...sex and the misogynists

I am aware there is a war against women's healthcare going on in this country...I'd heard the disrespect with which access to healthcare is joked about by men like Rick Santorum's backer Foster Freisstalking.  I heard him talk about the good old days when he said, ''You know, back in my day, they used Bayer Aspirin for contraception. Then gals put it between their knees, and it wasn't that costly.''

But I had no idea the war had turned so unbelievably slimy until I heard Rush Limbaugh repeatedly attack the charactor of Sandra Fluke, the Georgetown law student who had testified before congress regarding a woman's right to contraceptives as a part of health insurance coverage. She was not asking for the government to pay for contraceptives, she wants employers and universities to offer health insurance that includes contraceptive coverage...

There is a growing movement to deny reproductive healthcare for women of every socioeconomic group even though access to birth control has a huge impact on state governments. A study by the Brookings Institute shows that every dollar Medcaid spends on expanding family planning programs save a a state $5.62 by reducing unintended pregnancies.   But nowhere in Flukes testimony did she discuss anything personal or even contraceptives for limiting unwanted pregnancies.....
She limited her testimony to contraceptives that are prescribed for things like excessive bleeding, debilitating cramps, cysts, irregular periods, etc..

Limbaugh..."So Miss Fluke and the rest of you feminazis, here's the deal," he said. "If we are going to pay for your contraceptives and thus pay for you to have sex, we want something. We want you to post the videos online so we can all watch." 

Rush Limbaugh has a history of making misogynist remarks but I was still stunned when I watched and heard the 50 plus times he attacks Sandra Fluke.. It appears that today there are still many people who believe a woman who wants access to affordable reproductive care is a slut, a prostitute...that she wants to have.. "repeated, never-ending, as often as she wants it sex." That she is a slut for having sex, and a prostitute for wanting her insurance company to provide coverage for her birth control...

Margaret Sanger, the founder of Planned Parenthood, was arrested not long after she opened the first birth control clinic 100 years ago...When the judge sentenced her he said that a woman did not have..''the right to copulate with a feeling of security that there will be no resulting conception.''  It seems that in we haven't come very far, when women are still being vilified for asking for the freedom to be in control of there own bodies.

Limbaugh..."What does it say about the college co-ed Fluke, who goes before a congressional committee and essentially says she must be paid to have sex?" Limbaugh asked on his show last Wednesday. "What does that make her? It makes her a slut, right? It makes her a prostitute. She wants to be paid to have sex. She's having so much sex, she can't afford the contraception. 
She wants you and me and the taxpayers to pay her to have sex."

Limbaugh.....''Folks, for all the hilarity that’s contained in what’s going on here . . .
here’s a woman exercising no self-control. 
The fact that she wants to have repeated, never-ending, as often as she wants it sex''

Rush's ugliness

http://youtu.be/q1oOjKQflN0

No matter where you fall on the issue his rabid attack on her is stunning...
jaw dropping...
not only because he obviously never listened to her testimony, 
but it seems his rage is caused by idea of a woman having consensual sex..
Might it be something he's never experienced?
These kind of attacks are about silencing women...
Who will want to speak up for women next...who dare?

Sandra Flukes response

http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/video/sandra-fluke-interview-view-discusses-rush-limbaugh-apology-15850518

49% of large group health plans do not routinely cover birth control

97% of large group plans cover prescription drugs, but only 33% of those plans cover oral contraceptives, which are the most popular method of reversible female birth control in the country

A paltry 15% of large group plans cover the five most common forms of birth control: oral contraceptives, diaphragms, IUDs, Depo Provera, and Norplant

Women age 15-44 pay 68% more for out-of-pocket healthcare costs than their male counterparts, largely due to the cost of reproductive healthcare

\