Maternity french leave

And, no, RtO did not mean to say "French maternity leave," which we hear is a pretty good deal for moms and babies. Word apparently has not filtered out to the scablands of eastern Washington state that if you stand tall for 'Murrica, the Internets are going to scrutinize you. Thus we have Rep. Cathy Rodgers who, despite being the highest-ranking woman Republican in the House leadership team is not so well known at large. She gave the response to the State of the Union last night, and it was the most vapid political speech I have ever heard. I speak as someone who was paid to listen to political speeches for 45 years and spent many long hours listening to Wayne Nishiki. Apparently, the Republicans could not find any one willing to go public on policy ideas. But that is just by way of a setup. Rep. Rodgers is fecund, and while her party has not usually been favorable toward funny 'Yurpeean ideas about family leave, Rep. Rodgers got a sweet deal. It appears that during her pregnancies and new motherhoods, she just quit going to work. She missed

41% of House votes during the time span of having babby number 1, 77% during the time span of having babby number 2, and 21% when she brought babby the third into the world.

It is not recorded that she declined to accept her $174,000-a-year salary while lollygagging about the house (not the House) with the babies. The Republican advocate of rising through hard work seems pretty work-shy now,too.

She’s no champ at showing up when she is not giving birth either, with a vote absence rate nearly triple that of the average.

All in all, Rep. Rodgers seems like a near-perfect role model for the party of "I got mine," and I commend the GOP for its forthrightness in making her story known to a wider circle of 'Murricans than hitherto. Evidently she is not alone. For the Spanish response to the State of the Union, the party called on Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, who delivered the same speech except "with personal anecdotes or references changed." The differences must have been striking, since Ros-Lehtinen's children are all adults, according to her biography, so no time off for her. Let's see how she stacks up on the roll call roll. Uh oh. Not as much of a slacker as Rodgers but close. UPDATE, FRIDAY JAN. 31 Well, well, well. Didn't I say going before the public would result in greater scrutiny? It turns out Rodgers's speech wasn't as vapid as it sounded. It was really a piece of disinformation theater: Her anecdote about Bette who was screwed by Obamacare was, in a single word, phony. AND ANOTHER UPDATE I have to thank my daughter Kachina for the first one, which she put on Facebook; and Facebook for this one, via its usually obnoxious aggregating scheme. It's a review by an informed local observer of her career, but the factoid I want to pull out of it this:

She’s been on a state or federal payroll since graduating from Pensacola Christian College, in the early 1990s.

And, no, not the fact that she feeds only at the public trough, although that does speak volumes about her, but about that college that she attended, the first that any of her family ever did. Pensacola Christian is not famous like Florida State or Harvard, but it does have a claim to fame, and some readers of RtO may owe RtO for knowing it. Yes, Pensacola Christian is the sponsor of A Beka Books, the hilariously stupid and fraudulent publisher of home-school textbooks. See "Memory hole," my post from Jan. 12 for background and links about that.