Todd Akin and Rush Limbaugh versus Bill Maher: A Blatant Double-Standard

It’s hard to know where to start this response to the buzz surrounding Representative Todd Akin from Missouri.  During a taped interview for a local affiliate station – Akin infamously said women were less likely to get pregnant during a legitimate rape.

The statement was stupid and reckless.  It was pure scientific malarkey.  I’m not upset that he is being criticized but as predicted the left fringe has latched onto this story to promote abortion rights and to vilify Pro-Life advocates.  The cry is now resign or else.  No one gets to stay in office and to be gainfully employed if they utter an opposing view – a modern Jacobin construct. 

Further review of the postings of my friends from college reveal no outrage, no call for new legislation when it was reported on August 16, 2012 that a radical and violent supporter of homosexual rights barged into the Washington DC offices of the ultra conservative Family Research Council (FRC) and starting firing away at an unarmed security guard, hitting him in the arm.  Mr. Floyd L. Corkins II (the 28 year old shooter), made it known that he did not like the views on FRC on Gay matters.  You would think that one of my college friends would come out and say, I may disagree with your politics but I deplore this type of violence – a direct assault on the first amendment.  I you listen closely you won’t hear a thing except some vegan soup simmering on the stove and some murmuring about carbon foot prints that were avoided.

All of this brings back the media storm over Rush Limbaugh’s comments vis-à-vis Democratic Activist and law student Sandra Fluke.  The bombastic Rush Limbaugh went too far and called this activist a slut because she wanted the federal government to pay her contraception bills.  Rush can be an idiot at times and this was a classic example of that but the left had fun with this episode calling for Rush to be boycotted, silence Rush – basically, anyone who offends the left must be muzzled. 

Time and time again, outrage is expressed when a notable conservative can be served up on the alter of justice, but there are never any similar outrages when it’s a notable liberal doing the same action or worse.

A case in point: no one in the IDC (Intentional Democratic Community - my college political residential hall) cyberspace has yet to post anything about Ed Schultz of MSNBC when he aired the following statement on The Ed Schulz Show (radio air date) May 23, 2011.

“And what are the Republicans thinking about? They're not thinking about their next-door neighbor. They're just thinking about how much this is going to cost. President Obama is going to be visiting Joplin, Missouri, on Sunday. But you know what they're talking about? Like this right-wing slut, what's her name, Laura Ingraham? Yeah, she's a talk slut.”

This one hit home since Laura was a student at Glastonbury High School during my student teaching assignment.  This Dartmouth grad received a JD before becoming one of the most brilliant political commentators on cable.  At least Schultz was suspended without pay by MSNBC.  And what happened in the IDC blogosphere?  Nothing.

Democratic consultant Kirsten Powers has penned two articles about Uber liberal Bill Maher when he posited “that the real name of then-20-year-old Bristol Palin’s book should be ‘Whoops, There’s a Dick in Me?’ ” Where was the feminist outrage?  Asleep at the switch. 

And of course, President Obama has declined to condemn TV comedian Bill Maher for calling former Republican Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin a “c-nt” during a live show in Dallas.  Really?  During the Fluke episode the president pleaded that in criticizing Limbaugh he was protecting his daughters from Rush Limbaugh’s big stumbling mouth calling a law student a slut but the president then at the same press conference refused to protect Mrs. Palin when she was addressed as a c---.  Obviously, the president really is more interested in the $1 million dollars Bill Maher contributed to a friendly super-pac rather than women who might disagree with him politically.  This is a N-LOW: National Organization of Liberal Women mindset.

Where is the IDC outrage towards Mr. Maher?  The C word has always been the worse word used against a woman since the 1970s – make that the worse word used against a LIBERAL woman.  It’s time for civility and integrity in our political discourse.  

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Geoffrey G. Fisher is a certified history teacher working in southwest Florida as a guest teacher.  He holds a BA in History from the University of Connecticut and a MA in Public Policy from Trinity College in Hartford, CT.  In addition to teaching he is a former elected official and speechwriter.  Mr. Fisher now writes the political blog: THE THINKING CAP at www.theamericanthinkingcap.blogspot.com.