Tuesday, March 15, 2005

GUNS TRUMP WOMEN IN POLITICAL CORRECTNESS

Isn't it odd that really successful women -- Margaret Thatcher comes to mind -- are NOT acclaimed by feminists if they are conservative? It shows that the real agenda of feminists is only incidentally pro-women. It is really just another flavour of Leftism. It uses women. It does not champion them.

The pistol-packing grandma about to be inducted into the Florida Women's Hall of Fame is the most controversial appointment since its inception 22 years ago. Why? Because Marion Hammer, a squat senior citizen with a soft Southern twang, was the first — and only — female president of the National Rifle Association.

Gun control advocates and women's rights groups are outraged at the selection of Hammer, one of three women Gov. Jeb Bush tapped this year to join writer Zora Neale Hurston, tennis star Chris Evert, former state Education Commissioner Betty Castor and Lt. Gov. Toni Jennings among others "who have made significant improvement of life for women and for all citizens of Florida," according to the Hall of Fame's Web site.

Hammer, who said she never tells anyone how many guns she owns because "it's nobody's business," remains nonplussed. "Isn't that a hoot?" she chuckled when told that the National Organization for Women and others plan to protest her nomination on Monday, the day before the induction ceremony takes place in the Capitol. "Women who are out there trying to promote advancement for women, protesting the recognition of a woman who has broken many glass ceilings," Hammer said. "That's just a hoot."

But women's rights proponents aren't laughing, and neither are gun control activists who call her a "threat to public safety." "Marion Hammer has been a strident advocate for weapons that kill and maim, even assault weapons," said Linda Miklowitz, the outgoing president of the Florida chapter of NOW. "She's an embarrassment to the Women's Hall of Fame." Breaking glass ceilings isn't enough, Miklowitz said, "if it's for negative reasons."

Hammer is a Tallahassee lobbyist who works for the NRA and the Unified Sportsmen of Florida. She also lobbies pro bono for children with learning disabilities, the result of her experiences with her grandson who has severe dyslexia, and she was appointed by former Senate President John McKay to sit on a task force for scholarships for disabled children task....

Attorney General Charlie Crist, who is expected to run for governor in 2006, nominated Hammer and said he doesn't see what all the fuss is all about. "She might be controversial to some people, but not to me," Crist said, adding she is a "freedom fighter who has expanded the freedoms" of Floridians by her advocacy for the Second Amendment. The women who selected Hammer and nine others out of about 80 nominations said Hammer's political philosophy did not enter into their decision.....

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EASTER BUNNY INCORRECT

The Easter Bunny is a vanishing breed. Not that there's a shortage of 6-foot white rabbits carrying baskets of colored eggs. It's just that Mr. Shopping Mall Bunny is becoming more politically correct. The bunny at The Gardens mall Easter egg hunt last weekend — oops, make that just plain "egg hunt" — was called Garden Bunny. "The name just complemented The Gardens of the Palm Beaches," mall Marketing Director Jeannie Roberts said.

Saturday, Baxter the Bunny is available for photos at the Mall at Wellington Green. At Town Center in Boca Raton, Peter Rabbit will hand out goodies and pose for pictures. "Because we're such a multicultural community, it's good just to remain neutral," mall General Manager Sam Hosen said.

Some stick with tradition. The Easter Bunny still appears at the Boynton Beach Mall and at Treasure Coast Square in Jensen Beach. The Palm Beach Mall has no bunny at all. "I suppose the name Easter Bunny is fairly unusual. We have Easter eggs too," Boynton Beach Mall Manager Andrea Horne said. "I know it's probably not the popular thing to call it."

The rabbit's name seems to have little effect on shopping habits. "I'm not really sure how religious the bunny is," The Gardens' Roberts said. She's right. The origin of the Easter Bunny dates to the Anglo-Saxon goddess of spring and fertility, Oestre or Eastre, whose mythical companion was the ultimate symbol of fertility, the hare. Over the centuries the Christian belief in the resurrection of Jesus became entwined with the pagan celebration of the annual rebirth of life each spring. German immigrants brought the Easter rabbit across the Atlantic in the late 1800s, and he's become the secular symbol of the Easter season.

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