March 2, 2012: Republican Official Says Limbaugh’s Attacks on Law Student ‘Insulting,’ ‘A Distraction’

National Republican Senatorial Committee vice-chair Carly Fiorina chastizes talk show Rush Limbaugh for his vilification of Georgetown University law student Sandra Fluke (see February 29, 2012, March 1, 2012, and March 2, 2012), who testified in opposition to a House amendment that would have allowed health care providers to deny contraceptive coverage and other health care necessities if they had religious or moral objections (see March 1, 2012). Fiorina says that Limbaugh’s characterization of Fluke as a “slut” and a “prostitute” is “insulting… incendiary, and most of all, it’s a distraction… from what are very real and important issues.” Fiorina is a supporter of the Blunt amendment, which Fluke testified against, and which would have allowed health care providers to deny coverage of procedures or prescriptions based on religious or moral objections. “The Senate had an important vote yesterday,” she says. “This is a vote about protecting the conscience clause, which used to have broad bipartisan support. That’s a hugely important issue in this country.” [Politico, 3/2/2012] Conservative blogger and CNN commentator Erick Erickson responds by criticizing Fiorina, who says she should join Limbaugh in attacking Fluke and, by proxy, the Democrats who fought to defeat the Blunt amendment. He agrees that Limbaugh’s language in regards to Fluke is “insulting” and “distracting… but he was using insult and sarcasm to highlight the absurdity of Sandra Fluke and the left’s position, which in a nut shell is they think you, me, and every other American should pay for them to have sex. And while I understand people being offended, I am offended by many of these same people thinking I should be subsidizing what has, for years, been considered a consensual act. They call it ‘women’s health,’ but the language associated with it involves pregnancy and sex. They have, in other words, turned ‘women’s health’ into a euphemism for having sex.… So of course Rush Limbaugh was being insulting. He was using it as a tool to highlight just how absurd the Democrats’ position is on this. It’s what he does and does quite well.” [Erick Erickson, 3/2/2012] Think Progress reporter Alex Seitz-Wald says that Erickson, like Limbaugh, is deliberately misrepresenting Fluke’s position and the position of Congressional Democrats. “Limbaugh and other conservatives like bloggers Erick Erickson and Michelle Malkin (see March 2, 2012) are fabricating the claim that Fluke wants taxpayers to pay for contraception,” Seitz-Wald writes. “That is blatantly f[al]se. Fluke’s testimony, and the entire contraception debate, is about insurance companies paying for contraception as part of their health coverage, the… way they pay for any other medication, such as Viagra. Morevoer, Fluke’s testimony was not about herself, but about a friend who need[s] contraception to fight cancer and other fellow law students.… Meanwhile, Limbaugh apparently doesn’t understand how birth control works. His entire stance is premised on the notion that women need more birth control the more sex they have. Of course, as anyone who has taken an 8th grade sex ed class could inform him, that’s not how it works.” [Think Progress, 3/2/2012]