By Dan Calabrese ——Bio and Archives--May 23, 2014
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It doesn't take a neurosurgeon to work out what Democrats are doing to Monica Wehby in Oregon. It's more useful to realize they are doing it precisely because she is a neurosurgeon -- a successful female one, to be precise. Dr. Wehby, a 52-year-old pediatric specialist, won the Oregon Republican primary Tuesday and will face Democratic Sen. Jeff Merkley in November. She won despite planted, pre-primary media hits that detailed police "incident" reports from her divorce and from a later breakup. The Oregonian discovered at least one of these reports was first requested from police by a researcher for the Democratic Party of Oregon. Jamal Raad, spokesman for that organization, used to work for Mr. Merkley and this week rejoined his team. The reports themselves don't merit much comment, beyond pointing out the willingness of the national press to sensationalize some trivial moments in Dr. Wehby's private life. A Politico story about Dr. Wehby in 2013 visiting the house (to which she had a key) of a boyfriend who wasn't returning her calls was run under the headline: "Oregon Senate Hopeful Accused of Stalking Boyfriend." Never mind that the story (at the end) quoted the boyfriend, a businessman, as saying he had been "emotional," regretted calling the police, and that they remain friends. A story about how the man she was divorcing, Jim Grant, called in 2007 to complain that she had "slapped" him with a note pad (she denied it and police acknowledged that the "slight red dot" on his face might have been a "zit") was run under headlines in numerous papers about Dr. Wehby's "harassment" of Mr. Grant. Never mind (again) that Mr. Grant now lives four doors from her, donated to her campaign, and calls her a "good friend."By the way, the writer here is Kim Strassel, another uppity woman who doesn't buy the left-wing orthodoxy about an entire gender that needs to march in lockstep behind its big government benefactors. Watch out, Kim! Serious question: In the political arena, are past relationship dramas the same kind of factor for men as for women? If it's fair game to flyspeck Monica Wehby's past breakups (even though they're obviously making a lot out of very little here), is it OK to, say, question the fitness of a married guy who screws around with a 21-year-old intern in his office and then encourages his political team to hang her out to dry to save his own #? Or is it OK, to, oh, I don't know, question the stability of a guy who writes a supposedly biographical book referencing a past girlfriend and then admits that the supposed girlfriend was actually a "composite"? Or do we only attack women, specifically Republican women, for their past relationship dramas because it shows us that women can be, let's see . . . Emotional? Irrational? Vindictive? I'm just trying to understand how things work around here. Monica Wehby sure comes across as a nightmare type of Republican if you look at it from the Democrats' perspective. Put her in the Senate and she's going to be able to share lots of horror stories like this one. And it's her fault for not being a loyal subject to the sisterhood. Vote for the party that wages war on women who deserve it!
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Dan Calabrese’s column is distributed by HermanCain.com, which can be found at HermanCain
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