Article here. Excerpt:

"At an event this week in New Mexico, Obama repeated the misleading claim that "women still earn only 77 cents for every dollar earned by men," and dismissed the notion that factors other than discrimination explain the wage gap as "just totally wrong."

Yet even the organizations that champion the most aggressive government action in the name of equal pay acknowledge that most of the wage gap is a result of men and women's different choices related to work, not employment discrimination. A 2007 report from The American Association of University Women, for instance, found that most of the wage gap could be explained by factors such as employment, education and personal choices. Pay differential wasn't just the result of sexism in the workplace."

This is a Free Audio Dialogue. You must provide your e-mail address and will receive a link to the full dialogue.

"It's definitely true that men, as a rule today in industrialized societies, are basically where women were in the 1950's, psychologically and socially. Part of what is keeping men there is being blamed for having power that is really a camouflage for the powerlessness. Real power is control over my own life."

Story here. Excerpt:

'PHOENIX — Arizona's child protection system and the people who work in it will be subject to more public and legislative oversight because under new laws signed Tuesday.

Four bills signed by Gov. Janet Napolitano were promoted by supporters as increasing accountability and transparency of state functions to protect children from abuse and neglect.

The bills would increase public access to Child Protective Services information after the death or serious injury of a child.'

Via email from Angela Pedersen: The DC Festival 2008 in Support of Equal Parenting Rights and Family Preservation is on!

Under the leadership of Lary Holland and numerous organizations the DC Festival 2008 will be held on August 15 and 16 in Washington, D.C.

If you belong to an organization please be sure to send your letter of support to Lary Holland. Information on how to do this and why we need your letters of support is listed here.

Organizations that already support this effort are:
1) Fathers4Justice
2) Dads and Moms of Michigan
3) A Child's Right
4) Equal Parenting Bike Trek Crew
5) Split-N-Two
6) CRISPE
7) United Civil Rights Council of America
8) Parental Alienation Awareness Organization (PAAO)
9) Shared Parenting Works
10) Father's Rights Coalition
and many, many more. You can view a constantly updating list on the main page for the DC Festival 2008 here.

Story here. As expected the original agenda for discussing the changes of Dowry laws and domestic violence laws suddenly changed.

It tells in the words of government official “We do not want to convey the impression that we believe the existing laws are flawed or need changes. That is why we have changed the agenda,” an official said.

In another related development, Delhi police have issued a circular banning the mandatory arrests over women-centric laws invoking the well-enunciated principle that provision of power to arrest is not the same as order to arrest.

Story here. Excerpt:

"Bullying among adolescents has captured the attention of researchers, educators and parents alarmed by a parade of mean girls and cyber-bullies caught in mid-punch on viral video. But such aggression may not just happen in a whirl of adolescent hormones, some in the growing anti-bully movement argue.

Meline Kevorkian, a Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., researcher and public speaker on bullying, surveyed 167 educators last year and 25 percent indicated bullying occurs most in elementary schools. Research also indicates that three-quarters of 8- to 11-year-olds report they've been bullied, with more than half identifying it as a "big" problem, Kevorkian said."

I found this video interesting mostly because its an actual news report from a Sacramento television station. This is the first time I've ever seen this issue discussed during a news program.

Story here. Excerpt:

'At a town hall meeting here on Monday, Obama praised the women responsible for his upbringing and outlined his record of pushing to address issues important to women. The only men in the room were reporters, campaign aides and Secret Service agents.

As the working-class women in the audience nodded, Obama continued: "Too many of America's daughters grow up facing barriers to their dreams, and that has consequences for all American families. It's harder for working parents to make a living while raising their kids. And we know that the system is especially stacked against women."'

Senator Barak Obama gave a speech on the importance of fatherhood the same week that the National Fatherhood Initiative released a report, "The One Hundred Billion Dollar Man," on the taxpayer costs of absent fathers. The good news is that more and more policy makers and organizations are starting to understand the impact of absent fathers. The bad news is policy makers do not really understand the causes of the fatherhood crisis.

As one of the few mainstream journalists who understand the government's role in creating the fatherhood crisis, Kathleen Parker, pointed out in "Obama's Incomplete Plea on Fatherhood," Obama failed to mention that "the problem of absent fathers, especially in the black community, is tied in part to well-intentioned social programs such as ... domestic violence prevention." Since "the state's punitive powers, permitted without due process, are mind-boggling to consider" and not every allegation of domestic violence is legitimate, "[o]nce the system is engaged and injunctions issued, even innocent fathers are unlikely to see much of their children. Perhaps never."

This is good news. Excerpt:

'Lautar is under court order to pay nearly $800 a month in child support and other expenses, despite the fact his ex-wife has admitted in Allegheny County court papers that Lautar is not the girl's father. The child was born during their marriage. After the couple divorced, the mother married the girl's biological father. The mother, the father and the daughter live together in Moon, according to papers filed in Allegheny County Common Pleas Court.

"I'm stuck in this rip-off, this fraud," said Lautar, 40, of North Strabane. "It's paternity fraud, is what it is. ... And the state is enforcing this fraud."

Obama's recent Father's Day speech vilifying dads got me wondering what more is on his official web site. To be brief, his entries under "Issues" for women and families might have been copied directly from the National Organization for Women.

Obama's site repeats the "1-in-4 women will be abused" myth, along with the "77-cents on the dollar" pay gap fiction. If elected, he pledges to create a new $25 million DV fund to create "partnerships" between DV agencies and Fatherhood programs. He applauds the progress made from VAWA.

He supports a Responsible Fatherhood & Healthy Families Act that will "crack down" on men in arrears for child support.

Other pledges are to more aggressively promote women in science and math, support passage of an Equal Pay Act, and further strengthen Title IX.

Article here.

Apparently, the patriarchy has launched an attack against the poor, long-fingernailed women who have difficulties using the iPhone.

Erica Watson-Currie of Newport Beach, Calif., wanted a stylus. She and other women who have long nails -- as well as some people of all genders with chunky fingers -- have trouble typing on the iPhone.

Story here. Excerpt:

'Mothers will be offered £40 a week to go back to work under plans unveiled by Gordon Brown.

The scheme would give a couple with children £40 if one parent works and the other, usually the mother, agrees to look for a job. If both work the couple would get £80.
...
But critics said the £40 payments did too little. Chris Grayling, Tory work and pensions spokesman said: ‘Gordon Brown just doesn’t understand that what Britain needs is not yet more pointless tinkering with the benefits system for working mothers but real action to tackle family breakdown in a nation where millions of people are trapped in benefit dependency.’'

Story here. Excerpt:

'Gloucester Mayor Carolyn Kirk said the report of a "pregnancy pact" has not been confirmed.
...
However, Sullivan has now told officials he can't remember what his source of information was.

At a news conference Monday, Kirk said the principal was "foggy in his memory about how he heard about the information."'

Article here. All right, makes sense to a point. However I can't imagine it being good for anyone to be dosed with artificial oxytocin regularly. It serves a purpose and to overload the body with it seems as bad as overloading it with any number of other artificial hormones.

That said, if you read the article all the way to the end, you will see this:

"However, despite the many potential benefits of the research projects, some scientists have sounded warnings over the negative potential uses the hormone offers.

They say oxytocin could have potential as a date-rape drug as it is involved in both trust and sexual arousal."

I do believe the next date rape drug scare will be aspirin.