"Republicans in Congress have blocked or voted down every serious idea to create jobs and strengthen the middle class. "

Which is why the only way to restore an economy that works for working people is to throw the bums out - vote Democratic in November.



Full transcript here.

Never Forget, and Vote Accordingly

Via Digby:





Senator Mitch McConnell
Senator Rand Paul
Ed Whitfield, KY-1
Brett Guthrie, KY-2
Thomas Massie, KY-4
Hal Rogers, KY-5
Andy Barr, KY-6

Remember in November.

"So it’s good for everyone when women are paid fairly."

Actually, Mr. President, truly equal pay would require women be paid a 30 percent premium over men's pay to make up for past inequity. And you bet your ass I know what kind of precedent that would set.



Full transcript here.

"Making sure our economy rewards the hard work of women"

You can say it, Mr. President: the repug attacks on working people is an integral part of the repug war on women.



Full transcript here.

Surprise, Surprise: Rich Bitch Author Not Really a Feminist

.When will we get it through our heads? All rich people are thieves and parasites who care about nothing except ensuring they get to keep stealing from the rest of us without having to do any real work

So of course the author of the execreble "Lean In" is honoring a despicably anti-woman member of Congress.

Kathleen Geier at Political Animal:

But you’d probably figure that, if an allegedly feminist organization like Lean In is honoring her, she must have at least some sort of a decent record on women. Is she pro-choice, maybe? Or at a bare minimum, a supporter for equal pay, perhaps?

Sorry — no, and no. The New Republic’s Mark Tracy has the goods here. It turns out that Ros-Lehtinen is an anti-feminist nightmare whose anti-woman politics are not a shade different from Phyllis Schlafly’s. As Tracy writes:

— She voted to withdraw federal funding for Planned Parenthood and Title X. She presumably supported the defunding because Planned Parenthood and Title X provide family planning services, but they also screen for cancer in women.

— Her voting record on abortion issues earned her a nice round 0 percent from NARAL Pro-Choice America.

— She voted for the deceptively titled Working Families Flexibility Act, which opponents—including nearly all House Democrats, President Obama, unions, and worker advocacy groups—believe would enable employers to cheapen federal overtime requirements and to encourage employees to spend more time at home rather than earning more money at work.

— Most starkly, she voted against the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, which gave women the practical ability to sue over alleged equal-pay violations.

This is disgusting, and Sheryl Sandberg and the Lean In organization should be ashamed of themselves. Women have died for the lack of abortions and free cancer screenings which Ros-Lehtinen has cruelly voted to deny them.

SNIP

But while Lean In has little to do with feminism in any meaningful sense, it does, I think, have a lot to do with feminism’s increasingly close collaboration with neoliberalism. As Nancy Fraser wrote last year, “the movement for women’s liberation has become entangled in a dangerous liaison with neoliberal efforts to build a free-market society.” She continued:

feminist ideas that once formed part of a radical worldview are increasingly expressed in individualist terms. Where feminists once criticised a society that promoted careerism, they now advise women to “lean in”. A movement that once prioritised social solidarity now celebrates female entrepreneurs. A perspective that once valorised “care” and interdependence now encourages individual advancement and meritocracy.

Do be sure to read Fraser’s entire essay — it’s short. And also, check out Susan Faludi’s great piece about Sandberg and feminism in the current issue of The Baffler. It’s several months old, so you may have read it already. But if you didn’t, have a look. It’s one of the smartest things that has yet been written about the Sandberg phenomenon. Unlike so many feminists whose work I usually respect, Faludi is independent-minded enough to see Sandbergism for the dubious proposition that it is.

 I'll bet Sandberg donates to repugs and steals the wages from her undocumented servants. The only lessons she has for women are negative ones.

How Bad is the Pay Gap in Your District?

Believe it or not, Kentucky is not even close to the worst in this measure.

From Think Progress:

Women are earning less than men in 97 percent of Congressional districts, the National Partnership for Women and Families has calculated. That means that only 13 members of Congress have the privilege of representing an area where women are out-earning or making equal pay to men.

Nationally, women make just 77 cents to a man’s dollar on average, but in some districts, that number is as low as 61 cents:

Here are Kentucky's numbers:

District	Percent of Men's Median Pay	Amount Lost per Year	3
District 1	79 %	$7,743
District 2	77 %	$9,393
District 3	82 %	$8,259
District 4	82 %	$8,375
District 5	72 %	$11,068
District 6	81 %	$8,542

Districts 1 and 5 are far western and far eastern Kentucky, respectively. Along with District 2 in west-central and southern Kentucky, they are traditionally the poorest regions of the state. District 3 is Louisville, 6 is Lexington and 4 is the Cincinnati suburbs of northern Kentucky.

We are, as ever, thankful for Louisiana and Mississippi for making us look good by comparison.

Tactics Without Content: Why Repugs Don't Get It

Via political animal, Ta Nehisi Coates on repugs' inappropriate use of the race card:

The conservative movement doesn’t understand anti-racism as a value, only as a rhetorical pose. This is how you end up tarring the oldest integrationist group in the country (the NAACP) as racist. The slur has no real moral content to them. It’s all a game of who can embarrass who. If you don’t think racism is an actual force in the country, then you can only understand its invocation as a tactic.

The same thing is happening with repugs' incomprehensibly lame attempt to claim they're not anti-woman at all. They don't understand that banning equal pay, contraception, abortion and protection from abuse are actual attacks on women, that women resent those attacks and will hold those attacks against repug candidates in the voting booth. All repugs see is the accusation that they are attacking women coming from Democratic candidates. So they fight the accusation as a tactic, completely ignoring the actual substance behind the accusation.

It's not working, mostly because the vast majority of women have seen this before. It's the cheating boyfriend who admits he cheated on her, refuses to apologize for cheating on her, and makes clear he intends to keep cheating on her, but can't understand why she's so upset and won't take him back.

President Obama Makes His First Bill A Great One

As Salon's Joan Walsh recommends, watch this all the way to the end. This is what classy looks like.