Steve Lonegan weighed in in this morning’s Asbury Park Press. Apparently, this was supposed to address women’s issues, but it kind of wandered all over the place. I decided that the best way to cover it all was to simply insert my comments into the article (bolded) I sent this to the paper, but as usual, I used way too many words to expect it to see the light of day there!

With distressed home prices caused by government intervention, skyrocketing energy prices and 42 consecutive months of unemployment over 8 percent, leftists are using the so-called “war on women” to divert attention from the stagnant economy and divide us. One might say that the right is using this argument to divert attention away from the very real attacks on women’s rights. Leftist efforts to create “victims” and promote more government programs to “help” them are the top priority. It is the Right that is calling people “victims” and trying to eliminate government aid programs that exist in the first place!

It’s part of an extremist ideology that doesn’t see people as individuals but as members of sociological “groups.” Divide and conquer. That’s what you saw at the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte — everything from ethnic caucuses to gay and lesbian caucuses to an animal rights caucus. None of us are individuals — we are only recognized for the group to which we are assigned. And yet, at the RNC, you saw pretty much a very narrow demographic, and it’s the Republicans who are making bold statements that define and denigrate “otherness.” I’d say that accepting that there are many different types of people with different needs and goals is much less of a “divide and conquer” strategy than the “us vs. them” tactic that’s so dear to the Republicans.

Half a century ago, the late Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. had a dream of a day when people would be judged “on the content of their character,” not by demographics. And yet, simply by belonging to a particular demographic, whole swaths of people are judged without a moment’s consideration to the “content of their character” by members of the Republican Party! But the leftists’ infatuation with various “wars” on different “groups” illustrates their goal of dividing us into groups pitting one group against the other. When you initiate or pass legislation specifically targeting a “group” which takes something away that they have had or limits their civil rights, or establishes a prohibition that will exist in perpetuity, yeah, that’s aggressive enough to be a “war” and tightly focused enough to be called a war “on” that group.

Radical pro-abortion zealots would have you believe that the most important right a woman can have is access to a taxpayer-funded abortion. Radical pro-abortion zealots would, by definition, be in favor of mandatory abortions in all cases, even wanted pregnancies. Hyperbole is not your friend, sir. But the pro-life movement is a women’s movement, led by women, many of whom have been victimized by abortions they were encouraged to have by the same types of people who say Republicans are waging a “war on women.” Blatant fabrication. The leadership of these groups is predominantly male, especially at the higher levels. However, they have found that having a few female mouthpieces is beneficial. As for their stories of “forced abortions,” if you read the descriptions on their various websites, it’s patently clear that few of these women have even had abortions just by reading how they describe them. Top story on one I visited recently stands as a good example – the woman described how she was given a Vicodin and laid on a table covered with paper and the doctor took a big knife and stuck it up through her cervix and “scraped and scraped and scraped.” If this story were real, she wouldn’t have been able to write it, because she’d be dead. Most of the descriptions are just as credible as alien abduction stories.

Now, there are some who think that the “right” to have an abortion is more important than economic or political freedom. False dichotomy. Even if you were to actually define the terms “economic freedom” or “political freedom,” which are highly subjective, you would be hard pressed to find a single person on this planet that would say “I’d rather have legal abortions than economic freedom” or “I’d gladly give up all my political freedom in order to keep abortion legal.” This is setting up the strawman to fit into the next declaration: These are the people who strongly support President Obama and his policies. “Yessireebob, I love abortions and hate freedom, and that’s why I’m voting for Obama!!” The strongest supporters of the dependency state are also the most pro-abortion because they believe personal responsibility is not important, and that circumstances, not individual actions, determine success. That’s right, Steve. If a 52 year old woman going through menopause accidentally conceives, the responsible choice is to have that baby. If a young couple figures out they can probably manage to support a child if they’re careful with their finances and find out that the baby will require expensive lifelong care, the responsible choice is to have that baby and rely on public assistance because they can’t afford it. If you’re using birth control to avoid pregnancy and it fails, you are clearly irresponsible, so the responsible choice is to suck it up and have that baby you weren’t responsible enough to prevent in the first place.

It’s this very ideology that led the president to say to business owners, “You didn’t build that.” Yes, he told business owners that they didn’t build the roads that led to their buildings, the electric, water, sewer, and other public utility connections they need to run their businesses. . .the ideology of a shared infrastructure and coordinated service provision is truly, truly horrible!! Because to left-wing zealots, people only fail because they were victims of some perceived slight. The cries of “racism,” “sexism” or “homophobia” are loudest from society’s biggest failures — people seeking to blame others for their inability to succeed. When the majority of the population fails to succeed, that does not indicate individual shortcomings, but a barrier to success that’s inherent in the structure of society. Are you really telling several million Americans that they’re a bunch of whiny babies who are so stupid and lazy that they completely deserve what they got? And then you want them to vote for you?

Liberals like to criticize conservatives, (not like conservatives. Calling people “Leftists,” “victims,” “extremists,” “members of assigned groups,” “radical,” “zealots,” opposed to freedom, supporters of dependency states, “irresponsible,” “victims of some perceived slight,” unable to succeed, manufacturers of allegations, divisive, mob-builders, and unproductive isn’t anything at all like criticism. Or name-calling.) and efforts to intimidate them through name-calling often succeed because many politicians err on the side of being liked by their constituents, not pursuing the right policy. The desired effect is for Republicans to panic and overreact by overcompensating. Could they be panicking because they’ve been called on bad behavior that shows you can’t simultaneously paint entire groups of people with a broad brush and then pretend that you didn’t really mean it? This is the strategic aim of the manufactured “war on women” allegation. You couldn’t make this stuff up.

Advocates of this divisive plan seek to build an army (perhaps mob is a more apt description) of like-minded liberals who parade under the banner of egalitarianism, seeking to use their power to take a chunk out of the productive class. Tell us about this “productive class,” Steve. Making lots of money by moving money around is not synonymous with producing anything tangible. They believe they have the right to mortgage the income of others and to take their “fair share” simply because they have the growing numbers to wield political power. No, they believe that there are certain things that are essential to maintaining a society that is healthy and sustainable and provides opportunity for growth and success, and that contributing to those things from which a society’s members benefit is part of the responsibility of belonging to that society. Understanding that short-term personal gain does not benefit society as much as investment in the security of the whole of society is not the same as believing that all personal gains should be eliminated or appropriated.

There’s a war all right, but it’s not women who are the target — it’s a war on the shrinking class of productive Americans. So the elderly, disabled, unemployed, and impoverished should be fighting hard to protect the rights of the wealthy. Women should stop resisting the idea that it is well and good that they should get the low-level jobs and accept less pay for the same work and have babies they don’t want or can’t care for (and more of them because contraception is only for women who can afford it and whose men tell them they can use it.) Who wins the war will determine the direction of this nation for the foreseeable future. Ideally, the wealthy will be able to build really big walls around their mansions so that they don’t have to see or smell the slums outside of them, just like in, say, India. Preferably, they will be at the top of hills so that the “unproductive” will trickle down.