I <3 Jon Stewart and Feminists

Suzanne at BlogHer nails it.

Stefania and the Thompson Twins take apart Palin’s speech piece by piece. Classic.

Dear conservatives, you might want to check your own backyard.

Sarah Palin’s record on how she supports special needs children (or not). There is a big blogosphere fight brewing over this one, with the primary issue seeming to be a program called “Alaska Challenge Youth Academy” – Conservatives claim it resulted in an increase in funding for education for special needs children, progressives are claiming its not a special needs program, therefore the budget remained stagnate or cut. Fight it out amongst yourselves.

Something to think about while you watch tonight’s ‘Tribute to Cindy McCain.’

I said on CNN this morning we didn’t hear anything about the ISSUES last night…apparently I wasn’t alone.

and finally…this clip sums up what I’ve been sputtering to tell a cable news audience for 48 hours. Amen Jon, Amen.

Apparently I am smoking crack and the world is upside down

…but conservative bloggers are up in arms over this Palin pregnancy thing and trying to tell me liberal bloggers are …wait…let me find it…

What’s disturbing about both the rumors– originated at Daily Kos on Friday– and the way the Left has already been going after Palin and Bristol is that there’s an
obviously anti-woman streak in it. “Palin can’t campaign because she has a special needs baby!” “Palin can’t possibly run for VP while her daughter is going through a major life transition!” “Palin endangered her baby by being governor while pregnant!”

Really, guys? So a highly capable woman with a strong support network and great family is supposed to lay aside the greatest opportunity of her career because she has a family in which normal challenges have to be overcome? The Left is more than happy to abandon all its “I am woman, hear me roar” rhetoric as soon as it meets a woman whose roar it doesn’t like. The Left is more than happy to abandon the
“right to privacy” as long as prying is politically beneficial.– Mary Katharine Ham, BlogHer

I’m sorry but I need to pick my jaw up off the floor here for a minute and bring everyone back to the land of NOT CRAZY, where conservatives normally don’t call the left ‘anti-woman’ and call out sexism.

I would argue, their candidate is the leader of the anti-woman rhetoric and any fringe nut-jobs on the left saying anything remotely ‘anti-woman’ have already been tossed to our liberal curb. You know, where we keep the rest of the Rush-type women haters.

I mean really…are you trying to out “pro”woman the Democrats simply because you’re running a woman? Seriously? Really? When you vote down things like family leave and family planning? SERIOUSLY? The party pushing us to back alley abortions and freaking out over condoms in schools? The one totally fine with the idea women don’t really need equal pay they just need more education and training? The one, as my husband just reminded me, trying to re-classify birth control as abortion?What the hell kind of drugs are you people doing?

How about we all take a deep breathe and review, shall we? I need to take a deep breathe here.

In through the nose, out through the mouth….

From David Greenberg, the president and CEO of Planned Parenthood in Oregon-

John McCain is one of only a few Senators to earn a Zero percent lifetime rating from Planned Parenthood’s Action Fund, and he only scored that high because the organization doesn’t have a lower rating…. Let’s look at his record:

He voted against requiring health care plans to cover birth control (3/22/03).

He voted against comprehensive, medically accurate sex education (7/25/06).

He voted against international family planning funding (3/14/96).

He voted against funding to prevent teen and unintended pregnancies (3/17/05).

He voted against public education for emergency contraception (3/17/05).

And he voted against restoring Medicaid funding that could be used for family planning for low-income women (3/17/05).

NPR reported (2/2/08) that, “Many Republican voters seem to believe, incorrectly, that the current Republican front-runner, Arizona Senator John McCain, supports abortion rights.”

John McCain wants us to believe that he’s a moderate who supports improving the health of women in the United States, but in fact he’s among the most extreme members of Congress who voted against common sense measures on family planning, sex education and access to basic healthcare.

So while we’ve got a couple of asshole bloggers who should in no way be associating themselves with a Democratic platform, you’ve got a candidate and running mate poised to set the women’s movement back 50 years. You understand asshole bloggers right? I seem to recall a few that blog for your candidate that the campaign has totally disassociated with too….

Anyway…back to the women’s movement thing.

Is there a women’s movement that involves the beliefs of McCain/Palin and those family values I keep hearing so much about? Sure, it’s from 1950 and still allowed under today’s society and even under a Democratic administration.

Let me be clear. I’m thrilled to see you on the anti-sexism, pro-woman bandwagon. There is room for all. I’m entirely confused by you here, and don’t really understand why you’re sticking around. Maybe those McCain stances above will help remind you of where your candidate stands. I’d dig a bit into that VP candidate of yours too, since you’re so interested in making sure we women-folk are treated so well. I highly recommend you go check out MOMocrats meme today entitled “Palin in Comparison” in which they dismantle, issue by issue, the farce that is McCain’s VP pick.

While you do that, I have to go approve Patrick Ruffini as a Facebook friend now. Because apparently the world is upside down and I am smoking crack.

This One is For My Mom

UnOfficial, nonSanctioned, strictly made for my mother:

I Own One Home. Sort of.

It’s not paid for.

We have a mortgage like the rest of the world (minus the McCain family) and we currently couldn’t sell the damn thing without losing our shirts.

Our pants too.

Maybe both shoes as well.

My brother does not own a home. He lives here with us, in the ONE house we own. He couldn’t really afford to live on his own, even though he has a nice job and makes good money. He’ll be moving out when he and his girlfriend have two incomes and can afford a place together. It’s really the only way to go…roommates and what not.

My parents own one home as well. It currently has a sink hole. I wonder if any of John McCain’s houses have sink holes?

My brother-in-law does not own a home. His family is in an apartment in Germany while he’s in Iraq. So I’m pretty sure they know exactly how many houses they own.

We also own two cars, although we’re still paying for one of them.

But I’m very certain we only own one house.

I can tell you how many tv’s we own too. But I think we’re just counting the big, big stuff.

Like houses.

Those are pretty easy to keep track of. Like, say, when the mortgage bill comes at the begining of he month. Or the second mortgage bill comes at the middle of the month.

Property taxes are due in November.

Insurance bill comes every month.

Home owners association every three months.

Yeah, totally easy to keep track of exactly how many homes I own.

How about you?

Cross Me

So just to review, we’re all grateful for Senator McCain’s service to this country. I have to say that, because if I don’t I’m unpatriotic. But it’s true, I’m thankful for our soldiers and all those who serve this country and for those war heroes like the Senator who have done what their country told them to do.

Now, disclaimer aside, I’m really flipping tired of it being trotted out in this election. Really. Tired.

At first, I thought it was totally relevant.

Then, the stories were getting a bit, overused.

Then, I started to wonder how big a campaign ploy this was going to turn into and if his service and sacrifice was going to turn into a total disgrace due to it being paraded around and exploited.

Then I watched the re-run of the Saddleback interviews today and something in the back of my head said ‘hmmmm, that story sounds totally familiar’ and I just chalked it up to ‘must have heard McCain tell that one before.’

And then…today, from Daily Kos

I was watching the forum last night and decided that since I hadn’t eaten yet, I would try to listen to John McCain speak. I was doing OK with the “my friends” and the evil chuckle when I heard him talk about his POW story of the cross in the dirt. That was when I couldn’t take it anymore.

It just sounded so fake and so contrived, so I did a little research about it. Someone on here said it sounded like a scene from Ben-Hur, so I did a google search about Ben-Hur and cross in the sand and such. No dice. But I searched around a little bit more and here is what I found. A story about Alexander Solzhenitsyn from his times in the Soviet Gulags.

Click the rest of that diary, it makes for very interesting reading.

No, No, No, Weird, Fake, Duh, Gold

I’m not sending my kids to this school.

I won’t be seeing this movie.

I won’t be voting for the candidate relying on athletes.

The woman who had the affair with Edwards? Apparently much like your flaky, new age aunt.

I’d settle for VP.

Idiots.

and finally…she only eats like .01% of Phelps’ normal caloric intake per day, and is cuter.

I Want A ‘MOM’s Club’ (alternate title: God Help My New PTA)

I took my eldest to Kindergarten today. While the emotions are ravaging my mind and soul tonight, I can’t help but exhale a bit.

He did great. He seems great. Life moves on.

So while the Mom in me grapples with time passing and children growing, the woman in me is rather pissed off.

Expectations are killing me.

As most of you know, I work.

I work like millions of Americans and like millions of other mothers and fathers.

What is making me angry, and what I can’t wrap my head around tonight, is why my parenting expectations are so much higher than my husband’s.

He works, too.

But there are special ‘clubs’ at school for Dads, catering to ‘finding opportunities for father’s to participate’ in school functions. Me? It’s just expected.

So there I was, signing up for a few volunteer positions (because if I didn’t god only knows what doom it would spell for my child or our future at a brand new school) and my husband is afforded the luxury of ‘Dads Club.’

Which, mind you, he nearly skipped signing up for because…you know…he works.

I realize there are larger things at work here like society and culture and biological predispositions…but stay with me.

As a thinking person I realize that regardless of work, I need to be involved in my child’s school. It’s not convenient. I have a million other things to do, but ‘work’ is not an excuse to get out of it.

The only thing that makes this even slightly manageable – I work from home. What about the millions of mothers who leave the house to work daily? Who punch a clock? And is my work diminished because I DO work from home?

You just work from home…you can come sell cookies and help organize the fundraiser.

Why are all these working women expected to participate, while their male counterparts are given a pass? Or a special fucking club, like if they show up they are already 10 steps ahead of any other working father on the planet.

Reminds me of the Dads (of which my husband is one) that actually change diapers and give baths and suck out snot with the bulb thingy. You’d think they had walked on water from all the praise they received for participating in their child’s life.

Every time I think we’ve made progress, I am confronted with the reality of our society expecting everything of  women when it comes to raising children. Nevermind there is another capable adult in the mix.

Oh, that guy? Yes well, he works.

No one thinks anything of raising an eyebrow if I dare text on my blackberry while sitting at a school function, yet those same no ones don’t even glance when the guy in the suit gets a call during Kindergarten RoundUp and he spends 3 minutes whispering into his cell.

Obviously, he’s a guy. In a suit. It MUST be very important.

Me? Oh you know, not much at all. Just feeling like not paying attention to my child’s teacher momentarily to do something as UNimportant as reply to Barack Obama and John McCain’s staff.

It has nothing to do with gender roles or societal norms. It has everything to do with being a parent.

Which is why, at my very first PTA meeting, I just might have to ask for a MOM’s Club. You know, to find those ‘opportunities’ for involvement in my child’s education.

Or maybe I’ll just sign up for the Dad’s Club.

School’s in session.

Preschooler Thwarts TSA, Film at 11

I really did see this one coming.

I just didn’t expect the TSA to be involved.

That whole “we will not negotiate with terrorist” thing isn’t true.

The TSA totally negotiated with my 3-year old and make no mistake, she’s a terrorist.

Sleepy Girl in a Ford Taurus X

With sleepy eyes and stuffed puppy in her hand, I buckled my darling daughter into her car seat at 5am, hoping the time of day didn’t spell doom for our trip back to Los Angeles from Detroit. We had kissed our family good bye (yes, Nana cried…she always does) and woke before dawn for a 7am plane ride.

I was entirely prepared. I did everything the night before- I even packed the snacks and goodies and toys. There was a spot in the bag for the night’s pj’s and clothes were laid out. I missed nothing and I went to bed feeling organized and accomplished and entirely sure of myself.

Silly Mommy.

My first clue that our trip home was going to go all wrong came when my daughter winced at walking through the airport. She wanted to be carried. But as Mom is trying to get all the luggage to the counter and carry ons and hold hands…the “carry me” thing just wasn’t going to work. Both kids were already whining once we got up to the counter and they had to wait again in the security line.

As we entered the line a very nice TSA agent looked over our boarding passes and asked my son his age.

“I’m 5!”

“And what about you little girl?”

…and the little girl buried her face in my leg, refusing to even look at the man talking to her who smiled and handed me back our tickets.

We made our way several feet to the xray line, and I got the kids de-shoed and un-backpacked and got my laptop ready and felt, again, rather organized and accomplished.

Silly Mommy.

Despite the fact that we have done this dozens of times, my youngest decided things needed to change. The procedure was incomplete and something was amiss.

I noticed that look on her face as I set down a bag on the conveyor belt. You know the kind of look where you can see their lip turn under, but you’re not exactly sure if they will be crying, laughing. or asking to go potty.

“What’s wrong baby?”

“I don’t want to go.”

“Honey we have to go, it’s our turn, come on…”

“No! I don’t want to go. I want to DO IT AGAIN!”

“Do what again honey? We need to move, come on…people are waiting.”

and with that the floodgates opened and every parent’s worst attitude nightmare began.

People moved around us, some with looks of sympathy, others with looks of confusion, and still others with that “please dear god tell me that family is NOT on my plane” look.

There was crying. There was screaming. There was the classic on the floor kicking and arm throwing thing. At one point she even folded her arms and “hmmmph’d” me mid bellow.

I tried the stern Mom thing first.

Then I got threatening.

Then came sweet and nice reasoning.

Then came bribing.

The screaming and crying and flailing continued.

Of course I tried to just manhandle her and carry her through. But she was doing that wiggle thing kids do with the back arch- and pulling out her patented go-to move…yelling for Daddy.

So imagine, if you will, what you might think if you saw a woman trying to carry an unwilling preschooler through airport security while she SCREAMED at the very top of her lungs “I WANT MY DADDY WHERE IS MY DADDY GET ME MY DADDY!”

Yeah, exactly.

That’s about when TSA pulled us aside. Me trying to wrangle the screaming and kicking girl while her brother held both hands over his ears yelling “MOM MAKE HER STOP!”

Of course it’s hard for a TSA agent to question me over custody while a 3-year old screams. A GIRL 3-year old. Because, trust me, it’s a tone and pitch you just don’t get with the boys. I was quickly allowed to attempt, again, to get through the xray.

This time I just carried her. On the other side another very nice TSA agent tried to help me gather our belogings. I’m sure he’s still regretting that move, because just as he got a bag on my shoulder Little Miss Yells-A-Lot swung around and kicked him in the thigh.

Yes, my daughter kicked a TSA agent.

I apologized profusely and then gave my girl a look that finally seemed to scare her to death and she became slightly reasonable. She still huffed and puffed and demanded she put her shoes on herself and then walked slow as a snail, head down and pouting to our gate…where the doors were closed and the plane to Los Angeles was pulling away.

You would think it ends here. But no.

Upon learning we missed our plane my 5-year old broke down in tears. So I had two kids pouting and crying or crying and pouting while I tried to decide if flying standby all day was worth it, or if I should just head back to my aunt’s house.

I went with option b. And after a shuttle bus ride to get a car and car seats and traffic for 2 hours (and a dead bird, which we hit on our way) I collapsed on a couch and decided I was never flying with my children anywhere ever again for the rest of their lives.

Silly Mommy