I just want to say that listening to the announcement of the vote electing Nancy Pelosi Speaker of the House brought me to tears–big, sobbing, crocodile tears. Seeing her take the gavel didn’t do it for me–it was listening to the announcement of the vote and the voice of the clerk announcing the vote.  Don’t just listen, watch the announement of the vote 1:30 minutes into the Democracy Now Headlines.  I didn’t think it would be that moving to me, but here she is, in my lifetime, a woman so powerful in the U.S. government.

I was young enough when Sandra Day O’Connor joined the Supreme Court that I didn’t pay a lot of attention or feel the weight of the occasional, but I imagine it might have been a similar moment.

As a child, I wasn’t aware of the lack. It wasn’t until my mother and her friends, in the late 1960s and early 1970s, talked about what they had to deal with in their professional lives from men who didn’t want to see women in power. I sat quietly listening to their whispered conversations, and I absorbed their truths.

I may not be a second-wave feminist, but I thank them from the bottom of my heart for what they’ve done to bring choices to women’s lives that seemed out of reach in previous generations. I believe I will continue to see big changes in my life and my daughter will see bigger changes in hers. She will live in interesting times.

read comments (0)

A Baptist minister wonders this week in a USA Today opinion piece “What if we’re wrong about homosexuality?”

1. Duh
2. OK. Now spread the word.

I hope Oliver “Buzz” Thomas does talk to other religious leaders about the mounting scientific evidence and setting the record straight (so to speak) as he mentions in his article. It takes people willing to speak compassionately in the language of their peers in order to crack hardened views. Given the interesting title of his upcoming book, 10 Things Your Minister Wants to Tell You (But Can’t Because He Needs the Job), it looks like he is willing to be one of those people.

The minister says:

Religion’s only real commodity, after all, is its moral authority. Lose that, and we lose our credibility. Lose credibility, and we might as well close up shop.

I’m not sure this is true. Maybe this is just his fear because he has been taught and teaching this for so long. There are liberal religious and non-religious traditions that maintain credibility without an attempt to claim moral authority. Ethics and justice don’t look for the same sort of One True [fill in the blank] as do the religions of moral authority.

Even John McCain has said this week that homosexuality is not a defect, contradicting a recent Department of Defense document on “Physical Disability Evaluation” for troops separating from the military.

Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

read comments (0)

In a Reuter’s story yesterday, reprinted at Common Dreams, CNN founder Ted Turner said that one way to reduce the dangers in the world–military invasions and nuclear weapons–is to leave women in charge.

OK.  I don’t know if it will work, but I’ll go with that experiment if you are willing.

“Men should be barred from public office for 100 years in every part of the world. … It would be a much kinder, gentler, more intelligently run world. The men have had millions of years where we’ve been running things. We’ve screwed it up hopelessly. Let’s give it to the women.”

read comments (0)

Air America, frequently rumored to be ready to file for bancruptcy, is saying that they will NOT be filing. I think this may be a IBIWISI (I’ll Believe It When I See It) situation. I’ve never quite understood the appeal of the argumentative talk radio format. I used to watch Al Franken on the Sundance Channel on occasion, but it didn’t grab hold of me. Why listen to endless hash and rehash?

Well, someone likes it, and I like knowing Air America is there even if I can’t quite stand it myself.

I’m also curious to find out more about Green Stone Media, a new radio talk radio group that is “not a left-wing or feminist network” despite the involvement of Gloria Steinem and Jane Fonda. I have to invoke IBIWISI again. (Say it “EE-bee-wheez-ee.”) I’ll believe it when I see it and when I hear it. You can listen to a few programs on their site.

I’ll try to squeeze it in, but if they yell at me and insult my intelligence, I’m leaving.

read comments (0)