How The GOP Went Back To The 1950s In Just One Day

TPM

Very neatly, and on three separate fronts, conservatives in America turned the clock back to the 1950s with their rhetoric about women’s rights Thursday, according to women in politics on both sides of the aisle.

In just one day modern women being told by Republicans that they’re not qualified to talk about their own sexual health, are dressed like “whores” and probably need birth control because they’re so slutty.

“Republican policies have been stuck in the 50s for a while now. I guess this week they decided they wanted the whole retro package,” said Jess McIntosh, communications director at EMILY’s List.

A joke about aspirin and contraception sparked a blaze that lasted all day across mainstream media and social network channels on the remarks by Santorum's billionaire campaign financier Foster Friess that women who don't want to get pregnant should just hold an aspirin "between their knees".

During an ABC interview with Jake Tapper presidential candidate Rick Santorum said that premarital sex should be outlawed, that women have no right to accessible reproductive health care, that contraceptives should be illegal and that states can outlaw the sale, purchase and use of contraceptives.

Former Sen. Rick Santorum (Penn.), Mitt Romney, congressman Ron Paul and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, the top four 2012 GOP presidential candidates, have committed to a "personhood" constitutional amendment that would outlaw most common contraceptive choices available to women. Mother Jones reports that Republicans in the U.S. Congress also want to pass a federal Personhood Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. That amendment would effectively reverse the 1965 Griswold v. Connecticut Supreme Court finding that Americans have a fundamental right to use birth control.

Will the GOP’s rhetoric Feb. 16 have ramifications felt on Nov. 6? The women on both sides of the aisle agreed that it could — and the polls back them up. After months of Republican fighting about abortion, and weeks of the GOP talking about contraception, Greg Sargent reported on a polling memo showing Obama was leading Mitt Romney 65-30 among unmarried women.

Read the full story @ TPM

Democrats Consolidate Progressive Base While Republicans’ Trouble Deepens

The Democratic Strategist

The latest national survey by Greenberg Quinlan Rosner for Democracy Corps and Women's Voices. Women Vote Action Fund shows a Republican Party in deepening trouble and emerging underlying trends that may have shifted the balance for 2012. Barring sudden economic shocks, there is accumulating evidence that we have entered a new phase in the political cycle, substantially more favorable to the Democrats.

This survey sees a collapse of the Republican brand at almost all levels. Negatives associated with the Republican Party have not been this high since right after they lost the country in 2008. Their presumptive nominee flirts with a 50 percent negative rating and may now represent a big drag on the national party.

President Obama nears the 50 percent mark and is now just four points away from what he achieved in 2008. Democrats have newly consolidated the progressive voters of the Rising American Electorate who were responsible for Democratic victories in 2006 and 2008. These voters--unmarried women, young voters, and minorities--dropped off in 2010 and lagged throughout 2011. They have returned in a big way for Democrats, led by a resurgence and re-engagement of unmarried women. Only young voters have not been re-consolidated, which is either a problem or an opportunity.

Seniors, who abandoned Democrats in 2010, have come back two surveys in a row and suburban swing voters watch the Republican primary debate with growing alienation from the Republican Party. The tax issue, a presumptive Republican advantage, has moved dramatically in favor of the Democrats.

These results may not simply be the result of a spot of good economic news and rough news cycles for Republican nominees, but the beginning of long-term structural changes that will characterize the 2012 election cycle.

Recent controversies over Planned Parenthood and contraception will not revive the Republican's standing, indeed, the opposite may be true, as this survey shows voters disagree with them on principle and wonder why at a time of great economic distress, Republicans are consumed with denying birth control coverage for women.

Read the full article @ The Democratic Strategist

Bad Judge Draw for South Carolina in Voter Photo ID Preclearance Case

From Election Law Blog, by Rick Hasen

Via Texas Redistricting comes the news that the panel is district court judges Collen Kollar-Kotelly, and John Bates and D.C. Circuit judge Brett Kavanaugh.

This panel will decide whether the Department of Justice erred in not approving South Carolina’s voter identification law under section 5 of the Voting Rights Act. DOJ concluded the law would worsen the position of minority voters because minority voters are less likely than whites to have government-issued id.

Among South Carolina’s arguments is that the court should read the preclearance requirement narrowly (making it easier to get things precleared) to avoid serious constitutional problems with a broadly-read section 5. (The underlying claim is that section 5 violates states’ rights to choose their own election rules and is now an unconstitutional exercise of congressional power given no recent history of intentional discrimination by covered jurisdictions.)

... But even if South Carolina faces long odds before the three-judge court, we all know the main action will be before the Supreme Court. That’s why South Carolina already hired big gun Paul Clement to work on this case.

The next question will be whether South Carolina seeks to expedite consideration of this case so that it will have a chance to use its voter id law in the November elections. I’ve explained in Slate how this could put the thorny issue before SCOTUS before the election (though that seems less likely as time ticks by).

Read the full article @ Election Law Blog

House Republicans Deny Women A Voice In Contraception Hearing

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) echoed Democrats’ concerns about Republicans excluding female witnesses from a hearing focusing on President Obama’s new health insurance regulation requiring insurers to provide birth control in their health insurance plans.

“This is an issue about women’s health and I believe that women’s health should be covered in all fo the insurance plans,” Pelosi insisted at her press briefing this morning, refuting the GOP’s claim that the debate should focus on “religious liberties.”

“Where are the women? And that’s a good question for the whole debate. Where are the women?” she asked. “Imagine, having a panel on women’s health and then not having any women on the panel, duh!”:

PELOSI: What is it that men don’t understand about women’s health and how central the issue of family planning is to that? Not just if you’re having families but if you need those kinds of prescription drugs for your general health, which was the testimony they would include this morning if they had allowed a woman on the panel. I think the fact that they did not allow a woman on the panel is symbolic of the whole debate as to who is making these decisions about women’s health and who should be covered.

This video summarizes the testimony Chairman Issa rejected at today's hearing: Sandra Fluke, who would have been the Minority's witness and the only female voice on behalf of millions of women who seek safe and affordable coverage for preventive health care.

Visit Democrats Oversight House Gov to read more.

Today, top Rick Santorum donor said, Women could use aspirin ‘between their knees’ for birth control.

GOP culture warriors - Former Sen. Rick Santorum (Penn.), Mitt Romney and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, the top three 2012 GOP presidential candidates, have committed to a "personhood" constitutional amendment that would outlaw most common contraceptive choices available to women. Mother Jones reports that Republicans in the U.S. Congress also want to pass a federal Personhood Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. That amendment would effectively reverse the 1965 Griswold v. Connecticut Supreme Court finding that Americans have a fundamental right to use birth control.