August 2009 Archives

May 2009, Union Square, NYC

Today was another bad day for California, and equal rights in general.

The California Supreme Court had a chance to overturn the ridiculousness that was Proposition 8, but instead has officially upheld it -- affirming marriage inequality discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation.

Many Americans did not take this news lightly, and thousands of New Yorkers (our state is said to be the next battleground for gay marriage) gathered for a march and rally that started at the Stonewall Inn and culminated in Union Square. We may have lost today's battle, but the war is far from over. We've seen small victories in a handful of states so far, but this can't be won one state at a time -- this needs to be changed on a national level. This needs to happen now. On October 10th, people from all over the U.S. will be converging on Washington DC, for what may end up being the biggest March on marriage equality ever. And you can bet Sion and I will be there...

Day Three
Late to bed, early to rise. Pretty tired this morning, after the blaring night-club music until 12:30 and then a 7am wake-up call. At least the shower was hot, or, should I say, the drip from the hand-held showerhead was warm water. We ate a quick and good breakfast and got in the van to meet up with Dr. Jot and the team at the Millennium Villages offices in town... typical to UN/aid offices they were very nice and had all the amenities you would need. Nothing crazy, but internet and flush toilets. As the MV staff was giving us a very comprehensive briefing on what they do, a torrential "rainy season" downpour started and we thought this might be the harbinger a ridiculously muddy day. The MV team gave us all men's size 10 rubber rain boots, which we were happy to take. Traveling with us was Malcolm the videographer, Marc the photographer, Dr. Jot and Chrisestome, the local Ugandan who trains and monitors CHWs in Ruhiira. We loaded up into a side-seated UN Land Rover, and after stopping in the center of Mbarara to buy some "lunch items" at the local supermarket (cookies, peanut butter, jam, and about 500 mini-bananas), we let Malcolm take the front seat and we strapped in on the side of the truck. After a few minutes on a paved (yet potholed) road, we turned off onto the real "road" to Ruhiira, a red dirt ribbon through ripples of highlands and lowlands, speckled with small-holder farms and little, one block village centers. The road was wet, windy and cratered... so after the hour and a quarter drive, we were green and queasy.

The trip was well worth it, though, the scenery in the MV region was spectacular. So green and lush and mountainous... it's amazing how people live and farm on the steep slopes, but their views are priceless. After a brief stop at an MV office on a neat town rotary, we continue up into the highlands until we came across Doreen, a beautiful Ugandan Community Health Worker who was doing her rounds... and she was WEARING THE FEED Health Backpack!!!! Seeing her with the bag on, doing her work was amazing! She has written on masking tape the different supplies that she had with her (TONS of stuff fits in the bags) and labeled each pocket of the bag for our benefit. Watching her take out de-worming medication for three young kids and Vitamin A supplements to give to nursing women and then laying each thing carefully on the mat from the bottom of the bag was so cool... and even better because she speaks flawless English and is a great spokesperson for the important work she is doing. It was really a joy to spend a few hours with Doreen as she was visiting her patients and to see how she nudges them towards healthier lives... she made each kid wash their hands before taking the pills, she weighed an infant in the hanging scale she carried around and she took detailed notes of all of it for record-keeping and follow-up.

We then followed two other groups of CHWs on their visits over very steep terrain to see patients. The visits included young pregnant mothers who were making birth plans since the clinic is very far away and they needed to go there a few days before their due date to ensure they would be at the clinic for birth. We watched as a young woman filled a large jerry can with completely brown water and then throw it up on top of her head to take home. Wow. We then went to the main health clinic in Kabuyende. It was run by two doctors who, together with a few nurses, see all of the cases and perform all the medical services for thousands of people. The facilities were pretty decent considering how remote it was...and the health care workers were amazingly professional and knowledgeable, they also seemed very appreciative of the CHW program, so that there are trained professionals going out into the community to find the people who really needed the clinic's care and direct them to it.

We drove back to Mbarara pretty late and ate dinner at the Agip hotel... veggie pizza and beer for the second night. It was really good! Then we passed out under our bed-nets pretty fast!

Whether you follow sports or not, you probably have a pretty good idea of the big names in America's major events. Bret Favre, Alex Rodriguez, and Kobe Bryant are just a few that come to mind for me right off the bat, and I follow team sports about as much as I eat chilled monkey brains. Which is to say, not at all.

Distance running is a different matter. Most Americans I know can't name a single elite runner, but they do know this: most of them are from East Africa. Beyond that, zilch. They don't know the difference between Robert Cheruiyot and Genna Tufa, Catherine Ndereba and Serkalem Abrha.

But the differences are great, beyond the fact that Cheriuyot and Ndereba are Kenyan while Tufa and Abrha are from Ethiopia. The first two in that list are world-famous athletes and earn enough in prize money and appearance fees to live like kings in their native Kenya. The latter two live a monastic life among several other runners in a single apartment in the Bronx, surviving on whatever they can earn at smaller, less-televised events around the country.

Such athletes represent a growing phenomenon in the US running scene: African immigrants who are here on temporary visas not to get rich and famous, but to eek out a modest living and send whatever they can to their families back home.

It's a radically different image than the glamour often associated with Kenyan and Ethiopian elite runners, but it also makes perfect sense. Just as not all professional musicians can be David Bowie, and not all writers are Stephen King, not every African you see breaking the tape at a race is Robert Cheruiyot.

In running, like any field, success is a relative term. For every Kenyan or Ethiopian (usually) who takes home $150,000 for winning a major a marathon, there are hundreds who earn a fraction that much, or sometimes nothing, in their quest to just make ends meet.

Kassahun Kabiso, an Ethiopian who has lived in New York for the past six years, finished 14th in the New York City Marathon last year, beating out the remaining 40,000 runners in the field that day. But 14th isn't good enough for a prize, so Kabiso, who has won smaller marathons for awards of less than $10,000, also drives a cab for 20-30 hours per week.

Meanwhile, most of Kabiso's roommates don't work at all, and rely on their coach, Mike Barnow, for the necessary race fees and travel expenses. Barnow is as much a humanitarian as he is a coach. Using his own money to subsidize his runners, Barnow is rarely reimbursed. After all, his top runners send whatever they earn back home.

I discovered all this last weekend, after I ran a 5K in Harlem, which Genna Tufa and Serkalem Abrha won with times of 15:34 and 17:40, respectively. I came in 5th, finishing in 16:45, wishing I'd run just over a minute faster and won the men's race myself. Then I did a little research on Tufa and the struggles that he and his fellow immigrant runners face, and I realized that I wouldn't want to beat him.

I like to win races, but he needs to.

[Image: Village Voice]

Giraffe Manor in Kenya is the sort of elegant African hotel where a giraffe just may join you for breakfast. Surrounded by 140 acres of indigenous forest just outside Kenya's capital, the manor also hosts The Giraffe Centre. At the Centre, Kenyan school children can learn about ecology and conservation in a hands-on environment. All procedes go to Kenyan environmental projects.

CNN's "Inside Africa," the best televised half-hour on Africa, ran a story on this resort outside of Nairobi. In it an adorable park ranger quixotically explains why it took a while to get over his irrational fear of giraffes. Also, CNN International producer Jessica Ellis -- an animal lover from the looks of her Flickr photostream -- gets a smooch from the sand papery tongue of the hotel's lovable namesake.

FEED Projects, the enterprise co-founded by Ellen Gustafson and Lauren Bush, is debuting its newest endeavor, the FEED Health Backpack. The simple but elegant premise for this backpack is that for every one sold, an identical one filled with medical supplies by Millenium Villages is carried by Community Health Workers to residents of African villages to provide urgently needed health care. The bag, which is available at kennethcole.com and at Kenneth Cole retail stores, is environmentally sound, being crafted sturdily from 100% recycled nylon, and is supremely functional for both its missions - backpack for schoolkids in America and "doctor's bag" for the Community Health Workers in Africa.

To celebrate the launch of the FEED Health Backpack, a lively party took place in Santa Monica, with thoughtful green touches evident in every aspect of the planning. Vanity Fair and Planet Green co-hosted the event, which was conceived by Awearness. The setting was the Santa Monica LivingHome, the first residence in the country to receive LEED Platinum status, a designation granted to only the greenest of buildings. The beverages were by Veev, the only carbon-neutral spirits company in the world, and the locally produced, organic fare was provided by Bite Catering Couture. Upbeat music spun by a DJ helped set the convivial mood. And although the question "What are you wearing?" never seems to go out of style, attendees like Radha Mitchell, Ryan Kwanten and Vanessa Lengies kept the focus on the endeavor being celebrated.

I spoke with FEED co-founder Ellen Gustafson about the larger context of the issue of food insecurity. It's not so much the case that there's a lack of food overall in the world, but it is not distributed equitably. Political instability obviously plays a role. And environmental degradation, including deforestation and a worsening drought/flood cycle, contributes to loss of soil fertility and agricultural productivity in the areas where it's needed most. So with the Millenium Villages, the entity that FEED pairs with, a wholistic approach is taken to address all the factors that keep people food insecure and in extreme poverty. For example, food aid is brought in while local residents work to rehabilitate their soils to grow healthy, bountiful crops. If children are able to eat a good meal at school, they are far more likely to continue their education. And the new FEED Health Backpack is filled with micronutrient supplements for children, malaria tests, first aid kit, family planning supplies, a scale for weighing infants and a growth chart to check the infants' development, among other items.

As the FEED co-founders write in their mission statement, problems as vast as world hunger and extreme poverty can seem so overwhelming as to discourage action to solve them. But there's a tremendous amount to be said for small steps and incremental efforts. And that, it seems to me, is the crucial key to effecting any kind of change. Even a complex solution can be achieved when it's broken down into actionable elements. These building blocks of change are more approachable and have a way of adding up, before one knows it, to a substantial amount of good. Hence, the genius of a bag whose purchase enables a one-for-one donation. What could be a more concrete result than a child fed a nutritious meal at school, or health care brought right into the homes of villagers? That's what the various FEED bags provide.

There's a long, honorable tradition of philanthropy in America, and the better angels of our nature seemed to be quite present amongst the attendees of the launch party. In the contemporary practice of this philanthropic tradition, the philanthropists come from the many different backgrounds that the marvelous diversity of our society provides, rather than any one social strata. It is truly heartwarming to see these activists leveraging their good fortune to raise awareness and to improve the lives of the less fortunate. With the passing of Senator Edward Kennedy, whose life's work was championing of the rights of the ordinary citizen, we are reminded of the importance of working for a common good, for we are all interconnected citizens of the world.

To Make a Difference in your local community, please click here or to purchase your own Feed Health Backpack, please click here.

89 years ago one man, Harry T. Burn, listened to his mother and voted for women's suffrage. This marked the first victory in winning women the right to vote in the USA. Women of color still had to fight for the 1965 Voting Rights Act for full suffrage despite the 15th amendment's passage many years before the 19th amendment.

One yes vote for the 1965 Voting Rights Act was the late Senator Ted Kennedy.

Yes, he was a flawed man. But let's get the laundry list of things he championed during his illustrative Senate career...Luckily the Feminist Majority provides us a list:

• The Equal Rights Amendment Extension Act of 1978, which provided more time to pass the ERA.


• Minimum wage laws that impacted women.


• The Pregnancy Discrimination Act, which prohibited discrimination against pregnant women and revered the Supreme Court decision that permitted discrimination against women in the workforce.


• The Civil Rights Restoration Act, which restored the scope of Title IX and reversed the Grove City Supreme Court case that had gutted Title IX.


• The Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act (FACE), which protected reproductive health care providers.


• The Family Medical Leave Act, which provided 12 weeks unpaid job-protected leave to workers for newborn care, adoption or faster care, or illness of the worker or her/his spouse, child, or parent.


• The Civil Rights Act of 1991, which provided to women workers the right to collect damages in sex discrimination cases.


• The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, which reversed the Roberts Supreme Court decision that gutted the ability of women workers to sue for wage discrimination.

Some of these wins were partial wins, first steps in a larger movement. The victory for more time to work on the ERA ultimately fell flat due to the ERA failed to be ratified.

But he was more then just the laws he championed and the candidates he supported. Senator Kennedy was able to connect to people, especially children:

He met us where we were and made us feel safe as long as he was there defending our rights and fighting for equality. He understood that it takes all kinds of people to make up this country, and he never made you feel like you were less of a person. He was the quintessential politician who remembered your story and carried it with him ... always.

It's been said many times that some rise above their humble beginnings. Lincoln did it. Obama has done it. I like to think that Senator Kennedy rose above his privileged beginnings to work on average American issues like pay equity and fairness in education. He could have coasted through life. So despite his flaws, he continued to work hard for us. And for that, I am grateful.

Image: Wikipedia

In a new song leaked Monday, the rapper Jay Z reminds famously caustic conservatives like Bill O'Reilly and Rush Limbaugh that we're living in a new era, and advises that they get with the program.

"Please tell Bill O'Reilly to fall back," he raps. "Tell Rush Limbaugh to get off my balls, it's 2010, not 1864 ... Got a black president, got green presidents/ Blueprint's in my white iPod, black diamonds in my Jesus piece, my God."

Featuring Dizzy Drake and produced by Timberland, "We Off That" takes swipes and names names, but it's mainly just a good ol' fashioned rap song. And it proves that hip hop is today what folk music was 40 years ago: a way to make a point, tell a story, and ideally, shake things up.

Well, he managed to elicit a response from Limbaugh on his radio program. After calling Bill O'Reilly a "moderate," Limbaugh said he doesn't "think [he's] ever been mentioned in a rap song. I guess this means I've made it."

[Image: Boston.com]

A friend of mine is moving back to New Zealand in the next few weeks. She was here in the USA to earn her PhD in sociology. A few weeks ago she posted a wonderful essay on Facebook about being American. She mused about picking up "American" habits and traits that are totally opposite of her Kiwi upbringing, such as wanting her food in a restaurant done exactly how she ordered.

Since then I've been pondering the meaning of "American." My father is from Mexico and yet he couldn't be more American if he had been born here. I work at a university where a majority of the student population is either here on a student visa, their parents immigrated here or they immigrated themselves. My world is full of people who walk the fine line between American and visitor.

Nancy Folbre was musing a similar thought as she sat down to think about the current debate over health care reform:

It's not always clear what we mean by the word "American," but the common-sense meaning of the word implies citizenship. Ignoring the distinction -- as well as dismissing the needs of noncitizens -- does a disservice to foreign-born workers who now represent about 15 percent of our labor force.

President Obama has made it clear the undocumented won't be covered under health care reform. I'm still trying to figure out how all the other non-citizen Americans fit into the plan -- which isn't even a fully formed plan yet.

[Image: Ringtonia]

Toure's much buzzed about article for New York magazine's summer issue called the African-American community on Martha's Vineyard -- where the President is presently vacationing -- "self segregating." On NPR's Tell Me More, Jill Nelson, the author of "Finding Martha's Vineyard: African Americans at Home on an Island," refuted that claim, arguing that the cultural critic "did not visit the island" for the piece, and, further, that he was "career building." Martha's Vineyard -- the setting, we cannot fail to note, of 1984's "The Inkwell" -- has strong African-American loyalists. The aforementioned Nelson, a journalist and author, who has been a resident of that swishy island for nearly a half-century writes of the Vineyard:

Yet as much as we are united by class and race, neither is absolute. These obvious identifiers are trumped by the seductions of the physical and psychic separation of Martha's Vineyard from the rest of the world. In the plaza in front of the Oak Bluffs post office are two mailboxes. For years one was labeled 'On Island'; the other, 'America.' The fact that we are on an island, detached from the mainland, isolated con­sciously or not, necessitates a level of mental detachment from many of the demands of the so-called real world. We may come here by choice, but it is also true that we are trapped by geography. On Martha's Vineyard there is no simply getting in your car or on a plane and leaving. Once here, we are all captives, dependent on the ferry schedule, the weather, and the season. It is these factors that define our comings and goings. Voluntarily captive, we are forced to figure out ways to coexist, live and let live, to cre­ate a reasonably civil society that encompasses all who are here.

Other prominent African-American residents include the President's drinking buddy Skip Gates; Spike Lee; arguably America's first African-American President, Bill Clinton; Harvard law professor, Charles Ogletree, and, according to The Telegraph, "Oprah has been seen strolling around town."

[Image: CBSNews]

In April my colleague David wrote about Playing For Change's amazing project (and their video of street musician Roger Ridley performing "Stand By Me"). Playing For Change has since gone on to appear on programs like The Colbert Report. Playing For Change has also been featured on PBS.

Playing For Change began as a project taping street musicians from around the world. The tracks were then layered, until they had what their web site describes as "a kind of global street symphony." At some point, legendary TV producer Norman Lear was moved enough by the project to bring it to the attention of Bono. As a result, the U2 frontman lent his voice to "War/No More Trouble," which is also, I think, quite quite moving.

If you've seen or read Persepolis, the graphic novel-cum-animated film by Marjane Satrapi about the 1979 Iranian revolution and its aftermath in her personal life, you know that Iran has been a hotbed of unrest for decades. Satrapi's story is at once a history lesson and a glimpse into how Iranian politics have affected individuals -- particularly women -- from that country. It's a coming-of-age story set in one of the most turbulent nations in recent history.

Only that "history" isn't exactly past, as was proved last June, when Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, was re-elected over his progressive opponent, Hir Hossein Mousavi, and thousands of Iranians took to the streets in (sometimes) violent protest. The dissenters believe the election was rigged, and were demanding a do-over. It quickly became an international incident when President Obama chose, at first, not to get involved, saying he did not want to be seen as "meddling" in Iran's affairs.

After a week or so, he spoke up and admonished the Iranian government for suppressing its people with violence and threats, and Ahmadinejad -- big surprise -- accused Obama of meddling.

At the time of the protests, I remember thinking that Satrapi must be glued to the story from her home in Paris, where she settled in the 1980s. I'm still sure that she was, but so were two young Iranians now living in Shanghai: In June they announced that they would be updating her story with a mini graphic novel about the 2009 election, Persepolis 2.0, with Satrapi's blessing of course. Their sequel has just been released, and they are making it available to anyone with an Internet connection under the instructionally titled URL "SpreadPersepolis.com."

[Image: Persepolis 2.0]

After spending almost two years involved with charity: water as a volunteer and advocate, I am still amazed each time I see the work they are doing. In this video, Scott explains how it all started, how far they've come (clean water for almost one million people), and what they encourage people to do to help. The annual "September Campaign" officially launches on Sept. 1 -- as David Alm mentioned last year, charity: water is asking people to "donate your birthday" to raise money to build water projects in areas of need. This November you can count on hearing how I will be donating my birthday to the cause.

Day Two
Late to bed, early to rise! We were up at 6, in a cab at 7 and back to the Kenyatta airport to "catch our flight", which-of course- after much confusion and even more failed negotiation, we missed. We were then pushed to the 1pm flight, theoretically, except that we could not both get confirmed seats. So at 8:30am from the Nairobi Airport, we commenced operation "1PMFLIGHTtoUGANDA." This led us to call our new friend Mark Somen at the Tribe hotel, who then called in a favor to the owner of the Tribe, who knew an exec at Kenya Airways who made sure we were both confirmed on the flight in first class. If there's ever a nod to networking... there it is! When we finally landed and filled out the Ugandan health forms confirming that we didn't have a fever, cough or sore throat. Pressured by our lateness and impending nightfall on the unpaved, unlit roads, we jumped in the van and proceeded, without stopping for five and a half hours through the countryside of Uganda. The road varied between paved and fast to potholed and crawling. As night fell the game of chicken that we had been playing with every car, truck, van, bike, motorbike, child carrying a full yellow jerrycan, and woman with bananas balanced on her head- got exceedingly more treacherous. Wow. There were definitely some narrow moments there, thank god for iPods.

We arrived in Mbarara and picked up Dr. Jot (our NY-based friend who is in charge of all of the Community Health Workers, CHWs, in Millennium Villages, MVs, across Africa) and his colleagues in the middle of town at the Stanbic Bank. We dragged them across town to the Lake View Hotel (haven't seen the lake yet) and had dinner. Actually my pizza and Nile Special Lager beer were pretty good! L and I are in our room, bed nets ready, and should be passed out asleep... if it weren't for the club that is literally right across the street from the hotel and BLARING Ugandan reggae right at our window, which, although closed, does NOTHING to block the intrusion. I think I will sleep anyway.

If you've spent any time in hipster enclaves like Williamsburg or Oakland, California, you've no doubt seen a lot of guys in skinny jeans, colorful sneakers, and bulging ever so slightly behind their ironic T-shirts, incongruous mounds of flesh.

These bellies are no doubt the product of many slices of pizza, falafel sandwiches and bottles of Bud, but according to Guy Trebay of the New York Times, they might also represent a silent rebellion against our very athletic commander-in-chief, Barack Obama.

Nevermind the fact that Williamsburg was one of the neighborhoods that partied like it was Mardi Gras when Obama got elected last November; Trebay hypothesizes that the new "Ralph Kramden" -- his name for the hipster gut, "too modest in size to be a proper beer gut, developed too young to come under the heading of a paunch" -- is in direct opposition to the example set by a president who works out every morning before getting down to the business of saving the world.

Trebay goes a step further, too, expanding his analysis to the increasing presence of women in the workplace. It used to be, he writes, that men needed merely to provide an income to impress the ladies. Now, with the ladies working in cubicles beside the men, the pressure to have rippling abs is just as great.

So hipsters, contrarian in their way but also glaringly conformist amongst themselves, have decided to take a few steps back and proudly assert their right to be round.

But not round like a jelly roll. After all, the look only allows for a round tummy. Legs must remain twig-like. And as blogger Maria Mercedes points out, the trend is "only for dudes" -- sorry ladies.

[Image: Hiroku Masuike for the New York Times]

Judging from this video tribute compiled by Conservatives4Palin, Sarah Palin's life in the spotlight is over and done with. With a "greatest hits" vibe and the nostalgia of a high school graduation retrospective, the film not only heroicizes Palin but seems to say goodbye to America's prom queen at the same time.

After months of doggedly pursuing his dream of interviewing the president, 11-year-old Damon Weaver finally got his wish last Friday.

Weaver's intention began after he interviewed Joe Biden last fall, before the election, and the 6th grader from Canal Point, Florida has also interviewed Colin Powell, Oprah, Dwayne Wade, and many more luminaries that few -- let alone 6th grade -- journalists could ever hope to land an interview with.

Not only did Obama treat the interview with the same professionalism he accords to the nation's top news anchors, but he also agreed to be Weaver's homeboy. In this clip, the two discuss an issue of particular interest to Mr. Weaver: elementary school education.

If you're lucky, you've never been inside a meth lab. If you have been inside a meth lab and aren't strung out on the poison that was cooked there, you're even luckier.

But there is value in seeing first-hand the particular brand of squalor and sadness from which meth is frequently born. It's an empty world, defined by just one thing: an addictive, toxic drug that's made from over-the-counter cold medicine and household cleaning products.

I'm among the lucky ones who's never been inside a meth lab, and I've only seen the drug once. Several years ago, a friend had ill-advisedly spent a weekend on the stuff with a classmate of his from graduate school. I saw the half-empty packet the morning after their first night and was immediately repulsed. It's an ugly drug: greyish, irregular crystals that look sort of like dirty sugar.

So it was with a mixture of fascination and disgust that I wandered through a faux meth lab at Deitch Projects, a contemporary art gallery in SoHo, last week. Part of the show "Black Acid Co-Op," the meth lab portion was originally constructed for the Ballroom, a contemporary art space in Marfa, Texas. Created by Jonah Freeman and Justin Lowe, "Hello Meth Lab in the Sun" is, as described on Marfa.org, a "rumination on the theme of alchemy, uncovering some of the sites of alchemical transformation in the modern world."

Those raucous town halls -- even in states the President carried -- is indicative of .. something. But what?

It is no secret in American politics that President Obama has a blind side with the bubba vote. For whatever reason -- race, Harvard, personality clash -- Barack Obama is disadvantaged among white working class voters. His cerebral approach is not an organic fit with Bubba. For that reason, and his governmental experience, the President chose Joe Biden, then the least-wealthy man in the United States Senate, as his running mate.

Hillary Clinton's campaign exposed Obama's weakness in places like Appalachia and the rust belt. Her argument at the time was how could then-Senator Obama win in 2008 if he couldn't carry Democrat strongholds suffused with hard working, suds drinking, unionized Americans. Barack Obama never had a problem with minorities or "Starbucks Democrats" -- college students and elites. While some white working class voters -- like those in Pennsylvania -- ultimately saw their economic self-interest and came out for Obama over McCain last November, a vocal percentage have subsequently become teabaggers and town hollerers. If only a civil, well-choreographed beer summit could solve that problem.

Enter: Bill Clinton, formerly the biggest cat in the jungle. The 42nd President's credentials with white working class voters are impeccable. After his triumphant return with Current TV journalists Euna Lee and Laura Ling, Bill appears poised for prime time, ready for another difficult assignment. Irrelevance does not suit William Jefferson Clinton, who congenitally cannot, cannot go quietly into the night. So why not make use of him domestically, even as his wife serves at the pleasure of the President on the international stage? Tina Brown recently wrote on TheDailyBeast:

If Obama has lost his customary ability to synthesize, perhaps he should turn for help to that great ol' explainer William Jefferson Clinton. This administration's determination not to make the last Democrat's mistakes on health care has been overlearned by Obama and his advisers. Because the received wisdom about Hillarycare is that it was killed by the unilateral arrogance with which it was handed down to Congress, Obama has gone too far in letting warring committees turn his key campaign promise into roadkill.

Surely it's the former president who got it wrong once who has spent the most time and lost the most sleep thinking over how he would do it again. More important, wouldn't Bubba do a better job than the professorial Obama at sweet-talking, arm wrestling, hugging, and head locking such obstructive Blue Dogs as Arkansas Rep. Mike Ross, who used to run a family drugstore just like the one Bill remembers from his years growing up in Hot Springs? Or North Carolina Rep. Heath Shuler, who's one of that class of moderate Democrats Nancy Pelosi and Steny Hoyer promised not to push around too much when Rahm persuaded them to run for a seat in the House? Obama needs to get himself dirty, and be seen to get dirty.

Clearly, Barack Obama will have to make sure he maintains the independent character of his presidency. Lines would have to be drawn as to who is the President and who is in a strictly advisory role. But Clinton's stature as a former president -- and possible future Secretary General of the United Nations -- makes him politically useful to the current occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Clinton might even go a long way in narrowing the distance between the perception of Obama as overly cerebral and true working class grit. Bill Clinton can be more than just a special envoy to Haiti to this administration. Could he help President Obama connect -- really connect on a visceral level -- with the people of West Virginia, a state he lost in 2008, but who's self-interest on the health care issue is consonant with those of the White House? Why not?

[Image: Cinie]

Last week Whole Foods CEO John Mackey had an op-ed published in the Wall Street Journal with his opinion on health care reform... and that's when the poop hit the fan. There's a boycott a brewing and fast.

While you can decide on your own if you want to get your organic milk at Whole Foods or your local (still nationally owned) grocery store, I return again to the thought of are we justified to hold an entire company accountable for the views of its leader?

In his blog, Mackey says:

As you are probably aware, I wrote an Op/Ed piece that was published in the Wall Street Journal earlier this week on health care reform, one of the biggest and most emotional issues facing our country. I was asked to write an Op/Ed piece and I gave my personal opinions. While I am in favor of health care reform, Whole Foods Market as a company has no official position on the issue.

In answer to President Obama's invitation to all Americans to put forward constructive ideas for reforming our health care system, I wrote this Op/Ed piece called simply "Health Care Reform." An editor at the Journal rewrote the headline to call it "Whole Foods Alternative to Obamacare," which led to antagonistic feelings by many. That was not my intention -- in fact, I do not mention the President at all in this piece.

See! It was his personal views in the Wall Street Journal, not those of Whole Foods. Although I do have to wonder if say I had written that same op-ed it would had been published. I doubt it. It was the power of Whole Foods that allowed Mackey or his assistant to call up the editors at the Wall Street Journal and say, "We have a piece that says Americans are responsible for their own health, want it?"

The disparity in wealth in this country is matched only by the disparity in health coverage. Neither come anywhere close to fair, and both leave a huge number of Americans poor and getting poorer, sick and getting sicker.

Robert Greenwald, the prolific social issues documentarian, responds to this crisis with "Sick for Profit," a short film that exposes the bank-breaking tactics of one of America's largest insurance companies.

Stephen Hemsley, the CEO and president UnitedHealth Group, says that his company is dedicated to helping people lead healthier lives. But many of the people who have United plans have met with one obstacle after another in trying to file their claims; meanwhile, Hemsley earned $3.2 million in 2008, despite being implicated in a lawsuit against UnitedHealth last year.

Greenwald and his company, Brave New Films, may take on similar topics as Michael Moore, but his approach is far less heavy-handed. He relies on testimony, facts, and good old-fashioned reporting. In the end, Greenwald's films are true documentaries, not mere propaganda.

In June of 1964, three civil rights workers were in Mississippi helping black residents register to vote when they were murdered and left 15 feet beneath an earthen dam.

Though 18 men stood trial for violating the civil rights of the victims, in 1967, and seven were convicted, it's hard to say how many were complicit in killing the three men. Only one man has been convicted of that crime, and that wasn't until 2005, when Neshoba County sentenced reputed Ku Klux Klan member Edgar Ray Killen to 60 years in prison. Others who conspired to kill the three men have remained at large in the small town of Philadelphia, Mississippi and neighboring communities for 45 years.

One of the key suspects was Billy Wayne Posey, who died last Thursday at 73. Federal prosecutors say they were still investigating the murders, and that they will continue to do so. In 2000, Posey told investigators that there were "a lot of persons involved in the murders that did not go to jail," but he did not identify them.

For a couple of not-terrible movies (if my 20-year-old memories of them are accurate) about the '64 murders, check out Alan Parker's Mississippi Burning (1988) and Murder in Mississippi (1990), a made-for-TV movie co-written by the ever-prolific Ben Stein.

[Image: The victims, Michael Schwerner, James Chaney, and Andrew Goodman]

Why do people associate thoughts and feelings with tangible items? Objects and Memories is a project that examines this question. This documentary examines the response to items recovered or offered after 9/11.

Objects and Memory examines the response to items recovered or offered after 9/11 and other national tragedies.

"The film uses objects and accounts of people whose lives were affected, interviews with historians and poignant, powerful photographic images. Objects and Memory portrays how a small object can be so significant and can "provoke such powerful memories."

The Objects and memory project seeks to preserve the past and speak to the future. Simple objects like employee id cards, keys, police badges, a fire fighters helmet convey messages and meaning from the events of 9/11.

Objects and Memory also explores the need to keep and offer meaningful objects in the context of other traumatic national events and memorials: the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing and the Vietnam Veterans' Memorial. These experiences help illustrate how personal and collective memories are triggered by objects that have journeyed through time and space."

Watch Objects and Memory August 17th at 10pm ET on PBS.

Day One
We arrived in Kenya at 9pm, after a day's travel, which was honestly not that bad. Seriously, neck pillows are a ridiculously smart invention.

We were met by three UN security guys, whose name I had not been briefed with, so I have to be honest, despite his taking us directly to the "Government VIP Lounge" and knowing that we were meeting our World Food Program contact Gabrielle outside, it was a little weird to give them our passports and bag tickets and $50 for the visa!! But, of course, it all worked out flawlessly, as the UN has consistently showed us, and by the time he walked us outside to the land rovers, our bags were already loaded. (The UN was helping us because the second half of our trip was to visit UN-fed schools in Nairobi, which we are supporting through sales of our FEED bags).

The driver, Charles, told us to lock our doors, but I certainly did not feel unsafe driving through the streets of Nairobi. One thing that you notice in the developing world is that street lights are just not quite as bright... actually no lights are, unless you are in a western hotel. Even in the airport, the lights for the duty-free shops are fluorescent white bulbs that are definitely not as white as they would be in NYC.

Nairobi at night is pretty damn nice. Wide, organized streets and roundabouts and a good amount of Sat. night traffic, I can't wait to see it in the daylight.

We arrived at the Tribe Hotel in the Gigiri area of the city, where the UN compound is, and this place is amazing. We were greeted by General Manager Mark Somen, who is just starting his new job here after a stint at the SOHO house in NYC. I mean, really??? We come all the way to Kenya to meet someone who used to work 10 blocks away from us... of course we played the name game and we now know we have friends in common.

Riccardo, the dark and hardened Italian photog we worked with in Rwanda, met us and Gabrielle, the UN WFP public information officer, for a light bite at the Tribe's beautiful restaurant. Gabrielle and Ric avoided all pleasantries as the convo was quickly a debate about aid work in general and the realities of the neighboring Somalia.

We are headed a short sleep, before our flight to Uganda tomorrow. I have heard amazing things about Uganda and can't wait to see it!!!

A recent poll showed that 38 percent of Americans would be willing to do without their iPod if it meant helping the environment. That number, unfortunately, is pretty low considering the stakes. Former Presidential candidate Stephen Colbert publicly sacrificed his old iPod for the endangered Virginia fringed mountain snail (polygyriscus virginianus). Is this just an effort to curry favor with the people of Virginia for 2012 or a truly humanitarian sacrifice?

In case you missed Back to Woodstock, the Dateline documentary commemorating the 40th anniversary of the 1969 music and art fair Sunday night, this clip on Democracy Now with Amy Goodman provides a glimpse of the film and a brief interview with its filmmaker, Julie Cohen.

Here Anne Curry from NBC introduces the film, suggesting that however much you might know about Woodstock, there may well be a few things you don't:

Amid all the gloom that has helped to define the nonprofit industry in the U.S. since the recession began, one particularly harrowing story stood out.

In November of 2008, as it became clear that the economy was headed over a cliff, an expert on public service predicted that at least 100,000 nonprofits would fail during the current downturn. The culprit, said NYU Professor Paul Light, would be reduced funding from donors and charitable foundations.

But as an innovative collaboration between VolunteerMatch and the Corporation for National and Community Service is illustrating, individuals and organizations in the U.S. are collaborating much more proactively than they have in previous recessions. The result is that not only are more people volunteering, but they're volunteering in new and creative ways. And, most important, by working together with volunteers, many organizations have been able to maintain their service levels during a time of growing need.

The State of Volunteering
The Corporation for National and Community Service is the federal agency in charge of promoting civic engagement through service and volunteering. In order to educate and inform the public and help organizations make better use of volunteers, the agency releases data and analysis about annual U.S. volunteering trends at VolunteeringInAmerica.gov.

Despite expectations that the recession would dampen public service, the U.S. volunteer rate actually stayed relatively stable from 26.2% in 2007 to 26.4% in 2008, representing a million more volunteers. Young adults, in particular, are helping out in greater numbers -- from 7.8 million young adult volunteers in 2007 to 8.2 million in 2008.

Typically periods of high unemployment and foreclosure rates have seen lower volunteer rates, so this is being seen as a significant countertrend.


Let's be honest. World hunger sounds like something that a beauty contestant uses as her "platform": a far away, insoluble, and intractable problem. Hunger is ugly and unglamorous, certainly not something that the fashion world, of all places, seems poised to address. Actually, most global problems affecting the most impoverished and voiceless among us, like access to healthcare or clean water or education, seem distant and overwhelming. But, if you look at them that way, then, well, they are.

Our world is too small and too connected to think that the fact that a child dies every 5 seconds, because they are hungry, is distant. And, if we know that our actions locally can really affect change globally, international problems can become less overwhelming.

I came to the humanitarian field through an interest in security. I had heard the African adage that "a hungry man is an angry man" and thought it was pretty spot-on. I am angry when I'm hungry; so I can imagine what people might do who are food insecure for weeks on end and are watching their children die.

In 2006, I started working as a Communications Officer for the United Nations World Food Program (WFP). What they do is pretty unbelievable. They feed people in 80 countries, including giving a free school meal to 20 million children. WFP gets food to the people most affected by natural disasters and conflicts and focuses on the women and children who hurt the most. The school feeding program is modeled after ours in America: all children get a nutritious meal in school, so they can focus on learning and improving their lives. School feeding is not distant or overwhelming at all, it's actually quite simple.

Two nights per week I wait tables at a jazz club in Manhattan. What we serve isn't exactly cheap, but then again, how many jazz clubs are owned by one of the city's preeminent restaurateurs? Quality comes at a price.

Likewise, the service staff at this restaurant is a carefully selected lot. Of the dozens of people who apply there each month, only a handful get interviews. And of that group, only about 1/3 make it through the rigorous, two-week training process without either quitting or being eliminated by their trainers.

In other words, we aren't your garden-variety slaw slingers. We may not love waiting tables, and most of us have other careers, but we take pride in doing our jobs well. You might say our skills are more personality based than technical: we have what our managers like to call an "excellence reflex."

How we developed such a reflex is different for everyone, but it probably started in childhood with household chores, was honed during young adulthood through menial jobs that taught us the value of a dollar, and by our 20s and 30s had become second nature.

Billionaire George Soros came up with a novel way to help 850,000 low-income children in New York State receive federal monies that were slipping away as a result of the Great Recession. His $35 million gift to the state of New York will be matched on a 4-to1 basis as a way to leverage federal stimulus money to assist low-income children in the state. Because of the current budget crisis the state would otherwise not have been able to have made the matching funds available. George Soros' philanthropy made the difference; his $35 million is worth $170 million to the state's schoolchildren.

The idea came to Soros as a kind of karmic give back for the help he received to get through his university studies half a century ago. Soros was the recipient of aid when he was a student at the London School of Economics in the early '50s. He worked as a waiter at nights. When his tutor found out, she submitted his name as someone worthy to the Quakers, and he subsequently received a check for 40 pounds. "They just sent me 40 pounds without any strings attached. I thought that was the way to do it, without strings attached," Soros told The New York Times. "And it touched me, I must say; I felt then that this is a very nice way to help people," Soros told NPR. "And so it gives me personal satisfaction to be able to do it on a much larger scale."

[Image: AMEINFO]

Are we ready to revisit the possibility of a porn bailout? Every industry is struggling through The Great Recession. Adult entertainment -- which is a part of the embattled media industry -- is no exception. Not only is it being hurt by the lack of DVD purchases and the drop in movie production, but the adult entertainment industry is also being battered by free adult content on the internet. According to Fast Company, recent figures suggest that adult content distribution companies have seen a 30 to 50 percent slide in revenues. From The Los Angeles Times:

For (Savannah) Stern, 23, the rapid decline of job opportunities in the porn business over the last year has been dramatic. She has gone from working four or five days a week to one and now has employers pressuring her to do male-female sex scenes for $700, a 30% discount from the $1,000 fee that used to be the industry standard.

Less than two years ago, Stern earned close to $150,000 annually, sometimes turned down work and drove a Mercedes-Benz CLK 350. Now she's aggressively reaching out for jobs and making closer to $50,000 a year.

As for that Mercedes? She's replacing it with a used Chevy Trailblazer -- from her parents.

"The opportunities in this industry really are disappearing," Stern said. "It's extremely stressful."

There goes the myth of porn being recession proof. No wonder Stormy Daniels is still mulling over a run for Senator of Louisiana. Senators don't get fired, get lengthy August recesses and they have great health care!

[Image: LATimes]

Eunice Kennedy Shriver, the youngest sister of President Kennedy, has died. Much will be said and written about her founding the Special Olympics and what she did for people with mental/intellectual disabilities. What had been lost over the years in conversations about her landmark work was that it was her outlet her for Kennedy politically savvy mind.

It was the brothers -- Jack, Bobby and Ted -- who built an American political dynasty.

Eunice, too, was smart, politically savvy and fascinated by public policy. History professor Edward Shorter says the only thing that kept her from running for political office was the era she grew up in.

"Because in the 1950s, she couldn't go there," says Shorter, the author of The Kennedy Family and the Story of Mental Retardation. "She couldn't get on that political stage. Women weren't tolerated there."

What was a loss for Eunice, was a gain for worldwide community. But I can't help but wonder if she could have done more if she had been the one giving the stump speeches and not just introducing the men in her life from John to Arnold. Although she did more with an idea than most people can do with any elected office.

That said, Eunice wasn't allowed to run for office due to circumstance. Today women aren't running for many reasons including that they are waiting to be asked/can't picture themselves as running for office. The Women's Campaign Forum has a nifty online tool that allows you to ask a woman in your life to run for office, any office. Perhaps you know a woman who has done more with an idea than most people could do with an office? Can you imagine what she could do with an elected office?

Much thanks to Eunice for her work and much love to the Kennedy-Shriver family in their time of need.

[Image: EuniceKennedyShriver.org]

Big Ideas For a Small Planet addresses important issues that face humanity. This documentary focuses on environmental topics with interviews and accounts "with forward-thinking designers and features on green products and alternative ideas that may transform our everyday lives."

In this episode, interior designers explore new possibilities for sustainable furniture, including repurposing junk, and dressers and chairs constructed from recycled cardboard. Guests include Thom Filicia, Majora Carter and Dixon Mitchell of Vanguard.

Watch Big Ideas for A Small Planet - Design on the Sundance Channel on Tuesday, August 11 at 8pm Eastern.

[Image: Thom Filicia Inc.]

As the debate rages on between the right and the left halves of the blogosphere as to whether or not the "Cash for Clunkers" program is a success or failure, PETA has seized the opportunity for some headlines. Not since George Clooney "infused" tofu have People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals been so creative in pursuit of the mercurial news cycle. From The PETA Blog:

The day after the Senate votes on an extension of the Cash for Clunkers program, we're launching our new environmentally friendly program, "Cash for Cluckers."

Because a lot of nonvegetarian Americans are buy-curious about faux-meat products--and because factory farms wreak havoc on the environment--we've decided to offer consumers a rebate on their first taste of that faux goodness. For the first box of chickenless cutlets or nuggets that non-vegetarians buy, we're going to send them a $1 rebate and include a free copy of our "Vegetarian Starter Kit."

Note: No eggs, dairy products, or other animal-derived ingredients can be used in place of the faux vegan chicken. The program is open to U.S. residents through September 30th (Cash for Clunkers, by contrast, is only open through Labor Day). While the federal program has just landed another $2 billion in funding, we cannot fail to note, PETA's Cash For Cluckers is open only to the first 5,000 entrants. But that should more than make up for the clever free publicity of the vegetarian lifestyle.

More information here.

[Image: HoustonPress]

My motivation for photographing the bomber was most definitely his character. I met Harry when on a road trip with my husband. We passed his small airport hanger and saw an array of light aircraft which I wanted to take a closer look at. As we approached the hanger, Harry came to meet us in his golf cart, he was quick to offer us a tour of his airport (Westport Airport, NY). During our brief encounter with Harry I was touched by his open character and his enthusiasm. He told us that he had been on 36 major bombing missions during the war and was shot down three times! He continues to run a small airport and was so clearly at home there in his hanger.

When I saw his wonderful living room in the corner of the hanger I knew it was the perfect place to take a portrait of Harry, the surrounding flags, posters and microwave really describe what it is to be Harry, the ex World War II bomber who lives in upstate New York and spends his days flying light aircraft over his land of freedom and liberty.

CNN's "Inside Africa" -- hands down the best half-hour round up of that continent's news -- this week ran a story on Nelson Mandela using his singular soft power to rally celebrities around a good cause. Alfre Woodard, Alan Rickman, Whoopi Goldberg, Charlize Theron, Hugh Jackman, Matt Damon, Helen Mirren, Don Cheadle and many others lent their voices to his audiobook of African folktales. Proceedes from the project go to Artists for a New South Africa, a nonprofit dedicated to helping children of South Africa orphaned and impacted by AIDS/HIV as well as the Nelson Mandela Children's Fund. Mandela, by the way, celebrated his 90th birthday on July 9.

Check out the website for "Mandela's Favorite Folktales."

With all the talk these days about fast food, obesity, sugar, processed cheese, contaminated meat, type-2 diabetes and all the other aspects of our rapidly diminishing health, one side-effect may have been overlooked.

That would be the fanaticism of health nuts, people who eschew all of the above in the name of physical, mental and even spiritual well-being. And then there's the enormous industry of organic and macrobiotic foods, supplements, and remedies that have developed to serve this wiry army of yoga mat-toting, wheat grass-shooting, Michael Pollan-reading rebels.

More than a decade ago, Dr. Steve Bratman, a holistic physician, coined the term "orthorexia nervosa" to describe those whom he thought were taking the health thing a little too far. In an article he published in the magazine Yoga Journal in 1997 titled "Health Food Junkie," Dr. Bratman wrote that "orthorexia begins innocently enough," but that over time, it takes such an "iron self-discipline" to reverse the habits of childhood and to resist the surrounding culture of unhealthy living that one rarely accomplishes the change gracefully. Eventually, he wrote, you will find yourself devoting increasing amounts of time and energy your pursuit of living a healthy life, and you're likely to do it with a hefty dose of superiority.

I've certainly known people who adopt fanatical positions on the food they'll eat that go way beyond vegetarianism or even veganism. And some of them haven't always looked so hot in the midst of a new diet -- they've broken out with acne, become wan and fragile, and even gained considerable weight in their quest for perfectly balanced chakras.

Personally, I believe it all comes down to moderation and listening to your body. If you are in good health and pay attention to what you eat, you simply won't crave junk food. You'll want foods that sustain you and provide what they should: fuel for your body and mind, appropriate to what you use them for in your daily life. I, for example, eat a lot of pasta because I also run a lot. For a sedentary person, that much pasta would equal a few dozen unwanted pounds. No one but you can really know what the appropriate foods are.

Still, I doubt that anyone's body, if it's truly attuned to what it's consuming, will do well to eat pizza and Twinkies every day.

[Image: Duk from Wikimedia Commons]

The debate over religion tends to polarize rather than inspire discussion, but with discussion comes understanding, while polarization precludes it. There are those who turn off the moment you mention God, and there are those who say that if you believe in anything but science, well, you're living in a fantasy. If you've seen Bill Maher's polemical, sophomoric film Religulous, you know what I'm talking about.

The New York City Skeptics is a new organization of mostly agnostic or atheistic left-brain types who may not be so much "skeptical" as they are non-believing, but their mission is nevertheless to get people talking. Devoted to "critical thinking, skeptical inquiry, and scientific education," the organization aims to provide some clarity in an increasingly foggy culture of ideas.

This week, the small but growing group of scientists, journalists, doctors and other professionals launched a blog dedicated to such topics as why basic research matters, the complexity of memory, and how different modern eras have created different "master narratives" -- the general attitudes and predominant theories that define how people view the world.

American journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee arrived home in California Wednesday morning after nearly five months in a North Korea prison, all thanks to Bill Clinton.

Well, maybe not, though Clinton's diplomatic skills no doubt expedited the process. The women were freed less than 24 hours after he landed in North Korea to meet with Kim Jong Il and negotiate their release. Ling and Lee were were sentenced to 12 years at a labor camp in March for accidentally crossing from China into North Korea while reporting on a story about the trafficking of women along that border. They said that if they crossed over into North Korea, they did not know it at the time.

But Clinton's fancy footwork is not what got them off, writes another American who spent some time in a Korean prison. Cullen Thomas of the Daily Beast describes how he was arrested for mailing hashish to himself from the Philippines back in 1994, when he was 23, and was facing prison time in South Korea. His counsel advised that, since he was guilty, he should express remorse and tell the judge he was sorry. He also learned to say " Young so hey choo ship sho," which translates to "Please grant me mercy."

Last month, Ms. Ling made a phone call to her sister, the journalist Lisa Ling, in the US, and expressed similar remorse: an unequivocal, absolute acceptance of guilt. And this, writes Thomas, was the key to their freedom.

Both North and South Korea abide by a Confucian moral code, and under that code, it's far better to admit you were wrong and say you're sorry than to plead innocence even when it's obvious that you're guilty.

If America and the two Koreas were comic book characters, I think the Koreas would be Gallant and America, with its justice system based on legal hair-splitting, semantics, and money, would be Goofus. Gallant might screw up, but he'd always own up to it, and in the end, he'd always be better off. Goofus was doomed.

[Image: MSNBC]

A curious thing happened to The Ugly Truth: It didn't just get bad reviews, but it got slammed for perpetuating the awful stereotype of "career woman doesn't have time for romance."

And the hating didn't just come from angry feminists, either.

I don't doubt that many women reviewers felt the same way, but are fearful of backlash if they were to have penned a rebuke of one of the genre's most worn out plot lines. But it still leaves me to ponder if male movie reviewers are fed up with the cliches and failed attempts to be the next 10 Things I Hate About You, does this mean we might be turning a corner?

As John Powers points out, he's mom was a career woman and he is not buying Hollywood's portrayal:

This drives me particularly crazy, because I've spent my whole life surrounded by strong career women. My mother ran a market-research company, and my sister is an international consultant. When I was a professor, my office-mate taught feminist theory. I've worked for female bosses at LA Weekly, Vogue and here at Fresh Air.

And here's what I've learned: Just like career men -- now there's a term -- every career woman has her own personal style. What they all have in common is that I've never seen any of them behave remotely like Weaver, Swinton, Close or Heigl.

Could we perhaps -- oh let it be -- be on track for movies that present a realistic view of romance in our time?

Is "The Great Recession" over? Last week the president appeared to be saying that this might be the beginning of the end. The GDP numbers also seem to say as much. Even the dark NYU professor Nouriel "Dr. Doom" Roubini -- who predicted this recession -- and who is usually gloomy when talking about the American economy, seems to see "green chutes." On Fareed Zakaria's GPS panel on the recession, Roubini, billionaire NY Daily News publisher Mort Zuckerman and Harvard financial historian Niall Ferguson.

Last week at the National Council of La Raza conference I sat in on the "Serving, Leading & Inspiring: Latinas in Elected & Appointed Office" panel. The panelists included my former State Senator Iris Martinez (disclosure: I have donated to her campaign), State Representative Lisa Hernandez, State Representative Susana Mendoza, LA Unified School District Board President Mónica García and Elmy Bermejo, Chair of the board of HOPE, was the moderator.

The panel ended up being a story-telling session and each woman had a different story of how they ended up being an elected official. While I would have enjoyed more time for questions, it was great to hear each story.

Senator Martinez was asked to run for office by a Latino elected official, current Chicago City Clerk Miguel Del Valle. Martinez was a single mom by divorce when she ran for office. She saw this as a positive for her because she knew that when she knocked on doors in her neighborhood and a woman answered she would be able to connect. She was living a similar life. After she was elected a message was sent that back at home, we can tackle the issues we care about: daycares, afterschool programs & the challenge of raising children with gangs in the neighborhood. She was honest that yes it is hard to be in the old boys club, especially in Chicago, but it's just makes things spicy. The men do call on her and other Latinas to make things happen. Martinez thinks that Latinas need to step up and seize the opportunity, don't wait to be asked. We need to take that risk.

State Rep. Hernandez had been working with then-Lieutenant, now Governor Quinn, so she had great perspective and experience before running for office. She spoke about that feeling one gets, that she got, just after she learned she was now an elected official -- "Oh, my, gawd! What do I do now?" Hernandez's strength was that she truly was connected to the community she was now representing. Her office is run like a community center, no one is turned away and her staff is trying to address all the issues that walk though the door. She spent a good amount of time talking about her struggle with work/life balance. Does she attend her son's Little League game or that townhall meeting of constituents discussing healthcare issues? She also is learning that she can't represent and help her community if she's not taking care of herself.

Behold the conservative commentators:

A robust and free press is what stands between the evil that men do and informed citizenry. One of the great stories coming out of Africa -- and there are happy stories on the continent -- is that the press is strengthening. African journalists are on the rise and doing important reporting on what goes on behind closed doors. CNN's Inside Africa devoted the whole half hour of it's weekly program to the African Journalist Awards. Investigative reporter John-Allan Namu from Kenya who covered his country's ethnic conflict last year won the CNN MultiChoice African Journalist 2009 Award. Other winners include Ethar El-Katatney of Egypt for Economics and Business reporting and Halden Krog of South Africa for the Mohamed Amin Photographic Award. A full list of the winners here.

In the above clip CNN's Johannesberg correspondent Nkepile Mabuse brings together a panel of AJA finalists to discuss African journalism, bringing sunshine in government to the dark continent.