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Michele Bachmann is Not a Feminist but She is Running for President

Michele Bachmann is not a feminist but she is running for President. Michele Bachmann, a congresswoman and a lawyer, is running for president. Michele Bachmann is a mother and a foster mother and a wife and she is running for president. What part of this makes any sense at all? Michele Bachmann, according to recent news, went to law school because her husband told her to. Bachmann is running for… Read More »Michele Bachmann is Not a Feminist but She is Running for President

What the Rally for Sanity and Obama Have in Common

On the bus ride home to the Shenandoah Valley with some of the nearly two hundred people who made the hours-long journey to the Rally for Sanity, October 30, we were fired up. We were talking politics, the Democratic Party, The Tea Party, Republicans, and, well, passion. Mostly where the passion of two years ago went. Many of those on the bus had campaigned heartily and heavily for the president.… Read More »What the Rally for Sanity and Obama Have in Common

Why Are We in Afghanistan? And Other Pressing Questions

Bill Press had a discussion on the “war” in Afghanistan on his radio show this morning. I put the word “war” in quotation marks because it remains difficult for me to decide whether this is an actual war or another incursion/occupation based on our idea of promoting democracy around the world—even in places that aren’t receptive to it. His point was: Where is the media coverage? Where is the information… Read More »Why Are We in Afghanistan? And Other Pressing Questions

What Do You Believe?

Belief systems are a funny thing. They’re hard felt, hard won and nearly impossible to shake. And unfortunately, most of them are often built on things other than facts. Polls frequently tell us what the American public “believes.” We “believe” that health care reform will not make a difference in our lives; we “believe” that our government has too much power; we “believe” that government programs necessarily mean a socialist… Read More »What Do You Believe?

I Am Giving Up Hope for Lent

In the Christian tradition, Lent is a period of forty days, beginning today, Ash Wednesday, when the observant go into a period of denial, penance, and prayer, and, more commonly give up something important to them until Easter. While, as a Jew, I do not subscribe to the risen Christ—and can’t really reconcile giving over the suffering of someone else’s punishment as reparation for my own sins– it’s more than… Read More »I Am Giving Up Hope for Lent

What A Difference A Year Makes

Arianna Huffington ‘s headline in HuffPo Tuesday was “Obama One Year Later: The Audacity of Winning vs The Timidity of Governing.” On Wednesday’s Hardball MSNBC pundit Chris Matthews was pissed: he thought Obama had already become an incumbent insider who plays golf and hangs around with big money guys. He wondered if the President had already lost his vision. Progressive radio and television talk show host Ed Schultz offered himself… Read More »What A Difference A Year Makes

The Shriver Report on Women

I don’t think I or any woman I know needs to read “The Shriver Report: A Women’s Nation Changes Everything” by Maria Shriver and the Center for American Progress. Although the Report is being highly touted as important on several NBC programs, all the women I know know exactly what our state is: Pretty hectic and too often unrewarded compared to the work we do. Our children and our husbands… Read More »The Shriver Report on Women

Women’s (and Men’s) Work Still Not Done

I don’t think I or any woman I know needs to read The Shriver Report: A Women’s Nation Changes Everything http://www.awomansnation.com/ by Maria Shriver and The Center for American Progress. Although the Report is being highly touted as important on several NBC programs, all the women I know know exactly what our state is: Pretty hectic and too often unrewarded compared to the work we do. Our children and our… Read More »Women’s (and Men’s) Work Still Not Done

Big News? Women Over 50 Less Likely to Remarry

Okay, perhaps the New York Times article that graced the front page of the Style section recently deserves a little more parsing than that. But really. Like that other scary statistic that turned out to be wrong — remember the one about women over forty being as likely to get hit by a terrorist’s bomb as to marry? That one had women running like banshees to get hitched to anyone… Read More »Big News? Women Over 50 Less Likely to Remarry

The New American Witch Hunt

First, there was Senator Charles Grassley’s not-so-funny suggestion that the heads of A.I.G. should commit public suicide, and then in yesterday’s Senate hearing Edward Liddy, the Chairman of A.I.G. detailed the numerous death threats the employees of the company had been getting, some of them quite horrific. Senator Barney Frank asked for the names of those employees getting bonuses, which Liddy offered if there could be assurances of confidentiality which… Read More »The New American Witch Hunt