Fact: My high school fashion sense made Ugly Betty look good.

Yes, that’s me circa 9th-10th grade. I was mugging with my BFF, thus the open mouth. I feel that it took me until my 30s to really find a comfortable style for myself. It’s a bit preppy, a bit vintage, and a bit whatever suits my fancy. Despite being such a fashion dork I’m enthralled by the fashion throw down that is occurring on the campaign trail. First we had Michelle Obama cause an uproar when she appeared on “The View” in a White/Black dress. I along with the rest of America went to their website and despite the fact that I had been in one of their stores just months earlier, I fell in love with their style. Recently she was spotted on the campaign trail in an H&M dress. For a woman who was tagged as the next Jackie Kennedy, she certainly is thrifty!

Next fashion uproar was about Cindy McCain’s dress at the convention. For a party that kept claiming to be fighting for the middle class, that price tag for one night’s outfit was quickly picked up by the liberal end of the political spectrum.

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While a certain pair of men running on non-major party tickets keep getting press, the only ticket with two women of color isn’t getting much love. As a women/mother-centric site, I thought I’d give it to them today. In my last post, I wrongly said that the GOP would meet in a few weeks..oops! It’s next week. So on the last night of the DNC and days before the RNC, I give you the Green Party ticket and what they say they want to do for women:

It says something about a ticket that doesn’t even list either candidate’s names in their URL: http://votetruth08.com/. You could say that they know they don’t stand a chance, that they really do want to fight for the truth, it makes you wonder what is the truth?

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On her second day in the office and still unfamiliar with the layout that makes up ESPN’s compound in Connecticut, Hannah Storm took time to chat with me on the phone about being the anchor for ESPN’s new morning version of SportsCenter, being a mom in a competitive sports world, and of course, blogging.

Being a Sportscenter junkie myself, I was ecstatic to hear that ESPN was finally giving us new sports coverage in the morning instead of rerunning last night’s edition. I was amazed though to find out that ESPN had been running no new programming until around 3 pm in the afternoon each day. In the time of instant news, I found it shocking and that is precisely the reasoning behind launching morning and early afternoon editions. BUT…when I found out that Hannah Storm was going to anchor one of the new SportsCenters I couldn’t contain myself!

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In 2002 a woman named Martha Burk burst into our living rooms and challenged everyone to decide if private country/golf clubs that exclude women were discriminatory. Many responded with a quick no. They are private! was the largest chorus in the responses. Of course, our 15-second media didn’t allow for much discussion of why Burk thought that these clubs were discriminatory.

For her stance, Burk was harassed and threatened - The FBI were called out to ensure her safety when she protested outside the Augusta National Golf Club for not allowing women to be members during the 2003 Masters. Her suggestion that Tiger Woods should be taking a stand upset a lot of golf fans on top of criticizing one of golf’s most revered tournaments. I fielded a press call as a board member of a local NOW chapter with this quote:

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On Father’s Day Illinois Sentor Barack Obama returned to church by attending the Apostolic Church of God and giving a sermon on fatherhood. Here in Chicago the local news outlets are reporting that it was similar to Bill Cosby’s fatherhood sermons/lectures that he’s been giving for years. In other words, the lectures are for African-American men only.

I am aunt to two beautiful, intelligent, and fabulous nephews who don’t have active fathers. Both of my parents were fatherless and not by the choice of my grandmothers. And I’m not African-American. While I know that Obama also used this sermon to reengage the Black church scene, I do wish he had given this in a non-church setting or a non-ethnic centric setting because I want his message of “We need fathers to realize that responsibility does not end at conception. We need them to realize that what makes you a man is not the ability to have a child. It’s the courage to raise one.” to resonate across race lines to Latinos, Caucasians, and everyone else. I’m sure each of us of a different hue and background can think of one missing father.

Then I consider Amy Richards’ life story. In her recent book Opting In: Having a Child Without Losing Yourself, [buy at WCF, Powell's, Amazon] she mentions several times that she has never known her father. I recently saw her discussing her book and she talked about how her mother left her father and that he ended up being arrested a few times over the years for kidnapping young boys. She has made the leap from kidnapping to more nefarious activities and decided that she is actually better off not knowing him. Consider all the moms who leave their abusive husbands - The kids must be better off without their fathers.

Men’s Rights groups and their brother Father’s Rights groups would like to bundle all feminists as being anti-father. What else could we be when we demand that men pay child support that actually supports the child? What I think confuses them is the fact that feminists see both sides. We see the value of a dad in a heterosexual household - IF IT BENEFITS THE CHILD. We also know that, like Amy Richards, having dad kicked to the curb isn’t always something to cry about. Of course there are same-sex couples. Yeah, we support them too because well, we’d rather focus on having love in a home than different genders. And logically this means that if we support lesbian families we hate fathers. *eye roll* Not to mention our support of single women choosing to become mothers via sperm donation.

Here me now and believe me later…Feminists want loving families. That’s it.

This feminist has an awesome guy in her life who is “the bestest dad in the whole world!” as our daughter told him several times on Father’s Day. My wish is that every dad who is in the home be an active dad. The days of just bringing home the bacon are over. My wish is that every time a child is born that a great father is as well. I wish all the single moms, whether by chance or choice, a Happy Father’s Day for filling both roles. And to the lucky moms who also have “bestest fathers” as your partners in this crazy thing called parenting, I hope our luck keeps up!

On Monday night, Cleveland Cavaliers star LeBron James got in his mother’s grill after she got caught up in a skirmish that resulted from James’ involvement in a breakaway dunk attempt by Boston’s Paul Pierce. In some not so nice words, he told his mom to sit down. The video, which is up on You Tube, clearly shows the fallout from James’ mother’s intimate involvement in his career. Clearly they are close, but when LeBron is on the court, he’s got no time for his mom to coach from the sidelines.

The concept of stage moms isn’t anything new. Even back in 1933 the term was prevalent - it was the title of a popular film - Stage Mother. But currently, our nation’s most famous stage mom has to be Dina Lohan. Lohan has been all over the press in the last year for her support of some of her daughter Lindsay’s most ill-thought out choices. The elder Lohan has been supremely influential in her daughter’s success as has LeBron James’ mother. But how beneficial can these symbotic mom-child relationships be? What happens when your job is to promote your kids’ job?

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This article in the Wall Street Journal my friend Kim sent me caught my eye mainly because of its title, “How Stay-at-Home Moms Are Filling an Executive Niche.” Now that my working mom status has changed, I pay close attention to how the media covers stay-at-home moms. Especially when the topic has anything to do with stay-at-home moms re-entering the workforce. In this particular article, the author, Sue Shellenbarger, focuses on a topic of particular interest to me - moms who take on small projects to stay up on current business trends.

Shellenbarger states:

The decision among some highly educated women to stay home with children is sparking a countertrend: The rise of the mommy “SWAT team.” The acronym, for “smart women with available time,” is one mother’s label for all-mom teams assembled quickly through networking and staffing firms to handle crash projects. Employers get lots of voltage, cheap, while the women get a skills update and a taste of the professional challenges they miss.

I get this concept. I too, feel that I’m a highly educated woman who likes to network and handle small, last-minute projects. I try to stay in the mix as often as possible so that I can mingle with adults from time-to-time and keep my mind fresh. I’m pretty sure in four years, an executive won’t care if I can recite the theme song to “Dora the Explorer.”

However, I’m bothered by one of the themes of the article overall - that highly educated stay-at-home moms can be bought for consulting work for “cheap” because the chance to get refreshed on current business trends and dip our toes in professional challenges makes up for the money.

Shellenbarger highlights the “cheap” cost of using SAHMs in corporate work:

The University of North Carolina’s Kenan-Flagler Business School was able to muster an “incredibly talented” team with eight at-home mothers — including a Stanford University Ph.D… The team taught leadership skills to 100 M.B.A. candidates…[and the] training was so successful that enrollment doubled this spring and Kenan-Flagler made it mandatory for leadership training. Cost to the B-school: $21 an hour per woman.

Twenty-one dollars per hour? And one of the women leading the training has her Ph.D? I might as well go get a job at Costco and work a few overtime shifts. I guess my master’s degree isn’t worth as much as I thought if I don’t keep it in practice.

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As I was watching Jennifer roll through the questions on Jeopardy! on Saturday, I thought I noticed a trait that I sometimes find myself doing - Not going for the kill. At one point, Jennifer had earned $10,000, the champion had $5,000 and the other guy had maybe $2,000. She hit the Daily Double and risked $2,000. Now that’s a fair amount to wager on a Daily Double when someone’s about four grand behind you, but within four more turns she had landed the second one and was up around $12,000 and the men were far behind her. That’s when I saw it. That nervous smile women get when they are rolling over the competition, especially men, and suddenly realize that “men don’t like losing to women.” Jennifer wagered $2,000 again and easily won it.

If you’re a fan of Jeopardy! you know that they were in the second round. They were early in the second round. Before I knew it, the returning champion was nipping at Jennifer’s heels. In fact the second round ended with Jennifer up only a few HUNDRED dollars. Yes, Mr. Champion had blazed through a few big dollar questions, but I couldn’t help wonder if Jennifer had eased up a bit.

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Welcome to Moms on Issues! As Veronica mentioned, on this new blog, Veronica and I are going to be tackling political and social issues facing working moms today. From moms in the media to caring for our elders and our kids, we’ve got it covered.

We’re thrilled to be a part of the WIM team and hope you enjoy our points of view. We promise to speak our minds so be sure to speak yours as well. Anyway, here goes…
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Whether you’re a mom who works outside of the home or from home or doesn’t work at all, I’m sure at one time or another you’ve found yourself hitting that proverbial brick wall. Being a mom is tiring - even after you get your kid to sleep through the night (and sometimes even achieving that is a challenge). So if someone offered me a pill to feel more energized and focused throughout the day I’d leap at the chance to take it. Wouldn’t you?

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I’ve Veronica and I’m a mom with a lot of issues. Every other week I’ll share some of them with you and I hope we have a great discussion. While I will focus my issues around the media’s portrayal of working moms, I won’t limit myself to that either.

My stance is that as a society we are all still adjusting to the idea of working mothers aka women who have small children and work outside the home, either part-time or full-time. Because our society moves at a snail’s pace in reacting to the rapid change that has happened, it confounds a lot of people, especially those in the media, about whether we are selfish or Superwomen. That said, the fact that every mother is a working mother also confounds people. What do you mean that cleaning and nurturing your child is work? That’s what you are built for right? Well, yes…and no.

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