Tuesday, April 15, 2014

GOP'S "FEMINIST" TAKE ON PAY EQUITY FOR WOMEN: CAPITALISM ROCKS!

How much contempt do Republicans have for ordinary workers? Well, Representative Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee was on Face the Nation on Sunday, trying to put a "feminist" face on the GOP's refusal to back legislation intended to reduce the pay gap between male and female workers -- and it's not just that Blackburn made a ridiculous argument based on a strain of Republican thinking that ended long ago:
"It is Republicans that have led the fight for women's equality. Go back through history, and look at who was the first woman to ever vote, elected to office, go to Congress, four out of five governors."
(As Ed Kilgore notes, the platform of the Republican Party backed the Equal Rights Amendment for years -- until 1980, when the convention that nominated Ronald Reagan ended the party's support forever.)

It's also that when Blackburn was asked about equal pay for women, she not only shrugged off the possibility a legislative remedy, she segued into Randian riffs about entrepreneurialism and the glory of being part of the 1%. Remember when Eric Cantor commemorated Labor Day by praising small business owners? Remember when Michelle Malkin expressed her support for Mitt Romney by asserting with a sneer that "Romney types ... are the ones who sign the front of the paycheck, and the Obama types are the one who have spent their entire lives signing the back of them"? Blackburn's response on pay equity for female workers contained some of the same contempt for ordinary workers, because, to Republicans, the only real American is a capitalist.

Here's a partial transcript, with emphasis added:
SCHIEFFER: But why did the Senate Republicans, then, block this?

BLACKBURN: Well, because the legislation was something that was going to be helpful for trial lawyers, and what we would like to see happen is equal opportunity and clearing up some of the problems that exist that are not fair to women. We are all for equal pay. I would love for women to be focused on maximum wage, and I have fought to be recognized with equality for a long time. A lot of us get tired of guys being condescending to us. But, you know, I got to tell you, one of the things that we need to do is look at access to capital. Small business owners that are female, that is their number one problem, is access to capital. We need to also look at regulations, how that is affecting them.


It was recently reported that Blackburn might run for president in 2016. I don't know if that's true or if it was just a phony story floated to raise the profile of a female Republican during a period when the GOP is getting a lot of criticism on pay equity and other women's issues. Whatever the case, I wonder how pro-female she would appear as a candidate when she can't even bring herself to call herself a woman on her congressional website. Yup, according to her own site, she's a "congressman."


Strange.

6 comments:

Victor said...

Blackburn's obviously been studying "Word-salad" with the Zen Master of that linguistic form - Sarah "The Whore of Babblin'-on" Palin.

Jules said...

And Abraham Lincoln and Martin Luther King Jr. were both Republicans!

The GOP remains eternally puzzled as to why the darkies and the bitches won't vote for them. But if they're going to be that way, the GOP is fully justified in taking away their ability to vote.

Pops said...

I have said this in the past and been called "Misogynistic". The only useful thing Blackburn is capable of is Mud Wrestling. What a doofus skank she is..

Yastreblyansky said...

There are three female congressmen in the current house: the other two are Diane Black (also TN) and Cynthia Lummis (MS). Black has explained thatthe term "congresswoman," which is today used by the vast majority of women - and Republican women - in the House, is "grammatically incorrect" and a "politically correct misnomer" because the term "'Congressman' is not a gender specific job." (http://blog.lib.umn.edu/cspg/smartpolitics/2013/06/meet_the_three_house_women_who.php) For whatever it's worth. (I have a degree in linguistics but no idea what's "grammatically incorrect" about it.)

Jules said...

I have said this in the past and been called "Misogynistic".

Awww. Poor thing.

Grung_e_Gene said...

Linked this!

Blackburn is just another Right-Wing Stepford Woman sprung from the bosom of Phyliss Schflay.