Aspirins and short skirts and contraception, oh my! The last few weeks have seen a slew of Republican gaffes concerning women’s sexuality. From Rick Santorum’s billionaire supporter Foster Friess waxing nostalgic about the good old days when women put aspirin "between their knees” in lieu of contraception to an online furor over whether the young conservative women at CPAC dressed too provocatively—the GOP has a major woman problem on their hands.

Their fear of sex—of women’s sexuality in particular—has become a major media talking point, and a source of outrage among American women. But what I don’t understand is why anyone is surprised. Republicans have long based their agenda for women in a deep-rooted disdain for all things female. We’ve been down this road many, many times before.

On January 23rd, the Obama administration charged former CIA officer John Kiriakou under the Espionage Act for disclosing classified information to journalists about the waterboarding of al-Qaeda suspects. His is just the latest prosecution in an unprecedented assault on government whistleblowers and leakers of every sort.

Kiriakou's plight will clearly be but one more battle in a broader war to ensure that government actions and sunshine policies don't go together. By now, there can be little doubt that government retaliation against whistleblowers is not an isolated event, nor even an agency-by-agency practice. The number of cases in play suggests an organized strategy to deprive Americans of knowledge of the more disreputable things that their government does. How it plays out in court and elsewhere will significantly affect our democracy.

Komen for the Cure Vice President for Public Policy Karen Handel is anti gay everything.  She’s “wholeheartedly” against gay marriage, civil unions, ‘absolutely agaisnt gay adoptions’ and domestic partner benefits.

In a 2010 interview with an NBC affiliate in Georgia—just one year before she took the job at Komen—Handel bloated about supporting Georgia’s constitutional amendment against gay marriage.

“I’ve been very clear. And you know, as a Christian, marriage is between a man and a woman,” she said in the interview with Atlanta’s WXIA-TV.

Apparently Pardo and the Senators who secretly met with him believe it imperative to met in secret to discuss Americas backing of an Israeli strike on Iran regardless of the opinion of the American people.

It is clear that the war drums have intensified and the probability of an attack on Iran by US and Israeli forces has increased exponentially.