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palin calls them "real americans".
...I'm assuming. I'm sure these guys had a "good" reason to oppose this amendment, I just lack the proper Burkean perspective to see it myself. Maybe one the board conservatives can enlighten me.
Ok, now that we got the bipartisan, "give the other side the benefit of the doubt" niceties out of the way, on with the show.
30 GOP Senators Vote to Defend Gang Rape
It is stunning that 30 Republican members of the United States Senate would vote to protect a corporation, in this case Halliburton/KBR, over a woman who was gang raped. The details from Think Progress:
In 2005, Jamie Leigh Jones was gang-raped by her co-workers while she was working for Halliburton/KBR in Baghdad. She was detained in a shipping container for at least 24 hours without food, water, or a bed, and "warned her that if she left Iraq for medical treatment, she'd be out of a job." (Jones was not an isolated case.) Jones was prevented from bringing charges in court against KBR because her employment contract stipulated that sexual assault allegations would only be heard in private arbitration.
Offering Ms. Jones legal relief was Senator Al Franken of Minnesota who offered an amendment to the 2010 Defense Appropriations bill that would withhold defense contracts from companies like KBR "if they restrict their employees from taking workplace sexual assault, battery and discrimination cases to court."
Seems simple enough. And yet, to GOP Senator Jefferson Beauregard Sessions of Alabama allowing victims of sexual assault a day in court is tantamount to a "political attack" at Halliburton. That 29 others, all men, chose to join him in opposing the Franken amendment is simply mind-boggling.
Here are those who vote to protect a corporation over a victim of rape:
Alexander (R-TN)
Barrasso (R-WY)
Bond (R-MO)
Brownback (R-KS)
Bunning (R-KY)
Burr (R-NC)
Chambliss (R-GA)
Coburn (R-OK)
Cochran (R-MS)
Corker (R-TN)
Cornyn (R-TX)
Crapo (R-ID)
DeMint (R-SC)
Ensign (R-NV)
Enzi (R-WY)
Graham (R-SC)
Gregg (R-NH)
Inhofe (R-OK)
Isakson (R-GA)
Johanns (R-NE)
Kyl (R-AZ)
McCain (R-AZ)
McConnell (R-KY)
Risch (R-ID)
Roberts (R-KS)
Sessions (R-AL)
Shelby (R-AL)
Thune (R-SD)
Vitter (R-LA)
Wicker (R-MS)
In the debate, Senator Sessions maintained that Franken's amendment overreached into the private sector and suggested that it violated the due process clause of the Cons ution.
To which, Senator Franken fired back quoting the Cons ution. "Article 1 Section 8 of our Cons ution gives Congress the right to spend money for the welfare of our citizens. Because of this, Chief Justice Rehnquist wrote, 'Congress may attach conditions on the receipt of federal funds and has repeatedly employed that power to further broad policy objectives,'" Franken said. "That is why Congress could pass laws cutting off highway funds to states that didn't raise their drinking age to 21. That's why this whole bill [the Defense Appropriations bill] is full of limitations on contractors -- what bonuses they can give and what kind of health care they can offer. The spending power is a broad power and my amendment is well within it."
God I love it when Senator Franken quotes the Cons ution. Not every Republican was so clueless. Ten voted for the Franken amendment including the GOP's female contingent of Senators (Snowe, Collins, Hutchinson and Murkowski).
"We need to put assurances into the law that those kind of instances [the Jamie Leigh Jones case] are not capable of being repeated," said Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, who voted in favor of Franken's amendment. "I want to make sure that a woman, any individual who is a victim of a terrible act, knows that they have got protections."
Murkowski said that she considered the arguments that Sessions made about the amendment being too expansive before she decided to vote for the legislation.
"I looked at it," said Murkowski. "And, I tell you, you look at some of the things we do and you have to say, 'OK, you have a specific instance we're trying to address and does this go above and beyond?' But when you have to err on the side of protecting an individual, I erred on the side of greater generosity, I guess."
Republican Sen. George LeMieux of Florida echoed some of Murkowski's sentiments.
"I can't see in any cir stance that a woman who was a victim of sexual assault shouldn't have her right to go to court," LeMieux said. "So, that is why I voted for it."
Although Franken chatted up LeMieux on the Senate floor before the vote, LeMieux said that he had already made his decision. But, LeMieux added, Franken's talk didn't hurt.
"I had decided to vote for it before I came here, but I was happy to hear his argument for it," LeMieux said. "He did what a senator should do, which was he was working it. He was working for his amendment." I'll add, Al Franken is everything a United States Senator should be.
As for Jamie Leigh Jones, she was nothing but elated and thankful. "It means the world to me," Jones said of the amendment's passage. "It means that every tear shed to go public and repeat my story over and over again to make a difference for other women was worth it."
And for the GOP, it is a new low.
palin calls them "real americans".
They don't actually protect rape.
I guarantee you that 99.999% of all of those senators all WANT TO protect women.
The problem? Haliburton owns them. $$$. Haliburton tells them to do something, they will do it, even if it means this.
Shameful, but not surprising. The GOP is run as a culture of fundamentalist religion and misogyny. Actually, that was redundant. Fundamentalist religions are inherently misogynistic.
It really shows you guy's level of thought process when you take the words of a Think Progress article and not something that explains the other side.
I'll bet it was specific to working in the Middle-Eastern culture, where such activities may have the woman executed by their laws. Still, I'm sure there is more to it than that as well.
Anyone have the full text, or are you liberals going to continue to be liberal thugs?
PixelPusher, don't think that democrats aren't bought either. look at the corrupt crap both sides do
their main allegiance is to $$$$. don't act like the dems are on a high horse.
didn't a conservative get killed ing a horse?
The fact is Alternet, where this story came from is a self described "echo chamber of progressive ideas". Go to there About link. Also why is this included in the Defense budget? Same Liberal tactics. Here is a article from the Politico about this bill.
If Obama vetoes it, does that mean he likes rapists?
House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) and House GOP Conference Chairman Mike Pence (R-Ind.) are voting against the House/Senate fiscal year 2010 defense authorization bill — because it contains hate crimes provisions designed to protect gays and lesbians. Boehner, speaking at his weekly press conference Thursday, said the inclusion of the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act in the defense bill was "an abuse of power" by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi that sought to punish offenders for what they thought — and not what they did.
He accused the speaker of pursuing her social agenda "on the backs" of the troops.
GOP Whip Eric Cantor is also a no, saying that the legislation cons utes classifying a new group of "thought crimes."
...
The bill makes illegal, for the first time, hate crimes based on sexual orientation, adding it to race and gender as factors in Justice Department prosecutions. Proponents say it's no different than existing bias crime legislation and is, thus, cons utional.
Despite GOP opposition, the authorization bill is expected to pass the House, as early as this afternoon.
http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpu...ense-bill.html
Never claimed to. Ironically, liberals' discontent with Democrats was cause for chuckles by Republicans for decades. You see we lack the "discipline" and "unity" to do what Wild Cobra just did.
Hey it could have been worse. She could have gotten a ride from Ted Kennedy.
So Halliburton's campaign $$$ are more important to them that rape justice for women, but they really, really care about women.
So Repug asshole wrote that working women are a "detriment" to family values.
Repugs are all about old, wealthy, white male supremacy and killing foreigners.
OK, am I the only one curious about the text of the amemdment?
Here is is:
Source:On page 245, between lines 8 and 9, insert
the following:
SEC. 8104. (a) None of the funds appropriated
or otherwise made available by this
Act may be used for any existing or new Federal
contract if the contractor or a subcontractor
at any tier requires that an employee
or independent contractor, as a condition of
employment, sign a contract that mandates
that the employee or independent contractor
performing work under the contract or subcontract
resolve through arbitration any
claim under le VII of the Civil Rights Act
of 1964 or any tort related to or arising out
of sexual assault or harassment, including
assault and battery, intentional infliction of
emotional distress, false imprisonment, or
negligent hiring, supervision, or retention.
(b) The prohibition in subsection (a) does
not apply with respect to employment contracts
that may not be enforced in a court of
the United States.
Senate record, October 1, 2009, page S10069
Senate record, October 1, 2009, page S10070
It almost completely throws out arbitration. This wasn't targeting just bad crimes, but is a huge gift to trial lawyers. This can be so thoroughly abused by people and lawyers wanting to get rich, it's ridiculous. It's also a job killer for USA jobs. Corporations contracting with the DoD will simply subcontract out to companies under a different nation's jurisdiction.
That's right lib s. Another job killer you guys are championing.
Wow... My logic must really piss you off. I just like to have facts rather than knee-jerk reactions like you do. Funny how all you can do is slanderous type actions with no substantial discourse. That's OK. I understand that you have such low self esteem you have to put others down.
Weird how Democrats weren't outraged when scores of women came forward to say they had been sexually abused by Slick Willie Clinton.
If it makes you more comfortable, here is an article from RightPundits.com.
thats funny. hawks claim they wage war just to protect women.
We're protecting our "freedom."
Ok, I didn't make that up...Wild Cobra actually typed that himself. That 19 year old girl and her lawyer are going to kill jobs because she has the audacity to sue for her wrongful imprisonment and rape.
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