Meghan McCain reserves the strongest words for Obama, arguing:

This is the point we should be emphasizing for those who refuse to see Don't Ask Don't Tell opposition as a human-rights campaign. We need to bring the issue back to the security of our country both overseas and at home. Every soldier in our armed forces is serving his or her country in the most admirable way an American can, and we should be able to respect them, by not asking them to hide their sexual orientation.

But the second part of her argument is a bit questionable (emphasis added):

Now, I cannot speak for my brothers, but I know many men and women who serve in the military. Let's give them more credit. Just as there are no atheists in foxholes, I suspect it could be said that there is no homophobia in foxholes either. I find it hard to imagine that when a soldier is in a Humvee fighting terrorist insurgents, that the thing on his mind is who his fellow soldier chooses to sleep with when he's off duty.

I get her point, but again...aren't religious assumptions partly responsible for this mess?

Still McCain's article is part of the clearer headed contingent. With the growing strain on the ground and the repeated calls to add thousands more troops to the effort overseas, it seems absolutely foolish to persecute enlisted soliders based on their sexuality. Yet, that is exactly the practice being defended. According to CBS News:

Ending "Don't ask, don't tell" is opposed in Congress, with several members (including Republican Senator Lindsay Graham) saying the military needs to be consulted before ending the policy.

The military has been consulted - they said they need more troops. What's the issue here?

Unfortunately, the issue is either the biased policy or entrenched members of the service working to uphold this bias:

Ainsley Kling, 26, just completed 7 1/2 years with the Coast Guard; after her commitment was up, she left voluntarily with the rank of petty officer, second class. She wished Obama had gone further and ordered a halt to all ongoing investigations under "don't ask, don't tell."

Kling, who is lesbian, said harassment based on sexual orientation persists, recalling a Coast Guardsman who wrote "fag" on someone else's bicycle, though neither party was believed to be homosexual.

When she wanted to write up the violation, her supervisor urged her not to do so, saying that he "knew things about me he shouldn't know." She did not file the report.

Lt. Dan Choi (pictured above in a tee-shirt that says "Don't Hide") is rapidly becoming the face of the military's GLBTQ members.

A West Point graduate and Iraq war veteran, Choi is facing discharge under the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy for revealing in March that he is gay.

He appeared later at a rally in his Army uniform, a piece of black tape over his mouth.

"Many of us have been discharged from the service because we told the truth," he said.

In addition to the warring over Don't Ask, Don't Tell, gay rights activists also pushed hard for a repeal to the Defense of Marriage Act.

The president extended some benefits to the spouses of gay federal employees in June while voicing support for a House bill that grants them other rights. The State Department now allows married gay and lesbian couples to obtain passports with their married names. And the Census Bureau has agreed to release data on same-sex marriages.

But Obama is also clearly mindful of the politics of the combustible issue. Opposition remains strong in much of the country to extending rights to gays, especially where marriage is concerned.

House Democrats introduced a bill last month that would repeal the marriage act, but polls consistently show that opponents of legalizing same-sex marriage outnumber supporters. Twenty-nine states have banned same-sex marriage.

With a full plate of contentious domestic issues to solve, activists are beginning to wonder if Obama will actually make time for these issues, or allow his commitment to equal rights to waver in the face of pressure. However, Obama continues to say he fully supports civil rights:

He expressed strong support for the HRC agenda of ending discrimination against gays, lesbians, bisexuals and transgender people but stopped short of laying out a detailed plan for how to get there.

"My expectation is that when you look back on these years you will look back and see a time when we put a stop against discrimination ... whether in the office or the battlefield," Obama said.

Don't Ask, Don't Tell Makes America Unsafe [The Daily Beast]
Report: U.S. general calls for more troops in Afghanistan [CNN]
Obama renews pledge to gays to end 'don't ask, don't tell'[LA Times]
Gay rights marchers in DC: 'We won't back down' [Associated Press]
As Pressure Grows, Obama Addresses Gay Rights Group [Washington Post]
Obama again pledges to change policy on gays [AP]

Well, last night, he chose the former, debating himself on the relative "merits" of Don't Ask Don't Tell, and plowing through even when the laughter subsided somewhat and the situation began to feel uncomfortable. It was pretty amazing to see a comedian at a USO show in a former palace of Saddam Hussein in front of hundreds of active duty military personnel — the very personnel proponents of Don't Ask Don't Tell claim require it for cohesiveness (which is code for their lives and those of their comrades) — openly mock the military's stance on the LGBT members some of those soldiers undoubtedly know serve among them.

In the segment, the pro-Don't Ask, Don't Tell Colbert proclaims the issue is a problem to be fixed in Washington and then migrates to the argument that it's about military cohesiveness and those who haven't served shouldn't get involved. I guess that explains why Barack Obama hasn't gotten involved in it yet?

• Wanda Sykes' White House Correspondents' Dinner performance was pretty funny , but some conservatives, including Meghan McCain, aren't laughing because they're too busy feigning outrage for the cameras. [C-SPAN, ABC News, NY Daily News]

• Dick Cheney continues to hone his own special brand of performance art; now he's claiming that Colin Powell is less worthy of attention than Rush Limbaugh and the U.S. should just keep on torturing people. [Associated Press]
• Nancy Pelosi continues to deny that she knew a thing about waterboarding, let alone signed off on it, but it turns out her top aide was specifically briefed on it before she signed off on a letter to the CIA opposing it. [Politico, Washington Post]
• Obama's going to have a meeting today where health insurance companies will totally promise to raise your rates by 1.5% less next year. For most people, this means they'll be jacking up their prices by 4 times the rate of inflation rather than 5, co congratufuckinglations. [Associated Press]
• John Edwards' staffers say now that they planned to sabotage his campaign if he looked to be winning the primaries. [ABC News]
• Joe Biden's a busy guy, having now added advising Obama on potential Supreme Court nominees to his resume. [Washington Post]
• Defense Secretary Robert Gates' plan to shift 10 percent of military spending to items our troops currently need to protect their lives in Iraq and Afghanistan is facing opposition from Republicans who want to make sure that whatever soldiers survive our current wars without armored vehicles and medical transport helicopters have big tanks and airplanes with which to invade China and Russia. [NY Times]
• John McCain believes that the military's Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy is working just fine at weeding out the dreaded gays from its ranks. Who needs a cunning linguist in the military, anyway? [ThinkProgress]
• No one knows where in the world Osama bin Laden or Carmen Sandiego can be found. (Carmen's probably easier to find). [Associated Press]

Apparently, back when Beyoncé met Barack and Michelle Obama (and he proved that he can do the "Single Ladies" dance), before Michelle called Barack out on his dance moves, Michelle told Beyoncé that she's happy her daughters look up to her — who, truth be told, does seem pretty fucking normal by comparison to some other train wrecks tweens idolize. Beyoncé, it sounds like, is still freaking out that Michelle said that. She isn't, however, freaking out as much as Mike Rawls, who is a huge Washington Wizards fan and apparently spent much of Friday night's game between the Wizards and the Chicago Bulls trash talking with the President of the United States. And you thought he was cute before.

Oh, you want to hear about actual politics? No, I know you don't, so I should probably mention that this morning, Michael Steele called the Rush Limbaugh brouhaha a "sideshow distraction" and the Democrats cooked the whole thing up months ago when they realized that Rush Limbaugh has worse popularity numbers than Dubya (or Jeremiah Wright) and that Limbaugh was likely to stumble right into their trap. Which he did, followed by the entire Republican establishment! And while we're talking sideshow train wrecks, the National Enquirier is reporting that John Edwards has told Elizabeth that he really did knock up his mistress, Rielle Hunter, which is a truth I pretty much figured out last summer when I put together a time line of events related to Rielle.

Fine, real talk. Iran has pretty much told us to fuck off again because we're not willing to disavow the established nation of Israel; moderate and conservative Democrats aren't actually keen on the idea of spending even more money and raising rich people's taxes, and the same Republicans who thought it was a great idea to eliminate the minority party's ability to filibuster judicial nominees a couple years ago now plan to... filibuster the new President's judicial nominees. Also, Obama has finally started "consultations" on eliminating the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy, Norm Coleman wants to get a new election and Obama has declared March Women's History Month.

As for Brad Pitt, the movie star is going to be meeting with Nancy Pelosi today, which is way more interesting and honorable than Pelosi's bow to the demands of the NRA yesterday.

In that trip, a civilian co-worker at the U.S. Property and Fiscal Office saw Brian kiss her girlfriend. So despite not asking nor telling, she was kicked out of the military.

Brian said the effort to remove her from the Guard started with a barrage of anonymous e-mails referencing her sexual orientation and a networking Web site where her photo was posted. The e-mails were sent to her chain of command, including the Kansas Adjutant General's Office.

That however, wasn't enough to separate her from the career she'd chosen, where she'd received awards and promotions and was working on a Master's degree. It took a public display of affection seen off-site by a civilian co-worker whose job was, ironically, protected from discrimination because of sexual orientation to do that.

[Sharon Watson, public affairs director for the Kansas Adjutant General's Office] said a separation from the Guard because of homosexual conduct is "not based on performance but based completely on federal law." The federal law states the military must have proof of the homosexual conduct, an admission from the soldier or an attempt or successful application for marriage to another gay person by the soldier.

Apparently, "proof" is one person noticing that you're living your personal life on your own terms, and requires no corroboration. On the other hand, there's this:

[Brian] said she served with heterosexual soldiers who were found guilty of adultery, sexual harassment, and credit card fraud and received disciplinary actions instead of discharges.

You know, men.

More than 12,500 soldiers have been ousted from the military since the Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy went into effect in 1994. A recent study showed that last year, despite women making up a disproportionately small percentage of military personnel, more than half of those dismissed were women. While President Barack Obama has openly committed to ending this discriminatory policy that unhelpfully diminishes the number of qualified people willing to serve in our armed forces, his spokeman Robert Gibbs said on January 14th (the day after Brian was shown the door) that it wasn't going to happen right away. It just sort of seems like some people, like Amy Brian, would rather not have to be kept waiting.

Kansas Army Discharges Gay Soldier [Topeka Capital-Journal]

Related: Obama Will End ‘Don't Ask, Don't Tell' Policy - But Not Right Away [Think Progress]

Earlier: Don't Ask, Don't Tell, And Try Not To Be A Woman

• The word is, again, that Hillary Clinton has been offered and will accept the Secretary of State job. It might not happen until after Thanksgiving, officially, though, because Obama announced he's rolling out the economic team first on Monday. [NY Times]
• Some people are a little concerned about who else she might bring to Foggy Bottom, though. [Washington Independent]
• On that economic team roll-out Monday, the top dog appears to be Timothy Geithner, the current president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, who it's said will be our next Treasury Secretary. [The Hill]
• He might well be sharing the stage with Bill Richardson, who everyone is saying will be the next Commerce Secretary. Interesting note: if he is, he'll be the second Latino in a row to hold the position, like Clinton would be the second woman in a row at State. [CNN]

• What will presumably get announced when the Clinton nomination is official is the identity of Obama's national security adviser — who, speculation holds, will be Marine Gen. James L. Jones (Ret.). [Huffington Post]
• By the way, get your Hillary campaign memorabilia now — she's still selling office equipment from her campaign to pay her debts. Taking the Secretary of State gig might mean she'll never pay off those vendors, as she would be prohibited from raising money for the debt by law. [Politico]
• Some Obama volunteer is making his own personal stimulus package by trying to sell, on eBay, a binder and speech he or she pilfered from a pre-election rally. Classy. [LA Times]
• A bunch of elementary school kids at the Ludlow Elementary School on Long Island petitioned for — and received — a more permanent campaign keepsake: they've renamed their school Barack Obama Elementary School. [ABC News]
• If you're not a fan of Big Brother, stay the fuck away from the inauguration. [Associated Press]
• And, onto policy issues, there's now yet a third competing Democratic health care reform package — in addition to the pre-emptive health care legislative strike by Finance Committee Chair Max Baucus and the package that Ted Kennedy, chair of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, has promised, Oregon Senator Ron Wyden has one, too. No wonder even Hillary Clinton couldn't get anything done 15 years ago. [The Hill]
• Upstart Congressman Henry Waxman, when he wrests the gavel of the Energy and Commerce Committee from Auto Industry Michigan Congressman John Dingell, is expected to push for Obama's energy and environmental reform plans. [LA Times]
• But a repeal of the military's Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy will likely wait until later in the 2009 — or even 2010 — while Obama and his staff soothe the Pentagon's fears that other dudes will be checking out their junk in the barracks, as though that hasn't gone on the entire time anyway. [Washington Times]
• The crazy, goat-herding, rooster-owning prosecutor who, from his trailer parked outside the courthouse, engineered an indictment of Dick Cheney and Alberto Gonzales showed up for court today and acted, predictably, completely crazy. Because he's crazy. [Brattleboro Reformer]
• Speaking of, Fred Thompson is engineering his return to acting, but no one is really sure how well he's going to fit into the Gossip Girl cast. [Huffington Post]

MEGAN: It's morning again, and I'm finally awake enough to realize that I put my shirt on backwards when I went to bed last night... and I wasn't even intoxicated.

ANA MARIE: You put a shirt on to go to bed? lerjkewjr! Sorry that was my kind of clearing my throat. Typing- wise.

MEGAN: Otherwise my boobs get all wonky. Plus, I prefer my place kind of chilly and I haven't swapped in my winter bedclothes.

ANA MARIE: Ah, a nightshirt. I was somehow thinking you wore, like, a tux.

MEGAN: That would be kind of awesome, but I feel like the shirt studs would leave marks.

ANA MARIE: Should we talk about the news?

MEGAN: Anyway, so Tina Brown was just on Morning Joe looking kind of fabulous and speaking all British-y.

ANA MARIE: Yes, she sounds smart pretty much all the time. (Hi, Boss!)

MEGAN: Did you watch Arianna guest on Maddow last night?

ANA MARIE: I did. From the studio! Because I was on fake Countdown with fake Keith. I think maybe she and Cindy McCain have the same vocal coach.

MEGAN: A bit somnolent, right? The accent makes me want to get, like, cocoa. By a fire.

ANA MARIE: With that accent, I don't need cocoa. Mika just said "team of rivals" on Morning Joe. DRINK!

MEGAN: Damn it, the tequila is just out of reach! Tina Brown, though, sort of makes me want to learn to like whiskey, and I mean that as a compliment.

ANA MARIE: Hey, I have a question: WHY is Hillary considered a legitimate SecState nominee? Does she have some foreign policy experience I don't know about? I asked this of an MSNBC employee yesterday and she said, "Well, her husband..." and I was like, "If someone tried to give me a job because of my HUSBAND's resume, I would be embarrassed." I guess I might even make up some kind of story about Bosnian sniper fire! I mean, there's an argument that the President's job is big enough that foreign policy experience is just a PART of what you'd need to have. (Clearly, this was the American people's judgment.) But SecState? There's no other part of the job! Having worked on health care policy is kind of not relevant!

MEGAN: Well, but, frankly, what foreign policy (as opposed to defense) experience did Colin Powell have? Hell, what foreign policy experience do most of our ambassadors have? Clinton's nomination is, I think, a great deal about her international star power/prestige, etc. I think it's also about her supposed managerial ability, which, having tried to work with her Senate office and watched her campaign, I frankly question.

ANA MARIE: Then why not nominate Miley Cyrus? She is very popular and has not lied about being under sniper fire.

MEGAN: But it's no longer a nomination, didn't you hear? Only the story is probably completely false since no one else has been able to confirm it. Like, for real, people, The Guardian is the best source on this? I go back to: Hagel, Kerry, Grabbyhands, Nunn. And then you get Hillary Clinton.

ANA MARIE: Maybe this whole thing is a sideshow to make Kerry seem like a noble choice. Oh, and another thing? There are cabinet positions that Hillary would be qualified for: HHS, maybe even Defense (given her well-regarded service on the Armed Services Committee). But this whoopdedoo has probably scotched those. It's probably ruined her chances at State. To the extent it was ever real. I mean, seriously: Is this what the Obama administration is going to be like? Endless high octane pundit debates about things that won't happen?

MEGAN: I think the problem is that there isn't real news to talk about! It's the gossip season. Plus, at the point at which Chris Hitchens is drunkenly inveighing against you on TV, I'm sort of more pro-the idea, frankly. Plus, it would be nearly full employment for me.

ANA MARIE: Oh, and I love Christopher. I would be honored to be the subject of his inebriated inveighings. He should auction that shit off.

MEGAN: MEGAN: But does he need the money? Also, can we just mention, the music that is playing on Morning Joe: "North American Scum."

ANA MARIE: They have pretty good taste in music. There's a very disappointing relationship between taste in bumper music and shows themselves. Proof: You know who has GREAT bumper music? Laura Ingraham. I see that the New York Times is selling copies of its Nov 5 edition for $15. The print media industry is saved! We will borrow the Franklin Mint business model and print WEEKS-OLD NEWS!

MEGAN: And you know that the New York Times will totally make bank on that. I do not understand the people that collect that sort of stuff, but, then, I have moved around a lot in my life.

ANA MARIE: You have a life, maybe?

MEGAN: No, that's not true at all. I'm just too lazy to haul shit.

ANA MARIE: We're going to be LIVING THROUGH the Obama administration. That sort of is my idea of keepsake. That, and the policies he'll enact. Who told the entire MSNBC hosting staff they could go on vacation this week?

MEGAN: What in particular are you keen to see him do? After listening to Mika inveigh against the auto bailout, I now know what she really, really doesn't want.

ANA MARIE: My wishlist for his honeymoon period? Election reform — while it's fresh on everyone's minds — to include making election day a national holiday and some kind of reform to registration so that fake registrations don't slow down legit new voters. Statehood for DC (with the Utah congressional addition off set). Exec orders on torture and Gitmo. Card check.

MEGAN: Oh, see, I sort of hate card check. But I'm on board with the rest of it.

ANA MARIE: AND GET THE PUPPY ALREADY! Why? Oh, and gays in the military! More gays! He could executive order that shit.

MEGAN: Yes, an end to don't ask, don't tell! That would be awesome. On card check, I don't like the elimination of secret balloting. I don't know how that helps. But, then, my parents are required to belong to unions that have variously screwed over our family over the years, so I'm not exactly like "Woo, unions."

ANA MARIE: You've been listening to right wing radio or something. The American workplace is not a pure and formal democracy, and employers have never had much respect for the secret ballot when it came to unions in the past. Not that unions are all good either.

MEGAN: Yeah, well, how does card check help is my point? It fixes the management sins of 40 years ago? But, yeah, I remember when my dads union decided to flex their muscles for no sake other than flexing their muscles against management and my family went without health insurance for a while. Their families didn't, of course, since they were not covered by the same health insurance as us since they weren't actual employees of the organization. And we never got it back retroactive, either. But, hey, they showed management! Something. Yeah, I hold grudges.

ANA MARIE: Speaking of pointless flexing of muscles: I think Lieberman will not get much more than a wrist slap.

MEGAN: Ooh, I'm sure he's so scared at the loss of his subcommittee chairmanship. I can't believe that Jon Tester is defending him on MSNBC right now. How is fucking Tester scared of Jowls McGee?

ANA MARIE: Nice moment though: Jon Tester just started to say "Joe was wro— DIFFERENT on the war." I think we can say "wrong" now.

MEGAN: I think we could have said "wrong" then, That's on my list of stuff I'm looking forward to seeing change in an Obama Administration. I also want a full-on, prisoner-less, compromise-minimized 1984-style tax reform.

ANA MARIE: I don't think Tester or anyone is scared of Jowly Joe. I think this is an attempt to extend the "no drama" policy to the Hill. An attempt that will ultimately be unsuccessful but I admire the effort.

MEGAN: The point of the legislative branch is fucking "drama," so I just wonder when they forgot it.

ANA MARIE: And, yes, I think there will be drama to spare. No thanks to sleepwalkers like Mark Warner, but I have faith in, you know, McCain.

MEGAN: Well, and let's not forget Max Baucus is running around with his own health care reform bill when Kennedy is promising his next year.

ANA MARIE: There you go. DRAMA! COMPETING HEALTH CARE BILL! I think we have the solution to reviving Heroes!

MEGAN: Well, and this is why everyone is focusing on speculating about the Cabinet and Hillary Clinton: everything else is just Nerd Drama. Like, woo David Frum is leaving the National Review?

ANA MARIE: So does that mean we can we talk about the new Star Trek movie?

MEGAN: I am so worried it will suck. For my dad's sake, of course.

ANA MARIE: Oh, and Frum is leaving to start some new "solo web project," by which he means, of course: porn.

MEGAN: But PORN WITH OTHER PEOPLE!! PORN WITH OTHER PEOPLE!! Please don't make me cry.

ANA MARIE: Hey, he's the one talking "solo."

MEGAN: And now my brain needs another bleaching, as, inevitably, I imagine David Frum jerking off on a web cam. This is why I wasn't reading his NRO columns, to avoid that mental picture!

ANA MARIE: I am clearly not the person you should be talking to first thing in the morning. I'm sorry. Tomorrow's mental images will be based on the Shiba puppy cam.

MEGAN: Yay puppies! Honestly, my preference in the morning is to grumpily drink my coffee while mentally cursing the supposed need to arise before 10:00 regardless. So, it's not you, it's me.

ANA MARIE: Well as long as I have someone to watch Morning Joe with I'm good.

But, in that absence of a record — and as the Vice President on a ticket headed by John McCain — his stances are now basically her stances, or at least the policies she'll be called upon to defend. And, like her position on abortion, his stances on a range of issues important to women are not exactly progressive.

Abortion Rights: On abortion, they're clearly alike (now). McCain used to support an exception in cases of rape, incest or risk to the life of the mother but reversed himself this year. Glamour reports that he didn't support overturning Roe V. Wade in 1999, then he did and that he was kind of a dick when the magazine's editors asked for further clarification. He's definitely all excited about the 2-3 Supreme Court vacancies expected "by the people who decide these things," since that'll give him a chance to appoint justices that will see Roe v. Wade as a "bad decision" the way that he does.

Equal Pay For Equal Work: Moving onto pay equity, something else that Sarah Palin's said nary a word on. McCain's said plenty, including that he's "all for pay equity" but not for the Ledbetter bill because it would lead to, you know, women using the courts to enforce said equity. Of course, he's also said that we could solve pay equity by giving women better job training, which sort of pisses Lilly Ledbetter off. Nonetheless, the official position of a McCain-Palin administration would be "no" to any bill that attempted to resolve the issues in the law that allowed the Supreme Court to fuck over Lilly Ledbetter.

Women At War: McCain's somewhat more progressive on women in combat, telling Glamour:

I think this policy needs to be reevaluated constantly.... We have more and more evidence of greater abilities of women in combat. Also...this conflict is everywhere; we have had a large number of women wounded and killed in Iraq and in Afghanistan. I'm for integrating women as much as possible—with one exception: For example, in Baghdad today, a male combat infantryman puts on 50 pounds of body armor, then another 40 or 50 pounds of military equipment. I want to make sure that women are able to also do that. Now, I'm not saying women are physically weak. Some of the strongest [people] I have ever known in my life are women.... I just want to make sure that they're able to carry out these missions in the most effective fashion.... Women have proven to [everyone's] satisfaction as pilots, as combat medics, in any other role they've been in, that they're perfectly capable, and in some ways not only capable but superior.

Of course, that's a little bit different than what he said back in 1991, but even old dogs can learn new tricks. Is flip-flopping a doggie trick? Anyway, he'd "reevaluate" constantly, sort of like he already has, but I would say it's iffy whether he and Palin would reverse the women in combat decision; I doubt they'd be spearheading any women-in-combat initiatives — let alone any reversal of don't ask, don't tell, despite its disproportionate effects on feamles.

Sex Education: While, as I've previously mentioned, Sarah Palin's record on abstinence-only education is sketchy at best, McCain's positions are more robust. He supports teaching abstinence in schools and is less supportive of birth control education. In fact, he's said that he opposes eliminating the proved-ineffective abstinence-only education programs currently on the books, while leaving wiggle room on giving teenagers some information that there are ways to avoid pregnancy if you ignore the abstinence thing. He did vote against an 2005 family planning bill and, when asked to explain by Glamour first said it was because it have provisions on funding abortion (it didn't) and then clarified that it was because it had provisions relating to Plan B, which doesn't exactly make it better.

In the end, when it comes to women's issues, there may not be a ton of information out there on where Sarah Palin stands, but — like every Vice President before her — she's not going to have any choice but to stand by her man... who hardly stands by many of the women in this country on the issues outlined above. McCain thinks women should nonetheless vote for him because he wants to keep taxes low (not that he's actually correct about that) and make sure that when his plan goes through Congress, the (magical) markets will keep prices low.

Interestingly, McCain's economic adviser, Carly Fiorina thinks women shouldn't be voting just based on abortion, and that issues likes taxes and health insurance are important to women too — issues on which, as I've just noted, McCain is actually worse on. So tell me again how is McCain's candidacy is supposed to be about the issues?

For these reasons and undoubtedly many others, the National Organization for Women Political Action Committee today endorsed Barack Obama and Joe Biden for the Presidency and Vice Presidency — one of the very few times the organization has ever made a general election endorsement. But even NOW's President, Kim Gandy, admitted on NPR that this would be controversial among some of their members despite the significant differences between Obama-Biden and McCain-Palin on the issues supposedly of importance to women. Bethesda, MD psychologist Lynette Long, a lifetime Democrat, probably knows a little about why — she's not voting on the issues, just on the gender that she shares with Sarah Palin. For all Fiorina's (and McCain's, and Palin's) posturing about the elections being about the issues (and about issues other than abortion), the McCain camp wants a lot of women like Long to completely ignore the issues, not choose between them.

Palin's Record on Women's Issues Questions [UPI]
Palin: Unserious About Sex Crimes and Domestic Violence [Shakesville]
Palin On Abortion: I'd Oppose Even If My Own Daughter Was Raped [Huffington Post]
McCain Poised to Flip on GOP Abortion Platform [ABC News]
Is McCain the Nostradamus of the Supreme Court? [CBS News]
McCain Opposes Equal Pay Bill In The Senate [Huffington Post]
John McCain [Glamour]
Women's Combat Roles Likely To Be On Next President's Agenda [LA Times]
McCain: Gay Troops "Intolerable Risk" [Gay.com]
John McCain Campaign to Brody File: Eliminating "Abstinence Only" Programs is Wrong [CBN News]
Health Insurance And the Single Girl [Glamocracy]
Tax Plans And the Single Girl [Glamocracy]
National Organization for Women PAC Endorses Obama-Biden [NOW]
National Organization For Women Endorses Obama [NPR]
In This Election, Putting Gender First [Baltimore Sun]