That Maher likes women the way he might salivate over a nice beef roast has been known for a long time. It's part of his shtick. We are expected to get over it and to enjoy his general funniness. You know how that goes.
Maher has now called Republican female politicians by some names of women's genitals:
“It’s that fearlessness — he acknowledged that some people would probably be uncomfortable with some of his remarks about religion, not to mention calling Sarah Palin the “c” word (“there’s just no other word for her”) — that makes Maher the most dangerous person in comedy,” Jones wrote. “He’s painfully well-informed, which means he takes no bullshit from anyone. President Barack Obama took it on the chin almost as much as Rush Limbaugh or Glenn Beck. How dare the President say he would not settle for America being No. 2 — America is already out of the top 10 in most international lifestyle and human rights categories (health care, education, social mobility, women in high political positions). ‘I’d be thrilled if we were No. 2,’ he ranted, noting it’s nice to be behind Bosnia in life expectancy (where the chief cause of death is wolfman attacks, he joked).”Shakespeare's Sister has much more to say about all this.
On his Friday show, Maher called Palin and Minnesota Republican Rep. Michele Bachmann “bimbos.” That came one week after he called Palin “a dumb twat.”
But note how the above quote suggests that Maher's name-calling is just part of his general toughness on everyone? He takes on Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck and even the president! Which means, really, that what he says about Palin or Bachmann is no different.
Except that he doesn't call Limbaugh, Beck or Obama dumb pr**ks. I checked, as far as that could be done, and if he has ever used that term for men in politics it doesn't appear in Google searches. Neither has he used the n-word.
Making fun of people without making fun of their demographic group can be done. Even Maher has done it when it's not about women. But I offer Maher a deal: If he starts liberally using those other censored words in my previous paragraph I accept his argument that this is ado about nothing.