Of course, I’m talking about the thirty Republican Senators who voted against Al Franken’s Anti-Rape Immunity Legislation Bill. I truly find this unbelievable. This bill will allow our government to withhold defense contracts for companies “if they restrict their employees from taking workplace sexual assault, battery and discrimination cases to court,” according to the originator of the bill, Al Franken (D-MN).
In addition, Franken (speaking from the Senate floor) said:
The constitution gives everybody the right to due process of law. …And today, defense contractors are using fine print in their contracts to deny women like Jamie Leigh Jones their day in court. …The victims of rape and discrimination deserve their day in court. Congress plainly has the constitutional power to make that happen.Jamie Leigh Jones worked for Halliburton/KBR and was gang raped by her fellow employees while she was working for the corporation in Iraq. She was not allowed to bring charges in court against the corporation because of her employment contract. It stated that private arbitration was her only means of redress.
This is such a no-brainer. How on Earth can ANYONE not allow persons full redress for criminal atrocities committed against them? This is one of the most horrible crimes that can be committed against anyone. It is against the state and federal law. Corporate contracts should have nothing to do with it. I would love to get inside the mind of those who came up with the original thought that criminal behavior can be decided by the corporate hierarchy. Pretty sick.
Yet, here we are, thirty of our “august” Senators believing (at least according to their votes) that a rape victim can’t have a day in court, that she/he must rely on the corporate powers-that-be to “arbitrate” the “dispute.” Amazing.
Rape is a criminal act. It must be addressed in a criminal court, and if found guilty the perpetrators should be punished to the full extent of the law. A person’s life is forever changed after a sexual assault. We should not allow the victims to be victimized a second time by a good-old-boys system of justice.
Personally, I think that these 30 are so bought by the multinational corporations that they must vote for the Corporate Entity regardless of the harm the corporate structure will commit against another human being. That is so tragic, and an excellent example of just what’s wrong with our country and our representatives.
It appears to me that the “Captains of Industry” would love to wrest judicial control away from our government and perform their own Roy Bean “justice,” somewhat similar to the military courts martial. A sort of, “We know how to discipline our employees, not the government” mentality. “Our ‘laws’ are separate and apart from your ‘laws.’”
These thirty senators need to be ousted at the next available opportunity. I really hope that their opponents in their next elections will hammer this particular issue to the electorate to such an extent that these despicable creatures never be allowed to decide the fate of another human being.
One Senator I would like to point out in particular. Senator John McCain of Arizona. He ran for President of the United States! Here is a man who ran for the most powerful position in the world, a position that is the representative of ALL the people of the United States, and he has the audacity to advocate the marginalization of rape victims to the mercy of corporate arbitration? Wow!
I am including his and the other Senators’ names in this post. I want the names to be burned into the hearts and minds of every decent human being in order that they can be vilified wherever they go. If they are willing to put money in their pockets before common decency, they do not deserve to be holding any office whatsoever. Personally, I think they should be sentenced to a lifetime of working in a rape crisis center and see just what a tragedy rape is to a human being. Fie on them all!
Alexander (R-TN)
Barrasso (R-WY)
Bond (R-MO)
Brownback (R-KS)
Bunning (R-KY)
Burr (R-NC)
Chambliss (R-GA)
Coburn (R-OK)
Cochran (R-MS)
Corker (R-TN)
Cornyn (R-TX)
Crapo (R-ID)
DeMint (R-SC)
Ensign (R-NV)
Enzi (R-WY)
Graham (R-SC)
Gregg (R-NH)
Inhofe (R-OK)
Isakson (R-GA)
Johanns (R-NE)
Kyl (R-AZ)
McCain (R-AZ)
McConnell (R-KY)
Risch (R-ID)
Roberts (R-KS)
Sessions (R-AL)
Shelby (R-AL)
Thune (R-SD)
Vitter (R-LA)
Wicker (R-MS)
