Congress, Courts, Justice, Politics, Religion, Society, Uncategorized

The Anti-Women 22

220px-Leahy2009

Respectfully submitted by Lawrence E. Rafferty(rafflaw)-Guest Blogger

This past week a vote was taken in the United States Senate and it was not a vote to end a filibuster!  The vote that I am referring to was a vote to reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act.(VAWA)  It was noteworthy that the vote actually took place at all, but the results of the vote were especially interesting.  The vote to reauthorize VAWA, which was co-sponsored by Sen. Patrick Leahy,  passed by a 78 to 22 margin.  All 22 votes against the measure were by male Republican members of the Senate.

Before we disclose some of the members who voted against this bill, let’s discuss just what this bill has done for women.  “As the country celebrates the 18th anniversary of the legislation, here are some of the victories achieved through VAWA:

  • Victims can call for help. The National Domestic Violence Hotline was established as part of VAWA. It currently serves over 22,000 victims a month and has taken a total of 3 million calls.
  • Law enforcement officers are trained to help victims. 500,000 law enforcement officials, judges, and prosecutors a year are trained with VAWA funding to help domestic abuse victims.
  • Partner violence and homicides fell. From the year before VAWA’s passage until 2008, the number of women being killed by partners dropped 43 percent, and partner violence against women fell 53 percent.
  • Stalking became illegal. Before VAWA, stalking was not a federal crime. The law established stalking as a felony offense.
  • Rape is rape, no exceptions. Since the passage of VAWA, each state in the United States has updated its laws so that rape by a partner is treated equally to rape by a stranger.”  Think Progress

I guess I could understand a Senator voting against the reauthorization if they thought the bill was too expensive and had not been successful in protecting women in the past, but that does not seem to be the case.  Some of the reasons the dissenting Senators gave for voting against the VAWA are startling.  One reason given was that the VAWA reauthorization included Native American women and LGBT women and undocumented women.

“Two Senators — Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) — also offered significant amendments to the VAWA bill. Grassley’s amendment stripped all Native American, LGBT, and undocumented victim protections. It was voted down on Thursday of last week. Cornyn’s, aimed exclusively on the bill’s language relating to tribal lands, failed on Monday. Grassley and Cornyn amendments

Does it surprise you that all 22 of the dissenting Senators were male?  If this act was so bad, you would think that at least one female Senator would have voted against it.  Even in this current political climate, I just cannot understand how approving a bill that has helped prevent violence against women could be voted against by anyone.  Eight of the Senators even voted against moving the bill ahead to a vote.

The original VAWA passed in 1994 with even more Republican Senators voting against it, so maybe we are making progress.  VAWA    As I think about it, there were probably fewer female members of the Senate in 1994, so maybe we are not making progress after all.  Why do you think that some of the dissenting Senators wanted to omit Native American women from the VAWA protections?  Aren’t Native American women citizens? I realize that some of the Republican’s Native American concerns involve the Native American courts being able to deal with non-Native American participants. LA Times

From a political standpoint, I was surprised to see so many Republican Senators vote against reauthorizing VAWA.  Especially in light of the Republican Party’s public attempts to court Hispanic voters, it seems strange that some of the leading Republicans in the Senate would vote against a bill designed to continue programs that have helped protect women at risk.

I think we should ask Senate Minority leader McConnell and GOP Presidential hopeful Marco Rubio and Sen. John Cornyn and Sen. Lindsey Graham and Sen. Chuck Grassley, and the other dissenting Senators,  if they think women do not deserve the legal protections afforded them in this important piece of legislation.  Would women in these dissenting Senator’s states agree with their votes on this legislation?  Do these gentlemen remember how many voters are women?    What do you think of this legislation?

Additional sources:  Talking Points Memo; Think Progress;

100 thoughts on “The Anti-Women 22”

  2. Mike Spindell:

    Arent most crimes based on hate? Especially violent ones.

    Maybe you could educate me [no snark I am honestly curious] as to why there needs to be preferential laws made to protect groups of people rather than individuals?

    As Nick pointed out above, those crimes were against individuals.

  4. “There is an infamous case in LA @ Dodger Stadium. Three Dodger fans beat a man so he has permanent and severe brain damage. All evidence indicates this man was beaten solely because he wore a Giants jersey and hat, a fact the assailants yelled as they beat him senseless. Is that a hate crime?”

    Absolutely!

  5. Steven, I don’t have hyhpotheticals like you used w/ the Russian..a choice I found curious by the way. There are plenty of real world incidents that occur daily. I worked a case where 3 b/m raped a b/f. They continually said they were “raping a “fat girl”. Is that a hate crime? There is an infamous case in LA @ Dodger Stadium. Three Dodger fans beat a man so he has permanent and severe brain damage. All evidence indicates this man was beaten solely because he wore a Giants jersey and hat, a fact the assailants yelled as they beat him senseless. Is that a hate crime? On a daily basis, young men are gunned down on the street by gangbangers. These victims are doing nothing but standing on the street wearing the wrong colors. Is that a hate crime? On Fall Saturday afternoons fans of rival college football teams are beaten simply for supporting the visiting team. Is that a hate crime? When I was a child, I saw kids get beaten simply for wearing glasses, the beater yelling, “Take that 4 eyes.” Is that a hate crime? We had a post here a couple months ago of Alabama football fans tea bagging a drunken LSU fan. Is that a hate crime. By your values, there are millions of hate crimes committed on a daily basis. Have you read Orwell?

    1. Bron: There is nothing more I can really say to you…you simply don’t get it, you support the current discretion in the legal system yet don’t approve of laws that create the very discretion you support.

      I’d break it down more but I will leave you with this: in the state where I practice, both door offenses would be a misdemeanor charge (unless the damage to the door exceeded $2,000). So, without a hate crime law, the fullest extent of the law, as you put it, would yield roughly the same result yet, you, as well as I, know that the offenses are drastically different and warrant different punishments.

      Nick: While I would personally agree with Mike, in saying that your Dodgers example should be a hate crime, let me clear up a misconception that you have: I have not been arguing for my own personal values, rather, I’ve been defending the application of an existing law.

      Hate crimes, depending on the state you live, can be applicable in cases where crimes are committed due to a person’s race, religion, ethnicity, nationality (hence my use of “Russian” in an earlier hypo), gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, and disability.

      I would find millions of hate crimes? Um, no. Not unless I was the best prosecutor on the planet. Again, at no point have I argued about my values, I’m been arguing in defense of the current application of laws designed to provide stiffer penalties for more egregious crimes. And Orwell? Give me a break, at no point have I even suggested that people should be punished for merely “thinking” something, nor is that even possible both practically and legally.

      You know what, I wasn’t going to do this but lets through your examples, just clear up your misconceptions:

      1. Girl being raped b/c she was fat. Not a hate crime. Secondly, the phrase “I’m raping a fat girl” doesn’t mean the same thing as “I raped her because she was fat”, as a lawyer (and I’m assuming you are one), you should know that is an important distinction.

      2. Dodgers fans. It is not a hate crime, even though, given the specific facts of the case, I agree with Mike and think it should be. Interestingly, after the event occurred, there were ample discussions about whether it should be considered a hate crime due to the horrific nature of the act, which supports the concept that some crimes deserve stiffer penalties because, given the facts, the crime is especially abhorrent.

      3. People wearing wrong colors: Not a hate crime.

      4. Rival Football teams: Not a hate crime and drastically different from the Dodgers example.

      5. Wearing glasses: Not a hate crime. Are you kidding me?

      You, like Bron, seem to think that the any obvious, visual difference (judging from your examples) would fall under the law and that the law would go to work immediately (without their being proof). Wrong and extremely wrong.

      Now, I’m assuming your trying to force me into a trap by suggesting that the reason your examples don’t apply is because they are not one of the protected classes under the law, supporting Bron’s certain groups get special protections concept….although, while I don’t think your that clever and it merely happened by accident…that trap has two fatal flaws.

      First, hate crime laws don’t protect specific groups, they protect EVERYONE. If you are a human being living in the United States, and someone commits a criminal act against you because of, I dunno, your race, guess what, this law applies to your case (as long as it can be proven that race was the reason for the crime). The law doesn’t selectively apply to one specific racial group, but all racial groups…aka, you, me and everyone else in this country. You know what it doesn’t apply to animals…and cars…and plants.

      Second, as a country, we have agreed that certain acts are more egregious and bad for society, and those who prey on others because of their race, ethnicity, nationality, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability, or religion should be punished more severely than those who commit similar acts but for different reasons. The law serves as a deterrent to those thinking of acting in a way that contradicts the norms of society. Why? Because hate crimes are not only more damaging to a victim (where it can take longer to recover psychologically), but they affect those in society similar to that victim.

      So no, none of your examples would be classified as hate crimes under the current application of the law, ergo, I would not find that there are millions of hate crimes committed on a daily basis.

  7. Steven:

    I said that above. I am not making a special law to punish the rascist however, I am using the existing laws. So I really dont agree with you. I am not creating a new law to give preferential treatment to a group of people, I am using current laws to punish.

    There is discretion within our legal system as currently constituted.

  9. “What are the nature and the causes of modern tribalism? Philosophically, tribalism is the product of irrationalism and collectivism. It is a logical consequence of modern philosophy. If women accept the notion that reason is not valid, what is to guide them and how are they to live?

    Obviously, they will seek to join some group—any group—which claims the ability to lead them and to provide some sort of knowledge acquired by some sort of unspecified means. If women accept the notion that the individual is helpless, intellectually and morally, that she has no mind and no rights, that she is nothing, but the group is all, and her only moral significance lies in selfless service to the group—they will be pulled obediently to join a group. But which group? Well, if you believe that you have no mind and no moral value, you cannot have the confidence to make choices—so the only thing for you to do is to join an unchosen group, the group into which you were born, the group to which you were predestined to belong by the sovereign, omnipotent, omniscient power of your body chemistry.”

    “Global Balkanization,”
    The Voice of Reason, 117

  10. malisha:

    “Anyone who carries on about the law being either unnecessary or discriminatory because it concentrates its efforts on ameliorating violence against WOMEN as opposed to “against humans,” is just using pretend blindness/dumbness to cover for sexism.”

    Not hardly. Women and men are human beings, you dont beat them, kill them, commit fraud against them, etc. They both should have equal standing before the law. You dont elevate one above another.

    A man’s life is less valuable than a woman’s? That seems sexist to me.

  11. Steven:

    I told you that, it is the state of mind of the individual that matters. Was the act premeditated or was it an accident or was it in a fit of passion. If it is an accident, you cant very well put the person to death. And if it was in a fit of passion then you can say the person was temporarily incapacitated by rage or whatever.

    “you can’t simply just punish someone on the theory of it either happened or it didn’t.”

    If it didnt happen, there is no crime. You cannot punish someone for thinking racist or homophobic or sexist thoughts.

    As far as the door, the person who paints the smiley face has trespassed and damaged your property. So has the person who wrote racial slurs. I would probably have the person who drew the smiley face pay for a new door and apologize. While I would try and punish the other person to the extent the law allowed. But I would not make a special law that protected one group of people more than another.

    The law should protect all people to the same extent. Some groups should not have more rights than another group, then you start devolving into tribalism and determination by government which groups have preferential treatment.

    1. Bron,

      I wasn’t going to respond to your post since you essentially proved my point in your attempts to refute it. But, since I’m not sure if you realized that you actually agreed with me, I figured I’d break down what you said:

      1. A guy who paints a smiley face on your door should have to buy a new door and apologize.

      2. A guy who paints racial slurs on your door should be punished to fullest extent of the law.

      So, you do realize that while an act is the same (what happened – someone painted your door) there are elements that make one act more egregious and deserving of a harsher punishment.

      I knew you’d see the light.

      And it was nice to see that you you unknowingly said the same thing with response to my murder scenario, that even though both second degree murder and manslaughter require malice aforethought, you noted that some cases are different because an individual could be incapacitated due to rage. Again, I agree. But, that doesn’t jive with your original comments on this thread…you are, like in the door example mentioned above, taking mitigating factors into consideration to alter the punishment…which is what I’ve been saying from the start. You keep suggesting that some special law is floating around in the the judicial ether designed to punish one group more than another, but that is, as I’ve said from the beginning, not the case. Some acts are just more egregious than other similar acts due to the reasons for the act, aka, mitigating factors. And, like you said in agreement, some acts, due to those factors, deserve harsher punishments. So how do you achieve those goals of harsher punishment for more egregious acts? You have to create a statutory mechanism that says, “hey, when these mitigating factors are involved, give harsher penalties.”

      Whether you realize it or not, you proved my point.

      And, to correct your ending statement, there is no “one” group that receives more rights than another….by that rationale, if “groups” were given specific protections, hate crime laws would be similar to strict liability. So, if that was the case, and special groups received special protection, if a Jewish, white man punched a Christian, white man, it would be a hate crime regardless of what happened because the parties involved were of different religions.

      But it doesn’t work that way. Just like painting a door, the act of punching someone isn’t always the same, other factors are taken into consideration. It’s possible the Jewish guy punched the Christian guy because he was sleeping with his wife…which is much different than the Christian guy being punched simply because the Jewish guy didn’t want to be near anyone who wasn’t Jewish.

      As for your criticism of Malisha…I don’t know what to say except, are you serious? Are you suggesting that women and men don’t have equal standing under the law? When has a man’s life been devalued? So if a women kills a man is she given preferential treatment? If a woman robs a man’s house is she given preferential treatment? If a woman is drunk driving is she given preferential treatment? Are there laws that say, “if a women commits this crime, she is too be given a lesser sentence than a man?” Last time I checked, and I’ve read a lot of criminal statutes, the answer is no.

      The very idea that you think what Malisha says denotes that a woman’s life is more valuable than a man’s is indicative of the fact that you totally missed the point. Despite what you think, VAWA is not some special group defining anti-man punishment mechanism. It provides services to help support those who are victims of domestic violence through education and other social services (it just so happens that most victims are women).

      As for Tribalism…give me a break, quoting Ayne Rand does not substitute as an argument (especially when taken from a piece that discusses the dangers of modern tribalism in the West and identifies the irrationality from which the idea of ethnicity arises). First, as I’ve mentioned before, the only group receiving protections in any of what we have been discussing are, and let me emphasize this, VICTIMS. Second, tribalism is the differentiation of people based on the possession of a strong cultural or ethnic identity. An example of Tribalism in Western culture would be separatist movements in Europe like in Belgium, where Flemish people want to break from Belgium and form their own country. Similarities don’t rise to the level of tribalism, it requires a deeper cultural and ethnic connection.

  15. Box Turtle.. Hillarious, I can see that completely.

    She hasn’t announced her intention to run for office and she is being attacked by minions of an elected government official. Contemptable, but certainly not unusual. That’s enough in my book NOT to vote for him.

  16. Darren,
    Ashley Judd has “Box Turtle” McConnell really nervous. She has not announced anything, but his PAC is already throwing attack ads against her.

    She is another woman not to be taken lightly. She has a Bachelor’s degree in French, and speaks fluent French. Her Master’s degree is in Public Administration from Harvard. And she can sing. In Kentucky, it probably will not hurt that she is married to a top tier NASCAR driver.

    1. OS,

      Danica will finally give me a reason to watch Daytona. The last time I had a reason was to root for “Junior” and I don’t mean Johnson.

  18. This is only slightly off topic. Speaking of strong women who can take care of themselves.

    Did you see that Danica Patrick made history today? First woman to be on the pole for the Daytona 500. She ran off and left everybody but Jeff Gordon, who was the only one to really challenge her speed. From what I have seen of her so far, she is really getting the hang of driving in NASCAR. She is perfectly willing to run over a driver who will not get out of her way or drives rough with her.

    Maybe we should send Danica Patrick to congress to straighten them out. She may be tiny, and she may be beautiful, but she is clearly not a woman to be dismissed lightly. Quite a few jocks have found that out the hard way.

  19. I am somewhat in agreement with Gary T above. Remove gender language or word in such as way as to cover all cases. I have worked on several cases where the female in a relationship was the abuser. I used to work with a lesbian couple. The dominant one was a psychiatrist of all things, and the partner was a Registered Nurse. It was no secret the psychiatrist was physically abusive, and the RN sometimes came into work with visible bruises. No one seemed to know quite how to handle that situation.

  20. Sadly but not surprising, many Senate Republicans voted against protections for gays who are involved in an absuve relationship. That is how much they despise homosexuality, they would rather not offer these protections to gay individuals. There is opposition to gay rights and there is extremism.

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