Your star is rising, Number Two.

I realize this isn’t the most original thought ever, but I have to say that I don’t think the public would be as willing to discount the “nutty, slutty, gold-digger” bit if Bialek was a black woman.  I imagine the conservative white man/conservative white woman population is only having trouble with Cain because he’s characterizing a *white* woman that way and so they see him as overstepping.

I’m with ks.  The racial aspect may trump the nutty and slutty aspect. Also, Cain is largely seen as a clown, rather than a VSP, and I think that also plays into it. It’s hard to use “she’s nutty” when your whole schtick is that you’re nutty.

I just don’t think this is in any way a sign of the defense losing power.

I’m going to go with a bit of column of A & B here, Cain is definitely a frontrunner because he is willing to be their minstrel and plays to their strength but he is still a black man and thus definitively inferior.  But I think it also has to do with the fact he has more than one.  One is a gold digger, two is a good time, three is a problem in the conservative sexual harassment world apparently.  It’s clear Cain has a history and the media is spinning that narrative which is true for sure.  It’s a volume issue though, he’s facing numerous women so even if they were all gold-diggers statistically one would have actually been harassed (I know, actual harassment versus false accusation is in the high-90s but i’m being mildly facetious).

As for the personhood thing, eh, they have no ulterior motive.  They really think they can win with a big lie argument and continue to push it hoping future generations buy into it.  I see the fake embryo sets filtering around occasionally and go out of my way to point out they aren’t accurate for the time line or size.  But if enough people see it for long enough it always has chance of taking hold.

It’s also about shifting the discussion to the right, to make “lesser” restrictions on abortion seem moderate in comparison.

IDK, I’d like to believe that forcing members of a movement which is entirely built on the soundbyte that “life begins at conception” to actually look that supposed belief and the actual consequences thereof in the face would maybe lead at least a few of them to recognize that the entire thing really is just a load of complete bullshit.

the conception law concept is bad not simply because of the anti-choice politics, but because it changes a lot of things without being remotely complex or nuanced, which is guaranteed to cause unintended consequences. That, and that biology just doesn’t fucking work that way.

Once a child is born and becomes a person, you can legally say “I can’t have anything to do with raising it. I am putting it up for adoption” and it becomes a problem for the state. The law, as it is, has some pretty clear restrictions on who can put a child up for adoption and how. But if you call a fetus a person, how exactly do you intend to enforce that a woman take care of this person, when she has a legal right to give it up for adoption.

One would think anyone could but their 3 month old fetus into the foster system and it is now the state’s responsibility to pick it up and make sure it doesn’t die of malnutrition/not having lungs. Because by passing such a law, there is not a legal distinction between a 3 month old fetus and a 2 day old infant. Your age is based on how long you have been a person. Shall the state be required to issue Conception Certificates? who is going to do the math on that? is it speculative, or are paternity tests and record-keeping as to date and time required? Clearly birth is no longer relevant to identifying yourself as a legal person, since you were a person before that. What gender is a zygote, and how do you tell? Is this personhood recognition limited to persons in the state, or are all persons in every state and country also people-at-conception?

This is how you write a bad law. Make it ban or require something, without addressing details of what that ban or requirement would entail, or even demonstrating a working knowledge of what that thing is you are attempting to ban or enforce. You see the same sort of fundamental ignorance demonstrated in attempts at laws governing the internet.

All hail Amanda’s early steps to ascension to pundit-dom. She could have remained an awesome blogger in Austin, but the ascent to punditdom required a move to NY. I wanna see more of you on TV.

Really good appearance, you came off as knowledgeable, calm and clear.

  Cain’s like any other sexual predator; he knows selecting the right victim is half the fight.  When people object to this or that victim based on whatever,  they’re basically saying that that victim is okay to molest.  She doesn’t matter or she asked for it.  (And I find the idea of asking for it fascinating because saying no to that ‘request’ is just not an option.) They’re saying some sexual assaults are okay, in other words.

What you said in that segment makes a lot of sense. We throw this ultra extreme bill, if it miraculously passes then perfect, and if it doesn’t at least we’ve pushed the line, shifting the average towards our position, so measures that earlier were merely extreme now suddenly look not so extreme, making those more likely to pass than before.

Another thing, you shouldn’t rotate in your chair like that. You were moving all the time.

that they’re trying to do more than just pass laws with this whole personhood situation,,,nice information,,
http://fashionshow-fashiongames.blogspot.com/

I know you don’t police these super-closely but I’m getting an ad for something called Mutually Beneficial Arrangements and it’s gross.  At best.  You might want to look into it.

It’s also about shifting the discussion to the right, to make “lesser” restrictions on abortion seem moderate in comparison.

The failure to embrace this tactic is one of my big annoyances with the Democratic Party. I realize a lot of it is based on the Democrats having to negotiate with the conservatives in their own party before they negotiate with the conservatives in the Republican Party, but they could try it now and again.

  Cain’s like any other sexual predator; he knows selecting the right victim is half the fight.  When people object to this or that victim based on whatever,  they’re basically saying that that victim is okay to molest.  She doesn’t matter or she asked for it.  (And I find the idea of asking for it fascinating because saying no to that ‘request’ is just not an option.) They’re saying some sexual assaults are okay, in other words.

Yeah, ugh. One of the many facets of the disgust diamond that is Penn State University at the moment is the realization that Jerry Sandusky founded a charity that would supply him with the best victims possible to molest, kids who were labeled “troubled” or just poor.

Your post about the Iowa robocall brings to mind a trick the Maine Republican Party tried to pull for this election. We voted on Issue 1, a people’s veto of the law the Republicans pushed through this past legislative session to repeal election day voter registration (one of the reasons Maine has such high voter participation).

Last week the GOP put this (anonymous) ad in several community newspapers: http://thinkprogress.org/lgbt/2011/11/08/363649/gop-defends-maines-gay-baiting-ad-on-same-day-voter-registration/

Fortunately, Mainers saw through all the gay-baiting and talk of nonexistent fraud and repealed the new law by a margin of 20 points. Clearly we want it to be easy to vote. So what is the legislature going to do next? Pass a law requiring photo ID to vote.

I’m particularly pleased with your adjective choice about the IA robocall. ‘Daffy’ is perfect, both for being on-point, and for being just a fun word.

And another thing: I never noticed how quickly Tamron Hall speaks. She and Olbermann ought to duel on the words-per-minute thing.

ginmar, exactly right. The whole process of selecting the right targets is part of the MO.

@Comment #12: Ape Man on 11/10 at 09:16 AM

I know you don’t police these super-closely but I’m getting an ad for something called Mutually Beneficial Arrangements and it’s gross.  At best.

I was noticing that too. I clicked on it and went to the website. Even grosser, though also amusing.

There’s now an ad for “How to Fix Your Marriage” as well, which is to be expected from an and/or blog

OH, God, I’ve been catching up on the horror that is Penn State, and thought the exact same thing.  The guy set up a charity so he could have access to the very kids who most need help.  The message is loud and clear: rape is not a bad thing all the time.  Some rapes just don’t matter. Some rapes aren’t really rapes.  And if rape doesn’t matter at all, then sexual harassment is a sign that women are getting strange ideas about their importance.

Football, apparently, is equal in importance to the rape of a child who needed help. Funny how white guys and their concerns always wind up on top in this equations of how many things equal how many other things.

ginmar, it’s like I used to say:

Don’t trust anyone who wants to be around 12-year-olds more than 12-year-olds like to be around each other in his/her spare time.

Can we please get more posts pointing to the other posts that you write elsewhere?  This was great, and it would be nice to have more of it.  I stumble across your work in many of the places that I visit, and I’m always stunned by the fact that you do not link to many of them on your own blog.  How’s about a weekly round-up of work of yours that does not appear here?

Comment #22: megamahan on 11/11 at 03:39 AM

Read her twitter feed.

@ginmar watching this Herman Cain shit go down at the same time I’m wondering when someone from the Sandusky/Paterno mess is gonna go all-in and say the kids were asking for it.