“The tide of history is turning women from beasts of burden and sexual play things into full-fledged human beings,” Kristof and WuDunn conclude. “Before long, we will consider sex slavery, honor killings, and acid attacks as unfathomable as foot-binding. The question is how long that transformation will take and how many girls will be kidnapped into brothels before it is complete – and whether each of us will be part of that historical movement, or a bystander.”
Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide
by Nicholas D. Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn (Random House 2009; paperback June 2010).
Friday, April 30, 2010
The Social Evolution of the Female by authors Kristoff and WuDunn
Thursday, April 29, 2010
The Navy gets Sensible; Why not the Florida Legislature ?
Women to begin serving on Navy subs in 2011, officials say
By Mike Mount, CNN Pentagon Producer
April 29, 2010 11:36 a.m. EDT
The cost of reconfiguring subs to allow for adequate privacy had been an objection to making the vessels co-ed.
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
· NEW: New graduates of officer training to be first women on subs
· NEW: They'll go through 15-month intensive submarine officer training
· NEW: Program to expand later to include female enlisted sailors
· Larger, nuclear-powered submarines to be the first to carry women
RELATED TOPICS
(CNN) -- The first women to serve on U.S. Navy submarines are expected to be on the job by fall of 2011, Navy officials said Thursday, ushering in a policy change to what has been an elite service open only to men since the start of the modern Navy's submarine program.
While Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced the change last month, the Navy had to wait for Congress to review and approve the policy change over a 30-day period which ended at midnight Thursday morning.
The official announcement came later Thursday from the commander of Submarine Group 10, Rear Adm. Barry Bruner, during a news conference at the Navy submarine base at Kings Bay, Georgia.
The first women chosen for the program will be selected by the Navy among upcoming graduates from the Naval Academy, the collegiate Reserves Officer Training Corps -- also known as ROTC -- and officer candidate schools.
Those women will go through the intensive 15-month submarine officer training program, which includes nuclear power school, submarine training, and the Submarine Officer Basic Course.
The Navy will implement the policy change by assigning three female officers to eight different crews of guided-missile attack and ballistic-missile submarines. The assignments involve two submarines on the East Coast and two on the West Coast, according to Navy officials.
Smaller, fast-attack submarines are considered to be too small to accommodate the necessary infrastructure change in living quarters that is possible on the larger subs, Navy officials explained.
Integrating female officers into the submarine squadrons is the first phase of the policy change. Including female enlisted sailors into the crews will take place in a second phase in the coming years, the officials said.
Women joined the crews of the Navy's surface ships in 1994, but officials had previously cited limited privacy and the cost of reconfiguring the vessels in arguing against their joining sub crews.
The change in policy was recommended by the top naval officer, Adm. Gary Roughead; the secretary of the Navy, Ray Mabus; and Gates. No Navy leaders opposed the plan, officials said.
"The young women that have come up to me since we announced our intention to change the policy have such great enthusiasm," Roughead said in a statement Thursday.
"There are extremely capable women in the Navy who have the talent and desire to succeed in the submarine force," Mabus added in the same statement.
Women make up 15 percent of the active duty Navy: 52,446 of 330,700 sailors in the service, according to Navy statistics.
Female sailors still cannot serve in the elite SEAL program, because those are considered frontline combat unit positions. Similar regulations in the other branches of the military also prevent women from serving in combat positions.
Monday, April 26, 2010
A POSSIBLY HUGE WIN FOR WOMEN WORKERS ! Stay tuned.
Court: Wal-Mart to face massive class-action suit
By PAUL ELIAS Associated Press Writer The Associated Press
Monday, April 26, 2010 9:22 PM EDT
[Editor's note (SandyO): This is why Wal-Mart and other of Corporate America refuse to let their funded candidates to government offices hear the Equal Rights Amendment bills--they don't want to held accountable in court for sex discrimination that's very well-covered up. Read to the bottom to see the lengths to which they will go to maintain profitable discrimination. And this is why we practice what we preach:
DON'T BUY A THING FROM WAL-MART. WE DON'T, AND HAVEN'T SINCE 2001.]
[Editor's note (SandyO): This is why Wal-Mart and other of Corporate America refuse to let their funded candidates to government offices hear the Equal Rights Amendment bills--they don't want to held accountable in court for sex discrimination that's very well-covered up. Read to the bottom to see the lengths to which they will go to maintain profitable discrimination. And this is why we practice what we preach:
DON'T BUY A THING FROM WAL-MART. WE DON'T, AND HAVEN'T SINCE 2001.]
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — A sharply divided federal appeals court on Monday exposed Wal-Mart Stores Inc. to billions of dollars in legal damages when it ruled a massive class action lawsuit alleging gender discrimination over pay for female workers can go to trial.
In its 6-5 ruling, the 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals said the world's largest private employer will have to face charges that it pays women less than men for the same jobs and that female employees receive fewer promotions and have to wait longer for those promotions than male counterparts.
The retailer has fiercely fought the lawsuit since it was first filed by six women in federal court in San Francisco in 2001 and said it would appeal the decision to the U.S. Supreme Court.
The ruling "opens up every company in America that has employees to class actions like this," said Theodore Boutrous, the company's lead lawyer on the largest gender bias class action in U.S. history.
The appeals court upheld a lower court ruling allowing the lawsuit to go forward as a class action, which attorneys for the Wal-Mart employees said encompasses more than 1 million women. Wal-Mart disputes that figure and asserts fewer than 500,000 women are covered by the decision Monday.
Either way, the company could lose billions of dollars if it is found liable and required to fork over back pay to the affected women.
The appeals court did order the trial court judge to reconsider two important issues that would alter any potential pay out.
U.S. District Court Judge Vaughn Walker in San Francisco was told to determine the appropiateness of punitive damages and whether former employees at the time of the 2001 filing of the lawsuit should be part of the class action. The case was transferred to Walker after the resignation of U.S. District Court Judge Martin Jenkins, who ruled against Wal-Mart on those two issues.
Wal-Mart employs 1.4 million employees in the United States and 2.1 million workers in 8,000 stores worldwide, and argued that the conventional rules of class action suits should not apply because each outlet operates as an independent business. Since it doesn't have a companywide policy of discrimination, Wal-Mart argued that women alleging gender bias should file individual lawsuits against individual stores.
For the full story, see http://www.myconsolidated.net/news/read.php?id=17704597&ps=1018&cat=&cps=0&lang=en&src=emailSunday, April 25, 2010
LOOK WHO MAY BE NOMINATED TO SCOTUS and change the landscape of America for Families ! GO GET 'EM, PRESIDENT OBAMA !
Wood, Kagan Are on High Court Short List, Again
-----------------------------------------------
By Sharon Johnson
WeNews correspondent
Sunday, April 25, 2010
Two women are once again making the radar in Supreme Court nomination
season. Here's a look at Judge Diane P. Wood and Solicitor General
Elena Kagan and their records--long and short--on the hot-button issue
of abortion rights.
(WOMENSNEWS)--Several hours after Supreme Court Justice John Paul
Stevens announced on April 9 his plan to retire this summer, Americans
United for Life, an anti-choice advocacy group, targeted one possible
candidate, Judge Diane P. Wood of the federal 7th Circuit Court of
Appeals in Chicago, as someone who "would return the abortion
wars to the Supreme Court" because of her pro-choice decisions.
Calling President Obama "unquestionably the most pro-abortion
president in history," the Chicago-based nonprofit public
interest law and policy organization later also objected to Solicitor
General Elena Kagan, among other names circulating in speculative
press reports.
Both women were also mentioned in connection with the Supreme Court
vacancy a year ago. Here are their brief biographies and views on
abortion.
Diane P. Wood
Judge Diane P. Wood has served on the federal 7th Circuit Court of
Appeals in Chicago for the past 15 years and has written over 400
opinions during her tenure there. She is a former clerk to Justice
Harry A. Blackmun, who authored the 1973 Roe decision mandating that
abortion be legal.
When President Bill Clinton nominated Wood, she was deputy assistant
general in the anti-trust division of the U.S. Department of Justice.
She faced no questions about abortion during her confirmation hearings
before the Judiciary Committee and was unanimously confirmed by the
Senate.
So far, no reproductive rights organization has spoken in favor of
nominating any candidate reported to be on Obama's list. But these
groups can be assumed to look favorably on Wood for taking pro-choice
positions in several cases in the 7th circuit.
On legislation approved for Illinois and Wisconsin, she wrote a
dissent against "partial birth" abortions, a term with no
clinical meaning that is presumed to serve to widen--by its
vagueness--the applicable time limitations of laws that already outlaw
late-term abortions. The Supreme Court later approved the bans and
accepted the politicized terminology.
Her most controversial ruling said that abortion providers could be
awarded damages from anti-choice protestors under the "RICO"
anti-racketeering statues, a decision that was reversed by the Supreme
Court.
Like Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who issued a similar ruling as a
federal judge in New York, Wood ruled in favor of a female immigrant
who opposed being sent back to China because of China's policies on
forced abortion and birth control.
Wood's name began circulating as a candidate for the "woman's
seat" on the Supreme Court in early 2009 when the press reported
that Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg might resign because she was being
treated for pancreatic cancer. Obama interviewed Wood for David
Souter's position when the pro-choice Republican retired last summer,
but ultimately tapped Sotomayor, the first Hispanic judge.
Like Stevens, Wood, 59, would bring geographic and educational
diversity to the court. A native of Chicago, Stevens received his
undergraduate degree at the University of Chicago and his law degree
at Northwestern University in Chicago.
Wood would replace Stevens as the only non-Ivy Leaguer on the court.
A New Jersey native, Wood moved to Texas with her family at age 16 and
received her bachelor's and law degrees at the University of Texas.
Like Obama, Wood has taught at the University of Chicago Law School.
For many years, Wood was the only woman on the faculty. In addition to
teaching anti-trust, federal civil procedures and international trade
and business, Wood served as associate dean for three years.
Stevens is currently the only Protestant on the court, which
otherwise is composed of six Catholics and two Jews. Wood has not
stated her religious preference. Stevens' retirement raises the
prospect that--for the first time in U.S. history--the court will not
have a Protestant judge, although Protestants are the largest
denomination and have supported pro-choice positions in numerous
cases.
Wood is married to a neurologist at Northwestern University Medical
School and has three adult children and three stepchildren.
Elena Kagan
Elena Kagan, who was named solicitor general in March 2009, is the
first woman in the job, sometimes known as the 10th Supreme Court
justice.
The solicitor general defends laws passed by Congress, regulations
enacted by agencies and actions by the president that come before the
court.
A scholar of administrative law, Kagan was the first woman to be
appointed dean of the Harvard Law School in 2003. During her six-year
tenure, she modernized the curriculum, promoted public service law and
expanded the faculty to include several leading conservatives, to the
delight of the Federalist Society and other conservative legal groups
that consider the school "too liberal."
Kagan's views on abortion are more difficult to ascertain than those
of Wood. Kagan wasn't asked about her views on abortion during her
confirmation hearing for solicitor general.
However, the anti-choice women's group Susan B. Anthony List opposed
her nomination because of her lack of judicial experience, since Kagan
had never argued a case in any court. But the group acknowledged that
Kagan was "well credentialed" because she was dean of
Harvard Law School, her alma mater, at the time.
Right to life groups also opposed Kagan because of statements she had
made earlier in her career. She had criticized Rust v. Sullivan, a
1991 U.S. Supreme Court decision upholding a ruling that prohibited
recipients of Title X funds from counseling and referring women for
abortion.
As a clerk to Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, she authored a
memo suggesting that faith-based groups that operate pregnancy centers
should not play a role in counseling pregnant teens because they would
be unable to do so without injecting their views.
Obama also interviewed Kagan for Souter's seat. Like Sotomayor who
won the position, 49-year-old Kagan grew up in New York City, attended
local schools and received her bachelor's degree from Princeton.
Kagan, who is single, would be the third Jew on the court if
confirmed.
Kagan was confirmed by the Senate for solicitor general by a 61-to-31
vote, one vote over the number needed to avoid a filibuster. Kagan may
get more Senate support this time. Orrin Hatch of Utah, the most
senior Republican, said last week that Kagan was
"brilliant." Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, one of
only seven Senate Republicans to vote for Sotomayor and the only GOP
member of the Judiciary Committee to do so, praised Kagan's work as
solicitor general.
Sharon Johnson is a New York-based freelance writer.
http://www.womensenews.org/story/in-the-courts/100423/wood-kagan-are-high-court-short-list-again
Wood, Kagan Are on High Court Short List, Again
-----------------------------------------------
By Sharon Johnson
WeNews correspondent
Sunday, April 25, 2010
Two women are once again making the radar in Supreme Court nomination
season. Here's a look at Judge Diane P. Wood and Solicitor General
Elena Kagan and their records--long and short--on the hot-button issue
of abortion rights.
(WOMENSNEWS)--Several hours after Supreme Court Justice John Paul
Stevens announced on April 9 his plan to retire this summer, Americans
United for Life, an anti-choice advocacy group, targeted one possible
candidate, Judge Diane P. Wood of the federal 7th Circuit Court of
Appeals in Chicago, as someone who "would return the abortion
wars to the Supreme Court" because of her pro-choice decisions.
Calling President Obama "unquestionably the most pro-abortion
president in history," the Chicago-based nonprofit public
interest law and policy organization later also objected to Solicitor
General Elena Kagan, among other names circulating in speculative
press reports.
Both women were also mentioned in connection with the Supreme Court
vacancy a year ago. Here are their brief biographies and views on
abortion.
Diane P. Wood
Judge Diane P. Wood has served on the federal 7th Circuit Court of
Appeals in Chicago for the past 15 years and has written over 400
opinions during her tenure there. She is a former clerk to Justice
Harry A. Blackmun, who authored the 1973 Roe decision mandating that
abortion be legal.
When President Bill Clinton nominated Wood, she was deputy assistant
general in the anti-trust division of the U.S. Department of Justice.
She faced no questions about abortion during her confirmation hearings
before the Judiciary Committee and was unanimously confirmed by the
Senate.
So far, no reproductive rights organization has spoken in favor of
nominating any candidate reported to be on Obama's list. But these
groups can be assumed to look favorably on Wood for taking pro-choice
positions in several cases in the 7th circuit.
On legislation approved for Illinois and Wisconsin, she wrote a
dissent against "partial birth" abortions, a term with no
clinical meaning that is presumed to serve to widen--by its
vagueness--the applicable time limitations of laws that already outlaw
late-term abortions. The Supreme Court later approved the bans and
accepted the politicized terminology.
Her most controversial ruling said that abortion providers could be
awarded damages from anti-choice protestors under the "RICO"
anti-racketeering statues, a decision that was reversed by the Supreme
Court.
Like Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who issued a similar ruling as a
federal judge in New York, Wood ruled in favor of a female immigrant
who opposed being sent back to China because of China's policies on
forced abortion and birth control.
Wood's name began circulating as a candidate for the "woman's
seat" on the Supreme Court in early 2009 when the press reported
that Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg might resign because she was being
treated for pancreatic cancer. Obama interviewed Wood for David
Souter's position when the pro-choice Republican retired last summer,
but ultimately tapped Sotomayor, the first Hispanic judge.
Like Stevens, Wood, 59, would bring geographic and educational
diversity to the court. A native of Chicago, Stevens received his
undergraduate degree at the University of Chicago and his law degree
at Northwestern University in Chicago.
Wood would replace Stevens as the only non-Ivy Leaguer on the court.
A New Jersey native, Wood moved to Texas with her family at age 16 and
received her bachelor's and law degrees at the University of Texas.
Like Obama, Wood has taught at the University of Chicago Law School.
For many years, Wood was the only woman on the faculty. In addition to
teaching anti-trust, federal civil procedures and international trade
and business, Wood served as associate dean for three years.
Stevens is currently the only Protestant on the court, which
otherwise is composed of six Catholics and two Jews. Wood has not
stated her religious preference. Stevens' retirement raises the
prospect that--for the first time in U.S. history--the court will not
have a Protestant judge, although Protestants are the largest
denomination and have supported pro-choice positions in numerous
cases.
Wood is married to a neurologist at Northwestern University Medical
School and has three adult children and three stepchildren.
Elena Kagan
Elena Kagan, who was named solicitor general in March 2009, is the
first woman in the job, sometimes known as the 10th Supreme Court
justice.
The solicitor general defends laws passed by Congress, regulations
enacted by agencies and actions by the president that come before the
court.
A scholar of administrative law, Kagan was the first woman to be
appointed dean of the Harvard Law School in 2003. During her six-year
tenure, she modernized the curriculum, promoted public service law and
expanded the faculty to include several leading conservatives, to the
delight of the Federalist Society and other conservative legal groups
that consider the school "too liberal."
Kagan's views on abortion are more difficult to ascertain than those
of Wood. Kagan wasn't asked about her views on abortion during her
confirmation hearing for solicitor general.
However, the anti-choice women's group Susan B. Anthony List opposed
her nomination because of her lack of judicial experience, since Kagan
had never argued a case in any court. But the group acknowledged that
Kagan was "well credentialed" because she was dean of
Harvard Law School, her alma mater, at the time.
Right to life groups also opposed Kagan because of statements she had
made earlier in her career. She had criticized Rust v. Sullivan, a
1991 U.S. Supreme Court decision upholding a ruling that prohibited
recipients of Title X funds from counseling and referring women for
abortion.
As a clerk to Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, she authored a
memo suggesting that faith-based groups that operate pregnancy centers
should not play a role in counseling pregnant teens because they would
be unable to do so without injecting their views.
Obama also interviewed Kagan for Souter's seat. Like Sotomayor who
won the position, 49-year-old Kagan grew up in New York City, attended
local schools and received her bachelor's degree from Princeton.
Kagan, who is single, would be the third Jew on the court if
confirmed.
Kagan was confirmed by the Senate for solicitor general by a 61-to-31
vote, one vote over the number needed to avoid a filibuster. Kagan may
get more Senate support this time. Orrin Hatch of Utah, the most
senior Republican, said last week that Kagan was
"brilliant." Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, one of
only seven Senate Republicans to vote for Sotomayor and the only GOP
member of the Judiciary Committee to do so, praised Kagan's work as
solicitor general.
Sharon Johnson is a New York-based freelance writer.
http://www.womensenews.org/story/in-the-courts/100423/wood-kagan-are-high-court-short-list-again
Saturday, April 24, 2010
APROPOS OF EQUAL PAY DAY
Stats from National Coalition of Women, Jobs and Job Training…4/9/2010
Today women represent nearly half of our nation’s workforce, but more than one-half of working women are concentrated in only 25 of 504 occupational categories. Many of these occupations are among the lowest-paid. Women WIN Jobs supports the recruitment, training, placement, and retention of women in nontraditional fields where low-income women can earn 20 to 30 percent more than in traditionally female jobs. Women WIN Jobs addresses the need to heighten the skills of half of our workforce and supports women on the path to economic security for themselves and their families.
Today women represent nearly half of our nation’s workforce, but more than one-half of working women are concentrated in only 25 of 504 occupational categories. Many of these occupations are among the lowest-paid. Women WIN Jobs supports the recruitment, training, placement, and retention of women in nontraditional fields where low-income women can earn 20 to 30 percent more than in traditionally female jobs. Women WIN Jobs addresses the need to heighten the skills of half of our workforce and supports women on the path to economic security for themselves and their families.
Friday, April 23, 2010
Following is Sandy Oestreich's response to St Petersburg Times Political Blog stating that Pinellas County Commission (FL) members Brickfield and Bostock had refused to sign the Equal Pay Day Proclamation
This in response to an article stating that Bostock (female) and Brickfield (apparently rabid anti-woman) of the Pinellas County Commission refused to sign a simple proclamation declaring Equal Pay Day, an annual event. Seems all others signed, even Karen Seel and Ken Welch, both of whom had previously killed our efforts for more complete coverage of Pinellas County families in need via a Pinellas County Commission for Women (we are the most populated county in Florida; there are 19 others around the state). It was a political kill and Comm. Welch made sure to humiliate me by twisting my words. They voted unanimously against starting a CFW in the St Petersburg-Clearwater area.
My comment to those who voted against signing the Equal Pay Day Proclamation and those whose comments, mostly male, had negative views to express follows:
To claim that women are already paid equally is like proclaiming that there was no Holocaust.Department of Labor is the source for those stats. Women are actually gradually losing ground.
Since when are women not part of the human race and deserving of equal pay for equal work? We cook your meals, bear your children and compare paychecks. American working families are shortchanged an average of $4205 per year because she isn't paid fairly/equally. That puts 1 in 5 elderly women in poverty, on public assistance that YOU and I pay for How about making Corporations pay for that?
How about we stop thinking the latest Lilly Ledbetter and the forthcoming Paycheck Fairness Act will escape the ignoring that the 1963 Pay Equity Act has experienced for 45 years--THAT'S WHY LAWS DO NOT SOLVE THIS PROBLEM, and....
THE EQUAL RIGHTS AMENDMENT (ERA) THAT FLORIDA'S MEN AND WOMEN HAVE RE-IGNITED, DOES.
Let's stop tilting at windmills and get to solving the problem once and for all--
Anyone can contact the Florida Republican leadership, next Speaker Dean Cannon (407 623-5740) and Senate President-elect Mike Haridopolous (321 752-3131) and tell them to HOLD HEARINGS ON THE ERA BILLS BEFORE THEM IN 2011 ! Neither want to do this because they believe wrongly that ERA is either 1)UNimportant!! (with working women holding up the sky now that many male heads of households have been laid off !) OR 2) dangerous to Big Business' bottom line!
Actually ERA SAVES THE STATE MONEY and requires no funding--unlike almost ALL other bills.
ERA is WinWin, tell them. If they hem and haw as usual, ask why they won't hold hearings (and don't accept the lie that "I leave that choice up to the Chair of committee"). When they won't tell you WHY they won't hear this critically important Amendment and just vote it UP or DOWN, then tell them "I guess you must just HATE WOMEN since all of your other concerns have been deflated by 10 years of legal briefs we've been bringing to you IF you allow us an audience, ever."
See www.RatifyERAflorida.net and the blog there for our well-vetted Rationales for Ratifying ERA.
It's time to allow women a place at the table, for as G.Steinem says,"If you're not at the table, then you're ON THE MENU". We're tired of being the appetizer.
All other nations since WWII have an ERA!! Some brought to them compliments of US servicewomen and men.
For American MEN also have inequities that ERA would cure: unfair child custody awards, issues with the draft, immigration, name change, unfair adjudications in the event of teenage consensual sex (HE goes to jail; she goes into hiding).
See www.ratifyERAFlorida.net for the buttons on ERA for Men, for Women, for Moms, for the Wary, for Legislators, En Espanol, etc. Welcome to the New Nation of Equality where the effects are more harmonious marriages, fewer divorces, lowered abortion rates, stabilized communities, and improved economies--See the research studies:
Equal Rights Amendment IS a win-win.
Back us in Florida as we file our bills in 2011 AGAIN, for the TENTH YEAR. Maybe THEN the Republican House leadership will permit women's rights and men's rights to be testified upon in Florida's capitol. It IS the 21st century ! Tourists and new Floridians are aghast that Florida has not yet ratified ERA like their state did years ago and which is being held hostage to good ol boys and gals in Tallahassee. WE JUST NEED 3 MORE STATES: Equal Rights Alliance is filing bills in both state Houses every year for 10 years AND mentoring 5 other states who are filing ERA bills, too! Pitch in for equality or all, ERA. Has NOTHING TO DO with same-sex anything nor abortion. Get with us so we can help YOU and your children and theirs to a better life. We do this FOR FREE for YOU>
Write what YOU think to ratifyERA@cs.com.
Posted by: sandy oestreich | April 23, 2010 at 10:28 PM
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
