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Sunday Morning, the Marquette University E-board held a secretive meeting at Miss Katie’s Diner. At this meeting I can only assume what they plotted and conspired. However in some sort of unbelievable coincidence, Democrat candidate Hillary Clinton, along with Congresswoman Tammy Baldwin and Lieutenant Governor Diane Lawton, showed up for brunch as well. My theory is that both groups met at Miss Katie’s Diner with intent to turn over all of Marquette University College Republicans to the Democrats in some sort of shady breakfast deal. As is seen in the video, the secret yet, incompetent attempt on behalf of the e-board to turn over the party failed as Clinton paused for a photo op and handshakes with all of them. I want to know what they got paid to sell out the college party.

I’m not worried personally, even if they are plotting to hand over Marquette to the democrats, I trust that any MUCR that votes for Hillary will get hit with a sock full of nickels. That is a campaign promise. Vice Chair Luke Fuller defended his breakfast saying “the words ‘I’m voting for you Senator’ never came out of my mouth,” implying that it did from other e-board members, who should see the prior statement.

And no one needs to be concerned about my loyalties. I was smart enough to stay in bed (till 1pm) intend to keep any CRs from melting as they vote for Hillary.

Since I live with both Luke and Allison so those two still in the shower by the time I got up, and the strong smell of sulfur was coming from the bathroom indicates they may not fully support the plan to ruin MUCRs. I can’t speak for the rest of the assumed traitors.

As many of you may have seen, the Wisconsin Catholic Conference is in a bit of turmoil over the “Compassionate Care for Rape Victims Act.” The Conference, which represents Wisconsin’s bishops, is officially neutral towards the bill, which has been interpreted in Madison and the media as a “green light” for the bill (Consider: GOP State Rep. Terry “Musser, who considers himself pro-life, has said his own qualms about the legislation were assuaged in large part once the Wisconsin Catholic Conference, the public arm of Wisconsin’s bishops, said it did not object to the bill.”). After legislative action by the state Assembly, however, Madison Catholic Bishop Robert Morlino, joined by La Crosse’s Bishop Jerome Listecki, has issued a personal appeal to legislators to oppose the bill.

Key to the whole discussion has been a battle about “legal opinions” by the attorneys for the five Catholic dioceses. According to a report in La Crosse’s Catholic Times, “[Wis. Cath. Conf. Exec. Dir. John] Heubscher said the WCC’s neutrality is based on the unanimous opinion of the state’s diocesan attorneys that a current conscience exemption contained in Wisconsin Statue 253.09 would allow Catholic hospitals and individual physicians to ‘opt out’ of the possibly abortion-inducing treatment the legislation would require.”

In this blog post, I intend to render an alternative legal opinion of my own (though admittedly I’m a few months from being a lawyer).

December 30, 2007

Dear Wisconsin Bishop X:

You have asked me to render an opinion as to whether the Compassionate Care for Rape Victims Act, A.B. 377, would force Wisconsin’s Catholic hospitals to administer emergency contraception in an abortifacient manner. I answer that it likely would.

As you know, A.B. 377 as introduced did not contain a conscience clause exemption for religious hospitals. When the bill came before the Assembly Judiciary Committee, the Republican majority on that committee, under the leadership of Chairman Mark Gundrum, added conscience clause protection to the bill. That exemption did not survive on the floor of the Assembly; an amendment to add that protection failed before the whole Assembly. Thus, the current version of A.B. 377 does not contain a conscience exemption for religious hospitals.

In rendering this opinion, there are three key sources of authority: Wis. Stat. 253.09, the legislative history of A.B. 377, and Wisconsin Constitution Article 1 Section 18.

EXISTING CONSCIENCE PROTECTION

Wis. Stat. 253.09(1) reads: “No hospital shall be required to admit any patient or to allow the use of the hospital facilities for the purpose of performing a sterilization procedure or removing a human embryo or fetus.”

Wis. Stat. 253.09(2) reads: “No hospital or employee of any hospital shall be liable for any civil damages resulting from a refusal to perform sterilization procedures or remove a human embryo or fetus from a person, if such refusal is based on religious or moral precepts.”

The question is whether the administration of emergency contraception, otherwise known as the the morning after pill or Plan B, in a hospital emergency room would constitute “removing a human embryo or fetus.”

The same words are used in two other conscience protection statutes - for registered nurses (441.06(6)) and for doctors (448.03(5)(a)). No Wisconsin case definitively resolves what those words cover. The closest we have is a footnote in a Wisconsin Court of Appeals case that identifies 253.09 as “addressing a hospital’s refusal to honor a patient’s request for an abortion.” State ex rel. Angela M.W. v. Kruzicki, 197 Wis. 2d 532, 547 n.8 (Ct. App. 1995). Those who want A.B. 377 to apply to religious hospitals would argue that EC does not constitute an “abortion” as that term was used by the Court of Appeals, and thus a court has already decided EC is not covered.

Medical science confirms that emergency contraception can have the effect of preventing a fertilized egg from implanting in the womb of the mother. This functions as a chemical abortion in Catholic moral theology.

However, this may not bring EC under the scope of “removing a human embryo.” The word “removal” may be interpreted to require implantation. The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists says that pregnancy does not begin until implantation. Federal case law also adopts this interpretation of implantation as the beginning. This is also defensible from a plain language standpoint: you cannot remove something unless it is first present. Based on these sources, a Wisconsin court could conclude that mandated administration of EC does not force a Catholic hospital to participate in “removing a human embryo.”

LEGISLATIVE HISTORY

It is presumed that the Legislature in enacting new laws acts with full knowledge of laws already on the books. Kindy v. Hayes, 44 Wis.2d 301, 314 (1969). Certainly the legislative debate surrounding A.B. 377 brought 253.09 to the attention of the Legislature. Yet the Legislature specifically rejected conscience clause protections for religious hospitals on the floor of the Assembly.

Moreover, after the addition of conscience protection in the committee stage, the bill’s sponsors spoke out. State Rep. Marc Pocan, the primary Democratic sponsor, said that the conscience exemption “guts and nullifies the legislation.” State Rep. Terry Musser, the primary Republican sponsor, shared Pocan’s sentiments. (Madison Capital Times, Sept. 19, 2007).

Based on the floor rejection and sponsors’ statements, I conclude that the Legislature did not intend for there to be an exemption for religious hospitals from the Act’s mandates.

A JUDGE’S RULING

“[I]t is a cardinal rule of statutory construction that conflicts between different statutes, arising by implication or otherwise, are not favored and will not be held to exist if the statutes may otherwise be reasonably construed. Strong v. Milwaukee, 38 Wis.2d 564, 570 (1968).” OAG 42-77. In this Opinion, the Attorney General of Wisconsin said that a later law dealing with the administration of contraception amended without specifying an earlier statute limiting the administration of prescriptions drugs to pharmacists.

Based on the legislative history, these canons of construction, and the Attorney General’s OAG 42-77, I expect that a Wisconsin court would hold that “removal” requires “implantation,” and thus 253.09 is no protection from A.B. 377’s mandate that all hospitals provide EC.

WISCONSIN CONSTITUTION

If a Wisconsin court determines that Catholic hospitals are required to administer EC under the Act, as I believe it would, the hospital could respond by asserting its rights under Wisconsin Constitution Article 1, Section 18, the religious freedom provision. “The right of every person to worship Almighty God according to the dictates of conscience shall never be infringed; nor shall any person be compelled to attend, erect or support any place of worship, or to maintain any ministry, without consent; nor shall any control of, or interference with, the rights of conscience be permitted…” The Wisconsin Constitution’s religious freedom provisions are more expansive than the U.S. Constitution’s free exercise protection. State v. Miller, 202 Wis. 2d 56 (1996). These protections may be found to provide a constitutional right for religious hospitals to be free from state mandates to provide certain kinds of procedures. The hospitals would have to affirmatively assert this right after the state sought to enforce AB 337.

Thus, I suggest that Wisconsin’s Catholic bishops oppose A.B. 377. Emergency contraception may act as a chemical abortion by preventing implantation of a fertilized egg, and this would violate Catholic moral teaching. Yet a Catholic hospital would be forced to provide EC to rape victims under A.B. 377. It is likely that a Wisconsin court would find that Wis. Stat. 253.09 does not protect religious hospitals from the mandates of A.B. 377. Thus, the best strategy is to avoid this moral dilemma is to stop the passage of A.B. 377.

Sincerely yours,
DANIEL R SUHR

(I also owe a hat tip to Professor Augros).

Two things first: 1) I have not blogged in over six months - I apologize. 2) For those of you who have been reading for a while, you may know I am pretty obsessed with the idea of Newt Gingrich running for president.

I have not been paying much attention to the 2008 presidential race up until trecently. On the Democratic side, I am pretty sure it would be next to impossible for Hillary Clinton to NOT be the nominee. On the Republican side, things are a little more interesting, but I would say a little bit pathetic. Every few months, there is a new craze over who will save the party and stand up against the Hillary machine. First it was Rudy Giuliani, then it was Mitt Romney, now (and soon to be not) it is Fred Thompson. The election is a little less than 14 months away and we’re already trying to choose our candidates.

I still think it is imperative for Newt Gingrich to run for president. If he does, he could serve the country, the conservative movement, and the Republican party in a similar way that Barry Goldwater did in 1964 when he ran against LBJ. But instead of making conservative values popular for the first time, he’d reinvigorate those values, make them popular again, and translate them into effective policy solutions.

To be honest, I think the ills within the Republican party were self-created. After the 2004 elections, it seems to me that Republicans got complacent with having the power in all three branches of government, did not get anything done, and lost a bunch of key political battles. Along with recent scandals and some ineffectiveness of the Bush administration to communicate policies to the public, the Republican party in general also really just abandoned their conservative ideals of small government, lower taxes, and individual liberty. At this point, there is little substantive difference between the Republican Party and the Democratic Party.

With that said, I believe that Republicans are most likely going to suffer more losses in 2008, including the White House. Hence, I think it would be best to put up a nominee like Newt who could reinvigorate and excite the conservative base of the Republican party and clear the way for a more conservative candidate in the years to come (maybe as early as 2012). Republicans have been forced to promote candidates who are not really even conservative (i.e. Giuliani, Romney, McCain, Ron Paul, the outspoken libertarian and foreign policy appeaser) and candidates who have no idea what they’re doing (i.e. Fred Thompson, the next “Reagan” who cannot even verbally distinguish his views from those of the other candidates). Newt, not Thompson, would fill the conservative void in the race. He has the practical political skills and the innovative ideas. He is the best among both parties in communicating his stances and policy proposals.

Despite his skill and potential, Newt’s chances of winning against Hillary are slim. Politically speaking, Newt has some political baggage (stepping down as Speaker, marriage issues) that might hinder his chances of winning. Hillary’s campaign machine is extremely well-organized. Nevertheless, it would be best to put up a candidate who actually stands for something and could be an effective leader. I’d rather put a candidate like Newt and lose than put up a candidate like Romney or Giuliani and lose.

In 1964, the Republican Party had a choice between Nelson Rockefeller, the Governor of New York and the longtime leader of the GOP’s liberal-moderate faction, and the conservative Arizona senator Barry Goldwater. The party chose Goldwater who stood for principles of small government, individual liberty, lower taxes, ones that were beginning to become more mainstream after over three decades of the FDR liberal establishment.

Goldwater was not elected and America barely got through the disasters of the LBJ/Carter years. I think we could tolerate another Democratic administration. I think if a Democrat got into the White House, especially if it is another Clinton, then the conservative movement and the Republican party will work harder to fight for sound public policies and to win political battles. Republicans need to re-learn that conservative ideals are American ideals and that leftist liberalism is completely out of step from the American mind and political tradition.

Win or lose, a Newt Gingrich bid for the presidency would be transformative for the American political process, general political dialogue, the conservative movement, and the Republican party.

To the students of Theo 001, Section 1021 (along with our regular readers):

Thanks for visiting GOP3.com based on the information sheet given to you this morning before you entered your classroom.

If you would like another copy of the “Best of” list of Simon Harak’s zanny quotes, compiled by myself and co-blogger Daniel Suhr, download this PDF document and print it out. Also, we encourage all of our regular readers to review some of Harak’s outrageous remarks.

Unfortunately, you’ve accidently selected a political activist by the name of Rev. Simon Harak, SJ instead of a real instructor to fulfil your requirement for Theology 001 at Marquette. As most of you are freshmen, we will briefly review Harak and his history.

Here at GOP3.com, we have been documenting (see here, here, and here) Harak’s arrival at Marquette University and also discussing his past. Over at Political Science Professor John McAdams’ Warrior blog, McAdams has also documented (see here, here, and here) Harak’s propaganda work.

Simon Harak, who fashions himself as a Catholic priest, is a faux-peace political activist with a long history of apologetics on behalf of some pretty violent people. Harak is most well-known for his work during the interim between the Iraq Wars through his group called “Voices in the Wilderness.”

His group, which I’ll call Voices for short, visited Iraq dozens of times (30 in the 1990’s according to one account) under the pretense of giving food and amenities with the propaganda line that the United Nations’ imposed sanctions were starving Iraqi children (etc) and that the United States needed to stop restricting the Hussein regime.

Unfortunately, the truth of the matter, which the United Nations was forced to admit after the “oil for food” scandal of 2005, was that UN officials had helped Saddam’s henchmen hoard millions in finance and food supplies. Harak, as one of the chief excusers for Saddam, has never recanted his old positions.

Also unfortunately, this has been only one of the many radical things Harak has worked for. Harak also claims that the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait was acceptable (but not the UN-sponsored liberation), that the uprising of Palestinians against “Israeli genocide” is legitimate, and that the United States is the source of all evil in the world, including to the point of deliberately slaughtering innocents in Iraq.

As your information sheet indicated, Harak has gone off on more than just the Middle East. Be it socialism and social justice, the basic tenents of Catholic Christian faith, or respecting the law, Harak has gone off the deep end. He will probably end up being his generation’s Dan Maguire at Marquette University — another old, banal crony who you as a student subsidize through your tuition dollars.

That’s pretty bad. But fortunately, you at least do not need to subsidize Harak with your own time. You still have the opportunity to switch out of Harak’s Theo 001 course and into another course. Call up the College of Arts and Sciences at 288-7059 and ask to get into another Theo 001 class — they can get you in, even if another class is full. Or change to another class required by the Core Curriculum.

I’m sorry that you have been inconvenienced by all of this. I wish Marquette respected human dignity to the point of not hiring an apologist for Saddam Hussein. Alas, there are many excellent Theo 001 and dozens of other concentrations professors who more than supply the counterbalance to the Haraks of Marquette (who has only been on campus since the Spring).

Lastly, on behalf of the conservative movement at Marquette University, welcome to Marquette and Milwaukee!

For more information, feel free to contact me at brian dot collar at marquette dot edu.

I am going to temper my opinions from here due to the environment I am coming from (upon the request of my family but, here is a collection of a few of my thoughts on China thus far.

Pro: The exchange rate is roughly 7 RMB to the US Dollar. For those looking for a point of reference, I will use the CCPI (common college price index), commonly known as the BI or beer index. A beer in the grocery store is 2.6 RMB (37 cents) for 640ml (the average 12 ounce beer is 355ml).

Con: Saddam Hussien t-shirts are available in some of the shops next to the Mao and Che t-shirts. If a number of American Che t-shirt wearing admirers could just see that visual association…

Pro: Amazing service. With a glut of manual labor, even the smallest tasks are very personal, from 2 different people walking you from the door to your table at a restaurant, to people hand delivering the daily handwritten weather report on paper to your room. At most of the monuments and tourist areas there are trash collectors who literally took our empty water bottles from our hands as we finished them to prevent littering.

Pro/Con: “You want watch, DVD, good friend price, many qualities” - everywhere

Interesting: A number of the global business presentations for the region largely detailed the government’s latest 5 year plan and how a given business fits into it.

Interesting: A Chinese version of American Idol was recently canceled here due to it’s supposed vulgarity, rudeness and the promotion of incorrect values. They published a number of comments on it in the Shanghai Daily from Chinese people, including this one: “I can’t help but vomit at the sight of so many boyish girls and girly boys”. One of the “vulgar” exchanges included a contestant saying he liked younger girls to date.

Interesting: As people in the US complain about “harsh” drug trafficking fines and sentences, two men just today were executed for drug trafficking in the Yunnan Province of China.

I will have more as soon as I have time. If you are curious about anything in particular, drop a line in the comments on this post.

As some of you have noticed, I have not been the most active of bloggers lately here at Gop3.com, I have been preparing for the trip I am now embarking on to China. I am headed to Shanghai on on business for 3 weeks and I am currently sitting on the plane about to take off. I will do my best to get through to readers from behind the communist firewall (Gop3.com is banned in China) but, if I can’t I will be sure to fill you in upon my return. Oh, and don’t worry, I won’t be applying for the head of product safety position that was vacated by execution last month. Drop a comment if you have any questions or suggestions.

This afternoon I had the luck of being able to volunteer for an event hosted by Americans for Prosperity with Newt Gingrich. The whole afternoon was pretty cool, the brat’s were great, service was excellent, but Newt speaking put things over the top.

The event opened with a just a general bashing of Madison –of course well deserved- by Vicki McKenna of WIBA News/Talk 1310. (She’ll be hitting the Milwaukee airwaves soon). Basically she covered Diamond Jim’s latest tax increase of $1.75 billion. Most of the money to be wasted of course. Generally infuriating things for any Wisconsinite with half a brain. McKenna covered virtually every tax increase (including taxes on tobacco and beer) that’ll be taking place and reaffirmed that I need to get out of Wisconsin if I ever want to pay money. I really can’t wait to hear this woman when she hits Milwaukee, she’s pretty cool.

Onto Newt: Besides covering basic facts that the man is incredibly, ridiculously smart, he spoke at length about fiscal things and offered a lot of great ideas about how to improve government. He started off by talking about the immigration bill and how terribly the senate is running things there, then he went on to promote one of his own causes. He’s holding this workshop for elected officials at all levels. He’ll be holding one in Vermont –the goal is to have a thing in every town- and in Iowa, where the goal is to hold on in every county. I can’t really do justice to what this totally is, but check out the website.

Newt did mention some things that he first introduced at CPAC. He mentioned liberals calling medi-caid part D being too confusing and he related that to cruises and senior’s ability to choose one. There are many cruise ships, ports they sail from, room choices –etc and how instead we need to create Cruse A, B, and C and make sure no senior gets confused. He also added that Wal-Mart has over 250,000 items and seniors might just get confused there. He also spoke about NASA needed $240 billion to get to Mars. He suggested that we put up a $20 billion prize to see who can get their first. We’d get a man to Mars for 10% the cost, and prove that NASA is useless.

One of the things I wished Newt would have talked about more was Green Conservativism. He stressed that we need to promote a Green concept that was better than Al Gore’s but he didn’t go into that a lot, I would have liked to have heard his opinions more.

Newt took some time at the end to answer some questions as well as just hang around and talk to various people. I’d actually say that this speech gave me the opposite impression that the CPAC one did. I really thought that he was going to declare his candidacy for president, however the vibe I got from this one leads me to believe that he won’t run…odd

Some things are prohibited by higher law, and some are prohibited by man-made law. It’s very convenient when these two areas overlap.

Unfortunately, even when they do, justice is not always as easily served by man as by God. Jack Cashill at WorldNetDaily has the story of proud late-term abortionist Dr. George Tiller’s struggle to elude Kansas state law.

According to the law, there must be evidence that, without the abortions provided by Tiller, the mother of the baby would die or suffer “substantial and irreversible impairment of a major bodily function.” This includes mental health problems only if they are “permanent and substantial.”

For years, Tiller has been performing late-term abortions that do not fit the criteria (he boasts of over 60,000). So when Attorney General Phill Kline, enlisting renowned psychiatrist Dr. Paul McHugh, began investigating Tiller’s patients’ claims of mental health problems,what did Tiller do?

In November 2006, Tiller’s money and influence inspired a popular Republican district attorney, Paul Morrison, to turn Democrat and run against incumbent Phill Kline in his bid to be re-elected Kansas attorney general.

Tiller invested uncounted thousands of dollars to unseat Kline, much of it through operations like “Kansans for Consumer Privacy Protection,” an anonymous cut-out which just happened to have the same Wichita address as Tiller’s ProKanDo PAC.

This “consumer group” sent out six slick “Snoop Dog Kline” mailers in the weeks before the 2006 election. The mailers accused Kline of abandoning the fight on crime in favor of “snooping into women’s private medical records.” The local media amplified the Snoop Dog message with a vengeance, and Morrison triumphed.
…
Upon election, Morrison promised to review the Tiller medical records that Kline had successfully subpoenaed “inside out, backwards and forwards, and under a neutron microscope.”

No one much believed Morrison. Two weeks ago, he confirmed suspicions by leaking his exit strategy through an influential media supporter, Steve Rose of the Johnson County Sun.
…
Rose tells us that Morrison has reviewed the 15 files in question and finds many of the counts “ridiculous.” That much said, Rose has “a strong hunch” that Morrison will file a few misdemeanor charges “pertaining to the lack of notification to the state,” suggest a modest fine, and call Kline’s “witch hunt” off.

Fund the replacement of the attorney general, wait for him to punish you with some dummy charges, and then go right back to making a fortune off of the taking of legally protected human life.

Luckily, despite efforts by Morrison’s office to silence McHugh on the issue of the nonexistence of medical cause for the abortions, the message is getting across. McHugh is spreading the truth through this video.

Kansas law may catch up with the abortionist yet. Even if it doesn’t, Cashill put it well when he referred to the possibility of lessor charges being brought against the Tiller the Killer:

The reporting violations, however, are the least of Tiller’s sins, and there are 60,000 lost souls who, come Judgment Day, will testify to the same.

Amen.

It’s good to see the French leading the sensible faction on this one.

UNITED NATIONS - The U.N. Security Council refused to approve a statement Friday that would condemn remarks about Israel’s impending destruction attributed to Iran’s hard-line president because of objections from Indonesia, council diplomats said.

Qatar, the only Arab nation on the council, said it had no instructions, which also meant approval on Friday was impossible, the diplomats said. The statement must be approved by all 15 council members.

France’s U.N. Ambassador Jean-Marc de La Sabliere, who called for condemnation of the remarks attributed to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, said it was unfortunate that the council could not act immediately. But he said he would try again on Monday to get all 15 council members to approve the statement.

Yeah, let’s wait until Monday; Indonesia could wake up and smell the uranium over the weekend.

The president of a nation that is developing nuclear technology is beckoning on the destruction of a member nation (and it’s not the first time), and the U.N. can’t even agree to put out a statement against the statement. What’s worse, if they can’t follow through with a statement of condemnation, they are now by default giving their okay.

Here’s what’s not causing any condemnation:

IRNA quoted the president as saying that in last summer’s war between Israel and Hezbollah “the Lebanese nation pushed the button to begin counting the days until the destruction of the Zionist regime.” It also quoted him as saying “God willing, in the near future we will witness the destruction of the corrupt occupier regime.”

Of course, the sad thing here is that even if it were to approve the statement of disapproval, that’s all the council would have. Had it worked on Ahmadinejad the first time, when the Security Council passed condemnation of similar comments made in 2005, there wouldn’t even be a round two.

The U.N. is stooping so low that it’s striving for ineffectiveness.

Nine months after her debut as the anchor of “CBS Evening News”, Katie Couric is still breaking barriers–in the wrong direction. Now that she has set two records for the smallest audiences ever, some people are busy flipping out the chromosome card.

“I’m afraid that Katie’s paying a price for being the first woman,” [Linda Mason, who was the first woman producer at the "CBS Evening News"], said…

Mason told The Associated Press that her opinion came from her gut, not from any particular research. She stressed that there were other factors in Couric’s slow start.

The opinion came from her gut? I’d bet my gut is just as strong as Mason’s, and it’s telling me that maybe Katie Couric just isn’t that good.

The pity party continues:

“It saddens me,” said Deborah Potter, a former CBS News reporter who is now executive director of the News Lab think tank. “I wish I could tell you I was surprised, but I guess I’m not. The people who do the hiring still look very much like the people who did the hiring 30 years ago. They still make decisions based on what they find appealing.”

So now people have this crazy idea involving selection of news anchors based on appeal. If they are actually doing this at CBS, they must be doing a pretty poor job. And if they are not doing it, they should probably start. The surest way to get ratings is to make the program appealing, and beyond content, that depends wholly on the appeal of the anchor.

The article continues with a discussion of how unfair it is that people would criticize Couric’s makeup or wardrobe.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the world, strikingly parallel drama is unfolding on a much more serious scale:

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip - An Islamic group threatened to behead female TV broadcasters if they don’t wear strict Islamic dress, frightening reporters and signaling a further shift toward extremism in the Gaza Strip.

“We will cut throats, and from vein to vein, if needed to protect the spirit and moral of this nation,” the statement [from Swords of Truth] said. The group also accused the women broadcasters of being “without any … shame or morals.”

In many parts of the Muslim world, conservative policies keep women out of TV anchor positions or dictate they wear headscarves on air.

This is oppression. Sometimes, it takes a dose of garbage like this to wake us up to what really constitutes sexism.

Couric lives in a nation where she has every bit of an opportunity to do her job well. People may be critical of what she wears, but none so much as to keep her from work under threats to cut her throat from vein to vein, much less to bar her from her job altogether.

Is equality about creating a fair shot for everyone, or is it about creating a fairy land where everyone feels spectacular even if their reporting apparently isn’t? Couric has had the chance many Muslim women lack because of fear and intimidation. You can talk about underlying societal mindset, but if Couric was that great, she would trump these attitudes. Feminism and equality cannot just mean allowing women to have the same successes as men; they need to be about swallowing failure with the same self-responsibility.

To her credit, Couric herself appears willing to do this, but the women around her are whining without cause. Potter and Mason seem to think that a man is more capable than a woman of failing on his or her own merits. Moreover, the incentive to hire a woman or a minority is severely diminished when any subsequent firing or failure will instantly be followed by such complaining and crying foul.

Most of all, it might be helpful to put things in perspective to examine if we are digging too deeply to create an injustice. Ratings, after all, are not life and death by beheading.