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Sam -- thanks for the reference. I took a look at the article and found it lacking in detail, insofar as explaining the groupings of people.  It may be a perfectly valid survey, but I can't tell by the information they gave.  And I don't quite see how you come to the conclusion that you did.

I'm pretty much going by the reactions and discussions of women in my life and in the media. And my general impression is that this has certainly gotten women's attention, specifically young women who paritcularly react against men telling them what to do.

And as the discussion continues, it becomes more apparent to everyone that this is not a simple issue of religeous conviction. I think people generally are fine with people not being required to do things against thier personal religious beliefs  -- until it steps on our own toes.  When your religious belief makes my life more difficult, then I start paying more attention.

Hazel -- if you as a woman are not interested in the contraceptive issue, you are in a very small group.

And there is no basis in fact for your  assertions that the President is waging a war on women.  Maybe you need to try better sources for your information.

It took a long time for me to admit, to actually say the words -- I am a pacifist. In our world, pacifists are seen as weird, not very smart. Our society accepts violence as inevitable. Someday maybe, one by one, we all will understand that violence doesn't work and abandon it as a solution.
Being committed to pacifism has changed both the way I think and the way I act. Yes, it may result in my being the victim of someone else's violence, but that is not inevitable. I am always reminded of the young lady in Georgia who subdued a violent killer who was on a rampage a few years ago. She had no weapon, only her love of the Lord and compassion for this man. After many hours he was captured without a shot being fired.

It's about where our priorities are. Unfortunately, entertainment tops the list again.

So we should compensate people by ranking the danger of thier jobs? Last time I saw a list of most dangerous jobs, convenience store clerk ranked very close to the top. Then there are miners, loggers, police, fire fighters, soldiers. We are seeing thousands of soldiers coming home with injuries that will last a life time.

Unless these folks are immensely stupid, it sure looks like they were trying to pick a fight. It doesn't speak well of thier beliefs if they think this kind of tactic will convince anyone that their beliefs are worthy of consideration. I have never known anyone who succeeded in convincing anyone of the righteousness of their point of view using such tactics.

The only thing Rush apologized for was the use of the words "slut" and ";prostitute".  He has yet to acknowledge that his 3 day rant against Ms. Fluke was inappropriate in any way. And he has continued with a rant agains another young lady who wrote a book about the food industry  -- he called her a single, white  overeducated female -- as though that is the lowest thing one could be.   He appears to have learned nothing and has certainly not changed his attacks on women.

I am not familiar with the complaint against Bill Maher. I will tune in when he is talking politics, since his political satire is generally humorous. But his ridicule of those who beleive in God really is offensive, so that's when I hit the remote.I think he loses credibility with a lot of people when he does that. I don't know if he has anywhere near the following that Rush does.  Maybe it's just a different kind of audience.

Conservatives who view major networks and certain PAC's as an extension of the administration probably do so because Fox and the conservative PACs became powerful as such extensions in the Bush administration.  The problem is that things just don't work the same on the progressive/liberal side.  There is no scripted ;policy  that progressives are to follow.  By it's nature, progessive movements tend to be diverse rather than homogenaic.  In other words, disagreement among progressives is normal.

I think the Paster is reflecting a natural part of ageing. As our bodies slow down, we become more aware of what is around us and we shed a lot of ways of living that are no longer possible or desireable. Thankfully he is able to present it in a very positive and understandable way that can impact all of us.
I am reminded of a Tolstoy parable in which the lesson was that the most important thing to do is that which needs to be done, the most important person is the one who is right in front of you. IT perhaps takes a few decades of stops and starts to get the hang of it. It is about being in the moment. I am convinced that the the Lord has things worked out so that we are often presented with the very thing that needs doing or the very person that needs befriending. When we have our heads full of big things we need to do, places to go and people to see we miss a lot of these little opportunities to just be or do what is in front of us. Our plans need to give way to His plans.

Sam -- No one is forcing anyone to take contraceptives.  It's about paying for insurance that provides contraceptive coverage.  It is not the church that is offering the coverage, it is the insurance company. So it is about paying for something the church is against.  The church would have a better argument if they were self-insured.   

Just to clarify -- preventing pregnancy is not always the reason for taking birth control pills. There are other physical problems that are aleviated by the pill. And that is precisely what Mr. Fluke was talking about. But to me the larger issue is taking away a woman's right to access health care.  

There are many things the government or insurance companies do that are against my personal religious beliefs, yet I get no exemption from paying taxes and premiums that go to those things.  

And I see no complaint by the Catholic Church or any other religious organization against providing coverage for male birth control expenses.

I have also been looking for some sort of reaction from the right and have found nothing other than the kind of lukewarm comments you described. So many just act like it's a matter of Rush using the "s" word. They either don't get it or don't care, perhaps because the target was not a conservative.
And it is clear that Rush has no regrets and has learned nothing. His latest rant is against a young woman who wrote a book about the food business after interviewing people in various areas of food production in the USA. He condemned her for being a single, white overeducated woman. Kind of looks like he has lost it. An example of what happens when you let anger and hatred rule your decisions.

Michelle --I agree with your observation of the actions of Tea Party Members. At least when they first came about, they were much more obvious in their racist expressions.  I expect the people in charge have made it clear that this kind of overt racism would be destructive. 

The conservatives that I have known over the last several decades have generally leaned toward being racist. Some struggled against those ideas which I suspect they had learned from an early age.  I used to own a business in a first ring suburb which was largely occupied by people who had fled the city in the sixties when discrimination in real estate became illegal and all of a sudden white people felt threatened that non-blonds would move in next door.  It was called white flight.  I was astounded at how many of them felt free to express thier racist notions even decades later.   Ironically, the property values in the neighborhoods they had fled had increased significantly and at a rate far in excess of the property values in the suburbs.  These suburbanites could not afford to move back into the homes they had fled years earlier. And they were upset about it!  l just love poetic justice.