Need Some Inspiration? MOMocrats Will Help You Get to the WIE Symposium in New York City!

The deadline for the giveaway has passed and comments are now closed on this post. Congratulations to readers Sarah and Abigail, who will be attending the WIE Conference in New York this weekend.

You probably know we don't do a whole lot of giveaways here at MOMocrats, but some offers are too good to turn down.

MOMocrats have a chance to give two of our readers a full pass (a $600 value) to the Women: Inspiration & Enterprise Symposium in New York City September 18-19.  Sadly we can't get you to the Big Apple, but if you can get yourself there, leave us a comment below and we will draw two lucky winners at random who can spend a couple of days being inspired by the likes of Queen Rania of Jordan, Melinda Gates, Christy Turlington, U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, and many other amazing and accomplished women.

Tempted?  I'll further tempt you by telling you that some of the topics include,The Power of Social Media, Women in Media, Getting Women Off the Sidelines, and Advocacy and Making a Difference.

Thanks so much to the WIE conference for making this giveaway possible.  If I lived a little closer to New York City, you KNOW I'd be there! Think you could use a little inspiration (and maybe get a little shopping in while you're in Soho?), leave a comment below (make sure to include your E-mail address so we can contact you if you win!) by 5 p.m. E.S.T. on Thursday, September 15, 2011 and we'll see who gets to hang out with some inspiring women for a couple of days!

 

An Open Letter to Anthony Weiner

Dear Representative Weiner:

On last week's MOMocrats MOMochat show, my panelists and I made the decision to bypass the two political stories that were getting the most media coverage -- so we could focus on the events that actually matter.

"This past weekend, there was some lady in a bus driving around, and a bunch of fake tweets," is how Cynematic characterized the news that broke over the Memorial Day holiday.

Of course, we believed you when you said your Twitter account was hacked. Why wouldn't we? You have been a visible and powerful advocate for many of the causes we support: affordable healthcare, restoring progressivity to the tax code, investing in transportation and infrastructure, and putting the teeth back into environmental codes, to name a few.

The story was broken by Andrew Breitbart's Big Government website, which has a history of smearing progressive leaders and organizations. Van Jones, Shirley Sherrod, ACORN, and NPR are just a few victims of the Breitbart team's setups and selective editing methods. We've learned to take Breitbart's reporting with a very large grain of salt. 

And "Weinergate" appeared to coincide with the your efforts to force Justice Clarence Thomas (whose wife is a well paid conservative lobbyist) to recuse himself when the the Supreme Court is asked to decide the future of the Affordable Care Act.

I can see why you got so emotional at yesterday's press conference, where you acknowledged your "deep personal failing" and "terrible judgment" in conducting cybersex with as many as six (!) women.

Excuse my language, but no shit.

Didn't you learn anything from Bill Clinton? Or John Ensign? Or John Edwards?

You've never portrayed yourself as a "morals" guy and I honestly don't care what you do in private. But I expect you to be discrete. And smart enough to understand the golden rule of communicating online:

Thou shalt not send anyone anything you'd be embarrassed to see on the front page of the New York Times.

Because this information lasts forever.

My teenage daughter understands this. She knows it's dangerous to reveal too much information about herself. She's known this since the days she hung around on Club Penguin. 

She has also had to endure the talk about the dangers of sexting. Every middle schooler in America understands that cameraphone photos can be widely disseminated with ease. 

And while I'm on that subject, could you tell me when men decided that sending photos of their naughty bits is an acceptable form of flirtation? Because I just don't get it.

Congressman Weiner, I'm angry at you. By not fessing up at the outset, and lying to us on every media outlet in the country,  you've wasted ten days where we've been distracted from very important issues that face our nation.. and you have further weakened the clout of your fellow progressives in Congress.

At this point, you are saying you're not resigning. I support that, as long as you haven't broken the law or violated Congressional ethics. However, your stupid behavior and lies about it have compromised your effectiveness and credibility.

And that is something I can't forgive.

On Earth Day, Green Entrepreneurism is Alive and Well

In preparation for Earth Day on today's MOMocrats MOMochat radio show, Cynematic and I recounted our visit to last week's Go Green Expo in Los Angeles, and how encouraging it is to see the green sector of the economy beginning to flourish. We both were especially impressed with the range of green entrepreneurs represented there, especially those that were headed by women.

As promised, here are links to some of the businesses we mentioned on the show:

Linda Loudermilk Designs - Sustainable, organic, socially conscious... and fashionable, too.
Children's Clothes by Fuzzy Green Monster
Poster of Jersey Shore's "The Situation," endorser of The Green Garmento reusable dry cleaning bag.

One of favorite products - as moms - was Wrap-N-Mat - a nifty, reusable  food wrap that replaces plastic sandwich bags. Naturally, this product was invented by a mother of four, who is the company's CEO.

Designer LED Lights from Viribright.
Los Angeles area residents can hire Farmscape Gardens to design and maintain their own urban farms. The enterprise's staff of professional horticulturists also works with local schools.

There were more exciting products and services on display at the Go Green Expo, and we hope to focus on more of them on a future MOMochat show.

Celebrate International Women's Day with the White Ribbon Alliance

The White Ribbon Alliance for Safe Motherhood is an organization working to get women worldwide better access to lifesaving prenatal and childbirth care. Last year, on Mother's Day, we at MOMocrats encouraged our readers to share their own birth and adoption stories to promote the White Ribbon Alliance's Mother's Day Every Day initiative.

This year, we are hoping you will help us spread the word about a new WRA initiative, the White Ribbon Alliance Global Dinner Party. In honor of International Women's Day on March 8th, the White Ribbon Alliance is asking women around the world to hold dinner parties at their own homes and invite their friends to raise money and awareness to reduce maternal mortality. 

Details on the many ways you can participate and suggestions for making your own party a success are available at the WRA website in their Global Dinner Party Guide. If you are planning your own White Ribbon Alliance Global Dinner Party, let us know here in the comments. We'll feature the MOMocrats' own dinner parties — and link to other bloggers' posts about their Global Dinner Party events — in an upcoming post.

Why the Tea Party Convention "Delegates" Aren't

The National Tea Party Convention being held this week in Nashville, sponsored by the Tea Party Nation group run by Tennessee traffic law attorney Judson Phillips, has been calling its 600 convention attendees "delegates." If you've been following media coverage of this event, you may have seen news organizations (outside of Fox) printing the term in scare quotes as I just did, or referring to the Tea Party attendees as "so-called delegates." Why?

As a former delegate to the 2008 Missouri Democratic Convention, I can tell you exactly why.

Here is the Merriam Webster dictionary definition of the verb, to delegate:

1 : to entrust to another <delegate authority>
2 : to appoint as one's representative

At a traditional political convention, whether at the state or national level, the delegates in attendance have been entrusted with the authority to represent other members of the party. Though the selection process for political convention delegates varies from party to party and state to state — some convention delegates (like the Democratic Party's superdelegates) are appointed by party officials at the national, state, or local level; some are actually elected by party members at local meetings held before the convention takes place — the position of delegate is meant to be a representative one. As in, delegates undertake their duties with the explicit understanding that they have been invited to a convention not to represent their own personal interests, but to represent the interests of a group  — the interests of their city or township, for example, or, at the national level, the interests of their state.

MOMocrats' Super Bowl Tailgate for Choice: You're Invited!

The MOMocrats are throwing a “Tailgate for Choice,” and we're inviting 
men and women who support reproductive rights to shout it
 with your dollars on Super Bowl Sunday!

If you’re attending or hosting a Superbowl party when the Focus on the 
Family tv ad comes on, use it to prompt you to donate at least $5 online to your 
favorite pro-choice organization. (See the list and take the pledge after the jump.)

That way, right-wing 
religious fundamentalists interested in making their narrow values everyone 
else’s values will instead have spent $2.5 million on A GIANT PRO-CHOICE AD.

Even if you’re not at a Super Bowl party—or even if the ad gets pulled—on Sunday, February 7, 2010, make a donation to keep choice safe and 
accessible for women. 'Cuz uteruses aren't political footballs.

9/11 National Day of Service Tomorrow

For eight years, the non-profit organization My Good Deed — a group co-founded by Jay Winuk, who lost his brother Glenn Winuk, a volunteer firefighter, during the September 11th attacks — has petitioned the federal government to declare September 11th a national community service day to honor the lives of those who died in a positive and constructive way.

Jay Winuk has said of the initiative, "As a 9/11 family member, I cannot think of a more inspiring, appropriate and constructive tribute to my late brother and all those who perished, were injured or rose in service — to rekindle at least for one day each year the remarkable spirit of compassion and service that unified our country."

In April, Winuk finally got his wish, when President Obama signed the Edward M. Kennedy Serve America Act, which officially declared September 11th a National Day of Remembrance and Service.

Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, who helped draft the provision of the act that proclaimed the national service day, explained, "September 11 should not only be a day for mourning — it should be a day to think about our neighbors, our community and our country. We can take a tragic day in our nation's history and turn it into a force for good."

President Obama issued a proclamation today urging Americans to participate:

Our democracy is strengthened when we uphold the freedoms upon which our Nation was built: equality, justice, liberty, and democracy. These values exemplify the patriotism and sacrifice we commemorate today.

In that same spirit of patriotism, I call upon all Americans to join in service and honor the lives we lost, the heroes who responded in our hour of need, and the brave men and women in uniform who continue to protect our country at home and abroad.

If you would like participate in a volunteer activity tomorrow to honor the lives of those lost on September 11th, 2001, and the service of the brave firefighters, police officers and EMTs who ran toward danger that day, you can find a National Day of Remembrance and Service event near you at Serve.gov or 911dayofservice.org. And if you have a great volunteer project planned for tomorrow, please tell us about it in the comments!

MOMocrats Live Chat: President Obama's Health Reform Speech

Want to tell the G.O.P. to stop stonewalling on health care reform? Please join MOMocrat @cyn3matic's act.ly petitions on Twitter:

Orrin Hatch

John McCain

Chuck Grassley

Re-Fired Up: A Health Reform Vigil in St. Louis

A couple of weeks ago, I went to a town hall meeting held by my Senator, Claire McCaskill, in a rural Missouri town on the outskirts of St. Louis.

It depressed me.

Health care reform opponents screamed and heckled and interrupted the Senator, again and again. Some health care reform supporters got frustrated and started yelling back. At one point, a white man in the audience snatched a poster of Rosa Parks from a black woman in attendance and crumpled it and ripped it and stomped on it and shoved the woman when she tried to take it back from him. The man cited the "no sign or banners" rule imposed by the university hosting the event as his defense as security escorted both him and the woman he had taken the sign from out of the building; meanwhile, several anti-health reform protesters blatantly displaying "Don't Tread on Me" Gadsen flag banners were allowed to stay without incident. That depressed me.

A fellow blogger was called a "babykiller" for wearing a pink Planned Parenthood t-shirt and had a racial slur tossed at her to boot for being black while wearing said t-shirt. That depressed me.

A man standing outside with the St. Louis Tea Party protesters held a sign equating President Obama to Hitler:

(Photo courtesy of Michael Bersin from Show Me Progress.)

That made me want to weep for education, America, manufacturers of cheap men's hair dye, and all humanity.

California Congressional District 29: Congressman Adam Schiff's Health Care Town Hall

In case you were wondering, I attended the town hall held by my congressperson a little more than a week ago, and noticed no one in attendance packing heat. I joke here, but I take any vigilantism or talk of intimidating people with arguments made in the presence of a gun seriously. That's not reasoned debate, that's bullying.

Alhambra, CA. August 11, 2009.

The town hall was originally scheduled to be held inside a library, but so many people rsvp'd that it ended up being held outside on the blocked-off street outside the library. It garnered a lot of attention as it was one of the few scheduled in Los Angeles for the week of August 10, 2009.