Let's Talk About Disgust Part III

In an opinion piece that appeared Tuesday in the Wichita Eagle, written by Kathleen Parker of the Washington Post Writers Group (should tell you something right there), yet another person tried to make the case that the 30 Republicans who voted against Senator Franken’s amendment to a recent defense bill did “the right thing.”

She buried her argument amid mounds of posturing against rape and even came out against companies trying to use binding, private arbitration to resolve criminal accusations against employees, but her ultimate argument is nonetheless specious.

Here’s the important paragraph:

In fact, the reason some Republicans objected is that the amendment was overbroad and might not be enforceable. The latter possibility was raised by the Defense Department in a letter to senators, saying that the department or its contractors “may not be in a position to know about such things. Enforcement would be problematic.”

(Read more: http://www.kansas.com/opinion/story/1028561.html#ixzz0VBFpgeRV).

Problematic enforcement is no kind of reason to avoid doing the right thing - and the right thing to do was to vote for that amendment, as imperfect as it may have been, to send a very simple message: companies cannot bury their crimes in the arbitration graveyard because they don’t want the bad publicity and the possible economic hit they may take from a criminal or civil case.

Instead these 30 Republicans, Senators Brownback and Roberts included, sent a very clear signal to corporations that, despite the amendment’s passage, they stand willing protect the corporation’s economic interests over the rights of individual citizens, even if those individual citizens are gang raped.

It’s over the top to accuse Brownback and Roberts of being directly “pro-rape.” I’m sure they would be very much against the rape of their wives or daughters or sisters or mothers. And I’m sure they are adequately appalled by why happened to Jamie Leigh Jones. The problem is they are much more slavishly devoted to corporate patronization than they are appalled by rape. They’re willing to look the other way, ignore people’s suffering, as long as they get the political backing they lust after.

Brownback and Roberts aren’t pro-rape, they’re just callous and afraid of offending the lunatic fringe of America.