Ayotte v. Planned Parenthood

Begins today. You can watch the oral arguments here. I would very much like to have more to say on this subject but have been v. work-busy of late; hopefully soon, as the case proceeds.

Also note that I am adding NARAL's Action Counter on the FDA's Plan B footdragging to the sidebar; for a fun, snarky comment on the whole Plan B / pharmacist's "rights" debate, check out Blogging Baby.

Ok, now I'm back to work.

My radical married feminist manifesto

Great piece: America's Stay-at-Home Feminists.

Feminists could not say, "Housekeeping and child-rearing in the nuclear family is not interesting and not socially validated. Justice requires that it not be assigned to women on the basis of their gender and at the sacrifice of their access to money, power, and honor."
...
The family -- with its repetitious, socially invisible, physical tasks -- is a necessary part of life, but it allows fewer opportunities for full human flourishing than public spheres like the market or the government. This less-flourishing sphere is not the natural or moral responsibility only of women. Therefore, assigning it to women is unjust. Women assigning it to themselves is equally unjust. To paraphrase, as Mark Twain said, "A man who chooses not to read is just as ignorant as a man who cannot read."
...
Women who want to have sex and children with men as well as good work in interesting jobs where they may occasionally wield real social power need guidance, and they need it early. Step one is simply to begin talking about flourishing. In so doing, feminism will be returning to its early, judgmental roots.
...
There are three rules: Prepare yourself to qualify for good work, treat work seriously, and don't put yourself in a position of unequal resources when you marry.

I disagree with this, though:

It is possible that marrying a liberal might be the better course. After all, conservatives justified the unequal family in two modes: "God ordained it" and "biology is destiny." Most men (and most women), including the liberals, think women are responsible for the home. But at least the liberal men should feel squeamish about it.

In my observation and experience, yeah, sure: liberal men will "feel squeamish" about sexism. But--and I say this as the currently money-earning half of a marriage with a stay-at-home partner--a person with a demanding job and the social/economic power that goes along with being the breadwinner, even if that person is a woman and a feminist, is not going to spend a lot of time "feeling squeamish" about unequal work on the home front. Partly this is because professional jobs take up a lot of mental energy; you're thinking too much about the job to be thinking about who's doing the laundry, especially if the laundry is getting done without your thinking about it. Partly this is because domestic work is a pain in the butt: no one who doesn't have to do it is going to spend a lot of time thinking about it. And partly it's because the nature of domestic labor (like most labor) is that if it's done well, it looks effortless and therefore becomes invisible. Only if it's done badly does it get noticed, and then the response is likely to be irritation rather than squeamishness.

In fact, I believe that this is the single most irretrievably gendered division-of-labor issue for couples who want to be, or think they are, equals: the person whose job it is to monitor that equality is the person who has the least power. And in most cases, that's the woman. That's why "don't put yourself in a position of unequal resources" is absolutely crucial advice: if you're going to have to monitor your marriage to make sure that it's an equal partnership, then that is in and of itself part of the labor of the relationship. That "counts," and having to do that "extra" work will be a lot more palatable, and possible, if you ensure from the outset that all other aspects of your marriage distribute resources equally. Otherwise you're stacking the deck against yourself, and at some point, yes: it is going to be "easier" to "choose" not to pursue a demanding career and have children and keep a clean house and play the referee in your own marriage. To begin with, don't, for god's sake, change your name when you marry. What are the arguments for changing your name? "It's easier?" "It will make us more a family?" "It will be better for the children?" Do you not realize that already, even before your marriage begins, you are conceding that making things "easy," making the two of you "a family," worrying about "the children" is your job, not his? If having the same last name makes such a big difference to the two of you, let him change his damn name.

Set up your finances from the outset so that you have separate bank accounts; set up your investments so that you make equal contributions to separate retirement accounts--and if you don't have enough money to maximize your investments in both accounts, then prioritze the woman's account over the guy's, because statistically speaking he is likely to make more money, to earn more over his lifetime, and to die sooner. If, god forbid, you divorce, he is likely to do better out of it than you are, so insure yourself against that possibility. This isn't cynical, and it isn't "anticipating divorce"; it's simply saying, make sure things are fair in your relationship. Given that society at large will pay him more, balance that by making sure that in your own house, you are paid more.

In other words, as Hirshman's piece argues,

Bad deals come in two forms: economics and home economics. The economic temptation is to assign the cost of child care to the woman's income. If a woman making $50,000 per year whose husband makes $100,000 decides to have a baby, and the cost of a full-time nanny is $30,000, the couple reason that, after paying 40 percent in taxes, she makes $30,000, just enough to pay the nanny. So she might as well stay home. This totally ignores that both adults are in the enterprise together and the demonstrable future loss of income, power, and security for the woman who quits. Instead, calculate that all parents make a total of $150,000 and take home $90,000. After paying a full-time nanny, they have $60,000 left to live on.

DO NOT make the mistake of agreeing that "his" money is what comes from his paychecks, and "her" money is what comes on hers; and definitely do not make that mistake and then compound it by expecting both partners to contribute the same amount to expenses like rent, mortgage, or groceries. Pool your combined income, deduct all expenses, and then split what's leftover equally.

And on this matter of housework, the "domestic glass ceiling": the best marital advice I have to give is be willing to be a bitch about housework. And do it as early as possible. Is your man going to divorce you if you insist he does his fair share? Then find out quick, before you have kids and it just gets worse. But probably he won't divorce you for insisting he do housework. So, insist. Don't fuck around with "housework strikes"--it'll drive you crazy before it does him, probably, and you'll cave. Don't get stuck in arguments about "who cares more" or "who just happens to be tidier" or "I just don't notice the mess, honey" or "I'll do whatever you ask me to"--all of which are excuses that mean "I don't think it's my responsibility to do housework, so of course I care less/don't bother/don't notice/will "help" if you think for me and tell me what to do." My advice is, go ahead and do what needs to be done. But let him know what you are doing every goddamn step of the way, and let him know that it pisses you off. "I've just gotten home from work, it's nice to see you're home earlier than I am. Before I take off my coat, I'll put your shoes away for you, shall I? Oh, and I'll pick up your coat from the floor and hang it up. Okay, now I can take off my own coat and hang it up right away, instead of dropping it on the floor for someone else to pick up later. I see there's no dinner started, I'll just get on that shall I? First, though, I'll clear the mail off the dining room table where you seem to have dropped it when you walked in the door. I'll file it over here where it belongs. Ok, now I'm going to go into the kitchen to get a sponge to wipe off the table, which I see hasn't been wiped since breakfast--I guess you didn't have a chance to do that yet, since you had to sit down and read the paper first, right? Wow, now that I'm in the kitchen, I see that before I can start dinner I have to load the dishwasher, but before I can do that I have to unload it...."

If you do that for a week or so, both of you will start to notice how much work is being done, and how unfair the distribution is. And both of you will have to make a decision. You will have to decide if doing this much extra work, every day for the rest of your life, is something you're willing to do to keep the marriage going. And he will have to decide if he is willing to listen to you bitch at him about it for the rest of his life, or if it would be easier to get up off his ass and do his fair share, or if he is so unwilling to get up off his ass that he would rather divorce you than be forced to notice how unfair he's being. That's the bottom line, and I recommend figuring out where it is sooner rather than later, and deciding whether or not you can live with it.

And finally, Hirshman asks:

We care because what they do is bad for them, is certainly bad for society, and is widely imitated, even by people who never get their weddings in the Times. This last is called the "regime effect," and it means that even if women don't quit their jobs for their families, they think they should and feel guilty about not doing it. That regime effect created the mystique around The Feminine Mystique, too.

As for society, elites supply the labor for the decision-making classes -- the senators, the newspaper editors, the research scientists, the entrepreneurs, the policy-makers, and the policy wonks. If the ruling class is overwhelmingly male, the rulers will make mistakes that benefit males, whether from ignorance or from indifference.

Amen, and hallelujah. With privilege comes responsibility.

Now, having said all that--and the preceeding was all written rather quickly several days ago--I have also been thinking since of my own career angst and the ways that all of this is, in the end, easier said than done. It's really very difficult not to internalize the fear of pursuing power and status and convince oneself that one wants neither, and it's also very difficult not to internalize the fucked-up priorities of a fucked-up society and convince oneself that power and status are more important than a balanced life. This latter is probably part of the problem with analyses like Hirshman's that focus primarily on the feminist problems of a privileged class, even though it's also probably true that the privileged class probably feels the crunch between "power and status" and "contentment" most acutely. And I think these issues are particularly pressing for women at this particular time because, as a group, we're in transition still, and as a society I think we're butting our heads up against the reality that "the workplace" as we've long conceived it is, frankly, incompatible with family life in many ways--a truth we didn't have to face as long as women were taking care of the family stuff outside of the workplace. And to be honest, I cannot bring myself to condemn individuals for making whatever compromises they need to make with current reality, even though I also fear that I can't bring myself *not* to condemn myself for making compromises, or for refusing to.

But yes, I think this idea that the glass ceiling is now at home is a really vital one, and worth thinking through. I'm interested in hearing what y'all have to say on it.

Why cat blogging?

I really think this video definitively answers the question. Personally, I think it's better with the canned laughter soundtrack off, though.

Stolen from Elise.

God warns U.S.: Do not confirm Alito, or I will smite you

Pieces of the Supreme Court Facade Crumble, nearly killing a group of Americans visiting the Court. Including, notably, a group of students from Ohio. Obviously God is sending us a message about the Bush administration.

Great lines from the article--someone at the AP was having fun with this:

Justices were back on the bench Monday following a two-week recess.

The fallen marble lay directly in the center of the path up to the court entrance.

Prayin Hard for Better Dayz

If you missed Camille Peri's piece by that title in Salon this weekend, go read it now. It's a lovely and thoughtful piece about how the language of racial authenticity diversity masks pervasively racialized class distinctions; how intelligent and sensitive kids can, sometimes, still see across those lines; how parents can learn from their children; how liberal idealism can impede genuine progress; and, in a subtle but resonant way, how faith, hope, and love can cross barriers we often don't even see.

Joe's new identity challenged our own assumptions and awareness as well. With Joe's new friends in our lives, neighborhoods that we usually drove through only on our way somewhere else now became our destinations. I remember walking through double locked gates into a labyrinth of concrete halls to drop off one friend at a unit that had only a TV and a PlayStation -- no chairs, no kitchen table, no beds. Dropping off another child meant driving through acres of public housing staggering down to the shipyards in San Francisco's Hunter's Point. Years ago I often went into these projects when I worked with teenagers in juvenile court, and later wrote about kids who were struggling to get out of them. But when had they built so many more of them? Why didn't I know how the projects had multiplied? They might have been communities of Amish or Hasidic Jews for all my life intersected with them now.
....
The new school could be our chance to get Joe out of the ghetto, however. For months, it had been our salvation, beaming like the neon one-way sign on a fundamentalist church, pointing the way back to our side of the invisible line. But a curious thing happened the day we went to the school orientation. Out of about four dozen students who had been accepted into the first class, only two were black. The smiling African American students pictured in so many photos in the brochure were a lie. Some of the bright new freshman faces even belonged to kids from wealthy suburbs with excellent public high schools. Like that of all the private schools we had seen, this school's vision seemed to reflect what white liberal parents would like to be true rather than the real truth, a fantasy that makes it easier for us to live with our choices.

Cute

"Oh," I thought. "Mousetrap is the perfect game for Pseudonymous Kid. It doesn't require a lot of reading, he likes building things, and hey--mice!"

Wrong.

Ok, well, I admit it: HE likes the game a lot. The problem is, even though I remember it being lots of fun when I was little, well, I'm not so little any more.

And frankly, the fucking game takes forEVER. And of course PK wants to "test" the game every time we add a new piece. And of course half the time you "test," one of the little metal balls rolls under the couch. And the other half the time, the test doesn't work right, so of course you have to set it all up and test it again, until it works properly. So that the little ball rolls under the couch.

And then there's this issue of collecting pieces of cheese. Was this added since I was a kid? 'Cause I don't remember it. PK, of course, is obsessed with cheese-collecting; he is cheese greedy. Which means that the point of the cheese--to "spend" it in order to get your opponents into the trap--gets overlooked in favor of simply collecting as much cheese as possible. And of course, as a result, the game takes even longer. And also of course, if he loses he is crushed: both the normal little-kid "I can't stand to lose" crushed, plus the additional MY MOUSE WAS TRAPPED!!! crush. So you have to wait until he feels he has enough cheese, and then you have to wait for him to land on the "turn the crank" spot, and then you have to let him trap you.

All the while resisting the urge to say things like "come on, PK, roll the dice already," and "AARRGGHH! Stop hitting the board with your foot and making the trap go off!" and "really, you have MORE than enough cheese, and it's 9:00 for god's sake!"

It is, however, okay to say things like, "yes, I know the rules say that if the trap doesn't go off right, you don't get to try again, but that's all right; let's reset the trap and give you another chance, okay?"

Everybody loves turkey

Especially Daisy, who as you can see is allowed on the table. The little plate that she is completely ignoring was set for her, but she figured that the big bird was FAR more interesting--of course.

Sorry about the photo quality--it's a still from a video clip. The fantastic camera Julie sent us takes video, too!

Thanksgiving = Movie Time

Whether you stay home and pop in a DVD or go out to get away from the relatives, Thanksgiving weekend is, of course, one of the sacred movie-going weekends of the American experience. Scott's got a thread going about truly awful movies. I think it's a half-assed thread, though, as I'm the only one to mention Howard the Duck, which along with The Ice Pirates has to rate as one of the two worst high school dating experiences ever. Way worse than getting caught fucking my boyfriend by his ultra-Catholic Filipina mother; embarrassing, sure, but what did she think was going to happen to her son once he started dating those white chicks? Whereas Howard the Duck--which come to think of it, I got dragged to by that same guy, which really raises the question of why the hell I was sleeping with him--has left an indelibly bad memory in my mind, unlike either F's mother (who was really perfectly nice) or even F himself. The embarrassment of high school boyfriends fades eventually, but the shame of having seen Howard the Duck will probably make my sphincter clench even after I'm otherwise rendered incontinent by old age.

Where was I? Oh yes, movies. Ok, so instead of awful movies, which we can all agree on (unless you haven't actually seen Howard the Duck, in which case count your blessings), how about a far more difficult and more revealing category: movies that everyone else thinks are awful, but which you actually really like? Here's a couple to get you started:

1. Even Cowgirls Get the Blues. Everyone I know who's seen it says it's stilted, artificial, poorly paced, and flat-out embarrassing. Of course, they are all wrong. The artifice and awkwardness of the thing are the whole point, people. That's what the movie is about: people who don't fit in, who feel awkward and weird. Form = content. Duh.

2. Into the West. I am completely, 100% serious about this. Yes, if you click on the link you will think "WTF? A magic horse movie? Ewwww!" But I SWEAR TO GOD it is seriously one of the best movies I've ever seen. Really. Truly. I have twisted people's arms to get them to see it, and they all promised to kill me if it was even half as bad as they expected it to be, and without exception they all ended up weeping by the end of it and admitting that it's a fantastic, wonderful film.

So if you're looking for a really sad but great movie over the holidays, rent that one.

A contest!

Eric over at Is That Legal? claims to suck at titling things, even though the title of his blog is perfectly fine. But his self-deception may be your gain, because he's offering a $20 B&N gift certificate to the reader who comes up with the best title for his new book. 'Course, nothing's free, and you have to read the intro to find out what the book's about, otherwise I'd suggest naming it something swanky like, "Bitch Ph.D. Sure Looks Fabulous in Her New Boots, and Is She Ever Smart, or What?" Or possibly "Professional Squidhead." But it's something about Japanese Americans in WWII, so probably not.

At the risk of insulting all of Eric's regular readers, I will say that *at this point* the suggestions are all rather, well, dry. So if you've a knack for the pithy, go get yourself a gift certificate and Eric's undying gratitude, plus immortality in his "acknowledgements" section.

Excellent teaching advice

If you have one of those godawful courses that's scheduled MTWThF, declare Wednesday a "reading" day at the beginning of the semester.

Pedagogical justification: you can give short assignments over the weekends and over Wednesday, thereby ensuring that the students keep up with the material. The assignments, however, can be somewhat more involved than they might be if they were given on days where the class meets. You can also assign somewhat longer readings between T and Th. Seriously, I've done this for years and I highly recommend it.

Personal justification: come Thanksgiving week, you can bail a day early :)

All of which is to say that my vacation starts Wednesday. I may or may not post over the break, b/c hey, that turkey isn't gonna cook or eat itself.

I don't think I've been so cheerful on a Monday in *ages.*

Tomorrow, the world

Check it out: Bitch is on the radio. Talking, natch, about online dating and open marriages. You gotta listen to the whole thing, it's really fun--and most of the people speaking have much less nasal voices than I do.

In my defense, it was a cell phone.

Pseudonymous Kid learns to play the dozens, sort of

Pseudonymous Kid: Mama, you are an ugly, stupid, kitten head.
Me: Oh yeah? Well, you're a pathetic squidheaded grubby . . . monkey.
Pseudonymous Kid: That's a good one. You're a . . . naughty, gross, scotch-tape pumpkin eater.
Me: Oh yeah? Well, you're a naughty gross poo eater.
Mr. B.: Ok, that's enough. We're eating dinner.
Pseudonymous Kid (carrying on): You're a big puffalocus.
Me: What's a puffalocus?
Pseudonymous Kid: It's a puffa . . . locus.
Me: Okay. You're an ugly naughty binky.
Pseudonymous Kid: You're a professional squidhead. You AND papa are professional squidheads.
Me: You're a. . . . terrible monstrous smelly foot.
Pseudonymous Kid: You're a bulbous octopus head.
Me: Oh yeah? Your MAMA is a bulbous octopus head.
Pseudonymous Kid: Yes.

Ooh! Knitted DNA!

Scroll down to the bottom of this page (which has some other cool knitted toys on it as well).

I so wish I were a good enough knitter to make this for everyone I know for Christmas.

Update: be sure and look at the comment thread for some fantastic links to other terrific geeky knit patterns and non-knitting related DNA kitch.

Blogger Membership Drive

The Electronic Frontier Foundation is having a membership drive. For those not in the know, EFF is a nonprofit dedicated to establishing legislation to safeguard bloggers' First Amendment rights. They also provide legal advice and, naturally, have a blog of their own.

If you join for $100, you can get a seriously cool pair of blogger pyjama bottoms. How cool is that? If you're a blogger and you put one of their badges on your front page, you can get the pjs for $75.

Hat tip Crooked Timber.

Pseudonymous Kid is kind to vampires

Pseudonymous Kid (waving a rubber bat in my face): Mama, I have an idea.
Me: Yes? Don't shove that thing in my face.
Pseudonymous Kid: It wants to suck your blood!
Me: Oh no! Don't suck my blood!
Pseudonymous Kid: Well, that's my idea. Maybe if we fed vampires blood from dead people, people who had already died because they were very old or sick, maybe then they wouldn't need to drink our blood. Isn't that a good idea?
Me: Um. . . . sure, I guess it's a good idea. Or we could feed them animal blood.
Pseudonymous Kid: Yes, animal blood and the blood of people who are already dead.

(a few minutes later)

Pseudonymous Kid: Mama, see this red pencil?
Me: Yes?
Pseudonymous Kid: It's not really a pencil. It's blood.
Me: Oh, like a straw?
Pseudonymous Kid: No, it's a special kind of blood that has been made into the shape of a pencil.
Me: I see. Is that for feeding to your bat?
Pseudonymous Kid: Yes. But it's not a bat, it's a vampire! It's just pretending to be a bat.
Me: I see.

(a few minutes later)

Pseudonymous Kid approaches, plastic coffin in hand, rubber bat stuffed inside, pencil sticking out the slightly ajar lid: Mama, see?
Me: Yes, is that so that the bat doesn't need to suck my blood any more?
Pseudonymous Kid: It's a vampire!
Me: Right, I'm sorry. The vampire?
Pseudonymous Kid: Yes. And see, this way it can just drink the blood and it won't have to go out and find people to bite. And see, the lid is still open a little bit, so that it can just push the lid off and go out to fly around and get some fresh air, if it wants.
Me: That's very kind of you.

(a few minutes later)

Me (to Mr. B): . . . so then he said the vampire bat could just push the lid off so it can get some fresh air. Isn't that cute?
Pseudonymous Kid: No! It's not a bat, it's a VAMPIRE.
Me: Right, my mistake. The vampire can get some fresh air.
Pseudonymous Kid: Although, in the case of being a vampire bat, you could call it that, because it is a vampire PRETENDING to be a bat.

What other people have to say about reproductive rights

From a kickass blogger named Redneck Mother, via another kickass blogger, Twisty.

Also, a good article in the Guardian about parental notification. Got it over at Unfogged.

Thoughtful response to Sunday's Frontline show, The Last Abortion Clinic (which I taped, but haven't yet had a chance to watch) from Abortion Clinic Days.

New Carnival of the Feminists is up

Over at Sour Duck. Go. check it out. There are some amazing posts there on all sorts of things, by women all around the world--some funny, some informative, some touching, some ranty. An amazing lineup; the organizers did a hell of a job.

Issue 4 of The Carnival of Feminists will be published on December 7th at The Happy Feminist. Send submissions to veryhappyfeminist AT yahoo DOT com with feminist carnival in the subject line.

Like the bitch says...

Happy Medicare prescription drug benefit enrollment period.

And that right there is why I say that, when I grow up, I wanna be a cranky old lady.

I am busy today

But here's something to keep you company. Make sure the sound is on.

CFB

(That would be "Call for Blogging," as opposed to "Call for Papers.")

1. Third Feminist Carnival: Will be up 16 November. Quick, you may still have time for a last-minute submission.

2. Blog Against Racism Day: 1 December.

Dear students

Really, I know you mean well and you get flustered and it is so very not your fault that I am plowing through a stack of papers at the last f'in minute. However, please do not call me at home, in the evening, with the following set of questions:

Student: I don't think my assignment for tomorrow will be done, what's the late penalty?
Me: It's on the syllabus, which I don't have in front of me.
Student: I think it's 10 points per day?
Me: Yes, that sounds right. Check the syllabus to be sure.
Student: Well, is that like 10 points, or 10 percent?
Me: Well, the assignments are graded on a 100-point scale, right? So it's the same thing.
Student: Uhm, oh yeah. Okay, I have another question.
Me: Yes?
Student: We're doing group work on our final projects in class tomorrow, right?
Me: Yes.
Student: So if i don't have my assignment, should I even come?
Me: Well, you won't have your assignment to contribute, but you can help the other people in your group talk about their work, right?
Student: Yes, I suppose so.
Me: And if you're not there, then not only are you late with your assignment, but you're also not doing the required group work that's part of your participation grade, correct?
Student: Right.
Me: So yeah, I think it would probably be a good idea for you to show up.

Follow up on Dowd

Lindsay has an excellent response to my post, and Scott's got a criticism of Dowd with which I have no problem whatsoever.

And, of course, there's Katha Pollitt's take: "Dowd is such a credulous audience for backlash propaganda it doesn't occur to her that she is promoting, not reporting, the problem she describes." I'll go along with that.

Alito's smoking gun

Well, here it is:

Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito wrote back in 1985 that he was proud of his Reagan-era work helping the government argue that "the Constitution does not protect a right to an abortion," documents showed Monday.

Seriously, read the whole article. If anyone comes around with the argument that a judge's personal opinions don't necessarily affect how he rules, just point out that Alito himself said "hat he was proud of his work in the solicitor general's office from 1982-1985, where he helped "to advance legal positions in which I personally believe very strongly,"" and then tell them to go take a flying leap. And this doesn't even get into the recent revelations that, having said he would recuse himself from any cases involving Vanguard, he, well, didn't.

I hope to god that this means the Alito nomination is now dead in the water.

I've been collecting links for an Alito link dump for a week or so, and admittedly today's WaPo article pretty much seals the argument, but there is still a lot of interesting stuff in these links. So check 'em out.

A number of entries over at Catching Flies.
This and this over at Bush v. Choice. A post related to that second link over at Dadahead.
This piece on spousal notification over at Feministe, and this one at Pandagon.
A li'l bit of humor at Opinions You Should Have.
An older but informative link round up over at SCOTUS blog, and a couple of good links over at After School Snack; see also this and some interesting statistics on the broader argument of how we define judicial activism.
And, begging Moon's pardon, he's also written three good posts on other reasons to oppose Alito, mostly having to do with his judicial philosophy rather than with specific issues.

And for god's sake, if you're not already reading everything Scott is writing about Alito over at Lawyers, Guns and Money, then why the hell not?

Sad news

Dorcasina's husband passed away tonight.

She and I, as some of you know, went to grad school together. I remember meeting him before they were married, and hearing the news that they were getting married, and seeing him at parties and grad student get togethers. He was a sweet, funny, quiet, smart guy with an shy but charming smile, and he obviously adored her. They have a daughter who is about two now, I think. So sad. The last time I saw him was at a mutual friend's wedding almost two years ago; he'd just finished a round (if memory serves, at the time it was the "last" round) of chemotherapy, and I admit I was shocked at how much weight he'd lost, the baldness--but if anything, it only made his eyes (which had amazingly curly lashes) bigger and more expressive. And he was still smiling, and we were glad to see each other, and I asked about his new daughter and he joked a bit about something, I don't remember what.

I think someone told me at the time that his prognosis wasn't very good, so I was surprised when I found Dorcasina's blog a few months later and read that they were still fighting it, that he was doing better. Based on my understanding of his illness, it is frankly amazing, a real testament to his and Dorcasina's wills, that he survived as long as he did, had so many good days left to share with her and their daughter. Still, in the end, he was much too young to die, and Dorcasina is much too young to be widowed. Such a terrible loss for her and their daughter.

If anyone wants to send cards or flowers, email me; I don't think it would be cool to give out her address, but I'm sure we can arrange something. And if anyone wants to make a small paypal donation for takeout food or babysitting or maid service or catering or funeral costs or any of the other myriad small expenses that pile up, feel free to make use of my paypal account and indicate that it's for Dorcasina, and I'll be sure to pass it right along.

Maureen Dowd

I know, everyone's been talking about her "What's a Modern Girl to Do?" column for weeks now, and I'm late to the party. Sue me. Actually, I did leave a couple of comments on other people's posts--one at this post of Scott's (see also his follow up post) and one over at Twisty's. At Scott's, I said

Ugh, the MoDo bashing is really getting to me--and the first comment on this thread, I think, illustrates why.

It seems to me that what's going on is revealing a fair bit of latent misogyny, in men and women alike. What, exactly, is Dowd's big sin? That she's being "weak"? "Whiny"? "Petty"? "Silly"? "Illogical"? Isn't this really of a piece with the attacks I get for being a "bad feminist" because I like high-heeled shoes? She's failing some kind of feminist litmus test because she's unhappy in her personal life?

Look, Dowd is the ONLY major columnist to make the personal political--which is a very feminist thing to do. The fact that she is saying things that we do not want to be true is no reason to attack her. I happen to disagree with her analysis and her conclusions, but I don't have any right, really, to disagree with her assessment of her own experience.

And it really bothers me, a LOT, that the criticisms of her article focus so heavily on ad hominem attacks couched in fairly sexist terms. What's going on, I think, is that she is being stereotypically "feminine" in a way that we do not like, and it's tripping our "hatred of the feminine" wires. If she's a bitch, that's okay, because it's strong; if she's whiny or unhappy, then let's pile on, because it's weak. And I think our hatred and disdain for feminine weaknness is a really telling indicator of the extent to which misogyny is still central to our culture.

An academic I really respect once said that "until we come to terms with our own internalized misogyny, we won't make much progress as feminists." And I think she's right.

And at Twisty's,

I don't care about the marriage issue, but I will say for the record that I DO care about the Dowd-bashing. It seems like any time the woman writes honestly about her personal life, everyone piles on about how "silly" she is. From feminists, I detect a li'l bit of internalized misogyny: it's okay for women to be successful as long as they do it in a mannish way--that is, by not getting too personal. The minute they seem conventionally feminine--weak, interested in marriage, whatever--we pile on.

I disagree with Dowd's analysis and many of her assertions: I haven't found that men are uninterested to successful, aggressive, conventionally attractive women (and Dowd IS conventionally attractive). Quite the contrary. But I see no reason to question her statements about her own life, and if anything I rather support the fact that she's trying to work out her personal life in a public context by trying to bring feminist analysis to bear. God knows we don't see that in the pages of the NYT all that often.

I still think all that's true. God knows my own personal experience is that guys are very interested in smart, aggressive, intelligent, (arguably) successful women, even when they don't have a clue what the woman looks like. And certainly Dowd's uncritical presentation of the supposed "success" one finds in following "the rules" is a little bit hard for me to believe (although I will also say that both men and women, I think, respond to a certain kind of friendly, hard-to-get maybe-she/he-is,-maybe-she/he-isn't banter. It's called, I believe, "flirting"). And sure, the tone of Dowd's "I'm desireable, why can't I find a guy?" lament is, as Scott says, not unlike the whole "I'm a nice guy, why don't women like me?" line, which we all know how to interpret.

So sure, I'm quite happy saying Dowd's argument, at least as represented in the NYT, is extremely limited and unconvincing. But I do think that the fascination, condemnation, and dismissiveness of a lot of the talk about it speaks to the misogyny of our culture. Here is a woman who is talking about her personal life. She is successful publicly, but she is, by her own account, unhappy about not having a partner. She's trying to analyze this situation in the context of feminism and the relations between men and women. There's nothing wrong with that. But a lot of people seem to think that it's proof she shouldn't be writing for the Times, or that she should be replaced by a better woman columnist. As if there's only room for one woman columnist, you see, and we're all competing against each other for that coveted slot. And a lot of other people, including a number of feminists who I respect, seem to think that her self-presentation is dangerously frivolous, dangerously girly--an accusation I'm not unfamiliar with myself. Now, I give a lot of credence to arguments like Twisty's that femminess is *in and of itself* a tool of the patriarchy, since achieving it is (a) expensive (b) time-consuming and (c) hobbling (high heels are bad for your back, for example). On the other hand, I think we'd do well to think about whether the emotional aspect of our reaction to femminess doesn't demonstrate, at some deep level, an ongoing lack of respect for the "feminine" that we've learned from the culture at large. Isn't an argument like "long painted nails are hard to maintain, and difficult to type with" qualitatively different from "ew, those nails look cheap and disgusting"? Isn't "we don't consider it professional to wear clothing that reveals parts of the body we think of as sexual" different from "god, she looks like a whore"? Isn't "I find this argument really underdeveloped and untrue" different from "why the hell does this woman even have a column in the NYT"? We still seem, in many ways, to be operating with a binary set of standards under which anything that hints of the conventionally "feminine" is dissed, dismissed, and disparaged--and that the woman who says she values these things is attacked as unserious and risible.

That tendency bothers me a lot more than anything Dowd is saying.

More on this issue:

Feministing has a bunch of links to what other people have said about Dowd.

Amardeep Singh provides a good critical analysis of the problem, with some parallels to my own sense of it. And so does Hissycat, in a two part argument.

I think this line's mostly filler

Sadly, I am down to the last half of the last pack of decent cigarettes I have. They don't sell the damn things in crappy-ass tinytown, so unless I make a drive into Big City this weekend, I'm gonna be a hurting pup next week.

I have a stack of papers that's about a foot high to grade by Tuesday. Yes, I have been putting them off for, oh, two weeks. Don't hassle me, man, it'll get done. Somehow. I swear. No, really. No, really! Shut up. I hate you.

Pseudonymous kid is lonely because other kids never come over to play. Translation: we haven't been arranging the playdates lately. Bad mama! Bad papa! Resolved: to correct this situation immediately.

I really want a cigarette, but I'm having to ask myself, "do you want it bad enough now to reduce your stash by one?" I hate that.

I haven't gotten dressed all day. Ah, the weekend.

I dunno about you, but I wanna see the new Pride & Prejudice movie. Shush. I heart Kiera Knightley.

I did a radio interview today (ok, internet radio) about online dating. When the show airs, I'll be sure to link you. Then we can find out if they edited my comments so that it sounds like I spoke in complete sentences, instead of backtracking and filling in with long pauses and filler like, "well. . . . like . . . . you see. . . ." and so forth. Have you ever really listened to or transcribed what people say when they're answering complicated questions at length? If you write it down verbatim, it's totally ungrammatical and awkward. I am hoping I don't sound ungrammatical and awkward on the radio.

We are eating canned beans for dinner. Because I am way too fucking lazy to cook, and Mr. B. is under the weather.

If my father keeps sending me political cartoons by email and/or over the chat client--sometimes as many as twelve a day!--I may have to block him.

That is all for now.

Hopefully, an end to the Deignan "controversy"

Tim Burke, in my opinion, has it just right. Following his lead, then, I'm going to try to put this thing to rest by using Burke's words, with slight modifications:

What Paul was doing in my perception was trying to evade my ban. I used the word "spoofing" in a casual and non-specific sense, not as a direct accusation of illegal activity. I didn’t think his presence in my community or the tone of his emails to me were productive, and banned him as is my prerogative.

I hope that's clear and sufficient.

In which I support a "pro life" bill

Which in fact I think provides something that's sorely needed.

This week, pro-life lawmakers introduced the Elizabeth Cady Stanton Pregnant and Parenting Students Act of 2005.

The measure would establish a pilot program to provide $10 million for 200 grants to encourage institutions of higher education to establish and operate a pregnant and parenting student services office. The office would serve pregnant and parenting students and help students who are considering adoption instead of abortion.

On many college campuses, student health insurance pays for abortions but won't provide students with the support needed to carry a pregnancy to term. Most student health offices have staff that will gladly refer students to local abortion centers but won't advice [sic] them of abortion alternatives.

Although I don't know the details of the bill, as presented in this article it sounds to me like a long-overdue--and feminist--solution. Student parents have an incredibly difficult time in college: often there's no campus daycare, and if there is it has long waiting lists; often daycares don't offer drop-in services or aren't open for evening classes; often even women's centers on campus don't have resources or support aimed specifically at student parents.

A really good friend of mine is a single mom who is struggling hard to get through college, and continually running into problems with daycare, school schedules, inadequate financial aid, housing, etc. She's called me in frustrated tears talking about dropping out, and I encourage her to hang in, but it's ridiculous: colleges and universities do a terrible job of supporting student parents.

And, of course, it starts in high school. One of the chapters I'm working on for this book about women's education (the post-Larry Summers book) addresses this issue: when a girl in highschool gets pregnant, the usual programs corral her with the other pregnant girls, isolate them from their peers, and often focus on getting the G.E.D. or parenting training. Which is all well and good, but it pretty much slots those girls into the bottom rung of the economic ladder. It's difficult for ambitious girls with kids to stay on the college prep track, difficult for them to figure out how to balance parenting with college, difficult to balance parenting with graduate school (if they're so inclined). And, of course, often young moms are single moms, which means they don't have a partner to support them and they meet social opprobium at every turn.

This is one of the issues on which I often find myself arguing with my peers: the educated, liberal, ambitious social classes. We have a tendency to argue that teen pregnancy is bad, that it hampers girl's economic, educational, and social development. We focus on birth control and delaying pregnancy. But the thing is, it isn't having a child that screws girls over: it's the stigma against having kids, the total lack of social support, the "you made your bed, now lie in it" attitude that we have as a society. In a lot of ways, it makes sense to me to have kids a lot earlier than I did; when my mom was my age, I was in my senior year of high school, about to head out of the house. She was still young--plenty of time to focus on career, or change career, or go back to school, or travel, or whatever she wanted to do. Whereas my kid's in kindergarten and won't be out of the house until I'm almost ready to retire.

So yeah, I think we need to acknowledge that part of the feminist project isn't just supporting women's right to make decisions that will allow them to compete on equal footing with men in the culture we have. We also need to change that culture, so that we don't force women to "choose" between achievement and motherhood. Because a choice like that isn't much of a choice at all.

Quel surprise!

Fox News is being sued for sex discrimination.

Say it ain't so.

Sarah's pictures of New Zealand!!!

At long last, Sarah's had a chance to upload some pics of NZ and the wedding. Go check 'em out, see what you all made happen, and pat yourselves on the back.

You might also want to read the posts she wrote just after arrival, right when she got back, and yesterday, describing the wedding and the trip.

And once again, thank you to everyone who sent money, good wishes, and warm thoughts--and especially to Grace, who prodded me to prod Sarah to get those pictures posted.

I'm pleased to announce

That Ogged and I are back together.

I want to apologize to every one of the children. Don't worry, honeys. We promise we'll never fight again.

Updated because I forgot a kid, "of."--Jeez, it's hard to keep track when there are so many.
Updated again b/c I forgot another one, now listed as "one." Note to self: get tubes tied.

La gente unida

While I realize that the question of who's suing who is the most pressing issue in academia today, those who have a moment to spare might want to read Lindsay's report about the NYU graduate student strike. She's got a really nice photo gallery, too.

Ah, the good old days, walking picket lines, toting Pseudonymous Kid...

Help

Last night I dreamed that I went to a conference and got in a fight over project-based learning with a middle-aged guy who reminded me of my uncle.

How soon is Thanksgiving break, again?

Random Yellow Dog Defeats Saint Paul Mayor

BitchPhD Newswire

Randy Kelly, DFL, who endorsed George W. Bush in the 2004 Presidential campaign, became the first Saint Paul Mayor in 33 years to lose his seat in an election. Said the gracious loser, "I've been handed a huge slice of my own ass this evening. It tastes like crow, actually."

As predicted by a Minneapolis Star and Tribune poll, where 66% of those questioned admitted that the endorsement issue influenced their decision, the challenger handily trounced Kelly by a ratio of more than two to one, the largest loss by an incumbent Mayor in the city's 151 year history

While endorsement of Bush was a major influence in the race, some downplayed the issue. Mary Kelley was interviewed as she was leaving her polling place for her grandson's campaign headquarters. She said, "It wasn't just that the bonehead endorsed a lying malevolent scumbag. I really liked some of the, um, ideas of, you know, that other guy."

Democratic Mayoral candidates ran unopposed by Republicans in both Minneapolis and Saint Paul, an unnamed GOP spokesman, Carl Rove, stated "We thought we had a candidate stupid enough to wage such an hopeless fight, but his Indiana residency, and other factors rendered him unfit for the office."

Aides for the new Mayor stated he was unavailable for comment, as he was outside doing his business. A celebration is scheduled at the canine headquarters to include snausages, frisbee and peeing on the shoes of Republican strategists.

(Posted by The Connoisseur)

All right, listen up.

I know everyone's all excited and we're getting extra bonus traffic today and everything but please. Let's try not to get all excited and start squabbling or baiting people in the comment threads, okay?

Don't make me come in there.

Or I'll make you look at this hideous bear-dominatrix-teacher-thing until your eyeballs bleed.

I hope you all voted yesterday

Anyone got a spare half mil? 'Cause the week after Thanksgiving, someone's auctioning off Elizabeth Cady Stanton's 1848 "Declaration of Sentiments" from the convention in Seneca Falls, N.Y.

Here's the full text of her speech.

We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men and women are created equal. . . .

That's it, man. There's the woman and the document who helped the rest of us vote.

I need to check up on all the election results, but it looks like we did well in a couple of key governor's races, like Schwarzenegger got his ass handed to him, and--last I heard--like the parental notification law in Cali didn't pass. Yahoo!

Fascinatin', Bitch

Click pic. Then click MP3. Then sing along.


Posted by Mr. B

Saved by Spousal Notification

Even though I posted on voting earlier, I forgot when leaving the house this morning that without the car, I would not be making it to my local polling station (at the high school local to my house, not my office). Thanks to Mr. B, who, in the midst of running errands, and voting, realized what I hadn't. He's picking me up in a few minutes, as he says, "to both prevent you being a hypocrite and to exercise that responsibility that" I have taught him to value so dearly; he didn't always vote.
So how, dear readers, should I reward the good Mr. B tonight?

Don't forget to vote

Here's a nice piece on why.

Spousal notification

Between a trackback on my first Alito post (unfortunately, the url doesn't seem to load for me, so I can't post a link) and a few comments in that thread, as well as comments elsewhere in the cyberverse, apparently the issue of spousal notification is being debated in lefty and righty circles. And, as with abortion, there seems to be a sloppy elision of what people think is morally obligatory with what they think is, or should be, legally obligatory.

So. Should married women tell their husbands if they're going to have an abortion?

Yes, of course they should.

Should they be required by law to do so?

No, of course they shouldn't.

See how easy that is? Just like husbands should tell their wives if they're going to be home late from work--but no one in their right mind argues that the law should require them to. Just like sure, kids should tell their parents if they're pregnant. Or if they're drinking. Or if their boyfriends shove them around. Or if they have an eating disorder. Or if they're getting beaten up at school. Just like sure, partners--married or not--should tell each other if they're thinking of cheating. Or if they're having problems at work. Or if they're planning a vacation, or if one of the kids is having problems, or if they've been drinking with the boys (or girls). Just like partners should share housework and child-rearing.

See, people *should* do a lot of things. They should communicate fully and openly. Only, see, people don't always do that, do they? And sometimes they even have good reasons. And you know, requiring them, if they have good reasons, to go through a judge in order to avert telling someone something, is an undue burden.

Like, let's say you're a guy. And your wife has told you that if you drink on poker night, she's gonna divorce your ass because, say, she's decided that drinking is against God's will (why she still allows poker, you don't know). You're not sure she really will, but you know she's gonna pitch a fit and you don't wanna deal with another night of being screamed at and locked out of the house, or having her go complain to the pastor and drag you in for counselling, or cry in front of the kids because you had a beer with some friends. So you go out to play poker, and you have a couple of beers. Are you within your rights to lie to her? Sure. Would it cause an "undue burden" if, before you could lie to her, you had to swing by a court of law and explain your situation to a judge and get the judge's ok? What if you knew that the judge, who worked in family law, had sat on hundreds of cases where alcoholism destroyed marriages, and was therefore strongly disinclined to give people a pass for drinking and lying about it?

Same goddamn diff. You know what the situation is in your marriage. Yeah, you might be a lying alcoholic jerk, but it's also possible that, in fact, your wife is a controlling freak.

In other words, the law--and all those people who sit around saying, "well so and so really SHOULD do x"--really need to mind their own goddamn business.

More cuteness! A teeny-tiny shit storm

How fun. Apparently I've become the latest "proof" that leftist professors don't tolerate dissent. I'm not linking the posts in question, b/c why reward attention-seekers? Just scroll down the technorati rankings and look for links that use the incisive and meaningful label "lefty."

In contrast to my brilliant critics, at least my logic skills enable me to distinguish between an unsupported inference and an actual argument. E.g., the comments to this post. Since when, o my readers, do comments like the following constitute substantive debate and/or discussion?

"Your linking talking points w/o analysis. Already I see several points that are exaggerated and misconstrued without even needing research" "Have you read this?" and "The question of the day, 'Can pro-choice activists be drawn out into a rational discussion of the Alito nomination and issues even more to the core?' The answer goes to determining character and capacity."

Note, please, that other comments in that very thread offered debate, discussion, argument, and disagreement. And that these comments were, in fact, not only allowed but encouraged, responded to, and engaged: see contributions by Equality, Andrew, and Josh, for example (there are others). Notice, too, that my reason for banning and deleting comments by a particularly annoying commenter were given, in accordance with my clearly stated comment policy.

If you can be bothered to look at the dumbassery linked to the technorati results, you'll notice that I am being held up as "proof" that lefty professors are totalitarian in the classroom. Let me point out, first of all, that even if you completely ignore the fact that not everyone who comments here regularly is politically liberal, a classroom is not a blog: so that even if this blog did censor comments that disagree with its arguments, that constitutes precisely zero evidence as to my behavior in the classroom. Moreover, I am hardly representative of "the professoriate" or "the leftist professoriate." One piece of (very poor) evidence does not an argument make, my friends.

And finally, this stupid-ass meritless threat of a lawsuit that's been brought by the commenter in question. Saying that someone is "spoofing" their i.p. does not constitute slander or libel by any stretch of the imagination--look up "spoofing" in a dictionary, and take note of the fact that it has multiple definitions. Like most words, it also lends itself to casual use. Furthermore, by repeating and publicizing this stupidity on his own blog, said commenter has publicized it far more than a comment made deep in one of my old comment threads ever could have, demonstrating that the supposed slander is not only unobjectionable to him, but is in fact something he wants talked about and pointed to. It seems clear to me that, having been banned, Mr. How-Dare-You-Ignore-Me has decided to make a huge stink designed to "punish" me for the crime of not taking him seriously. His foolish sexism is clearest, perhaps, in his statement that he won't sue me if another commenter, who he also claims to be "suing," apologizes--notwithstanding the fact that I am in no way responsible for what someone else does--a fact that, along with his comparison of said commenter and me to "Bill and Hill[ary Clinton]" demonstrates that what's really going on is an attempt to punish an uppity woman by attacking a man who took her side.

The most salient part of this fool's threat (which was also made in a now-deleted comment on my own blog) is that he intends to find out my identity and publish it, notwithstanding my obvious desire to remain anonymous. His proposed mechanism is unlikely to work in any case, as the means he's taking to find out who I am involves a third party that is in no way involved in his spurious "lawsuit." Furthermore, his guesses about my location are as illogical as everything else: apparently he's completely unaware of the fact that professors do, sometimes, travel--and that pseudonymous bloggers might not always publicize their travel plans. More to the point, his "threat" clearly demonstrates a desire and attempt to damage the professional standing and reputation of whoever-it-is-that-writes-this-blog; ironically, this is precisely what his "defenders" are accusing me and another commenter of doing to Mr. HDYIM.

Given that the person publicizing this incredibly minor incident is doing so under his own name, I find it laughable that he claims to find it "damaging." And I find it laughable, too, that those who have picked up his "cause" feel free to make ridiculous sweeping assertions without a shred of evidence, on the word of someone so clearly driven by a desire for vengeance over a non-existent slight.

So. Those of you who are surfing over here to call me a bitch, or to point out how very much I am abusing Mr. HDYIM, or to argue with how I run my blog, or to find "evidence" that "the left" is ganging up on the right--y'all might want to think a little bit about things like "evidence" and "argument" and "research" and "logic" before you leap to stupid conclusions.

Everybody loves baby lion cubs

OMG, teh cute!1111

These clothes are good enough to drink in, and so be these boots too

In the end, I went back to the Big City shop and tried on the fancy crystal boots again, but alas: I was forced to admit they were a little tight across the instep, and so could in no way justify spending that amount of money. Instead, I put $100 down on these: same brand, same shape to the foot, same insulation, different top, no crystals, and about $150 less. I'll pay off the balance with the next paycheck (or possibly the one after) and call them my Christmas present to myself.

Impeach Richelieu

Via Billmon, an article in the Int'l Herald Tribune to the effect that

Vice President Dick Cheney's office was responsible for directives that led to U.S. soldiers' abusing prisoners in Iraq and Afghanistan, a former top State Department official said Thursday.

Seriously, you have to read the whole article. It's brief, but almost every paragraph is a jaw-dropper.

Tech help?

For god only knows what reason, in the last couple of days people running Explorer on WinXP seem to be having problems with the site crashing. I haven't changed anything in the template, so I have no clue what's up. Anyone have any advice?

FDA giving you the runaround? Run around 'em

Salon's Broadsheet reports that, since public comment on making Plan B available OTC expired on Tuesday--and still the FDA is dragging its heels--

U.S. Reps. Joe Crowley, D-N.Y., Jay Inslee, D-Wash., Carolyn Maloney, D-N.Y., and Chris Shays, R-Conn., introduced a bill -- catchily called the "Plan B for Plan B Act for 2005" -- that would make E.C. available without a prescription until the FDA reaches its decision.

As Broadsheet points out, it can't hurt to write your representative and tell them you support the bill.

More Plamegate Analysis

John Dean's take on the Libby indictment is in some ways similar to my own, see below. He see's Fitzgerald going hard after Libby in an attempt to drill down, or up, rather, to Cheney. I find it slightly confusing in that it makes sense to me that Libby or even Rove could be indicted under the Espionage Act Title 18, United States Code, Section 793 in that they both did tell reporters classified national security information. Cheney appears not to have done this. What Dean isn't saying in so many words, it appears, is that Cheney's crime was conspiracy to violate the Espionage Act. Thanks to Andrew who set me straight on the applicability of the relevant statutes in the comments to my earlier post on this topic below.

Mr. B.

Tampons

In honor of the previous thread, here is the Dr. B. solution to tampon emergencies.

Pull off a roll of toilet paper maybe 6-8 inches long (perhaps longer if you need the "super" size). Fold it in half from top to bottom, maybe in thirds, so that it's only about 1-2 inches wide. Then fold in half lengthwise. Start rolling from the open end (that way the ends will be inside, lessening the problem of disintegration at the weak point). Roll the toilet paper up into the size and shape of a tampon. Voila.

Just don't forget to take it out--there are no telltale strings to remind you.

As to normal tampon usage, I used to use those "Instead" cup things, but for whatever reason, after PK was born they wouldn't stay put. Once when I was caught without tampons while visiting the boyfriend, and wanted to be able to have sex without making a mess, I substituted a makeup sponge (an unbleached natural sponge, not one of the manufactured kind). Now I simply have two natural face-sized sponges that I alternate: use one, then remove it, wash it out thoroughly with soap, leave to dry on the windowsill (on the theory that a little UV light helps kill lingering germs). Use the other while the first one dries, repeat as necessary. Replace sponges every few months when they start to disintegrate. Cheap and easy.

Embrace the fluff

Erudite Redneck wants to know what's in your pockets. Being as I am a femmey woman, I tend not to carry things in my pockets, so in the interests of equal time, here's the list of things in my purse.

1. A moleskine notebook I use as a wallet--cards & cash go in the pocket in the back.
2. One of those red "fortunecookie" type coin purses.
3. Checkbook, sans cover.
4. Passport, b/c you never know when you want to bolt.
5. Nat Sherman's MCDs. If I'm feeling frivolous, I'll go for the Fantasias, which amuse me.
6. A lighter.
7. Lip balm.
8. Cinnamon Listerine those weird little breath thingies that are like some kind of dissolving plastic film.
9. A broken watch.
10. Dr. Hauschka neem nail oil stick. Highly recommended by the way: a little oil applicator w/ a tip for pushing your cuticles back. Very handy in the dry winters.
11. Two lipsticks (brown and coral) and one lipgloss (brown).
12. Sample-size tube of Dr. Hauschka hand cream.
13. Keys.
14. Two emery boards.
15. A cuticle trimmer.
16. A pen.

Your turn. What's in your pockets and/or purse?

Summing up the shoe controversy and so much more

Jill at Feministe:

So, wait, are we Birkenstock-wearing hairy man-haters or stilletto-wearing pole-dancing sluts? Make up your damn mind, because I need to know what kind of shoes to put on tomorrow.

Ok, Alito sucks. What can we do about it?

Shit, a very long post on this just disappeared. So I'm sorry, but I shall summarize, with fewer links.

First: the way to fight this nomination is to convince pro-choice and moderate Rs to vote against him. Sadly, it looks like Spector (R) and Nelson (D) are already planning to roll, so that may not work.

But the hearings aren't happening yet, and I think there is room to make the case--which is there to be made--that Alito is far more conservative, reactionary even, than the American public will stand. The Rs are already trotting out their strategy: he's actually fairly moderate on abortion (but read the details, e.g., in the case I posted about where he argued against a wrongful death suit for a stillbirth). This is simply untrue, and all one need do is look at the *wording* of that argument, in which he seemed resigned to following a precedent he disagreed with. Once vested with the power to overrule precedent, he will.

And resigning *ourselves* to the belief that he'll automatically get confirmed, or that resisting his confirmation is political suicide, is *exactly* the kind of move that causes the Ds to lose. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy. There is a LOT more to be gained, politically speaking, from a principled fight than there is from a weak abdication based on a foregone conclusion that one can't win. Moreover, such resignation kneecaps the arguments, opposition, and popular outrage needed to convince Ds and moderate Rs to vote against Alito.

And we *should* be outraged. He's a far-right reactionary, supported by far-right reactionaries, and nominated, in part, as a political sop to the far-right reactionaries that objected to the Miers nomination.

We need to work on *explaining* the basis of their opposition to the general public. So, for instance, Scott Lemieux passes on the results of this poll, which report that "the public favor[s] not confirming Alito if he's anti-Roe by a 16-point margin, 60% of independents and even 35% of Republicans would not confirm if he's against Roe." Now, look at the White House Talking points as reported by IsThatLegal? and Kos. Clearly they're intended to softpedal concerns about Roe. In other words, the White House thinks that if people believe Alito to be anti-Roe, there will be a great deal of public opposition to his confirmation.

So what to do? Write. Talk about this. Don't let the argument that because he found that the "unfortunate" existing distinction between a fetus and a person required him to agree that a stillbirth does not allow a couple in New Jersey to collect damages for wrongful death (Alexander v. Whitman) convince you or others that this means he's moderate on choice. Point out that he thinks women should be legally required to tell their husbands if they want an abortion. That his own mother says "of course" he's against abortion.

Donate to organizations dedicated to getting the word out. Don't roll over on the talking points. THAT'S how the middle voters get convinced. It's a question of amplifying the message.

1. Did you contact your senators yet? This is especially important if your senator is a moderate or pro-choice R (Snowe, Snow, Collins, Chaffee, Warner, Spector, McCain, Gordon Smith) or one of the Democratic Gang of 14 (Joseph I. Lieberman, Connecticut; Robert C. Byrd, West Virginia; E. Benjamin Nelson, Nebraska; Mary Landrieu, Louisiana; Daniel Inouye, Hawaii; Mark Pryor, Arkansas; Ken Salazar, Colorado).

2. Write letters to your local newspaper. Maybe even an op-ed piece! Again, this matters especially if you live in a state with a pro-choice R or a possibly waffling D--but not exclusively. Remember: "the public favor[s] not confirming Alito if he's anti-Roe by a 16-point margin, 60% of independents and even 35% of Republicans would not confirm if he's against Roe." Therefore, part of the way to avoid the filibuster, to avoid Alito's confirmation, is to tap into that opposition. If the White House talking points get out there, they will convince people--erroneously--that Alito is not against Roe. That's why it's important for people to hear that he is.

3. You have a blog: write about this. Spread the word. Even just tossing up a link every day or every other day helps. Like maybe this one, this one, or this one, or this smashing op-ed piece that Scott wrote.

4. Organize: Talk to your friends, coworkers, and colleagues about the nomination. Invite some friends over to watch Citizen Ruth or Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, or have your book group read The Story of Jane. Then encourage your friends to do one of these other things, perhaps as a group. You could even write letters or draft a group op-ed right after the film.

5. Volunteer: Call your local branch of NARAL or NOW and ask what to help fight the Alito nomination. If you have other ideas, leave 'em in commments.

6. Donate: to NARAL, Emily's List, (yes, I owe you all a post about that).... Again, add other suggestions in comments.

7. Other ideas? I don't know everything. Enlighten me.

We are shocked. Shocked!

"The resort to this, this, this stunt - this political stunt - this scare tactic, is really deeply disappointing," he told reporters . But "if they want to get in the gutter, I guess that's what they'll do." Bad: Forcing the Senate to discuss the rationale behind leading a nation to war, the falsification of intelligence information, and perjury by the vice president's chief of staff.

''Remember, Terri is alive. She is not in a coma. Although there are a range of opinions, neurologists who have examined her insist today that she is not in a persistent vegetative state. She breathes on her own — like you and me. She is not on a respirator. She is not on life support of any type. She does not have a terminal condition.'' Good: hijacking Senate proceedings to pass an emergency law dragging a comatose woman to the Senate floor, intervening in a case that's proceeded through the normal channels to completion, and declaring years of diagnoses by specialists wrong after viewing a one-hour video outside one's area of medical expertise.

Q.E.D.

(Though you might enjoy Giblets' take on the same argument.)

In the meantime....

More product lust: dear god, I am going to have to buy this belt buckle with my next paycheck.

Re. the boots, by the way: a couple of commenters cut right to the point, which wasn't "are heels bad for you" (yes, duh; but I don't wear heels every day--I am catholic in my heel-height requirements) or "$400 for shoes? are you nuts?" (sue me, I'm a li'l vain, and willing once in a blue moon to spend too much money on fantastic clothes; for the record, however, yesterday my work outfit--which was smashing--was a $15 skirt and a $10 cashmere sweater, both purchased on super sale, along with a $70 brooch, which was a splurge. Oh, and a perfectly sensible pair of waterproof Santana boots for which I paid about $100, which was a lot at the time, because I knew that their plan styling and durable construction would wear well, so there). No, the real issue is, how am I going to pay for $400 boots?

And the shamefaced answer is, well, I was thinking of putting it on the credit card. Which is where the car repair costs went.

And THAT is why I cannot afford those boots. (Though I am considering asking if the shop in Big City that stocks them has a cash layaway plan).

Samuel Alito: an undue burden on us

Ok. I've done a li'l reading, participated in a conference call, done some thinking (in between trick or treating, job applications, grading, and teaching, of course). Upshot?

Alito is the guy we need to filibuster.

Now, let me remind y'all of something. I didn't say the f-word about Roberts or Miers. I said I didn't support them, and I said that we shouldn't support them, and I said that the Dems should oppose them. But I didn't say "filibuster." And I even said I was "cautiously optimistic" the day before Roberts' nomination, when rumors were floating Edith Brown Clement's name (check out the July archives for confirmation). So, while I oppose pretty much everything the Bush administration has ever done, I've tried not to be all knee-jerk about it.

But from what I can tell, this Alito guy is bad, bad news.

1. He opposed Americans' ability to sue state employers for violating the Family & Medical Leave Act. Work for state government? Tough shit, no unpaid leave for you if you have a baby or your husband gets cancer.

2. He argued that Congress couldn't restrict concealed weapons in school zones. That's right; your kids' right to be safe from gunplay in the schoolyard is less important than the right of 12th graders to carry concealed firearms into school. He also argued that Congress doesn't have the right to regulate ownership of machine guns under the Interstate Commerce Act; apparently he believes that machine guns don't cross borders, people carrying machine guns cross borders.

3. He also struck down a law prohibiting alcohol advertisments in student newspapers; made it harder for students to have their student loans forgiven if they filed for bankruptcy; and struck down a school board policy that allowed race to be used as a consideration in decisions about laying off employees--that is, the policy gave preferential treatment to minorities on the grounds that students of color needed role models. (Sorry, link is from the Chronicle of Higher Ed., you'll need a password.)

4. As everyone and their 10-year old knows by now, he wrote a dissent arguing that it's perfect constitutional to strip search a 10-year old girl if you have a search warrant for an adult man.

5. He reversed a decision that found that a school regulation against “verbal or physical conduct based on one's actual or perceived race, religion, color, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, disability, or other personal characteristics, and which has the purpose or effect of substantially interfering with a student's educational performance or creating an intimidating, hostile or offensive environment" was constitutional. That is, schools can't have a rule prohibiting students from calling each other "fag," "cunt," "dirty Jew," "gook," and so forth to such a degree that the bullied kid is afraid to go to school.

6. He argued that it's perfectly constitutional for racists to discriminate if, in keeping with their racist beliefs, they think that the "best" candidate for a job is, by definition, a white candidate.

7. He dissented from majority in two cases concerning immigrant rights, offering extremist arguments that ignored substantial precedent:

in Dia v. Ashcroft, 353 F.3d 228 (3d Cir. 2003), he dissented from a ruling that an immigration judge should reconsider an immigrant's claim that he would be persecuted if returned to his home country; the majority specifically noted that Alito's dissent would effectively eliminate the requirement of substantial evidence in such cases in a way that "guts the statutory standard" and "ignores our precedent." Id. at 251 n.22. In Ki Se Lee v. Ashcroft, 368 F.3d 218 (3d Cir.2004), he argued in dissent that an immigrant's filing of a false tax return should be considered an aggravated felony requiring removal, which the majority explained was simply "speculation" and contradicted "well-recognized rules of statutory construction."

8. Apparently, he's crap on criminal justice: according to the Washington Post,

A number of Alito's dissents involve criminal defendants. When a majority of the court found a violation of the right to a speedy trial, he dissented. So, too, when the majority ruled that a district court had the authority to reduce a convict's sentence under the sentencing guidelines. So, too, when the majority ruled that habeas corpus relief was constitutionally required when the state had not met its burden of proving the defendant's specific intent beyond a reasonable doubt.

9. He agreed, reluctantly, that a lawsuit for wrongful death in the case of a stillbirth should be dismissed, since New Jersey law prohibited such suits; but in so doing, he noted that the fact that case law distinguished a "fetus" from a "person" was "unfortunate."

10. Which leads to the biggie: Planned Parenthood v. Casey. Alito argued that requiring women to tell their husbands before they could have abortions did not constitute an "undue burden." Scott Lemieux has an excellent discussion of Alito's argument, which I won't bother to reproduce here--read what Scott wrote. Now, y'all know that the SCOTUS is due to hear an important case about abortion pretty soon: New Hampshire's parental notification law. At stake is whether or not the law, which does not have an exception to protect the health of a minor if it is threatened by the pregnancy. O'Connor was the swing vote in striking down a Nebraska law against third-trimester abortions on the same grounds, the lack of exception for the health of the mother; if Alito replaces her, it is very possible he will go the other way.

Now here, to my mind, is why this whole issue of what does or does not constitute an "undue burden" is vital. Even if the Supreme Court, for whatever reason, refrains from striking down Roe v. Wade outright, we've already--with this "undue burden" thing--started nibbling around its edges. We're in a situation, already, where it's okay to make abortion hard to get: states can impose waiting periods, they can require parental consent, they can force women to listen to misinformation about the supposed "health risks" of abortion (and by the way, one of the most common allegations, that abortion leads to depression because women feel guilty afterwards, has just been shown to be false). Alito's argument that it's not an undue burden for women to notify their husbands because, while *some* women might be abused, *most* women are not--and requiring women to report their intent to have abortions might, in *some* cases, help them discuss concerns (money, the husband not wanting a baby) with a husband who might help allay those concers.

In other words, it isn't enough to show that a restriction might cause an undue, even dangerous burden for some women. It has to cause an undue burden for *most* women. BUT. If it can save *some* fetuses, then that is desireable.

See what's happening there? Threatening the lives or health of some women is okay, because it might save some fetuses. Not the majority of fetuses, mind--just some.

Some fetuses > some women.

The other thing, as that "parental notification" link above points out, is that Alito is very specific about who has the right to bring a case to court. If it isn't an "undue burden" for YOU, you can't argue that it's an undue burden for women as a class. Only those women for whom it is, specifically, an undue burden--a threat to their health, a threat to their safety--can bring the suit. The very women who are, of course, least likely to be able to do so.

What's going on here is what Scott, in the post linked above, calls the "death by a thousand cuts." I call it the difference between rights in theory and rights in practice. That is, we could end up with a situation in which, theoretically, you still have the right to an abortion--that is, Roe v. Wade hasn't been fully overturned. But in practice, and practice is what matters, you don't, or can't, because all these individual little delays and hassles and inconveniences, none of which, in and of itself, constitutes what Alito considers an "undue burden" on some generic, middle-class, well-off, happily-married imaginary woman--all these little delays add up into a *collective* burden that means that abortions are inaccessible to women who need them. What you can practically do matters more than what you can theoretically do: pregnancies aren't theoretical, women aren't theoretical, abortions aren't theoretical. It is the very fact that each individual woman's individual situation is different that makes this whole "undue burden" issue so important. "Undue burden" for whom? What constitutes a burden to me might not constitute a burden to you; what isn't burdensome to you or me might be impossible for the woman down the street. If my boyfriend knocks me up, I'll tell my husband, and we'll--the three of us--decide what to do. If your boyfriend knocks you up and you tell your husband, he might kill you, or file for divorce (which would suck for the kids you already have).

But Alito has demonstrated very clearly that, when it comes to restricting the right to challenge a law, he is very narrow about who has that right; but when it comes to restricting the rights of groups of people, he is very broad. There is no doubt at all that he is against abortion. Since the entire point of the Supreme Court (and indeed, the Constitution) is to safeguard the rights of minorities--rights that, by definition, might not be exercised by most people, rights that wouldn't constitute an "undue burden" for most people if you denied them--then Alito is unfit for the job.

Here are some other links to some of the better Alito posts and articles I've seen in the last few days.

Rampaging PMS, Why Abortions Must Remain Legal.
Rox Populi, Your Scalito Random Reader
Pandagon, Daddy Dobson, Bauer, Scalito's Mom Weigh In
Lawyers, Guns and Money, Little Nino Link Dump
SCOTUSBlog, President Names Alito and Alito Blog Roundup
Americans for Democratic Action, Alito Info
People for the American Way, The Record of Samuel Alito: A Preliminary Review (pdf)
Feministe, It's Okay if He's Our Activist Judge and Scalito: Day 2
TheHeretik, Alito Bit More to the Right
Sentencing Law and Policy, Alito and the Death Penalty
NathanNewman.org, Scalito and Worker's Rights
Dahlia Lithwick, He Will Legislate from the Bench
Emily Bazelon, How the Nominee Tried to Restrict Roe
Robert Gordon, If You're a Liberal, You'd Prefer Scalia
Kos: Samuel Alito
Dear Senator
Scalito.com

And finally, don't overlook the wisdom of Mama: Alito's mother says, "Of course he's against abortion."

Tomorrow, I'll post some ideas about what to do to fight his nomination; in the meantime, you can write your senators, keep up with the the news from NARAL (previous link), NOW, and Planned Parenthood