I hope that the whole kerfuffle about astronaut Nowak will not result

[question everything]

in calls for keeping women barefoot and pregnant and in the kitchen or... at the flowers committee of the country clubs.

How sad if some will start questioning the "fitness" of women with their hormones and stuff to fly shuttle or - gasp - to be the commander in chief.

I do not listen to Limpback, Orally and the rest but, no doubt, something will be there.

[Horse with no Name]

1. It has more to do with mental health than it does gender n/t

[maxsolomon]

8. she kept the lid screwed down real tight

and when it came off, the jar broke.

NASA, i suggest you train your astronauts to not wear their diapers in public. you've provided the MSM with another distraction engine.

[salin]

2. as if there haven't been men who go off the deepend - and

there were no calls to turn all men into house-husbands for the possibily that they may not be 'fit' due to their hormones and all...

[wryter2000]

3. That won't keep them from pushing it as female hormones

When you consider the statistics of which gender murders lovers and rivals, clearly female lack of fitness isn't the problem. Actually, only small numbers of both sexes behave that way, but of those small numbers, men outnumber women by far.

Still, reality has nothing to do with what the RW has to say about anything.

[twilight_sailing]

4. "kerfuffle"

Doesn't seem to be an adequate description of an alleged felony crime, does it?

Edited for bad grammar.

[wryter2000]

5. It's quite major to the people involved

It doesn't have much impact on the rest of us.

[twilight_sailing]

7. Sorry, that's just silly.

[wryter2000]

18. What impact does it have on me?

Maybe I'm too silly to know what's important in my own life.

[twilight_sailing]

19. What impatct do the trails of other public figures have on your life?

[wryter2000]

20. Let's see

If they start wars, they use my tax money. If they screw up social security, they ruin my chances of retiring. If they sleep drive across country in a diaper to spray a rival in love with pepper spray, not so much.

[twilight_sailing]

21. It's a small world after all.

[Virginia Dare]

23. Except that an Astronaut's career is trashed...

and no small dollar amount (many of our tax dollars) went into her training. Doesn't warrant the hysteria surrounding the incident though.

[question everything]

12. I know. But CNN keeps going on and on

and, oh, by the way, we have a helicopter shot down in Iraq. Now back to the adult diaper.

At least their legal analyst, Tubin, warned that we really don't know much and the claim of attempted murder is very much premature.

[twilight_sailing]

14. So it's "Much Ado About Nothing" then?

It's kerfluffle?

[question everything]

30. Priority and relatives

when so many other news happen across the country and the world, including the deep freeze in the northern parts including death, when we are still faced with enough supply of heating fuel, when more are dying in Iraq - and this topics takes about 80% of the "24 News Channel" - yes, it becomes almost a joke.

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

27. What's the crime? Attempted murder?

That barely warrants local news.

This is just sensationalism. Run away bride stuff.

[stonecoldsober]

6. Jeez - I heard it here first!

[Lex]

9. Yeah, because men never go psycho and try to fight or kill their rivals.

Right?

[question everything]

29. Of course they do. But no one would cast a wide net about "men."

And... I don't say that this is going to happen about women, especially successful ones. I just hope it won't. But in the current political atmosphere where the ones that were behind the election of Bush "women are expected to obey their husbands" - this is my fear.

After all, SOTU Bush groper Michele Bachmann claimed that her husband told her she had to run for office and that's why she did.

[Connonym]

10. I had the same thought, why'd it have to be a woman?

Unfortunately, women haven't reached a position in American society where we're fully integrated into the working world. In a field so dominated by males, women are held to a higher standard. I don't think this would have gotten as much play if it was a male astronaut.

[Lex]

11. Wonder what the right-wing nuts would say if it had been a black man.

If it had been anything other than a white guy, they'd blame it on gender/race/whatever 'else' it happened to be.

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

13. What A Silly Premise. Why On Earth Would You Even Say That? It's Almost Irrational.

I seriously don't understand your concern with this. There is zero reason to believe logically that what you are concerned with has any bearing in reality whatsoever. Why would the arrest of some psycho nut give you these concerns? The concerns you listed just make absolutely no sense in this context of having any legitimacy of occurring.

[Lex]

15. "I do not listen to Limpback, Orally and the rest but, no doubt, something will be there."

That is the operative phrase in the post.

[question everything]

31. See post #16, below (nt)

[Cabcere]

16. I'm afraid it's already started.

:( One of the links to the story that was posted here (I don't remember which one) had a comment page, which I made the mistake of reading. :grr: Probably about 20% of the responses were downright misogynistic and hateful - stuff that would've earned anyone who said it to my face a tongue-lashing, at the very least. And that's not counting the "less offensive" ones that raised the question of women's "fitness" in a "neutral" manner. :grr: It's sickening, really. I'm not defending Nowak's actions, and I definitely think she has some issues that need to be worked out, but the fact that she happens to be a woman shouldn't really enter into it. It's not like men have never done crazy sh*t like this before. (I'm not trying to be a b*tch or insult men here, either - just pointing out the difference in response when a woman does something like this.) :banghead:

[leftofthedial]

17. what if she went off while on a mission?

but then what if a male astronaut went off on a mission?

[Annces]

22. She is the first astronaut accused of attempted murder

So I wonder what was different about her than other astronauts. I suppose there have been a few fighter jet pilots who have gotten in trouble at some point.

[Virginia Dare]

24. I'm sure it will...

there will be somebody out there who says, see, there's no place in space for emotional women.

[wryter2000]

28. LOL

I get your point and totally agree. Something about "no place in space" just hit me funny.

[Beelzebud]

25. Honestly, this thread is the first time I've seen that idea articulated...

I think most people are just shocked that such an accomplished PERSON, could just lose their mind.

I don't troll many right-wing sites, but I'm sure some knuckle-draggers out there are saying that sort of crap, but who cares what they think? They're irrelevant.

[bleedingheart]

26. Adultery is actually a punishable offense in the military

and if it is proven that all those involved were engaged in an adulterous affairs, then they could all lose their careers. Remember these folks are all officers in the US Military.

1. Nowak

2. Oefelein, IF he was really involved with her...this hasn't been confirmed yet. But if he was, he can be tried as well.

3. Shipman may be in danger as well...

If this turns out to be a love triangle gone sour...and only Nowak gets punished by the military, then I might wonder why the rules...and it would seem like only the woman is being punished. Nowak does need treatment and/or jail time...she apparently wanted to kill Shipman. If it turns out to be the delusions of a mentally ill person (there was no affair and she was just going nuts) then I think Oefelein and Shipman are less culpable but why didn't they do something to bring this to the attention of the folks at NASA and the authorities...(perhaps the fear of being charged with adultery??)

I am glad that Shipman wasn't hurt, and I feel bad for the family of Nowak...imagine the suffering they are currently enduring.