The most ethical administration in history

What good is it to implement all these ethics standard when you give waivers to everyone who applies for job.

Another 10 get waivers to work for team obama.......

Calling President Obama's Executive Order on Ethics for Executive Branch personnel "the strongest ethics standards in U.S. government history," White House counsel Norm Eisen on Friday announced 10 more waivers for Obama administration officials.

The waivers will allow the officials to participate with persons with whom and entities with which "the appointees formerly had a professional relationship," Eisen wrote, "because there was a compelling public interest in allowing it."

More.......

Tea Party notes

I just got back from the Tea Party at Voice of America Park in West Chester. Like a ding dong, I forgot my digital cameras so I bought a disposable. As a result, I did discover that one hour photo means we'll get around to it when someone shows up for their shift. I'll be posting the photos as soon as I get them back from the one hour photo.

Some notes...

I would put attendance somewhere around 10,000 people in and out during the festivities.

I found it disgusting that not one local news crew could be found on the grounds. You could have 40 people advocating abortion rights in a library and you'd find 10 TV cameras in the room.

The organization that it took to put the program on was impressive. Especially when you have no idea how many people will actually show up for the event. All the volunteers it took to put that together are truly selfless.

I still believe that people still have a misconception about the people who go to these tea parties. For every person at this rally was 10,000 people who couldn't be there because they are the kind of people you won't see on a reality show. They're the people who have to attend a JV football games. They're the people who had to go into the office to finish a project. They're the kind of people who keep informed and vote but don't have time for political rallies. They're the people who pay their taxes, fund their 401k's, don't commit crimes, try to be kind to their neighbor and are sick and tired of being blamed for what's wrong with America.

But maybe, even more than that, there's absolutely no one in the government to defend them.

Barack Obama?
John McCain?
Hilary Clinton?
Bob Taft?
Ted Strickland?
George Voinovich?
Sherrod Brown?
George Bush?

Can you name one politician who actually defends and/or represents the people who carry the load in this country?

I can't.

None the less, the tea parties are an eruption of people who have finally decided to be seen and heard.

I would advise the politicians to watch and listen.

A Soviet immigrant's take

Instead of Obama asking students what they can do for him, why don't they distribute this letter from a Russian immigrant and her observations about our country..........

In the USSR, economic equality was achieved by redistributing wealth, ensuring that everyone remained poor, with the exception of those doing the redistributing. Only the ruling class of communist leaders had access to special stores, medicine and accommodations that could compare to those in the West.

The rest of the citizenry had to deal with permanent shortages of food and other necessities, and had access to free but inferior, unsanitary and low-tech medical care. The egalitarian utopia of equality, achieved by the sacrifice of individual self-interest for the collective good, led to corruption, black markets, anger and envy.

Government-controlled health care destroyed human dignity.

Chairman Nikita Khrushchev released facts about Stalin and his purges. People learned of the horrific purge of more than 20 million citizens, murdered as enemies of the state.

Those who left Russia found a different set of values in America: freedom of religion, speech, individual pursuits, the right to private property and free enterprise. The majority of those immigrants achieved a better life for themselves and their children in this capitalist land.

These opportunities let the average immigrant live a better life than many elites in the Soviet Communist Party. The freedom to pursue personal self-interest led to prosperity. Prosperity generated charity, benefiting the collective good.

An absolute must read. Thanks to reader Rick.

Hydrogen Barackside

From reader Bernie

Governor Schwarzenegger - Dumbbell Finder

Too bad he can't find a few billions to reconcile their budget

Mary Jo Kilroy (D-OH), Columbus Ohio Mayor duck the details on how to pay for health care

We truly have a culture war

How do you know?

When a group feels empowered enough to pull this one off......

Two radio station towers were toppled early Friday, and the station's manager said an ecoterrorist group's initials were left at the scene. An e-mail to a newspaper said the Earth Liberation Front was responsible.

A sign bearing the letters ELF was found near the towers, said Andy Skotdal, general manager of KRKO Radio in Everett, about 25 miles north of Seattle. The group is a loose collection of radical environmentalists that has claimed responsibility for dozens of attacks since the 1990s.

Hey, maybe Van Jones can appoint these guys to jobs in his Czardom.

More........

Glenn Beck with David Horowitz on Obama's Communist Czars, Part 1

The AP is disgusting

Defense Secretary Robert Gates is objecting “in the strongest terms” to an Associated Press decision to transmit a photograph showing a mortally wounded 21-year-old Marine in his final moments of life, calling the decision “appalling” and a breach of “common decency.”

The AP reported that the Marine’s father had asked – in an interview and in a follow-up phone call — that the image, taken by an embedded photographer, not be published.

AP reported in a story that it decided to make the image public anyway because it “conveys the grimness of war and the sacrifice of young men and women fighting it.”

The photo shows Lance Cpl. Joshua M. Bernard of New Portland, Maine, who was struck by a rocket-propelled grenade in a Taliban ambush Aug. 14 in Helmand province of southern Afghanistan, according to The AP.

Gates wrote to Thomas Curley, AP’s president and chief executive officer. “Out of respect for his family’s wishes, I ask you in the strongest of terms to reconsider your decision. I do not make this request lightly. In one of my first public statements as Secretary of Defense, I stated that the media should not be treated as the enemy, and made it a point to thank journalists for revealing problems that need to be fixed – as was the case with Walter Reed.

“I cannot imagine the pain and suffering Lance Corporal Bernard’s death has caused his family. Why your organization would purposefully defy the family’s wishes knowing full well that it will lead to yet more anguish is beyond me. Your lack of compassion and common sense in choosing to put this image of their maimed and stricken child on the front page

of multiple American newspapers is appalling. The issue here is not law, policy or constitutional right – but judgment and common decency.”

The four-paragraph letter concluded, “Sincerely,” then had Gates’ signature...

So let me make sure I have this right. They contacted the father twice, he requested they not print the photo and they did anyway.

It's clear they had every intention of printing that photo. The request to the father was a contrived attempt to give them cover. That makes it even more disgusting.

Read the rest here.......

Why people fear the Obama school speech

This is prior to the election.

Give me more cowbell

The David Axelrod solution to all things Obama.......

Why the Obama administration is determined to do the time warp again is easier to decipher. Obama’s advisers think the answer to every problem is more cowbell, if by “cowbell” you mean “Obama.” It’s like Obama guru David Axelrod is the Christopher Walken character from the Saturday Night Live skit about Blue Oyster Cult (if you don’t know the reference, Google “cowbell”).

Every time someone comes up with an alternative to throwing Obama on TV, Axelrod says, “No, no, no. Guess what? I got a fever, and the only prescription . . . is more Obama!”

But is that really what the doctor ordered?

Obama’s address next week will be his third prime-time appeal in three months and the fifth in his seven-month-old presidency. The networks are chagrined about this, not least because the ratings half-life of these events is severe. (Fox’s broadcast network beat out the other networks by running So You Think You Can Dance instead of his last prime-time press conference.) More relevant, they haven’t done Obama much good.

His July 22 press conference was billed as perhaps Obama’s last chance to save health-care reform. It tanked (partly because Obama’s attack on the Cambridge police dominated the press). Afterward, public support for Obamacare dropped significantly. A Pew poll taken that week found that more people opposed the proposals being considered by Congress than supported them, and that Obama’s overall approval had dropped 7 points from the previous month. Other polls showed similar declines.

Now, more than a month later, things look even worse. The obvious solution? Even more cowbell.

Read the rest........

FOX News Allstars: Obama's Communist Green Czar Van Jones Will Be Gone By Monday

These are the people populating the Obama administration.

Nice..........

Obama's lost one

Of the relatives on the immediate side of my family, only one person voted for The One.

Note to Obama. Don't count on that vote in 2012.

Asked what it was that she didn't like about Obama the quote was, "everything".

I won't go into details about our conversation, outside of saying that who he is versus what he sold is a big problem.

What I find most sad, is that this is from a family with democratic roots. It goes back to Reagan's line "I didn't leave the democratic party, the democratic party left me!"

Life in "Progress" City

From the city of Atlantic City, who hasn't had a conservative run the city since Brontosaurus roamed the land.........

Atlantic City Councilman Marty Small and 13 people who worked on his unsuccessful mayoral campaign this spring were indicted Thursday on charges they conspired to commit election fraud during the June Democratic primary through a variety of schemes involving messenger absentee ballots, state Attorney General Anne Milgram announced in Trenton.

The state Division of Criminal Justice obtained a 10-count grand jury indictment charging Small, 35, who is also director of after-school activities for the Atlantic City School Board, and 13 campaign workers. Small and the others are charged with conspiracy, four counts of election fraud, absentee ballot fraud, tampering with public records, falsifying records, and forgery. Four of the people are also charged with hindering apprehension or prosecution.

"Councilman Small and his co-defendants are charged with seeking to corrupt the election process," Milgram said. "We charge that they disenfranchised voters by destroying messenger ballots that were voted for Small's opponents and submitting ballots as votes for Small from people who never received them. This conduct is a violation of the fundamental right to vote and the right of the electorate to have their vote counted."

The indictment alleges that Small and the others conspired to commit election fraud through the following schemes, among others:

They allegedly solicited applications for messenger absentee ballots from individuals not qualified to receive them and had the voters not fill in the name of the messenger, so they could fraudulently designate themselves as the authorized messengers or bearers.

They allegedly obtained messenger ballots from the Atlantic County clerk and submitted them to the Board of Elections as votes on behalf of voters who, in fact, never received or voted the ballots or, in some cases, were given only the security envelope for the ballot and were told to sign it. Those people were not given the opportunity to vote in most instances.

What's so "progressive" about election corruption?

More.....

Indoctrination, er, education in Obamaland

From the WSJ.......

President Obama's plan to speak to America's schoolchildren next Tuesday has some Republicans in an uproar. "As the father of four children, I am absolutely appalled that taxpayer dollars are being used to spread President Obama's socialist ideology," thunders Jim Greer, chairman of Florida's Republican Party, in a press release. "President Obama has turned to American's children to spread his liberal lies, indoctrinating American's [sic] youngest children before they have a chance to decide for themselves." Columnists who spy a conspiracy behind every Democrat are also spreading alarm.

This is overwrought, to say the least. According to the Education Department's Web site, Mr. Obama "will challenge students to work hard, set educational goals, and take responsibility for their learning"—hardly the stuff of the Communist Manifesto or even the Democratic Party platform. America's children are not so vulnerable that we need to slap an NC-17 rating on Presidential speeches. Given how many minority children struggle in school, a pep talk from the first African-American President could even do some good.

On the other hand, the Department of Education goes a little too far in its lesson plans for teachers to use in conjunction with the speech—especially the one for grades 7 through 12. Before the speech, teachers are urged to use "notable quotes excerpted (and posted in large print on board) from President Obama's speeches about education" and to "brainstorm" with students about the question "How will he inspire us?" Suggested topics for postspeech discussion include "What resonated with you from President Obama's speech?" and "What is President Obama inspiring you to do?"

This seems to cross the line between respecting the office and aggrandizing the man who currently holds it. As the President and his speechwriters prepare for school on Tuesday, we hope they will be more circumspect than the education bureaucracy.

Article here......

Life in "Progress" State

From the state of Michigan, who hasn't had a conservative run the state since the Wright Brothers built bicycles.........

A central belief in Washington and most state capitals nowadays is that government should "invest" in certain businesses—"clean tech," say, or manufacturing—to drive job creation. We hope it all turns out better than it has in Michigan.

For the past 14 years, Lansing politicians have offered $3.3 billion in tax credits through the Michigan Economic Development Corporation and spent another $1.6 billion in outlays to create and retain jobs. The subsidies have ranged from tax breaks for Hollywood, to money for new industrial plants, to millions for TV ads starring Jeff Daniels and Tim Allen talking about business and tourism in the state.

It's one of the largest experiments in smokestack chasing in American history, but one thing it hasn't done is create jobs. An exhaustive new 100-page study by the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, a Michigan think tank, has reviewed where all the money has gone and what came of it. The study finds that for every 100 jobs that were promised with these tax credits over 14 years, only 29 arrived. Dare we call this cash for clunkers?

Economist Michael Hicks, a business school professor at Ball State, calculated the rate of return on the corporate tax credits. He found that for every $1 million in tax credits awarded, there were 95 lost manufacturing jobs in the counties where the companies were located—a result that is "strongly statistically significant." There was no gain in personal income in these counties. Perhaps more jobs would have been lost without the credits, but what is undeniably clear is that the businesses that got the government loot were not magnets for other employers.

Many of these handout programs were started in 1995 by former Republican Governor John Engler, who we criticized at the time in "A Governor's Gimmick." They have since been expanded 18 times under current Governor Jennifer Granholm. Two of the most celebrated initiatives were the Michigan 21st Century Jobs Fund and the Broadband Development Authority. Ms. Granholm's vision was that these grants and credits would create 500,000 jobs and $440 billion in new investment by 2010.

Liberals cheered this "progressive" alternative to tax cutting. But the jobs lured to Michigan were so few that the programs were killed in 2007. The broadband program's legacy was $14.5 million of bad loans eaten by taxpayers. Then State Senate Majority Leader Ken Sikkema, an original supporter of the telecom program, called it "one of the biggest flops in state government."

More.....

Proof Positive the Public Option Will Lead to Single Payer

Baron Hill (IN-09): This Is My Town Hall Meeting. I Set the Rules.

Arrogance run amok

Pete Stark Blows Up Over National Debt

Obama Kids: Sing for Change (Pyongyang Remix)

Voting present as a governing style

The American Thinker on Obama's governing style, or lack thereof.........

Ronald Reagan, in addition to being a movie star, a union president, and an ambassador for General Electric, served eight years as Governor of California and was twice an unsuccessful candidate for the Republican nomination before finally winning the nomination in 1980.

Even Bill Clinton had been a congressional candidate, then attorney general of Arkansas, then for many years governor of Arkansas before he ran for president. Clinton served a term as Chair of the National Governors Association. He was a leading member of the Democratic Leadership Council, a group considered, wrongly, to be moderate but which was influential.

Obama, while possessing many of the campaigning gifts of these presidents, has shown no ability to govern at all. This is a very dangerous situation for our nation. Our leader is a man whose ignorance, in many areas of history and policy, is simply appalling. He is rather like the "President in the Plastic Bubble." Obama's entire life has been insulated from any sense of reality of the nation he governs.

Hey, the guy votes present every day he shows up for work.

More.......

Tea Party reminder

If you have the time this Saturday, make plans to get out to VOA park in West Chester.

Here are the details.

As of this morning, 4300 have RSVP'd.

See you there.

Modest Expectations From An Obama Supporter

I still haven't received my free gas card or the memo saying I didn't need to send in my mortgage payment.

Have you?

Defeat The Debt Pledge Commercial

Pilarczyk bans nun

Cincinnati Archbishop Daniel Pilarczyk has banned a nun from teaching at archdiocesan parishes and institutions because she supports the ordination of women priests.

Church officials said Wednesday that Pilarczyk made the decision after Sister of Charity Louise Akers, who has taught in the Archdiocese of Cincinnati for 40 years, refused to publicly renounce her support for a position the Vatican considers a violation of church teachings.

"The principle here is that someone who is teaching in the name of the church should be in accord with the teachings of the church," said archdiocese spokesman Dan Andriacco.

I guess rotating pedophile priests to new schools and churches so they can prey again isn't part of catholic teaching so that's OK.

More....

Jimmy Goes to a Barbershop: Swimming PART 1

2 gud to B tru

From the department of education.........

PRESIDENT OBAMA DELIVERS NATIONAL ADDRESS TO AMERICA’S SCHOOCHILDREN

Read it here or hear

I Pledge!

Here's a good idea. How about teaching kids "The Pledge of Allegiance".

Your Little Red Book is in the mail.

This is down right spooky.

And you want these clowns to run health care?

The latest on the "wildly popular" cash for clunkers program.................

Auto makers will release their monthly sales reports Tuesday and they're expected to show the first year-to-year increase since 2007. While the Cash for Clunkers program is getting all the credit, local car dealers are still waiting for their cash.

During the month long program, Billion Automotive sold close to a thousand vehicles but has only been reimbursed for 272 of them. Vern Eide sold over 200 cars and has only been paid for 27 of them, and that's fueling lots of concerns in the auto industry.

Billion Automotive cashed in during Cash for Clunkers, but owner Dave Billion is still waiting for the rest of his money from the government run program, $3.2 million.

"I wonder how long they'd wait if I owed them $3.2 million. I think they'd be at my door or at least my banker's door," Billion said.

Even though Billion is beginning to get some of his reimbursement money, he's still concerned because he says there doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason to the program.

When Cash for Clunkers was first announced, dealers were supposed to be reimbursed within 10 days of a sale. Billion says that hasn't happened.

Just like health care is supposed to be revenue neutral.

More........

democrats love taxes

Boy those democrats sure love taxes. Well, except paying them.

Here's another one of the Charlie Rangel crew avoiding his state's liquor taxes.........

A Westport lawmaker who voted to hike the state sales and alcohol taxes was spotted brazenly piling booze in his car - adorned with his State House license plate - in the parking lot of a tax-free New Hampshire liquor store, the Herald has learned.

Michael J. Rodrigues’ blue Ford Crown Victoria, emblazoned with his “House 29” Massachusetts license plate, was parked outside a Granite State liquor store on Interstate-95 South over the weekend, according to a witness who provided pictures to the Herald.

The witness, who requested anonymity, claimed he approached Rodrigues, noted his State House plate, and asked if he was on personal or official business. Rodrigues, who was loading booze into his car, snapped “mind your own business,” the witness said.

The hypocrisy is stunning

Read the rest........

Is Obama too liberal?

Jonathan Chait, a New Republic writer, asks the question.........

Is Obama losing popularity because he's too liberal?

Let me offer this to all these "progressives" out there.

If Obama had campaigned on all these liberal policies, he would have been crushed. In fact, I would offer that if the media had vetted and reported his experience as a socialist, he would have been crushed.

Instead, what the public was sold was this cool, flexible, another way kind of guy; a guy you'd love to share some merlot and arugula with. He was sold as the total antithesis of George Bush. That was the man David Brooks fell in love with.

Liberal policies are a loser in this country. It's why liberals had to change their name to "progressives". You don't see true conservatives running way from their label, do you?

So why is Obama becoming unpopular? The same reason car salesman aren't popular; bait and switch.

The Bengals still suck

As I indicated in my previous post, I can always count on a Bengals fan or two to prove their ignorance as evidenced by their comments.

Here's the most recent.

your a fag. the bengals have true fans and are always optimistic. youve gotta be a gay browns or steelers fan. maybe even ravens but neway your a big douche.

So what do you think? Did he vote for Obama?

While this particular writer didn't enclose his picture, I'm going to guess that he has a significant forehead; like most Bengal fans. But apparently, Bengals fans are still just ignorant enough to keep buying season tickets, just not enough to prevent blackouts for this upcoming season.

That's good. Maybe we'll be able to watch some good football this season.

Another bad month for the branch gorevidians

Where the hell is my global warming? I was shivering coming into the office this morning.

August was another tough month for the branch gorevidians. You may know these people as a cult believing in an unproven, invisible, occurrence on earth; like God, without the forgiveness.

Well the results to my Global Warming Challenge are in for the month of August.

The average high temperature for the month was 81.6 degrees v the historical average high of 84.8 degrees.

The average low for the month was 62.4 v the historical figure of 64.2.

That brings the challenge even Warm - 8, Cool - 8.

You know, there seem to be three subjects I can post on that bring automatic responses from dumb asses.

They are
1) The Bengals
2) Passenger rails systems
3) My Global Warming Challenge

Let repeat myself once again for you derelict branch gorevidians.

My challenge is not to disprove global warming or not. My challenge is simply to show that our weather is as random as the flip of a coin. I posit that branch gorevidians are the ones who believe that a coin flip will flip towards heads 55% of the time.

None the less, if you are a branch gorevidian this is an excellent chance to take money from the THE GREAT GORDON GEKKO. I've detailed how the challenge is stacked in your favor. That is, if you have the balls or as Eric from Plunderbong would say "put your money where your mouth is".

By the way where is Eric? I know he's been trolling this site so I know he's seen my acceptance of his challenge.

But I guess he doesn't have the balls "to put his money where his mouth is".

More from the "hope and change" president

Is calling someone an a-hole more hope or change

Obama - terrorists best friend

So now the Obamunists plan to release a bunch of Gitmo detainees all the while lying to the American public about their danger threat.........

Now, according to sources who have requested anonymity, we can report that the Obama administration -- through the State Department, which is preparing the congressional notices -- is apparently manipulating the intelligence and other evidence to sanitize the Congressional notifications.

Our sources say that the State Department is intentionally omitting any information about the detainees derived from intelligence, saying it isn’t “evidence” against them. As a result, State is sanitizing the notices and presenting Congress with false findings that there is little danger posed by the detainees.

At the same time, another part of the Obama administration is telling the U.S. courts a very different story about some of the same detainees.

Pleadings filed in the U.S. District Court here -- in opposition to Gitmo detainees’ writs of habeas corpus seeking release from detention -- are being prepared in the Defense Department.

These pleadings, called “factual returns,” are, according to our sources, much more “robust” and contain specific information that shows how profoundly dangerous the inmates are to the public and why they should not be released from U.S. custody.

The “returns” are apparently filed under seal in the court and not available to the public.

Free people can derive a lot of differing opinions from the facts. But there is only one set of facts.

Why is the Obama administration telling Congress that these men aren’t dangerous when it is apparently telling the U.S. District Court just the opposite?

More......

Obama approval

It's getting uglier than my prom date..........

Life in "Progress" City

From the The Big Easy aka the city of New Orleans, where you can't find a republican with cadaver dogs or infrared cameras.......

A Florida contractor hired by the Housing Authority of New Orleans to oversee its finances embezzled more than $900,000 during the past three years, according to charges filed Monday by the U.S. attorney's office.

Separate public records show that during the same time period the fiscal manager, Elias Castellanos, 43, bought a $1.6 million mansion in Davie, Fla., just north of Miami, and five late-model cars -- including a Lamborghini Gallardo worth more than $200,000, a Ferrari F430, a Porsche 911 and two Mercedes-Benzes.

Federal prosecutors charged Castellanos with one count of embezzlement Monday through a bill of information, indicating that a plea agreement is likely soon to follow. U.S. Attorney Jim Letten's office didn't provide details of the alleged scam, but charged that Castellanos pocketed $900,927 while serving as HANO's chief financial officer.

Federal prosecutors also said they would seek to recover $876,917 if they can prove the charges against Castellanos. The bill of information states that the government will try to seize property Castellanos purchased with the money.

Florida public records show he bought the 6,000-square-foot home in 2008 and the five cars between January 2008 and April 2009.

The felony charge against Castellanos comes on the heels of Friday's news that the head of HANO's rental voucher programs, Dwayne Muhammad, was using a Section 8 voucher to pay his own rent, even as he received a $100,000 government salary. And just before Castellanos left HANO in June, the FBI raided the authority's offices after three employees were accused of stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars in a separate accounting ruse.

What's so "progressive" about wide spread corruption?

More.....................

Flashback: Ted Kennedy 'Borking' Bork (1987)

Hear the words of selfless public servant libeling the character of a good man.

Tea Party Rally

This Saturday there will be a Tea Party Rally at Voice of America park.

I will be there among thousands of other gun owning, god fearing, red necks.

Here are the details...........

Vitals

Date: September 5, 2009

Schedule:

12:00pm - Onsite Parking Opens

1:00pm - Music begins, food and merchandise vendors begin

3:00pm - National Anthem

3:05pm - Speakers/Town Hall Program Begins

6:00pm - God Bless America/Event Ends

They would like for you to RSVP so they can set up the appropriate infrastructure.

Sign up here. Be There

HCAN organizer explains how to block opposing views

Who's really the astroturfers?

Congratulations Michigan

As if things weren't bad enough for employers in Michigan, they're now looking at a new tax increase.

Employers are required to pay Federal Unemployment Tax. The tax is a back up to state unemployment funds and is used when the feds extend unemployment benefits to workers.

If you pay your state tax on time, your FUTA will run .8% on the first $7,000 in wages. Because the state of Michigan is anticipating a default against a loan from the fund, employer's will now have an increased rate of 1.1%.

So congratulation Michigan for making red states redder and making your employers all the more noncompetitive.

SEIU Staff Union Pickets the SEIU!

When unions picket their own

Senator Kennedy Stops Global Warming Solutions!

Ted Kennedy, Feminist Hero

Last week, the Huffington Post published a piece contending that Mary Jo Kopechne would have done one for the team if she would have known how Teddy would have championed women's rights.

Yeah, I bet she would have thought it was awesome to dies only to watch this cretin continue his abuse of other women.

I continue to be blown away by the women who canonize this creep given his continues abuse of women in his private life.

Finally, a feminist speaks up......

Most feminists don't think Ted Kennedy was a misogynist. Upon news of his death, NOW, Emily's List and Planned Parenthood all released emotional, laudatory statements. It's true that Kennedy's legislative record deserves such a response. And he was quiet enough in the last 15 years of his life that it's not hard to minimize his past behavior if you want to.

Or if you're unaware -- Google reported that "Chappaquiddick" and "Mary Jo Kopechne" were the top searches Wednesday and Thursday.

"I didn't know about Chappaquiddick and the rape case until yesterday," says Miriam Perez, a 25-year-old editor at Feministing.com. She admires Kennedy's accomplishments, but is perplexed. "Like every person, he's human and there are lots of flaws involved," she says. "But a big feminist tenet is: The personal is political. So I don't feel it's fair to fully ignore it in this case."

Perhaps, along with the hagiographic Kennedy myth, we can bury this outdated tradition of excusing the reprehensible treatment of women by the same male legislators who otherwise advocate for our rights politically. It's degrading. It's like making excuses for the husband who beats you up but pays the bills on time. It may be 2009, but the bulk of the talking heads who covered this funeral were older white males, and among the few women -- eminent historian Doris Kearns Goodwin among them -- it's still shocking to hear them, nearly to a one, reduce Kennedy's bad behavior to rakish abandon or poor judgement. Why shouldn't we hold our elected male officials -- especially those who so assiduously court the female vote -- to a standard of personal decency in their treatment of women? Why do we still assume that this is an either/or proposition?

"It's a great question," says Gloria Feldt, former president of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America. Feldt worked with Kennedy and is an admirer, still. "He worked with women's groups in a very respectful way, in a way that few other senators do," she says. "But I don't know that you can reconcile it -- when it's in a group's best interest that said person stays in that chair, how do you weigh that moral equation? I wish it were simpler than that."

More..........

Carol Shea-Porter Health Care Town Hall