As Democrats decry Rush Limbaugh for his attacks on Georgetown law student Sandra Fluke and wring their hands about the lack of civility in public discourse, their leaders are waging an all out assault to smear Republicans as a crude band of misogynists eager to strip women of their rights.
Democrats are leveraging Limbaugh’s insult of Fluke as part of a campaign to raise money and appeal to women voters by charging Republicans with waging a “war on women.”
Limbaugh called Fluke, also a “reproductive rights” activist, a “slut” and a “prostitute” for her support for forcing Catholic institutions to pay for her birth control.
Democrats are desperate to shore up support from women, who swung strongly toward Republicans during 2010, helping hand the GOP the House, and who had grown markedly less enthusiastic about President Obama. But polling in the last few weeks shows women’s support for Obama rising amid the political firestorm over birth control
Obama Friday helped launch the Democratic effort to tap outrage over Limbaugh’s remarks by phoning Fluke, a rare publicized call to a private citizen that the White House clearly intended as both a slap at a leading conservative figure and a political gesture toward women.
The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, the political arm of the Senate Democrats, is topping its website with a call for viewers to sign a petition demanding that Republicans denounce Limbaugh.
Demand that Republican leaders denounce Rush Limbaugh’s virulent misogyny and pseudo-apology. Limbaugh has a long record of attacks on women. Fluke is only the latest. It’s time for the Republican Party to fire him as a spokesman.
To sign the petition, people need not write their name, just their email address and zip code, which can then be used to craft political messages and solicit funds.
House Democrats have a similar petition, though it doesn’t mention Limbaugh by name, asking for help to “Stop the Republican war on women” and charging, “House Republicans have launched an all-out war on women since taking the Speaker’s gavel.”
Meanwhile, the Democratic National Committee has an entire section labeled “McDonnell and Rubio vs. Women,” an attempt to brand as misogynists two of the leading GOP vice presidential prospects, Virginia Gov. Rob McDonnell and Florida Sen. Mark Rubio, alleging they are “declaring all-out war on women’s health.”
