family and friends. We aren’t idiots who must think with one collective mind. We not only honor ourselves, but we honor and respect freedom and liberty.

The Left has wrongly held the For The Women card for too long and President Obama is now clearly using it as campaign strategy. It’s far past time their card was revoked. They aren’t For The Women. They are For Using The Women. They absurdly claim the GOP wants women barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen. Well, they want us in hooker shoes, fearful of motherhood and in a cell servicing our Big Daddy Government masters.

Congratulations! You Just Made Rush Limbaugh Sympathetic!

By Dave Serchuk, Contributor

Imagine this scenario: you are a lifelong liberal. You pretty much hate everything Rush Limbaugh stands for, and says. You are really glad that the times have finally seemed to have caught up to him, and that people are outraged by his callous, gross comments. So what do you do next? You do the one thing that will make him a sympathetic figure. You call on the FCC to remove him.

Think this is just not-very-good satire? If only. Nope, I draw from this example because in an opinion piece just published on CNN.com Jane Fonda, Gloria Steinem, and Robin Morgan did exactly this. In the process they seem to have played into the exact stereotype of the thin-skinned, hypocritical liberal. One who supports the First Amendment and freedom of speech … except for when they don’t.

Here is the lame excuse they offered for why the heavy hand of government sponsored censorship should come down on Limbaugh, a guy who seemed to be doing a pretty good imitation of a man hoist on his own petard anyway.

“Radio broadcasters are obligated to act in the public interest and serve their respective communities of license. In keeping with this obligation, individual radio listeners may complain to the FCC that Limbaugh’s radio station (and those syndicating his show) are not acting in the public interest or serving their respective communities of license by permitting such dehumanizing speech.”

Umm, okay. But isn’t there something called ratings that are a truer indication of what these respective communities already want? And shouldn’t that count the most? Don’t ratings (i.e. “popularity”) in fact tell the FCC just whom the public thinks serves their interest? Whether we like it or not?

Either Limbaugh serves a large demographic or he doesn’t, it’s pretty simple. As long as he doesn’t violate any laws I don’t see what argument there is to be made to remove him based on serving some imaginary definition of the public interest. It seems to me the public has spoken quite clearly about what it likes. A large portion of it still likes Rush, although fewer than before this flap began.

Then they argued that while Limbaugh is “is indeed constitutionally entitled to his opinions … he is not constitutionally entitled to the people’s airways.”

I just don’t understand this line of reasoning. Just at the very moment when the public has come alive to the fact that Limbaugh has long since crossed over the line of decency, when the system, in fact, is working, along come these three to say that “the people” need to remove Limbaugh via the FCC. Even as “the people” seem to be doing a pretty good job of it already.

No. That is the wrong way to do it. The “people” need to get rid of Limbaugh the old fashioned way, by not listening to his show. By offering strong counter-arguments to his diminished pulpit. By telling his sponsors they’ve had enough. By proving that the First Amendment still protects all speech, even Limbaugh’s, but that it cuts both ways.

As long as liberals argue that government should protect us from upsetting opinions they are never going to win, and shouldn’t. Begging the FCC to do what listeners have yet to do—get rid of Limbaugh—both looks and is weak.

I am not a fan of Rush Limbaugh’s show. So I don’t listen to it. He hasn’t gotten one Nielsen rating from me, and his sponsors have missed me too. And in the past few weeks many more people who used to be on the fence about Limbaugh have come around to my point of view, it seems. If enough people argue back against his ill-informed spew, using facts, a real, meaningful change will have taken place in this country.

Liberals and Democrats either need to make their case better than Limbaugh does, or, just as effectively, sit back and watch as his hate machine continues to eat its own tail. Eventually, though, you run out of tail. And that’s when the fun really starts. In fact, you could say the past two weeks have offered a pretty great argument as to why Limbaugh and his kind don’t deserve your vote, by any definition of that word. So let them talk.

If only..... Just joking....

From Sophie:

"Imagine this scenario: you are a lifelong liberal. You pretty much hate everything Rush Limbaugh stands for, and says. You are really glad that the times have finally seemed to have caught up to him, and that people are outraged by his callous, gross comments. So what do you do next? You do the one thing that will make him a sympathetic figure. You call on the FCC to remove him."

And, then you do the one thing that will prove that you really are a batshit crazy FemiNazi:

You demand the State's Attorney in Palm Beach to prosecute Rush Limbaugh pursuant to a Victorian-era statute, which is clearly unconstitutional under both the First and Fourteenth Amendments, exposing the intolerance and totalitarian nature of the Left for the world to see.

"It's only Fascism when they do it!"

- Gloria Allred