On Oct. 7 an important piece of legislation was passed. Senator Al Franken introduce an amendment into the Defense Appropriations Bill of 2010 (H.R. 3326) that would prevent the government from using multi contract companies like Kellogg Brown & Root "if they restrict their employees from taking workplace sexual assault, battery and discrimination cases to court."

Thirty Republican men voted against it. They voted against a piece of anti-rape legislation.

This was in response to the case of Jamie Leigh Jones, who in 2005 at the age of 19 working as an administrative assistant for KBR at Camp Hope, Iraq, was gang-raped by at least three of her fellow male employees, then locked in a shipping container under an armed guard. Jones was forbidden to sue KBR or the one assailant that confessed to her because KBR contracts have "binding arbitration" clauses, meaning that any employee that has a beef with the company or another employee must go through a company-approved arbitrator, ending usually with the arbitrator siding with the company.

Only eight Republicans voted for the amendment, while the other 30 men felt that protecting the corporation's assets was more important then a rape victim's right to due process.

Greg Ranzoni, Albany