Obituary: Phyllis Schlafly

Longtime right-wing activist and author Phyllis Schlafly, 92, has died. She first got notoriety when she self-published a book called A Choice, Not an Echo, which has been credited with getting Barry Goldwater elected president.

Seriously, after the loss of her hero, she organized a group called Eagle Forum, and she was credited with defeating the proposed Equal Rights Amendment, thanks to the idiots in Congress giving the amendment a time limit on when it could be amended.

I wrote some time ago about how I got a book from a local book exchange, a critical book of Schlafly called Sweetheart of the Silent Majority, which Schlafly herself actually signed and not the author of the book. I thought it was funny she did that.

Photos of the book and autograph in question:

Snip:

“America has lost a great stateswoman, and we at Eagle Forum and among the conservative movement have lost a beloved friend and mentor, who taught and inspired so many to fight the good fight in defense of American values,” said Eunie Smith, Eagle Forum’s First Vice President in a statement. “I have personally lost a dear friend of over forty years.”

She earned a Bachelor of Arts degree from Washington University in 1944 — her masters from Radcliffe College in 1945 — and a J.D. from Washington University in 1978.

Schlafly’s organization has been split this presidential election — Schlafly supported Donald Trump, though many board members disagreed. She maintained her leadership of the organization.

An Echo, Not a Choice

After years and years of being in well-deserved obscurity, wingnut extraordinaire Phyllis Schlafly, around 90 years old, is back to her old rhetoric about how if these uppity women have the nerve to make as much as men, they will find themselves unable to find husbands.

I am thinking old Fred, her late attorney husband, must not have left her all that much money when he died. She had been relatively quiet after her successful campaign to derail the Equal Rights Amendment in the early 1980s. Now she's back, but nowadays her sexist rhetoric just sounds pathetic.

Few women have ever have glittering careers like she did; in fact, the only real economic equality that has happened in this country between men and women in the past 40 years is that they are now both equally poor. That's directly due to the rise in neoliberal ideas which undercut unions and the concept of a family wage. Schlafly, of course, despises unions.

As a little girl I remember Phyllis Schlafly, a political activist from way, way back, as the woman who singlehandedly got Senator Barry Goldwater elected president in 1964 with her book, A Choice, Not an Echo.

Etc.

Yet another southern Oregon person has won a major contest, or, in this case, sweepstakes.

This guy won the Publishers Clearing House sweepstakes where the top prize was $5,000 a week for life PLUS $5,000 a week for life for another person.

I wish him the best of luck. I wish I could get something like that, but I probably can never do it.
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Phyllis Schlafly, close to 90 years old, is still out there raising a ruckus. This time she is furious over a hypothetical "joke" Republican operative Karl Rove told about Todd Akin being murdered. The "joke" was a reference to all kinds of conspiracy theories especially popular among Democrats that Karl Rove was involved in this or that even if he wasn't.

Schlafly called on Rove to resign over his Akin remarks. Presumably she is referring to Rove resigning from his PAC.
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Dinesh D'Souza, a think tank right-winger who has a new movie out about the "real Obama," gets skewered royal.

Dinesh pulls all kinds of nonsense out of his ass. It's laughable because Obama probably is closer in ideology to Dinesh than to traditional Democratic ideals.
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So how did Clint do it? Or, more to the point, how in the hell did the Romney campaign allow Clint to get up there on national television and make a fool out of himself?

Behind the scenes, Mr. Eastwood’s convention cameo was cleared by Mr. Romney’s top message mavens, Russ Schriefer and Stuart Stevens, who drew up talking points that Mr. Eastwood included, in his own way. They gave him a time limit and flashed a blinking red light that told him his time was up. He ignored both. The actor’s decision to use a chair as a prop was last-minute, and his own.

“The prop person probably thought he was going to sit in it,” a baffled senior aide said on Thursday night.

Mr. Eastwood’s rambling and off-color appearance just moments before the biggest speech of Mr. Romney’s life instantly became a Twitter and cable-news sensation, which drowned out much of the usual postconvention analysis that his campaign had hoped to bask in.

It also startled and unsettled Mr. Romney’s top advisers and prompted a blame game among them. “Not me,” an exasperated-looking senior adviser said when asked who was responsible for Mr. Eastwood’s speech. In interviews, aides called the speech “strange” and “weird.” One described it as “theater of the absurd.”

That's putting it mildly.

Miscellaneous News.

Right-wing stalwart Phyllis Schlafly received such a warm welcome when she received an honorary degree from Washington University in St. Louis.

Some applauded while Schlafly was hooded. But about a third of the graduating students draped in the school’s green and black robes turned their backs to her, along with some faculty members sitting on the stage behind her. Many family members in the audience also took part.

Three faculty members made the extra point of walking off the stage and then turning their backs from the audience.

One of the protesters was Darla Dale, an assistant dean and a faculty marshal at the ceremony. Dale said she decided to participate after making sure the protest was intended to remain respectful.

Dale said she strongly disagrees with Schlafly’s views on the role of women in society as well as with her work to defeat the Equal Rights Amendment. And students encouraged her to join them.

"It felt good," Dale said of turning her back.

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Incredibly,

hard-right veteran Phyllis Schlafly makes a great deal of sense writing about the fact a college education is being oversold as the ticket to finding jobs.

Who'd have thought she would be correct?