Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN)
Thank you, Rep. Marsha Blackburn. Please never change. Appearing on
Meet the Press, the Tennessee Republican spoke strongly about
what she, as a woman, wants in the workplace—and it sure isn't pay equity laws.
REP. BLACKBURN: I’d say we need to be the great opportunity party. That’s what GOP needs.
MR. AXELROD: How about pay equity laws to ensure that women are treated fairly in the workplace?
REP. BLACKBURN: I think that more important than that it is making certain that women are recognized by those companies. You know, I’ve always said I wasn’t—I didn’t want to be given a job because I was a female. I wanted it because I was the most well-qualified person for the job. And making certain that companies are going to move forward in that vein, that is what women want.
That's quite a set of rhetorical pivots away from the idea that women should be, and might even want to be, paid fairly. Women should be recognized! But not by equal pay! And apparently, far more pressing to Blackburn than the fact that women are paid less than men is the idea that women might be hired just for being women. (Because that's such a valued thing in our feminist-dominated society? I think that's the implication?) Forget the pervasive pattern that affects tens of millions of women throughout their lives, let's be clear that Marsha Blackburn does not want to oppress men. Not one single solitary hypothetical man. (The funny thing is, pay equity would actually eliminate a financial incentive for companies to hire women. Making sure that hiring women wasn't any cheaper than hiring men would be a good way to keep women from being given jobs just because they're women, wouldn't it?)
Oh, but she went on:
GREGORY: What about…
REP. BLACKBURN: They don’t want the decisions made in Washington. They want to be able to have the power and the control and the ability to make those decisions themselves.
Uhhh, whut? Women want to make the decisions themselves about what their employers pay them? Maybe so, but that ain't the way it works. Women don't want the decision made in Washington that they should be able to find out if their employers are breaking existing equal pay laws or have a better chance at enforcing those laws? Yeah, no. Nice try at making it out like women are the ones who stand to lose power here, but it's dead obvious that the people whose power and control and ability to make these decisions Blackburn is actually protecting here are employers. Specifically, employers who want to discriminate against women by paying them less than men.
Which is kind of symbolically perfect for a line of conversation that started when Republican Latino outreach specialist Ana Navarro said "We as Republicans have got to do a much better job to attract women."