After failing to make much headway with women voters by insisting the GOP wants to take away the right to birth control, the Democratic Party is moving onto its next attempt to make the contrived “Republican war on women” narrative stick. The new fight is about the reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act, legislation the GOP has previously supported.
But this time around, Democrats are pinning a provision to it that would make it easier for illegal immigrants to obtain temporary visas as victims of domestic violence. In other words, it’s a transparent, politically-motivated attempt to provoke Republican opposition to VAWA and allow the left to claim the GOP supports violence against women:
Republicans are bracing for a battle where substantive arguments could be swamped by political optics and the intensity of the clash over women’s issues. At a closed-door Senate Republican lunch on Tuesday, Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska sternly warned her colleagues that the party was at risk of being successfully painted as antiwoman — with potentially grievous political consequences in the fall, several Republican senators said Wednesday.
Some conservatives are feeling trapped.
“I favor the Violence Against Women Act and have supported it at various points over the years, but there are matters put on that bill that almost seem to invite opposition,” said Senator Jeff Sessions, Republican of Alabama, who opposed the latest version last month in the Judiciary Committee. “You think that’s possible? You think they might have put things in there we couldn’t support that maybe then they could accuse you of not being supportive of fighting violence against women?”
Senate Democratic women are jumping on this gimmick today by marching on the Senate floor to insist on the quick renewal of the legislation.
But the one positive for Republicans is that there’s strong public opposition to illegal immigration. If they want any hope of winning on this issue, they’ll need to emphasize that it’s the Democrats who are holding the reauthorization hostage by tying it to provisions that would encourage more fraud in the immigration system. To the Senate Democratic women marching today, the GOP might argue: We would be happy to extend VAWA in its current form. We would love to do it immediately. In fact, the only thing delaying its extension is the controversial measure you tacked onto it.
What conservatives should avoid is relitigating VAWA. Yes, there are legitimate arguments that could be made against the law, some of which have been pursued by civil rights groups like the ACLU. But it’s also been in place for almost two decades, and while it may not be perfect, it’s negligible compared to the real battles conservatives need to focus on. If there’s opposition to VAWA from prominent conservative pundits, there’s a good chance it’ll be cited as ironclad proof that the Right is anti-women and used to divert attention from the serious election issues.
Good advice.
Why does it seem as if the Democrats are the only ones to master this tactic? Why can't the GOP load the legislation up with its own anathema-to-Democrats provisions, thus making it toxic to both sides with the outcome being that both sides agree to revert back to the previous bi-partisan version?
If you assume that most women are clueless idiots (the working assumption of Democrats/liberals/progressives), then the "GOP War on Women" line might seem like a winner for Team Obama. But it sure doesn't look to me as though American women have rallied to the side of Sandra Fluke. That, I believe, is because access to contraception is hardly a burning issue in the real world inhabited by women who aren't 30-year-old Georgetown law students. Nor, I am sure, do they care much about the Violence Against Women Act—an inside-the-Beltway snoozer whose impact on the vast majority of women is and will forever remain minimal. n nWe tend to forget, I think, that Obama has lost the ear of the American people. They no longer hang on his every word. It'll take more than some clapped-out "war on women" gambit from the dog-eared progressive playbook to close the deal with women whose most pressing concerns are revolve around jobs and the economy. Republicans should remember that, and not allow themselves to become rattled.
What the Republicans should do is expose the tactics Democrats have used to create this faux "War on Women". The mistake the GOP always make is to try to win the fight on legislative grounds when that's not the field Dems are playing on. n nThis is all carefully crafted political stagecraft. They roll out the HHS mandate on contraception, fully aware that it violates the First Amendment, knowing that Republicans will fight it on constitutional grounds. To combat that, enter Sandra Fluke from stage right to deflect the topic to birth control "access" – they have now successfully created a "crisis" of women's health with Dems, of course, being the ones who can solve the crisis and Republicans the ones preventing them from doing so. n nAt the same time, they AstroTurf outrage in all the media outlets and amongst their legions of social media outlets and activists, aided by straw man Rush Limbaugh. Now they have manufactured the "false narrative" they so love – Republicans hate women and want to destroy their access to health care – full out War on Women. The real issue, religious freedom and the eroding ofbthe constitution, is all but lost in the cacophony. n nThere is nothing new here – the left has been enacting this same play, with the same scenes for decades. The only thing that changes is the theme ofbthe script and the actors. n nThe fact that Republicans fall forbit over and over and over again is at the heart of the discontent in the grassroots. We see it all unfold so clearly and yet our leaders are clueless. n nWant to see them win this battle, and more importantly, defeat Obama in November, convince the GOP to expose the left for the abject fraud it is. They're not even pretending to govern. They are pandering to their base and purposefully deceiving the entire American citizenry. n nThe GOP should pull the Dem's masks off. n
This is where I must respectfully disagree with Ms. Goodman. n nVAWA is the American version of Hitler's Nuremburg Racial Purity Laws and that is not something I say lightly. Every decent person has a duty to oppose this law – regardless of political costs. n nA hard line was crossed when VAWA was passed, and if it is reauthorized, I am going to seriously consider leaving the country. Forget domestic violence, what VAWA says is that if you are male, you are a second-class citizen and all that stuff you learned in high school about your rights is bunk. I am better off in Europe. n nMark my words — if VAWA reauthorization passes, there will be a second American Civil War within 15 years….
Tom, American women *would* care (and detest) the Violence Against Women Act if they really knew what it was and what it has done — and in many cases what it has done to men and women whom they care about. Ms. Goodman's point about it having been effect for almost two decades reduced all of this to crystal clarity for me — 20 years ago, I could trust a police officer, now I can't — 20 years ago a police officer largely operated on principles of "right & wrong" and a basic Judeo/Christian value system — today the officer is taught principles of social justice theory and operates on the presumption that all men are violent thugs and all women victims. If the woman doesn't want to admit she is a victim, the officers are taught how to bully and coerce her into admitting that she is one. And the more vehemently the man denies that he is violent, the more he really is and the more dangerous he should be considered. I personally ran afoul of the latter – and I took down my American flag. n nThis is not a few rogue cops — this is the best and brightest of the profession and they are taught this. I know people who do the teaching. n nVAWA gave financial incentives to state to recover as much money from "Deadbeat Dads" regardless of either their ability to pay or even actual obligation to do so. Rather than finding the actual father, they often just tack the assessment onto someone with a similar name whom they already have a file on — this happened to a cousin of mine who didn't know about it until all his professional fishing licenses had been revoked — he fortunately had never missed a payment on the daughter he had and went into court with the stack of canceled checks (and the daughter) and said "here are my canceled checks for the daughter I do have, who is this other girl, and what is this about them not being able to reach me when they are cashing a check with my name and address on it each month?
Part 2: In many cases, the military pay for guys in the Guard & Reserve is far less than that of their civilian jobs — and their child support assessment is based upon both their civilian pay and their one weekend/month military pay. When they are called up for a year in Iraq or Afghanistan, both revenue streams end and all they get is the straight military pay. n nIn many cases, this is less than their support assessment, which they are not able to get reduced because it is "in the best interest of the child" to continue to receive the same amount of money — even if the guy doesn't have it. And what can he do — give the entire military paycheck and do without, send his savings, sell his stuff and scrounge — but still not have enough. n nAnd there are quite a few guy coming back from a year or two in combat who are arrested once they set foot on American soil — I believe in one case in his hospital bed — for unpaid child support. Support assessed on the technicality that they still had the civilian job (which they technically did because Federal law keep the job open for them when they return) even though they weren't getting the pay from it. VAWA. n nAnd the reason why states are so gung-ho about this — another guy I know had a lien placed on his pickup truck, I believe it was repossessed — for the child of his dead brother. And there have been cases where a guy has eventually proven, via DNA testing, that it wasn't his kid — and the court ruled "best interest of the child" that he keep paying anyway. n nAnother guy I know, a fisherman and not well educated, had paid cash for 15 years as he didn't know how to balance a checkbook and hence didn't have one — purchasing Post Office money orders for bills but was still on good terms with the mother and didn't see any need to do it here. He then gets married – to a woman younger and prettier than the mother – his age, she had gotten pregnant in 10th grade. n nMother then goes and files for support, claiming that she had never received any. And he gets to pay the whole 15 year over again, with all his assets seized and everything else. n nIn Maine, they are called "starter marriages" — a woman goes out and finds some guy who has a good job and assets — usually a young fisherman who everyone says is going somewhere, and you can tell by age 18 that someone is. She gets pregnant by him — and it isn't hard for a motivated girl to seduce an 18-year-old guy, particularly when older women teach her how to do it — she has the child and then claims he is abusing/threatening her. n nShe gets a protective order and a child support assessment and this becomes her dowry. She then goes on the dating market for the husband (OK live-in boyfriend) she wants with the income stream an incentive for the guy to be interested in her. Similar things happen in the minority community with the women having the housing and a stream of nomatic boyfriends existing at their pleasure. VAWA.
Third, remember the claim that the Virginia abortion law was "rape"? nThat too is VAWA — and I will bet that some of the women saying that stuff are receiving some sort of VAWA grant money, either directly or indirectly. The evil that this money has done is incredible. Notice too that the FBI has just expanded the definition of rape. n nAt UMass, VAWA money was used (by the EveryWoman's Center) to take out an ad in the student newspaper encouraging everyone to disrupt the Republican Club rally the next day. Things got ugly — so ugly that the police had to send out not one but two "officer in trouble" calls — *everyone* showing up to first get us off the steps and then out of our office. n nAnd as to "violence against women" — what about the two truly terrified kids from Smith College in the front row of the audience? (I said to one "we are leaving shortly, I suggest you join us" — they did.) And they had just wanted to see why we thought that Mumia Al-Jamal was guilty of murdering Officer Daniel Falkner (which he is) — the violence they were exposed to was funded by VAWA! n nThere is so much VAWA money, going to so many different places, redirected through so many more that — in some ways — it is worse than Obamacare. The roots of the Holocaust probably started with Martin Luther and the Protestant Reformation, Luther believed that the Jews were not Christians because of the objections he had with the Catholic Church and when they didn't join him (Lutheran Church), he became quite antisemitic. And that was 400 years earlier, Luther died in 1546, so we haven't had time for this anti-male stuff to ferment yet. n nBut it is every bit as dangerous. And it is creating a clear divide between women who hate men and women who love men — between women in the VAWA-funded man-bashing industry and women with husbands, sons, brothers and such whom they love.
Lots of cheap crap at the Values Voters going out of business sale.