WASHINGTON — There is another horripilation on the campaign
trail. Someone has told a joke that has roused the virtue police. I
am speaking of the virtue police, who are working for the grim
forces of political correctitude. They do not find the joke very
funny. The jokester is a supporter of Rick Santorum, and now he too
is on the hot seat for it.
Late last week his supporter, the amiable Foster Friess,
perpetrated the joke. It went like this. “You know, back in my
days, they’d use Bayer aspirin for contraceptives,” the easygoing
multi-millionaire philanthropist told MSNBC. “The gals put it
between their knees, and it wasn’t that costly.” Kaboom — all hell
broke loose. According to the Washington Post, “the remark
outraged women’s groups and many others.” Who would those “many
others” be? Democrat campaign strategists? Stockholders in Bayer
aspirin? Actually, I have not found anyone whom I know who gave the
joke a second’s thought, and my confreres include members of the
Concerned Women for America, scores of fellow bird watchers, and
many people who use Bayer aspirin every day, particularly after
reading the Washington Post.
Actually, the Post would be on firmer ground if
it had spoken merely of “some women’s groups.” And let me
add that even the complaints cited were pretty lame. I heard on CNN
Friday some feminists gassing on about Friess’ joke, and they
brought up Santorum’s response to it. Santorum said that it was a
“bad joke” but that he was “not responsible for it….that is
‘gotcha’” politics. Well, it is preposterous “gotcha” politics. One
of CNN’s feminists went on to say it was time for Santorum to “put
on his big boy pants.” How cruel and insensitive is that! Since
when do women remark on a man’s pants? What if Santorum cannot
afford to buy a pair of “big boy” pants?
Then the Democrats pivoted from Friess’ joke to the
question of contraception. They are going to make an issue in this
campaign of contraception! Allegedly the Republicans are against
contraception. Truth be known, I cannot recall any election ever in
American history that revolved around the issue of contraception.
If the Democrats are going to continue at this infantile level, I
would respond by accusing them of wanting to outlaw the passenger
car in favor of returning America to the era of the buckboard.
“Why, Mr. Obama, do you want us to return to the horse and buggy?”
There is plenty of evidence that leading Democrats hate the
passenger car. What is all this talk about bullet trains and mass
transportation, if not a not-so-subtle call for the return of the
horse and buggy?
Yet to return to the matter of Friess’ so-called bad joke,
I think I first heard it decades ago. As I recall, it was rather
amusing then but not a knee slapper. If it left women fuming I
never noticed. The joke did not have a long life. Now it is hurtful
and cruel, so the women of the fevered brow tell us, while
commenting on Santorum’s pants. Friess has amusingly noted on his
blog: “To all those who took my joke as a modern day approach I
deeply apologize and seek your forgiveness. My wife constantly
tells me I need new material — she understood the joke but didn’t
like it anyway — so I will keep that old one in the past where it
belongs.” “Seek your forgiveness”? I think he is again joshing
us.
Foster Friess is an interesting man. He has spent millions
of dollars around the world in disaster relief: in water projects
in Malawi, in the Indonesian tsunami, in the 2010 Haitian
earthquake. He has won dozens of awards for his philanthropy. In
politics too he has been active. Now he is a major backer of
Santorum. In 2008 he thought that the social issues got short
shrift and so he invested his own money to allow those who
articulate them a say in the public debate. He is a Christian and
thinks that people of faith have much to offer the public
discourse. I do too. Santorum’s presence in this campaign is one of
the campaign’s surprises. He is making a race of it, and the rumor
in Washington is that Obama is getting ready. Soon he may have to
defend his position on the bullet train and his opposition to the
passenger car. I should like to grill him on it and raise the
question, “Mr. President, why are you so enamored of the horse and
buggy? Do you think they are safe? Who will clean up the
streets?”
In the meantime I am reassured that Friess is going to
remain amiable. Someone has got to hazard a joke during Campaign
2012. It is the civilized thing to do, even if the women of the
fevered brow want to talk about Rick Santorum’s pants.
