Jon Stewart’s piece on Sen. Al Franken’s first legislative amendment. Added to a defense bill passed last week, it prohibits giving defense contracts to any company that requires employees to sign a mandatory arbitration contract preventing them from taking the company to court if they’re raped by coworkers.

Why was such a provision necessary? Last year a number of women came forward who were gang raped while working for various Haliburton subsidiaries but cannot take the company to court because their employment contracts prohibit it.

Thirty Republican senators opposed it. Stewart’s indignation is shared by Tom Crawford:

Who did this gang of 30 include? Both of Georgia’s senators, Saxby Chambliss and Johnny Isakson, voted against the Franken amendment. Chambliss and Isakson had earlier voted to strip federal funding for ACORN because of hidden-camera videotapes showing ACORN staffers advising a GOP operative posing as a pimp on how he could avoid paying taxes on his business.

Louisiana Sen. David Vitter, who confessed to patronizing a house of ill repute operated by the Washington Madam, voted against the Franken amendment. Nevada Sen. John Ensign, who has admitted having an affair with a woman who was married to one of his staff aides, also was one of the 30 senators voting against the Franken amendment.

This group of senators [link] obviously consider it a bad thing for a community organizing group to talk about evading taxes with a GOP operative pretending to be a pimp. Rape, sexual assault, extramarital sex with a prostitute, and an affair with a woman married to one of your employees, on the other hand, is evidently OK.

Can someone explain how that vote is justified?