"She's the kinda woman you'd detonate the Senate for"

[realFedUp]

( I don't agree with blowing up the
Senate over these nominations, but an interesting POV)

http://www.pandagon.net/archives/2005/05/shes_the_kinda.html

May 18, 2005
She's the kinda woman you'd detonate the Senate for
In the Republican pantheon, there are Good Women and Bad Women, both very easy to catalogue, at least in theory. The prime example of a Good Woman of late is poor Terri Schiavo, brainless, wordless, unable to rebel against her parents or even say something snotty. In her state, she was the kind of woman that makes sexist men feel like saviors--they'll draw their swords and fight off all the villians to get a drink of water to that poor woman who would then give what appears to be a smile of gratitude. Who's to say that is was anything but that, anyway?

On the other side of the coin is the Bad Woman, for instance, an insolent teenage girl who ran around with boys and got pregnant and now wants to get an abortion without notifying her father, as if that cunt was her own property and not her father's, all just to avoid the beating that she has coming to her for her willfulness. Bad Women are disobedient and despicable and so low that often dealing with them is a task beneath a man. Enter the Sister Punisher, a woman whose willingness to turn on other women to curry the favor of sexist men knows no bounds.

Sister Punishers are one of the most important tools of control for the right wing, because the right wingers think that this tool is above criticism--call out a Sister Punisher for her sexism and watch the hypocrites flock to call you a sexist yourself. Right wingers consider the Sister Punishers to be a sort of impenetrable force field, protecting them from criticism while they do the dirty work of undermining women's rights. All of this is important to remember in the upcoming days, because Bill Frist is fixing to use the so-called nuclear option in order to appoint a Sister Punisher that seems to have no shame or remorse at all to the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals.

Priscilla Owen is submissive to more than just the whims of sexist and controlling men who express deep interest in the contents of the uteruses of teenage girls. She also knows how to kiss the asses of the rich and powerful, and her willingness to put the interests of corporations like Enron before her sworn duty to uphold the law is both why Senate Republicans and the Shrub love her and why Democrats want to protect the nation from her as much as possible. But it is her willingness to do things like tell teenage girls that the decision to give birth doesn't belong to them but to dear old Dad that endears her to the patriarchy-loving Christian right. Overturning Senate tradition to get this woman appointed is a crystal clear example of why those who would oppress the poor and those who would oppress women have found their alliance to be fruitful.

Posted by Amanda Marcotte at May 18, 2005 07:59 AM

[realFedUp]

1. and one on Janice Rogers Brown...

http://crookedtimber.org/2005/05/05/janice-rogers-brown-revisited/

Janice Rogers Brown, Revisited
Posted by Kieran Healy

Judge Janice Rogers Brown is back in the news, with Mark Schmitt and various members of the Volokhs discussing her promotion prospects. Henry has already noted her fondness for self-help guru Sam Beckett. Below the fold I reproduce a post of mine from 2003 about Brown’s rant—there’s really no other word for it—to the Federalist Society, delivered at the University of Chicago Law School in 2000. Mark Schmitt links to a similar outing from around the same time. She should have taken it on the comedy club circuit.

While reading Eric Muller’s defence of David Bernstein, I came across another of his posts:

Is it just me, or does this speech by Janice R. Brown seem a little, well, unhinged?
(Allen Brill has a chronology if you want to know who Janice R. Brown is.) Several of Muller’s commenters assure him that it’s just him and the speech is “entertaining and thought-provoking.” Clayton Cramer comments that it’s “splendid and thoughtful.” Well, that clinches it for me.

continued

[carnie_sf]

2. I thought

you were going to name Barbara Boxer as the prime example of a bad woman, but she would be a different sort. Still bad, though.

[realFedUp]

3. bad according to Rethuglicans....nt

[carnie_sf]

6. I love Barbara Boxer

[A-Schwarzenegger]

4. Maybe you oughta put that thread title in quotes...?

[realFedUp]

5. because Big Brother might get the wrong idea?

I don't think the original was in quotes
but not a bad idea.