Joining the Obama Administration’s outreach to women, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and U.S. Representative Rosa DeLauro (D, CT-3) held a conference call last week, focusing on issues affecting women. Pelosi and DeLauro plowed through accomplishments for and concerns about the status of women in the United States. On the 2010 health care bill, DeLauro emphasized that the real benefits in the bill, for women,...

Daniel Ellsberg, who leaked the Pentagon Papers, said the WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange had been “pursued across three continents” by Western intelligence services. Ellsberg compared the Obama administration’s threat to prosecute Mr. Assange to his own treatment under President Richard M. Nixon, reports The New York Times. (Julian Paul Assange, born 1971, is an Australian internet activist best known...

On this past Thursday, the White House hosted a small conference call for online media with senior administration officials to discuss the impact of the recession on women and how the Administration’s agenda is affecting women. Led by Cecilia Rouse, Member of the Council of Economic Advisors and Jen Psaki, White House Deputy Communications Director, the on-the-record call was grounded in a new National...

Seriously. If you’re not following these incredibly simple rules, as outlined in this Washington Post op-ed, then you’re intentionally using gender stereotypes to inflict damage (aka being sexist): Don’t equate typically female characteristics or activities (baking, wearing high heels) with weakness. Don’t — even, or maybe especially, if you’re a woman — equate toughness with manliness....

In addition to World War I history buffs, this article is for people who detest John Maynard Keynes and the stimulus packages his theories justified – and which are still in use today – most notably by President Obama and most of the developed world last year. As was reported in September, World War I is officially over, now that Germany has delivered its last chunk of reparations imposed on it...

Lucky for someone, Lady Gaga’s meatdress didn’t make it’s appearance until just last month at the MTV Video Music Awards. But the subject line tease here is for this post, A Vision in Pork: Illustrator Gives Patty Murray the Lady Gaga Meatsuit Treatment (with images of course) at my gig through Election Day blogging for the Women’s Campaign Forum’s Woman and Politics blog. (Daily...

Update: The Toledo Free Press had this story about the tactics, described as threats in a 2008 lawsuit, used by Rich Iott in a dispute related to his son and several roommates. I’ll let people draw their own conclusions, per my comment in the District section. Original post: Catch up on the healthy debate about how much emphasis voters should give a GOP candidate in Ohio who has a long-standing interest...

Today is National Coming Out Day, a date set aside for people to come out to their families and friends and for those family and friends to be supportive of those they love. Given the events of the past few weeks, ranging from the tragic suicides of young gay people who were bullied by peers to the horrific kidnap and torture case in New York City I think that this year it is even more important that we all...

The video via Think Progress: And the full post at Think Progress. I’ve maligned the Young Guns program before, but here’s what the program says about itself: America is standing at a critical crossroads, and Young Guns candidates give America the best opportunity to move our country in the right direction. Founded in the 2007-2008 election cycle by Congressmen Eric Cantor (R-VA), Kevin McCarthy...

I love honey. I used to gift honey, especially from Germany, to my close relations on my return from my travels abroad. Now I have stopped gifting honey and even stopped eating it. My friend Sunita Narain, an indefatigable public-spirited person, tells us that even health-conscious companies, in this case from Australia and Switzerland, “do not check antibiotics in products they export to our world.” If...

The Economist pays a grand tribute to Bärbel Bohley, artist and toppler of the Berlin Wall, who died on September 11th, aged 65. “Born in the ruins of Berlin in 1945, her early life was shaped by the post-war division of her country into western (soon West) Germany, and a Soviet-occupied zone that claimed to be the ‘German Democratic Republic’. But in the end it was not the bullying communists...

Political Wire has two teases. The first highlights new poll results indicating that, “Sarah Palin is viewed unfavorably by 48% of Americans. She is viewed favorably by just 22% — including just 44% of Republicans, 21% of independents and 6% of Democrats.” The second reports on new Pew information: “Fully 46% say they would be less likely to vote for a candidate who supported government...

Today is an important day for Gypsies, also known as Romani (estimated population 6-11 million worldwide). A group of academics, government advisers and gypsy representatives are meeting in Strasbourg to discuss the next steps in a pan-European project entitled “The Decade of Roma Inclusion, 2005 to 2015″. The Independent describes Gypsies/Roma as “Europe’s most persecuted minority that...

The Stir has waded through the muck to come up with a this Top 50 list of the most sexist quotes from the campaign trails of female political candidates over the years (though it really doesn’t go back very far except in a couple of cases). So sad that this is just from a short span of time – can’t imagine what they’d find if we’d had the Internet longer. For more, read the cross-post...

Earlier today I was asked to write a 300 word oped on Ohio, our voters, our economy and what the heck do we want done with it all as part of the New York Times’ Room For Debate platform. You can see my thoughts next to those of five others here. Question for my fellow co-bloggers here and the community that reads us: What do you think about the Room For Debate format? Interesting, I think. Reminds me...

Moments matter. That’s the first of many lessons we are likely to derive from the suicide of Rutgers student Tyler Clementi this past September 22. If allegations made by local law enforcement officials are correct, Clementi’s tragic death followed the filming and webcasting of a sexual encounter involving Clementi and another person in a college dorm room. It’s alleged that two Rutgers students,...

Here’s Susan Page on new survey results from Celinda Lake coming out today: The poll, taken Sept. 1-8, asked 800 likely voters to listen to descriptions of two hypothetical congressional candidates, Jane Smith and Dan Jones. Half then heard a back-and-forth about the candidates that used the words “ice queen” and “mean girl,” then the word “prostitute” to characterize...

I recently came across an interesting book “Daniel Patrick Moynihan: A Portrait in Letters of an American Visionary“, edited by Steven Weisman (PublicAffairs; 671 pages; $35). I came to know Moynihan (better known as “Pat”) as a young journalist when he was the U.S. ambassador in India in the early 1970s. Pat was described as “the nation’s best thinker among politicians since Lincoln, and its best...

Today’s US Census report on poverty in the United States is a clarion call to our nation and our elected leaders, says Rev Jesse Jackson. “We in the United States possess the greatest resources and wealth ever known to humankind. So to have over 44 million people — 14% of our population — and 20% of our children living in poverty strains the soul of America. That fully one in four Americans...

As the unusual confluence of the Jewish new year, Ramadan and September 11th has come and gone, I’ve been thinking a lot about the direct talks being pursued right now by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. But this post is not about the talks’ core issues, as they’re called, or about the fact that the talks themselves are happening. I want to focus on Secretary Clinton and the skills...

In late August, the California legislature overwhelmingly passed amendments to stiffen penalties connected to its current anti-stalking law. You can read the bill here. The objects of the amendments’ affection? Paparrazzi who get too close. Lawmakers had sympathy for the idea that there is such a thing as paparazzi being too close, even to celebrities whom we might think don’t deserve such legal protections...

In a week that saw the launch of a funded, organized, coordinated effort to help us get at the roots of sexism (check out Name It. Change It), we also get Sarah Palin demonstrating the carelessness with which she’s accused many others in using sexist rhetoric. From CNN Politicalticker: “Those who are impotent and limp and gutless and they go on their anonymous – sources that are anonymous...

Ok, some of you won’t believe this is a true story. All I can do is tell you that it is, that sometimes truth really is stranger than fiction, and ask you to believe. Let’s set the scene. The patio at our home is large area, covered in natural slate. It faces east with a grand view of Black Mountain in the desert community of Scottsdale, Arizona. It’s a covered patio with two doors, one off the kitchen...

Australia’s ruling Labor party, led by Julia Gillard, and the opposition Liberal party, led by Tony Abbott, have failed to get a clear majority in the Parliament, for which elections were held Saturday. Both parties would now be wooing four Independents and one Green party member for support to gather the required majority to form a government. However, the final election outcome would be known in another...

Anastasia Pantsios, a lifelong journalist, does a great job in Ohio Daily Blog‘s post, “A Disturbing Pattern” with the subject of how the Cleveland Plain Dealer‘s primary endorsements for 12 newly-created elected positions read as gender-biased reviews though the motivation seems unintentional. But just because there is no intention does not mean that there is no bias. It should be revealed...