Since this whole situation seems to rest on assumptions and flimsy premises, let's try to jump along with the timeline of events.

Leap One: The Correct Course of Action is to Blame a Politician's Wife For His Actions In the Senate

Firedoglake has an action item up asking readers to petition the Susan G. Korman For the Cure Foundation, and associated celebrities like Ellen DeGeneres, to ask Hadassah Lieberman to step down from her paid position as a Global Ambassador. Conservative sites are crying foul, pointing out that she is nothing more than the wife of Lieberman. Her job should not be at risk because of his actions. And most rational people are inclined to agree.

While it is true that political spouses can and do influence matters of policy, a direct action by Joe Lieberman should lead to a direct action against Joe Lieberman. If Hadassah Lieberman was up on Capitol Hill last week railing against health care reform, I could understand - but at this point, her beliefs and actions as they relate to Lieberman's vote withdrawal are not known. So this is bad form.

However, this brings us to issue number two.

Leap Two: Who Made This About Pulling Women Out of the Workforce?

Kathleen Parker's article starts out with a debunking of the connections between Hadassah Lieberman and big healthcare, and points out that her position with Komen is unpaid. However, the logic train quickly derails (emphasis mine):

Whether one agrees with Sen. Lieberman's opposition to certain elements of the Senate health-care bill is a matter of legitimate debate. Democrats are understandably furious with the Senator Formerly Known as a Democrat, now an independent and sometimes a Republican sympathizer. Thanks largely to Lieberman, progressives have had to watch as their single-payer dream became a public option and, now, something closer to a nightmare.

But again, what has any of this to do with his wife's work for a nonprofit organization that has raised breast cancer awareness and saved countless lives around the world? There is no conflict of interest unless you think that a wife should stay home and be her husband's silent partner.

Huh?

In that light, the attack on Hadassah Lieberman has been fantastically anti-feminist. In what American century is a wife's job in jeopardy because of her husband's politics?

Hamsher's call to action against Lieberman was not based in some reactionary idea that women should stay in the home. Her action was because she believed Hadassah Lieberman played some kind of a role in Joe Lieberman's vote, which would constitute a conflict of interest given her position. These are tenuous connections, but easily traceable. But Parker isn't finished just yet.

Leap Three: Blame One Person's Actions on All of New Media

Parker, after halfway making her last point launches into the real reason for her two page crusade:

Ultimately, this may prove much ado about nada. But there is a larger issue embedded herein concerning the damaging effects of viral warfare on individual reputations, not to mention democracy.

Hadassah Lieberman is but the most recent victim of new media that owe no allegiance to facts or to the goal of an informed citizenry. In such an environment, anyone's reputation is subject to the whim of any other person armed with an agenda and a random selection of disputable facts, and unencumbered by standards.

Firedoglake is one blog. And influential blog, but one blog out of millions. And to slander all of new media as a group of individuals who don't believe in facts discounts why much of new media got popular in the first place. Some blogs and organizations play hard and loose with factual information. So do outlets like Fox News. So do mainstream media outlets, who often have to print retractions and corrections, and often propagate rumors or fail to report on important information.

Bonus WTF: Are All Confrontations Between Women Catfights?

Note to the Reliable Source: Two professional women beefing does not equal a cat fight. Two women should be allowed to disagree with each other publicly and not have that dismissive and gendered term apply.

When Bloggers Attack: Jane Hamsher Has Some Choice Words For Hadassah Leiberman [Reliable Source]
The Anti-Feminist Attack On Hadassah Lieberman [Washington Post]
Tell Susan G. Komen For The Cure To Remove Hadassah Lieberman [FDL Action]

LATOYA: Where do you want to start this morning? We've got a piping hot plate of hot mess to go through.

MEGAN: Well, being as this is a women's blog, we should do something woman-y, and I nominate the news that the McCain campaign spent $110,000 on hair and make-up for Sarah Palin in 10 weeks and $180,000 on clothing and accessories for the Palin clan — which is $30,000 more than initially reported.

LATOYA: Oh, I forgot to tell you.

MEGAN: That, by the way, means they spent more on hair and make-up and clothing and accessories than my condo is worth.

LATOYA: I have personally instituted a ban on discussing anything to do with Palin. As far as I am concerned, she is irrelevant. If she manages a resurrection and comes back to haunt us in 2012, so be it.

MEGAN: What are you going to do when she opens up an exploratory committee in 2010?

LATOYA: But until then, I'd love to see her fade into obscurity. She should be remembered, fondly, like Ross Perot.

MEGAN: Ok, but can we discuss that kind of money?

LATOYA: Thanks for the memories of shout outs at VP debates, but you need to mosey along now. Take your folksy ways and return to the ice cave. I mean, we can discuss the money. But somehow, I can't muster up indignant outrage.

MEGAN: Like, I will guarantee that there's no way on God's green earth that I have spent $110,000 on hair and make-up in my lifetime, even though I've been highlighting my hair for about 6 years.

LATOYA: Maybe if I had bought that whole "salt of the earth, of the white people, heartland of real America" tripe they were selling. Homegirl was just an opportunist. Cindy McCain was rocking nice clothes — why shouldn't she?

MEGAN: Totally. Look, if RNC donors want to give me $180,000 in clothes, I will totally run for office as a Republican. They can even call me A Maverick over and over again because of my support of reproductive choice.

LATOYA: And it's obvious they had the money. If the first card maxed out and they let her keep going, I say get what you get. Credit Cards come with limits.

MEGAN: But Republican money never ends!

LATOYA: That's why they're Republicans. They're supposed to have money, want to keep money, spend their money the way they want, and tell the gov't to mind their damn business. That's what I expect from Republicans. It's comforting that way.

MEGAN: Yeah, I get that. So, moving on, want to talk about NOW and the Feminist Majority Foundation going metaphorical balls to the wall to promote Congresswoman Carolyn McCarthy for Clinton's Senate seat?

LATOYA: Why not? Obviously, the dice are lucky.

MEGAN: Because I don't like the idea that a woman's seat ought to be filled by a woman, but McCarthy does have an established record on women's rights issues and is generally cool. But, mostly, I wish to continue pressing the point that Attorney General Andrew Cuomo is an unmitigated casual racist not deserving of elected office but certainly not deserving of an appointment to a lifetime Senate seat by David Paterson, the state's first African-American governor.

LATOYA: Hmm, well, I am not so sure about Cuomo. Then again, I'm only thinking about his record at HUD.

MEGAN: Well, then, there's a question. If you have a good record of doing decent things for the community as a whole while tossing around the phrase "shucking and jiving" in reference to an African-American candidate for the Presidency, followed by a steadfast insistence that it is actually not a racist term after the world notices that you said it, what should a politically active person do? Because I choose to call him a racist and think that he should go fuck himself.

LATOYA: Oh, I wasn't sure about the appointment, not your comment on casual racism. I think his HUD record proves he doesn't care about black people.

MEGAN: Then, yeah, fuck that guy.

LATOYA: But back to the original point, I understand what you're saying about not wanting to do this tit for tat seating thing. But I can understand where NOW is coming from, especially with the whispers of sexism around this bailout committee.

Frank credited the current resistance to doing more about foreclosures to ruffled male feathers. “I think part of the problem now is that, to be honest, Shelia Bair has annoyed the Old Boys Club.” He likened the situation to several regulators “up in the treehouse with a ‘No Girls Allowed’ sign.”

MEGAN: I know! I could not believe that shit when I heard it from Moe. I was like, wait, the new Democratic Treasury Secretary is mad about the (technically independent) FDIC chair telling Bush to go fuck himself while she's trying to save Real Americans?

LATOYA: Pretty much. Just call it the "Fuck that bitch" doctrine. She is showing people up so she has got to go.

MEGAN: Also, I think saying that she has to go is akin to when McCain said he would fire Chris Cox at the SEC. I mean, it's their fucking government, you think they could learn who is supposed to be independent — and therefore given a term — and who is supposed to be a sycophant. Tim Geithner either needs to say a bunch more stupid shit so Obama withdraws his name, or get his head screwed on straight. Yo, Tim, you can throw all the money you want at Wall Street and get them to lower interest rates, but if no one has a fucking house in 2 years, the economy is still going to be fucked, and that's what Sheila Bair is trying to prevent, you dumb cunt.

LATOYA: I think prevention is a dirty word to some people. Kind of reminds them of socialism.

MEGAN: But the Republicans promised that we were electing a dirty socialist! They promised!

LATOYA: The Republicans are promising a lot of stuff, but one hand doesn't know what the other hand is doing. Like this rift between the religious right and the ...um...regular right.

MEGAN: This part is kind of awesome.

Ponnuru acknowledges that social conservatives “could present themselves more attractively,” and “pick their spokesmen more wisely.”

No, asshole, at the end of the day, you're still advocating for a fucking theocracy and I am gonna notice no matter how much you pay for Sarah Palin's stylists.

LATOYA: She even used the term Oogedy-Boodgey.

First, to the origins. “Oogedy-boogedy” was bequeathed to me several years ago by my dear, departed friend, political cartoonist Doug Marlette. We were doubtless talking about our shared Southern heritage, about which one does not speak long without mentioning religion.

And, you betcha, oogedy-boogedy.

Marlette, whose childhood was spent among Pentecostals, Baptists, and other passionate believers, had religion in his bones and forgot more scripture than most preachers can recall on a given Sunday. He also won a Pulitzer Prize for his lampooning of Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker (peace be upon them) and their “PTL Club.”

If Jim and Tammy Faye put you in mind of oogedy-boogedy, you’re getting warm.

Now, I'm going to be saying Oogedy Boogedy all day.

MEGAN: And, Republican dudes, if you can't figure out what it means, I don't think you get to call me an Un-Real American anymore.

LATOYA: Rick Warren, talking about capping foreign leaders because the bible says so? Oogedy Boogedy!

MEGAN: Also, how is the world not fucking scared of that shit? Spencer said it best: if it was a Muslim preacher saying on national TV abroad that the Koran says they need to suicide bomb us, we would be flipping the fuck out. But a white guy? No, that's cool.

LATOYA: Selective memory. Side effect of the oogedy boogedy.

MEGAN: So, is the oogedy-boogedy something you catch from the Bible, or from other Jeebus-freaks?

LATOYA: Apparently, the bible is OK. It's the freak part that leads to the oogedy boogedy. There have been other strange happenings as well, outside of religion. Like Michelle Malkin talking sense.

MEGAN: Michelle Malkin has been talking some sense on and off again all year and it is sort of freaking me the fuck out in general.

LATOYA: She's done this a couple times before. I'm always kind of shocked, because I can't reconcile a sensible column with the author of "In Defense of Internment." I don't know whether to read or avoid. On her worst days, she makes me want to put my eyes out, Oedipus style, so I do not have to see what senselessness has wrought. But on other days, I wonder if I should move her and Kathleen Parker into regular rotation.

MEGAN: Is it terribly condescending to think that Malkin grew up a little? That after wallowing around in all that scary, informed-only-by-fear filth she sort of looked around at her compatriots, commenters and ass-kissers and thought to herself, damn, these people are crazy?

LATOYA: Then again, we both now she is one "banana cream pie"column (that link is NSFW) away from being in they "why did I ever think we could hang" category. And speaking of even more crazy shit — do you know they are trying to challenge Obama's citizenship?

MEGAN: I am hoping the problem is not just that other wannabe columnists have not decided to out-Malkin Malkin by being crazier, thus making her seem less insane in the process. Yeah, dude, that is some crazytown fucking shit. There are suits claiming the birth certificate is fake, and others claiming that because his father wasn't American, he doesn't qualify.

LATOYA: Remember that Colbert Report segment on Obama going to this crazy foreign nation of Hawaii? Yeah, someone must have forgotten the Colbert Report isn't real news.

MEGAN: Dude! If only! Actually, they are claiming that his mother actually gave birth to him in Kenya but faked that it happened in Hawai'i.

LATOYA: I mean, damn, the birth certificate is online. Hawaii published a column announcing it. WTF?

MEGAN: In this alterna-universe, claiming Hawai'i doesn't count is actually less cray-cray than what they are really claiming. They claim that all that stuff has been faked, as though he's an actual Manchurian candidate.

LATOYA: Oh wait, are you talking about that guy who is suing "the "Peoples Association of Human, Animals Conceived God/s and Religions, John McCain (and) USA Govt." The plaintiff previously sought to sue Wikipedia and "All News Media." Or is he just some fresh crazy? And Clarence Thomas picked up this lawsuit, to presumably dismiss it, which is making blogger like Karynthia get pissed off for having to defend him.

MEGAN: Dude, Alan Keyes filed one of the lawsuits. There are multiple strains of crazy at work.

LATOYA: I expected that. Do you want to talk about terrorism crazy now, or international government crazy?

MEGAN: Oh, it's so hard to decide. I was going to say that we should read what the nanny of the Jewish toddler said about rescuing him because it's sort of awesome in a We-Are-The-World kind of way that transcends race, but we can stick with crazy.

"First thing is that a baby is very important for me and this baby is something very precious to me and that's what made me just not think anything — just pick up the baby and run," Samuel said.

"When I hear gunshot, it's not one or 20. It's like a hundred gunshots," she added. "Even I'm a mother of two children so I just pick up the baby and run. Does anyone think of dying at the moment when there's a small, precious baby?"

LATOYA: I applaud that woman. I am also giving a half-hearted applause to Condi for calling out Mugabe and his general douchbagginess toward his people. The applause is half hearted because we only selectively seek to remove dictators that are screwing with us. Or, rather, standing in the way of something we want.

MEGAN: Right, although, if we're giving Condi a golf clap, we probably have to shout out Raila Odinga, the Kenyan PM, who sorta beat her to the punch on that.

LATOYA: He gets full applause.

MEGAN: I mean, Odinga even beat South African President Kgalema Motlanthe, who probably could have done it as his first act in office or something.

LATOYA: Meanwhile, our neighbors to the South have crazy drug war drama and our neighbors to the North have crazy Parliament drama. Is it just me, or are global current events starting to read like The Days of Our Lives?

MEGAN: OMG, Latoya, seriously, I used to watch Days of Our Lives sort of obsessively. And by sort of obsessively, I mean, once upon a time I stood in line at the mall to get an autography from and picture with Matthew Ashford. That I still have.

LATOYA: And your verdict is?

MEGAN: Days of Our Lives once featured a plot line in which Marlena, possessed by the actual devil wreaked havoc on Salem. I think it's a valid comparison to world events.

LATOYA: Hahahahahahahha — true! I'm about to go get some breakfast (Mocha Hut!) but I did want to leave with this gem. The ignored truth about Iraq is contained in an old ass booklet.

Republished in 2008 by Dark Horse Publications, the tiny booklet for troops heading to protect the Persian Gulf’s oilfields and supply routes is a pronunciation, cultural and religious survival manual whose wisdom applies to Iraq (i-RAHK) during the era of the Toyota pickup truck and Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia as much as to the age of the camel and the Luftwaffe.

“Show respect to all older persons,” writes the anonymous author.

“American success or failure in Iraq may well depend on whether the Iraqis (as the people are called) like American soldiers or not. It may not be quite that simple. But then again it could.”

MEGAN: Sigh.

LATOYA: The book is so old that Muslim is still spelled Moslem and Israel doesn't exist yet (while Iran is a footnote) and yet, the advice is still kind of pertinent.

MEGAN:

“You aren’t going to Iraq to change the Iraqis. Just the opposite.”

LATOYA: Alright — I am out. Pumpkin chai and salmon cake on a bagel, here I come. Thanks, Megan for a fun week, and thanks Jezzies, for the fun conversations. (And pics! Loved that!)

• Barack Obama's economic plan is out and it has: $3,000 tax credit to businesses for hiring new people; penalty-free access to your retirement savings; the elimination of taxes on unemployment benefits; more money for automakers (of course); and a 90-day moratorium on foreclosures. Like Kix, it's kid-tested and mother-approved. [NY Times]
• McCain's got his plans, too, which include: Obama's no-tax unemployment benefits; a reduction in your capital gains tax as though your stock has gained in value since you bought it; and tax breaks for only old people on tapping their retirement savings. I mean, I guess that is his main constituency, but still. [Washington Post]
• Speaking of McCain's core constituency, someone else yelled "Kill him!" at a Palin rally today. [Politico]
• And if we want to talk about who is pallin' around at terrorists, someone should ask why the head of McCain's transition team was pallin' around with Saddam Hussein. Fair's fair, folks. [Washington Independent]

• Sarah Palin told Rush Limbaugh she was "nothing to lose" these days, so she plans to continue her ill-founded attacks on Obama rather than talking about the issues she keeps mixing up the talking points about. [Huffington Post]
• Christopher Buckley, conservative son of National Review founder William F. Buckley, Jr., announced that he was going to be voting for Barack Obama given John McCain's being a big dick now and not acting like a small government conservative, so the National Review told him to piss off because differing opinions aren't welcome in the GOP these days. Just ask Kathleen Parker. [Daily Beast, Daily Beast]
• To Buckley's point, McCain's campaign found yet another area of government spending they don't really intend to subject to a freeze when they take office. If you're keeping track, it's now defense spending, homeland security spending, veterans spending and science spending that they're not going to freeze, but there are still 3 weeks until the elections. [The Hill]
• And, by the way, the bailout plan is no longer voluntary for banks. Nine so far have been told they will be participating in it. Nothing like a little nationalizing power to make a Republican Treasury Secretary forget his free market "principles." [Washington Post]

Earlier: The Wheels Come Off Sarah Palin's Not-So-Straight Talk Express

The use of the word "feminist" in reference to Palin has gotten so out of hand that even uber-conservative Kathleen Parker of the National Review, a woman who calls the mainstream feminist movement the "hirsute, Birkenstock-wearing sisterhood," admits that "to express reservations about [Palin's] qualifications to be vice president — and possibly president — is to risk being labeled anti-woman." As I've noted before, questioning Sarah Palin's "feminism" is a losing battle, because she probably thinks she is one.

The dictionary definition of feminism is "the doctrine advocating social, political, and all other rights of women equal to those of men," and in her own fractured way, I'm sure Palin believes she upholds this doctrine. And many many people believe that the fight for equality has already been reached, and we're in a "post-feminist" era — to which Gloria Steinem says, "I’ll know that we’re getting someplace when I go into Central Park and see white men wheeling babies of color and getting well paid for it. There is no postfeminism—it’s like saying 'post-democracy'!" Feminism has been declared over by some, its meaning co-opted by pretty much anyone with the proper genetic equipment, regardless of their actions or actual beliefs. The word itself is so maligned and misinterpreted that it's almost ceased to mean anything at all, and many women, particularly women of color, feel abandoned and ignored by the mainstream feminist movement. So perhaps instead of declaring the feminist movement dead, or pretending its goals have been accomplished, maybe it's time for a new word entirely and a more precise definition.

The word would include the notion that being pro-female does not just mean benefiting from the feminist movement, as Sarah Palin undeniably has. As Katha Pollitt notes in the Guardian today, "The glass ceiling is the invisible barrier of gender prejudice that prevents women, as a class, from rising to the level that their qualifications and abilities merit – the level they would reach if they were men…As has been known to happen in less exalted workplaces, Palin got the promotion because the boss just liked her. She will do no more to shatter the glass ceiling for other women as a group than such women usually do." The new word could be for women who actively promote the advancement of the interests of other women, not just the narcissistic advancement of themselves. I don't have any great branding ideas for the new movement's name — "womanist" is already taken and it sounds painfully retro; "community organizer" is also unfortunately taken. What about wombanist? Hmm, that sounds too close to wombat. Cuntrarians? Catchy, but the MSM probably won't print it. If you have any clever names for the new movement, we're all ears.

In Conversation: Gloria Steinem and Suheir Hammad [NYM]
The End Of Meritocracy [Guardian]
Palin Problem [National Review]

Earlier: Sarah Palin's Feminism Is Irrelevant To Her Irresponsible Record
Sarah Palin: Feminist? Victim Of Sexist Smears? Or All Or None Of The Above?

The National Review's Kathleen Parker, who we've already invited to move to Thailand, calls for Palin to drop out for the good of the party and the country. Naturally, she also says that all liberal feminists are part of a "hirsute, Birkenstock-wearing sisterhood" — because, naturally, a feminist would never wear cute shoes or trim her bush, let alone shave her legs — but her point is that Sarah Palin is rather obviously out of her league in this contest. After watching Palin's interviews with Charlee Gibson, Sean Hannity and Katie Couric, Parker's response is: "If BS were currency, Palin could bail out Wall Street herself." Ouch.

Then there's the New York Times "Editorial Observer" column, which takes Sarah Palin to task for the little rape kit thing she's refusing to talk about. Writer Dorothy Samuels comes to basically the same conclusion that I did — that Palin must have known, and that she did it in an orgy of Republican-y cost-cutting that Samuels calls "boneheaded." Samuels compares that to Joe Biden's sponsorship of the Violence Against Women Act, which Samuels notes contained "provisions to make states ineligible for federal grant money if they charged rape victims for exams and the kits containing the medical supplies needed to conduct them." As far as Samuels is concerned, the voters deserve an explanation.

And as if that isn't enough, today, the Washington Post reports that Palin took $25,000 in gifts from various interests groups with issues before the legislature, causing the campaign to not respond with a denial (of course) and The Guardian digs into the nasty anti-Semitic leanings of the preachers and speakers at Palin's church. So, for the end of this week, Palin's an unqualified Republican who takes bribes, doesn't like Jews and is enthralled with cost-cutting to the point of amorality. That's not a good day.

Worst Of Sarah Palin's Katie Couric Interview (So Far) [Gawker]
More Painful Palin Excerpts From Couric Interview [Daily Kos]
Palin Problem [National Review]
Wasilla Watch: Sarah Palin and the Rape Kits [New York Times]
Palin Accepted $25,000 in Gifts, Alaska Records Show [Washington Post]
Palin's Preacher Problem [The Guardian]

So: Parker's "thesis," such as it is, is that, as the mother of sons, she's finally realized how much feminism has made everyone — including men — hate men. They're either all abusers or bumbling fools or feminized emo hipsters. The fact that women have had and raised children without fathers around is totally evidence of how we hate men and not how men have in many cases decided not to take responsibility for their half of the parenting equation but WHATEVER, that ruins her thesis about how it's all our fault.

At the same time that men have been ridiculed in the public sphere, the importance of fatherhood has been diminished, along with other traditionally male roles of father, protector and provider, which are incredibly viewed as regressive manifestations of an outmoded patriarchy.

Also, according to Parker, we're always trying to fix so-called "masculine traits": traits she identifies as "honour, courage, valour and loyalty" that are completely lacking in women even after feminism because women are dishonorable, cowardly and disloyal and they tend to use two words that mean the same thing right in a row.

Although most people thought Parker was crazy to write a book about saving men, she says:

Once people actually read the book, they're surprised to see all the dots; once they connect them, they want to move Thailand.

Because, really, Thailand is a super-great role model for appropriate gender relations!

Unsurprisingly, Parker doesn't believe women should ever serve in a combat capacity and that we should all recognize innate differences between men and women (and she's not talking about the ability to pee standing up or bear children, but certain "special gifts".) Speaking of special, she has some really charming ideas about transgendered people that need to be shared and understood:

Factually, however, the pregnant "man" was really a pregnant woman who mutilated herself and grew a beard. She kept her reproductive organs, had her breasts removed and took male hormones.

She also thinks all our gender problems would be solved if we kept people sex-segregated until the age of 30. I'd say we could start with her, but then I'd have to listen to her some more. Maybe isolation is the key. Can we isolate her?

Q & A With Kathleen Parker [Time]
Save The Males [Real Clear Politics]
Save The Males! A New Book Says Society Is Biased AGAINST Men. Ridiculous? Hardly, Says Amanda Platell [Daily Mail]

The fact is that when I see a woman who is attractive (or dressed attractively, which is not necessarily the same thing), I know that she isn't being attractive for my enjoyment. She is not a thing for me to use. She's a human being, doing her own thing.

Feminism is damn sexy on a man.

Save Boys From Tween Tramps! [Salon]
Begone Wanton Trollops! [Shakesville]