In February, the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, led by Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), held one of the more notable congressional hearings of the last several years. Issa, hoping to advance the Republican campaign to restrict women's access to contraception, held a hearing on birth control, but the opening panel was made up entirely of conservative men.
It led Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-N.Y.) to ask a now-famous question: "Where are the women? When I look at this panel, I don't see one, single woman representing the tens of millions of women across the country who want and need coverage for basic preventive health care services."
Six weeks later, Issa is apparently still unhappy about it.
In a March 21 story published in the Rancho Santa Fe Review, Issa said, "Carolyn Maloney then made the famous statement, where are the women? That was an outright lie, and she knew it when she said it."
Actually, it wasn't a "lie" at all. When Maloney looked at the witness table, it was male-only. Democrats had invited a woman -- her name is Sandra Fluke; you may have heard of her -- but Issa refused to allow her to participate in the hearing. Republicans scrambled to add more gender diversity to the second panel, which spoke later in the day, but when Maloney asked where the women were, it was because there were only men testifying on women's access to contraception at the time.
Issa, thankfully, apologized to Maloney yesterday for the "outright lie" allegation, and Maloney accepted it, but the New York congressman still spoke on the House floor yesterday to address the matter.
You'll notice that Maloney was joined by quite a few friends -- i.e., other Democratic House members -- who were there to show their solidarity.
As for Issa's regret, the congresswoman explained that she's not the only one who deserves an apology: "In the fallout of that unfortunate hearing, women were called far worse than liars. I know what I said that day and I know it to be true but I do think the Democratic witness, Sandra Fluke, and the women of America, are owed an apology -- an apology for denying them a voice -- an apology for denying them a seat at the table."
Leave a Comment:
Don't hold your breath, Ms. Maloney.
Project much, Darrell?
Project much, Darrell?
That's is, exactly. The accusations of Republican lying must be getting through their thick heads. Now they call their accusers liars. It's projection in action.
Darrell Assa-Hola,aka the Elliot Ness of womens contraception,would go after womens voting rights if he thought he could get by with it.The women in congress should put him in the spotlight and keep him there.The man is clearly a woman hater.What he did with the contraceptive hearings was lend more credence to Rush Limbaughs,war on women.Speaking of Limbaugh,when he called Ms.Fluke a prostitute I'm surprised David Vitter did'nt give her a call.
"Six weeks later, Issa is apparently still unhappy about it."
Issa is a typical GOPer, bully people first, then whine when those same people tell the truth about the situation!
GOP bad for America, worse for working Americans!! Vote them out come November 2012!
Issa: his nam is synonymous with misogynist! Just another rich crooked Repug!
Really? They "scrambled?" The second panel was published in advance and the female guest on the panel were from out of town, and they "scrambled," as if to imply the Republicans realized their mistake and quickly grabbed a few women to correct the oversight.
This is very, very poor reporting and is becoming the partisan norm more and more here.
While there were no men in the first panel, there were two women in the second panel the Republicans called on the same day.
I'm not saying this makes it okay, I'm simply pointing out that there were in fact women - you see them seated behind the men at the table in the famous photo.
Did you even watch the video? She addressed this. She said that there were no women on the panel that she asked the question about. That alone makes her statement anything other than "an outright lie" - but she points out that the two Republican women in the later panel were specifically there to represent the interests of corporations not to provide contraception, not to present the viewpoints and issues of the tens of millions of women who rely on contraception and have a right to access to it.
So her literal point is true - there were no men in the panel she asked about, and her broader point was true - there were no women there speaking for American women about an issue that affects them intimately and personally.
Duh.
Issa apologized because he figured out that women vote, and in large numbers.
EVEN MALONEY IS NOT TELLING THE TRUTH ABOUT HOW WOMEN HAVE NO SEAT AT THE TABLE. IT's OVERDUE TIME THAT RACHEL MADDOW TOLD WOMEN AND FAIR MEN THE WHOLE TRUTH ABOUT WOMEN AND THE GOVERNMENT.
BIG STORY: US ELECTION MEDIA "COVERAGE" THREATENS WOMEN, FAIR MEN AND WORLD
It shocking and unacceptable that the media is censoring and failing to cover the story that the so-called election upcoming is dangerously failing American woman and gender fair men thus, real democracy itself and the world environment, because the major parties have not followed the voluntary examples of many countries and parties of the rest of the world putting democracy- sufficient numbers of women on the tickets. Unless immediate exposure and warning is exerted now, it will leave the US ranked 71st in the world, just under Turkmenistan in representation of women http://www.ipu.org/wmn-e/classif.htm and once again not meeting the 1995 UN Beijing Platform for women's minimum of 30% women in office to protect democracy http://www.un.org/womenwatch/daw/beijing/platform/decision.htm#diagnosis and the environment http://gas.sagepub.com/content/19/4/50. I want to encourage you to urgently, immediately and passionately act to tell the story and recruit other journalists, both women and fair men, to cover the national and (still in many places) world emergency that exists concerning this world-impacting election, it's lack of a sufficiency of woman candidates, the likely patriarchally planned lack of women VP candidates, and the media's now years long failure to let America know that its elections are failing women, failing democracy and failing to cover the many examples of success of gender balance in many countries in the world. http://genderbalancerepresentation.webs.com/megalinks2.htm The US media is failing to cover how many millions of Americans, would prefer Hillary Clinton or any other prominent Democratic woman over Joe Biden as VP and a ticket of Obama and Clinton or a woman if polled, and why there are no polls on this. The US media failed to cover the 1995 Beijing Conference Platform which called for a minimum critical mass for democracy of 30% women in all countries by 2000http://www.uneca.org/
acgd/beijingplus15/documents/15YearReviewofBPfA.pdf , it failed to cover the leadership of Rajiv and Sonia Gandhi in bringing women's representation to India via the Panchayat Raj http://www.hindu.com/2001/10/03/stories/05032524.htm which already serves hundreds of millions with gender balance, and the Women's Representation Bill still in committee in India http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women%27s_Reservation_Bill, the media failed to cover gender parite that brought 50-50 to every city in France brought about by Prime Minister Jospin and his wife Sylvia Agacinski http://www.observatoire-parite.gouv.fr/, they failed to cover the gender 50-50 in Wales National Assembly brought about by Senator Julie Morgan and her husband Prime Minister Rhodri Morgan http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2003/may/09/gender.uk, they have failed to cover the one women for every man ballots of the Nordic countries since the 1970's and their recent 40% requirement for women on corporate boards http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/21/business/worldbusiness/21iht-wbwomen.2.11315428.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all, and and the have failed to tell all the parties in Europe and worldwide that use voluntary standards http://www.socintwomen.org/en/quota.html and http://www.quotaproject.org/systemParty.cfm and the success of several African countries and Belgium, the Netherlands, Costa Rica and Spain and others in getting gender balance. They are not letting America know how far behind the rest of the literate world America has become. They are failing to cover the 50-50 campaigns in England http://www.countingwomenin.org/ and Europe http://5050campaign.wordpress.com/resources/about-the-campaign/ American women are being kept in the dark by the major media and both political parties. American women are working to overcome this.
http://www.cawp.rutgers.edu/site/pages/2012Project.php and http://www.womensorganizations.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=282:us-women-connect&catid=13:member-profiles&Itemid=69, but the major media has been so silent about this silent national and world emergency, even 'though there is a lot about it on the Internet. The Occupy Movement Convention in July will be gender balanced, but there has been no media coverage of this critical aspect.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/99_Percent_Declaration#The_document. The silent ignorant complicity of most women journalists in allowing the US to fall to the rank of 71 with Turkmenistan without blowing the whistle long ago is a testament to the power of patriarchy on women and just how easily women try to fit into a man's world, and the silence of men is the complicit silence of imbedded, habitual aggression. Women journalists like Keli Goff's rant on the Dylan Ratigan show, need to insist on each other to catch up on globally responsible homework on this without blaming women voters, http://loop21.com/politics/are-female-voters-blame-failure-women-candidates , who have been kept in the dark, and immediately enlist sympathetic men like Thom Hartmann http://www.thomhartmann.com/forum/2012/01/why-does-us-rank-71st-world-female-representation-government and men like Robert Reich http://robertreich.org/post/14932718385 and Chris Matthews http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-sheppard/2010/08/08/chris-matthews-show-hillary-should-replace-biden--help-obamas-re-election, who clearly want Hillary Clinton or some Democratic woman to be Vice President, shame and expose the patriarchal control being exerted on other journalists for not telling or investigating this whole story for years and still not warning of the disaster by not telling now on their every report on both parties and the upcoming election, and start real coverage of the issue of women's representation and real democracy, and protecting earth, and the economy (which will go into another depression without gender balance economics) in the US and world. This problem has been going on for years. It is planet-endangering dangerously overdue time to blow the whistle on this. A gender imbalanced Supreme Court gave us Citizens' United that has turned the election into an auction for environment and Internet endangering gender imbalanced corporations. I ran for Partner President on a gender balance ticket with Hjalmer Wayne Erickson in the year 2000 http://www.guide2womenleaders.com/candidates2000.htm, and my husband Andy and I have a website calling for the Democrats to nominate a woman for Vice President.http://hillaryforvicepresident.webs.com/whybarackandhillary.htm I am knowledgeable on this issue. You can refer to http://genderbalancerepresentation.webs.com/megalinks2.htm for information. I would be glad to be a guest on any program or website, and help you on this issue immediately. Feel free to copy this to others.
Sincerely,
Rachelle OneFamily Miller Ph.D.
I'm glad Congresswoman Maloney called Issa on this. More Democrats have to stand up to these scumbuckets, who lie, cheat and steal with impunity.