If you’re like me, you’ve heard and read enough from the pundits and politicians about the stimulus bills.  Look, when a country is where we are economically, no solution is going to be one that everyone can support because we know we don’t all agree on solutions and we know we don’t know what will happen – no matter who tells you otherwise. Today, starting at 12noon, you can participate in a discussion with people like yourself and others about the stimulus.  Here’s...

With the Lilly Ledbetter Act now law, and the first piece of congressional legislation signed by President Barack Obama at that, it’s time to consider who will lead the U.S. Department of Labor’s Women’s Bureau in its fulfillment of its mission: Mission Statement To improve the status of wage-earning women, improve their working conditions, increase their efficiency, and advance their opportunities for profitable employment. Vision Statement The Women’s Bureau promotes 21st...

Nicholas Kristof is feeling empowered, having had a hand in the creation of a new focus of a Senate Foreign Relations subcommittee, global women’s issues.  And I like what he’s doing with that feeling: tonight, he tells us in his blog that tomorrow, the New York Times will feature this column by him, “Mistresses of the Universe,” in which he discusses the following: Banks around the world desperately want bailouts of billions of dollars, but they also have another need...

From a blog post by Nicholas Kristof at the New York Times: The U.S. Senate is taking a welcome step: empowering a subcommittee specifically charged with global women’s issues. It’s the first time a subcommittee has had that mandate, and it will be led by Barbara Boxer of California, who will surely use her voice and spotlight to do some good on these issues. … Issues like trafficking and maternal mortality and sexual violence finally seem to be getting some traction. Eve Ensler has helped...

Other than my extreme distaste for Mark Naymik’s use of the word “delicious” in this Plain Dealer column about Ohio Governor Ted Strickland, Lt. Gov. Lee Fisher and Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner and the Democratic options for filling retiring U.S. Senator and Republican George Voinovich’s seat, it does a decent job outlining the reality that, when you say yes to one thing, you are pretty much saying no to something else – implicitly. That’s a tactic Strickland...

What do you think this image means? Yesterday, at Fem2pt0, I got to listen to Stanislaus Magniant from Linkfluence describe precisely what that image, and numerous network maps that can be derived from the information that created that image, means – by itself, in relation to the progressive blogosphere, the conservative blogosphere, the entire political blogosphere and conversation around specific issues like the family planning component that was dropped from the house stimulus bill. The...

Here’s an interesting exchange in an NPR story on the Michael Steele selection for chair of the Republican National Committee: The consensus emerging from Friday’s gathering was that though the party clearly needs some major cosmetic surgery, its basic tenets are just fine. “Our core beliefs don’t differ from most Americans’,” said Kevin DeWine, chairman of the Ohio Republican Party. “But obviously there’s a disconnect between our image and our issues.” “We’ve...

I’ve never hidden my dislike for George Bush’s creation of the White House Office on Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, renamed under Obama as the Council for Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. I also dissented when candidate Barack Obama talked about expanding the role of that office, should he be elected. But while I have my own skepticism, I’ve also wondered, where is the conservative outrage over that office’s creation and now expansion in its diatribes about...

But I do want to note that before New York Times writer Bob Herbert addressed the topic of his segment on Hardball, which followed former U.S. Rep. from Texas, Dick Armey’s, he specifically issues a call for Armey to apologize. Here’s Armey’s misogyny oozing out: Here’s Herbert’s call for an apology: So far, there is no apology from Armey that I can find. Walsh supposedly will be writing a blog entry about the incident. Crooks and Liars has the written transcript...

And I mean that in terms of whether you support or oppose the results of Roe. You can read the decision itself here or read a nice breakdown at About.com. For the record, I support the constitutional rights recognized in the U.S. Supreme Court decision which made a woman’s medical decision regarding her reproductive rights legal and I am against the erosion of those rights. I do, however, support efforts to curtail unwanted pregnancy through means that do not impinge on a girl or woman’s...

Read it here. An excerpt: Assimilation is already a fact of life in Israel. There are more than one million Muslim Arabs in Israel; they possess Israeli nationality and take part in political life with the Jews, forming political parties. On the other side, there are Israeli settlements in the West Bank. Israeli factories depend on Palestinian labor, and goods and services are exchanged. This successful assimilation can be a model for Isratine. If the present interdependence and the historical fact...

Today, I spoke in Akron, Ohio at a wonderful gathering for public information officers (PIOs) who work in settings that involve children and families (DR court, juvie court, hospitals) that focused on the media. My session ran to 11:50 am and then the hosts wired up the room so we could watch the inauguration – it came on just in time to hear Joe Biden take the oath and we watched through the benediction. I followed many friends who are in D.C. through Twitter and also people I know around...

I don’t agree with assessments of Andrew Wyeth’s work that label it “drab and kitschy” but toward the reviews of it as “profound reflections of 20th Century alienation and existentialism.” This Washington Post obit includes a photo gallery of Wyeth and his work. Here’s one of his most famous images, Christina’s World: The Christian Science Monitor has republished its review of Wyeth’s 1976 exhibit but the Village Voice’s suggestion for...

The Ms. Special Winter 2009 Inaugural Issue is now out with a cover image of President-elect Barack Obama wearing a t-shirt that says, “This is what a feminist looks like.” From a media advisory prepared by Ms.: When the publisher of Ms., Eleanor Smeal, and the chair of the Feminist Majority Foundation board, Peg Yorkin, met Barack Obama, he immediately offered “I am a feminist.” Obama ran on the strongest platform for women’s rights of any major party in American history. Feminist...

Hopeful, and with all due respect, but naive. Read his op-ed in Wednesday’s New York Times here. Key portion: Israel de facto recognizes Hamas’s right to rule Gaza and to provide for the well-being and security of the people of Gaza — which was actually Hamas’s original campaign message, not rocketing Israel. And, in return, Hamas has to signal a willingness to assume responsibility for a lasting cease-fire and to abandon efforts to change the strategic equation with Israel by deploying...

Not sure what a proxy is? What a puppet looks like? Then read this, from the Jerusalem Post: [An Egyptian government] official told The Jerusalem Post by phone that two senior Iranian officials who visited Damascus recently warned Hamas leaders against accepting the [Egyptian cease fire] proposal. His remarks came as Hamas representatives met in Cairo with Egyptian Intelligence Chief Gen. Omar Suleiman and his aides to discuss ways of ending the fighting in the Gaza Strip. The spokesmen said Hamas...

The video in this post was done by Molly Tillyer, who wrote me the following email: I grew up in a neighboring town (Oak Ridge). My younger brother and sister graduated from Harriman. My parents worked hard all their lives and built their dream home on the water about 3 years ago. [She later wrote me that her mother is a retired EEO investigator and Ethics Officer from Martin Marietta and her father is retired military.] At first they were in shock, who wouldn’t be? But shock has slowly turned...

The Feminist Peace Network has been providing links to a wide variety of voices and perspectives regarding the violence in Gaza and Israel for several days now. Its most recent post includes entries from the European Commission and Chair of the Council of Women World Leaders Ministerial Initiative, Israel National News, Gaza resident Dr. Mona El-Farra, Palestinian mothers in the UK, the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom and Women of Color Network Australia, among others. While...

If you still haven’t been able to wrap yourself around what it means to have more than 1 BILLION GALLONS of coal ash full of heavy metal and chemicals flood, flow, crash and destroy everything around you, as it did for the residents of Harriman, Tennessee three days before Christmas, first check out these photos by NASA, from before and after: Before: After – the paler blue indicates the extent and location of now-polluted water: And if those images are still too abstract, the ones...

I think it is, even though I think that at least some people who make that reference think to themselves that they are open to a two-state solution. I’ve been writing about this need to press the debate about the Gaza-Israel conflict into an answer to the question, “One state or two”?” from the beginning, asking occupiers of cyberspace and real life to respond. I’ve gotten just a few direct responses so far, all but one for a two-state solution (one brought up the concept...

In writing about the conflict, I could be a good lefty and give you my bleeding heart liberal chat about absolute disgust for the death tolls and devastation, for the cultural hardening on both sides that these conflicts incur and how that is the real damage, and why, regardless of the long-term uselessness of an immediate ceasefire with little else achieved, we nonetheless must demand a ceasefire. Or, I could be a good Jew and write about how Hamas, as an Islamist group does not represent the Christian...

This is it: As for the Palestinians, they plan to declare victory regardless of what happens. If the IDF withdraws rapidly, without a ground operation and without having seriously reduced the rocket fire, Hamas will boast that it survived and Israel blinked first. But Hamas officials and analysts said Monday that the organization would actually like Israel to launch a ground operation; it hopes this would let it inflict such heavy losses on Israeli tanks and infantry that Israel would flee with its...

You can read my thoughts about it at BlogHer but for a teaser, here’s what I actually left out (until I added an addendum), so you can just imagine what I included: The environment and energy: For progressives, probably a bad year, capped off with the TVA disaster that Kim Pearson wrote about here. And it’s getting worse. On the other hand, with energy, maybe not so bad a year, in that the conversation has intensified due to record high gas prices this summer and I would even venture...

BlogHer Contributing Editor PunditMom has the goods: The pundits continue to chew on the question of who will take Hillary Clinton’s Senate seat if, and when, she is confirmed as Secretary of State. Caroline Kennedy is getting the bulk of the media’s attention, but there is another Carolyn that is getting support from The Feminist Majority and NOW — New York Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney. I was honored to have the chance to interview Eleanor Smeal, the president of the Feminist...

Interestingly, this Women’s eNews article is the first one I’ve seen that finally gives a reason I can buy into understanding how it is that New Hampshire’s state senate, unlike any other legislative body in the country, now has a majority of women (13 out of 24): Two major explanations for women’s newfound majority are the state’s high number of legislators and their low–practically nonexistent–pay. New Hampshire’s Legislature has 424 members: 400...