Calling All Girls Who Want to Be President

“What’s Your Point, Honey?” movie trailer

Filmmaker Out to Elect Women for President

Many feminists were disgusted this past year by the sexist, misogynistic treatment that former NY Senator Hillary Clinton received during her Presidential run, at the hands of the mainstream media, the fauxgressive blogosphere, stalwart feminist organizations, and members of her party. This time, Republicans didn’t seem to have quite as much to add, because Clinton’s own Democratic Party, we were shocked to observe, outperformed them in maltreating her.

Amy Sewell, award-winning filmmaker of the endearing 2005 documentary, Mad, Hot Ballroom, is doing her part to help elect a woman President of the United States. Her latest thought-provoking 2008 release, What’s Your Point, Honey?, is the first social justice cause film that’s being marketed on amazon.com and on iTunes, too. I’d agree with her point that:

Feminism, gender inequality, is the longest revolution and the last social justice cause to have a great need to be brought to the surface and pushed out there.

Radio Interview Explores Feminism, Gender Equality, and Path to Politics

In January, 2009, I sat down with the dynamic and articulate filmmaker to record the audio interview from which this article is drawn. In the interview, Amy and I also discuss: women’s pay equality issues, the Lilli Ledbetter Act, gender inequality awakening of Baby Boomers as compared to the MTV generation. Plus, there’s an update about the lives of the seven diverse young women in her film, and their quest to run for political and organizational office.

Click arrow to play Lady Boomer’s interview with filmmaker Amy Sewell (1:41)

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The Point of What’s Your Point, Honey?

The film’s title, What’s Your Point, Honey?, was inspired by a 2007 Jim Borgman cartoon in the Cincinnati Enquirer. The cartoon depicts Hillary Clinton standing, pointer in hand, appearing to school Uncle Sam in front of a chart entitled, “Countries That Have ALREADY HAD FEMALE Heads of State.”

Here’s the list: Haiti, Nicaragua, Panama, Ecuador, Argentina, Chile, Bolivia, Burundi, Liberia, Indonesia, Philippines, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Mongolia, India, Germany, Serbia, Israel, Switzerland, Finland, Norway, England, Latvia, Iceland, Ireland.

And in response, a schlumpy-looking Uncle Sam asks Hillary,

What’s your point, honey?

In our interview, Sewell expands on the cartoon’s irony: The US is 71st in the world in women’s representation in government — we’re laggin’. We’re behind the -stans  and Cape Verde. . . . Despite often horrible treatment in some of the countries that have had women leaders, women are proportionally better represented and lead other countries in far greater numbers.

The filmmakers set out to influence the younger generations with their film, and to create an awareness of feminism in them, because many young women “do not believe that they’re not equal.” Additionally, Sewell says that she and the film’s director, Susan Toffler, decided to reclaim the term “honey,” in order to devalue it when used by the oppressor, so to speak

Co-stars of the documentary, “What’s Your Point Honey?,” include Sewell’s twin daughters, the generation of girls “that doesn’t believe that they’re not equal.”

Hidden Inequality

They made a movie for an audience that doesn’t want to hear it, Sewell asserts, because they think they’ve got it all in the bag. They see their moms going to work and just think that everything is equal—after all, mom’s working. Girls don’t really know what their moms go through at work, regarding career advancement, pay differences, harassment, and what is expected of them as compared to men.

Girls don’t grasp that women, despite feminist gains of the last forty years, are largely responsible for taking care of: the house, the kids, doctors’ appointments, day care, child care, shopping for groceries, supplies, and clothing, cooking, cleaning up, housecleaning, laundry, and more. Additionally, their moms are often caregivers for their elderly parents or in-laws. Yet, girls of today think that life is, and will be, the same for them as it is for the boys they’re growing up with.

Forget about equal pay: Sewell says that women should actually get paid MORE than men. After all, the mom does everything, and the dad “just goes to work,” as a young boy observes in the film. Yes, we’re swimming in the patriarchy, so much so that many fish don’t know it, haven’t seen it. However, girls are beginning to see sexism and inequality at home, and more women saw it in the political atmosphere of the 2008 Presidential election.

Eyes Wide Open—Lessons from Sarah

Sewell claims Sarah Palin lit a fire under many liberal women who thought, “hey if she can do it, why can’t I?” We should be running for local offices and positions that grow us into more and higher national prominence. A way to begin is to step up and get active about the projects and issues you really care about in your local community, and just go ahead and start to run things.

She enumerates three lessons women learned from Palin’s Vice Presidential run:

1. Women can be raising a family and become a major player, with the right support systems.
2. If you multiply out all the ways you run your household, you can do it on a larger scale in your community, city, state, and nation.
3. If Sarah can do it, why are we liberal women still on the sidelines, waiting for men or somebody to hand this to us?

The White House Project: “Beyond Gender to Agenda”

The film is based on a “contest” co-sponsored by COSMOgirl and The White House Project (WHP), an organization founded and run by Marie Wilson. Wilson is past President of the Ms. Foundation and co-founder of Take our Daughters to Work Day©. Her “Vote, Run, Lead” training program at the WHP recruits women to run for office. Since its beginnings in Colorado four years ago, the program has expanded to ten states. They select young women who are definitely interested in running for any office and serious in their intentions, and equip them with the tools they will need.

Wilson believes strongly in having a nonpartisan organization, because her philosophy is that all women bring the same basic life issues to the table, such as: child rearing, child and elder care, the wage gap, working in male-dominated fields, and, of course, who owns their bodies. The goal is to get more women into office. Women are 51 percent of the population, and 80 percent of the purchasing power. Women decide how 80 cents of every dollar in American households will be spent.

I questioned Amy: If women treat each other so poorly when running for office—as they did with Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin last year—will women be discouraged from running in the future, expecting that they might face a similar fate? Introducing the pipeline theory, she said that “it’s not about one. As long as you have only one woman running, everyone will always rip her apart.”

Sewell contends that if you have just as many women running as men, you get “beyond gender to agenda,” to quote Marie Wilson. There are many amazing, accomplished, powerful women out there; we just haven’t seen it happen in enough numbers yet, so we have to make our own way! But the environment is changing: Initially, Wilson asked women to run for office, because she knew that women needed to be asked. However, there seems to be an attitude shift in that women are beginning to step up and run. There were 100 applicants for the program in NY State, and several women who were in the film announced their plans to run for office right after completing their training.

Winners of the 2024 Project, co-sponsored by The White House Project and COSMOgirl, gather in front of The White House during the making of the documentary

The Key to Success: Fill the Pipeline with Young Candidates

As a way to keep the ball rolling and get younger generations involved, What’s Your Point, Honey? shows inequalities in their world today “wrapped around the metaphor of a woman running for President.” The filmmaker sees that girls can look up to the current women in power, like Hillary and Sarah Palin, but they don’t relate to them as they do to twenty year-olds, like those in the film.

If we build the pipeline, the more women we have wanting to come into political power, the easier it will be for all male political figures in the future to have a pool of applicants to choose from [for cabinet and other appointments.] [. . . ]

Our hope is someday that it won’t even be a question. We’ll have so many women in politics that we’ll de-genderize it.

Sewell is passionate about carrying through her message and continuing to reach an audience of women that can begin to fill the pipeline of participation in government, beginning with reaching young girls. Her new book, SHE’S OUT THERE: The Next Generation of Presidential Candidates: 35 Women Under 35 Who Aspire to Lead, will be released in April, 2009.

Further, an educational pilot program is being rolled out by North Carolina Political Center for Women: the What’s Your Point, Honey? DVD and study guides will be used as part of high school programs in North Carolina. This will be followed by programs throughout the US in middle schools, high schools, and colleges, accompanied by study guides appropriate for each educational level. Amy has generously provided the Viewers’ Guide here for you to download FOR FREE, which you can use when you buy the DVD, or rent or buy the video-on-demand (VOD) download.

Women Have Power

Sewell sees little advantage in fighting with people who do not and will not ever agree fundamentally, and I agree! Women need to join together and get involved with whatever social justice causes that move them. Furthermore, WOMEN have the purchasing power. Money speaks, and we have power here. For example, ads and products that call for our attention to speak out against: Boycott! The PUMA and some of the feminist movement made a difference by boycotting MSNBC, CNN, PBS, NPR, and network television due to their commentators’ misogynistic and biased stances about then Presidential candidate, Hillary Clinton, and VP nominee, Sarah Palin.

The movie purposely uses a light touch to draw new people into wanting to be active, and has a carryover affect. Viewers report that they begin to notice more instances of inequality or sexism in their daily lives, whereas before they wouldn’t have seen it. I encourage everyone to see and discuss this film, especially families. Be sure to rate, comment, and see what others are saying.

This is such an enthusiastic, supportive article, you’d think I have an ulterior motive, or am receiving some kind of net gain. I hope I am and do. I believe passionately, based on my spiritual and community background, that the societal road forward, onward, and upward must be: positive, collective, supportive, have dignity—and—be ignited, and driven by and for women. We can accomplish this by expanding girls’ and young women’s horizons, education, and opportunities for governance, and yes, the Presidency. Elect a woman? . . . “It’s not about one.”

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© Copyright 2009 by Lady Boomer NYC, article and audio interview. All rights reserved.

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Resources

These are linked within the article and included here for your convenience:

DOC WEBSITE:  http://www.whatsyourpointhoney.com/front/

THE WHITE HOUSE PROJECT:  http://www.thewhitehouseproject.org/

AMAZON DOC VOD LINK:  WHAT’S YOUR POINT, HONEY? ($2.99/week rental, $9.99/buy)

BOOK AMAZON LINK: SHE’S OUT THERE: The Next Generation of Presidential Candidates: 35 Women Under 35 Who Aspire to Lead

Senate Saturday Stimulus Debate Part Deux

[After all these windbags finish spoutin’, the late, great Billy Preston says it best.]

February, 7, 2009 — Liveblogging the Senate debate on the huge, now $1.2 trillion bill. Quoted from live testimony, as best I can keep up with the typing, for as long as it’s interesting — or should I say frustrating.

PART DEUX:

Sen. Tom Udal, D-NM —

Blah, blah, blah

Helping the states so they don’t contribute to the downward spiral.

Helping states — isn’t that a Republican thing?

Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-AL

There’s no free lunch. you can’t make nuthin’ come from nothin’.

Sessions quoted Larry Summers from Financial Times in 2007-8:

Fiscal stimulus must be: “timely, targeted and temporary” and must be targeted well. Poorly targeted stimulus can make things worse than if we didn’t do anything at all.

We’ll be paying $40 billion PER YEAR INTEREST on this bill.

Quoted Alice Rivlin, Budget Secretary during Clinton Administration: A long term investment plan should not be put together hastily or lumped in with an anti-recession package. The element of the investment program must be carefully planned and will not create jobs right away. Otherwise, money will be wasted if the investments are not carefully crafted.

We supported ethanol and thought it would fix all our problems (and it didn’t.)

This bill contains: $120 billion of “bow wave” spending that will continue past the spending in the bill.

Not reflecting well on the Congress. Last year, Paulson said we must pass $700 billion bill before Asian markets opened the next morning. Only $350 have been spent to date, so wasn’t most important thing in the world and results are dubious. It went outside the budget process with very little in terms of hearings and was an emergency bill passed outside of the regular appropriations process. Like this bill, it didn’t go through authorization or appropriations committees.

In a few days, we’ll get another Wall Street bailout and perhaps housing bill. We’re being asked to make huge and unprecedented expenditures without saying how they compete with other ongoing programs.

I think we’re losing our discipline. I voted against the Bush Wall St. bailout, and I’ll vote against this one unless it’s changed.

Sen. Blanche Lincoln, D-AR —

Blah, blah, blah, we came together and trimmed $100 billion. Can’t we all get along and reduce the major spending in this bill. We should be proud because we’re being bi-partisan.

She sounds like a grade school teacher: let’s be patient and all get along. What a waste of time. Talk about what’s in the f*ckin’ bill that you’re trying to pass.

Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-IA —

Discussed proposal for provision for small businesses, capital gains cuts for small business original investment be targeted to $1.5 billion and is a good investment.

Objected to children’s health insurance program passed last week in that it would give it to kids with insurance already instead of those without it???

Dems are trying to nationalize healthcare. Normally they should be in the healthcare reform package of which I’m a part of planning. Giving money to states isn’t targeted, you can get a subsidy to pay for health insurance regardless of how much you make.

National Science Foundation porno idiot – culture there that encourages this sort of thing. Porno not the main problem, just that the NSF hasn’t been the subject of much scrutiny over the years. More about the porno.

Grassley soap boxing about morality. I’m sure the NSF must be a hotbed of porno viewing. sigh. Sen. Barbara Mikulski will be looking into it. Go, Barbara!

Grassley Amendment: Show us the Money, so we can see where it’s going. If an agency gets a request for the records by Congress, it must comply. Vote for my amendment!

Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-WV —

Sen. Bill Nelson, D-FL —

I lost interest after a couple of hours of this. Not too much information about what exactly in the bill. sigh. But anyway, here’s as far as I got . . .

Stimulus Package Goes Nuclear

From the NIRS — Nuclear Information and Resource Service. Click here to look around at the recent info, sign up, and then sign the petition.

Safe energy now! No taxpayer loan guarantees for new nuclear reactors!

January 29, 2009

The U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee late on the night of January 27 snuck in a provision to President Obama’s economic stimulus package that would allow as much as $50 BILLION of your dollars to be used as loan guarantees for construction of new nuclear reactors. This would be on top of the $18.5 Billion taxpayer dollars already authorized by Congress during the Bush administration.

These loan guarantees would mean more nuclear reactors and more radioactive waste piling up in communities across our country. They would also mean less money for safer, cheaper and cleaner energy alternatives like solar and wind power.

The provision is vaguely worded. It would authorize $50 Billion in new loan guarantees for “eligible technologies.” These technologies include nuclear, “clean coal,” renewable energy sources and electric transmission. But the stimulus package is intended to create new jobs and economic activity over the next two years. Not only should new nuclear reactors and the false concept of  “clean coal” be excluded from taxpayer support, but the reality is that neither technology is ready to produce any jobs within the next two years.

The Department of Energy apparently would have to decide how to allocate this $50 Billion. If it all went to safe, cost-effective renewable energy sources,that would be one thing. Unfortunately, the provision’s backers, like Sens. Robert Bennett (R-UT) and Thomas Carper (D-DE) are clear that their intent is that it would go for new nuclear reactor construction. Yet the Congressional Budget Office predicts a 50% default rate by nuclear utilities using this program! This is simply a nuclear bailout waiting to happen, and we can’t afford it.

But it’s not too late. You can help stop this nonsense. The full Senate will vote on the stimulus package the week of February 2. [Editor: there’re still debating today, Saturday, February 7, 2009, so it’s not too late to CALL or SIGN.) Please CALL your Senators now (Senate Switchboard: 202-224-3121) and tell them to stop all loan guarantees for new nuclear reactors. AND, please send an e-mail to your Senators with the same message using the form below. (note: we encourage you to edit the wording to personalize your e-mail and reflect your own concerns).

Senate Saturday Stimulus Session Liveblogging

[Billy Preston’s “Will It Go Round In Circles” performed by Paul Weller band.]

February, 7, 2009 — Liveblogging the Senate debate on the huge, now $1.2 trillion bill. Quoted from live testimony, as best I can keep up with the typing, for as long as it’s interesting — or should I say frustrating. Why am I agreeing with the Republicans’ caution? As you know, I’ve always, until last year, been a Democrat. But never mind about that — that gets back to a great point made down page by Johann: it doesn’t matter how we got here, stop blaming each other and get to explaining what the bill will do and to making one that actually creates jobs.

And so they go, around, and around, and around, and around . . . .

Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-AL —

The new OBM Director, whose nomination  both Democrats and Republicans just approved, reported that the $1.1 trillion stimulus package will create jobs that “cost” between $100,000 – $300,000. Some reports say the number is as high as $900,000 per job. My non-econ brain thinks this means that there’s so much other spending besides job creation that what it costs to produce each job averages out to that.

Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-CA is chastising the Bush Admin for getting us in there, but I find her self-righteous tone annoying. Hmm, another one of my gals. I’m just not sure I can get over her behavior as head of the California Delegation at the Democratic Convention, but she’s reporting:

• 2,589,000 2008 jobs lost
• 1% increase in Medicaid state and national spending
• 1000 applicants line up for 35 firefighting jobs in Florida and the police were called to control the crowd, plus other examples
• Extensive layoffs happening in California.
• Going on about the past eight years, Boxer hits that we had a surplus during Clinton and balanced the budget, but the Republicans took it up to $3 trillion – war in Iraq and tax cuts to the wealthiest.

It seems to me that instead of bitching and moaning about the past, that BOXER, SOMEBODY, ANYBODY could be explaining the damn bill and how it would help create jobs. Instead, we hear about her putting aside her ego (really?) and compromising, because oh right, “WE WON!” implies Barbara.

This election was about change . . .  not just about trickle down tax cuts that the Republicans want.

So it’s either or? She has blathered on without saying a word of what the bill has in it or will do. Our government is an idiotic mess.

Sen. Mike Johanns, R-NE —

A bill $1.2 trillion — the biggest bill in the history of the world. Many couldn’t answer the number of zeros in the number, yet we have to vote on it within the next 24 hours. It’s not good enough that we’ve trimmed. Now it’s $7 billion over the house version, so we have a more expensive one. they’ve cut $110 billion. but bill is still comprised of wasteful spe3ning — might be worthy of support in appropriations process, but don’t stimulate the economy. it is a giant appropriations bill. I’ve fought for many of these programs, money: to consolidate the Dept. of Homeland Security, for Earth Science Mission, money for trail maintenance and cars — worthy projects but they don’t stimulate the economy.

I hear a lot about bi-partisan efforts. In Nebraska, our senators were elected on a non-partisan ticket, [and we hash things out.] Unless there is a new meaning attached to this word, this “compromise” closed door meetings , with 2 Republicans attending and in the end that was announced as the bi-part efforts, less than 1/4 of 1/10 of Republican Senators were included.

I’m not willing to put aside due diligence to find a couple of months from now that what we thought would work did not. . . . This is literally borrowed money, yet we’re not going to take a vote on paying for this. I’ve heard the debate about who’s responsible and who did what and what they wanted us to accomplish was to get out fiscal house in order, not to sort out faults, to solve problems.

I come from a state where our Constitution requires a balanced budget and forbids borrowing money over a certain amount. I could not issue debt, so instead of cutting taxes, I cut spending. It never occurred to any of us in our legislature that we’d tell our kids, etc. how we were going to borrow and leave the payback to them.

I think the Change people voted for was about how we run our government. we’ve got to grab ahold of this or our dollar won’t be worth anything, because we keep printing it.

Okay, dude, I’m in. Mike Johanns for President.

Sen. Amy Klobushcar, D-MN —

Blah, blah, blah, real families, bad times, all’s lost. Blah, blah, blah, what the new energy jobs will get us.

Sen. John Ensign, R-NV — A history lesson

Roaring twenties: Pres. Coolidge: low tax rates, encouraging private sector to invest was good, stock market became over-valued, like .com of 90s bubble burst, the banking bubble burst. Pres. Hoover increased taxes, government spending on infrastructure, instituted Smoot-Hawley protectionist trade law. Roosevelt, New Deal, massive government spending. people argue today that the Great Depression happened because the spending was stop and go. 1937 taxes were raised again, which caused a depression within a depression. The New Deal didn’t bring us out the Depression, it was WWII. Tremendous sacrifices were made with rationing of basic supplies. After 1929 market never recovered until mid-1950s. Do we want to wait that long for our market to recover?

% of debt to GDP chart: Went up over last few years. Tax rate cuts like under Reagan, Kennedy, Coolidge, stimulated economic revenue. Problem under Bush was that we spent too much money. All of this spending, sovereign wealth funds have been buying our treasury bills. what happens if other countries think we’re too big of a risk? Our economy goes off the cliff. At a certain point, living beyond your means catches up with you.

All spending is not bad, but all doesn’t create stimulus.

Ensign showed that in Japan lost 1990s decade: spending increased but it didn’t get them out of their economic woes.

$1.3 trillion bill when you add the interest, $300,000 per job created or saved. 1.3 million jobs (the low end) the pricetag is $600,000 per job.

Examples of the pork in this bill: $6.1 for corp. jet hangers in Fayetteville, bike facilities, pedestrian ways, and bike paths.

I love to cycle, but this isn’t a time to build these things. invest in infrastructure that makes the economy more efficient. Take our time to see where the money’s going. If we rush through this thing, we’ll have inflation and higher taxes and will do more damage to our economy.

If stimulus package was put together with both sides – because neither has the right idea, we would have had 80 votes. We should have sat down together to craft it, but the Dems brought a Dem bill to the floor in the first place.

To be continued. . . .

Is Stimulis Right For You?

“Are you an economy with performance issues?”

Stimulis That Makes You Go Mmm-mm-m

“Stimulis” was written and produced by Ted Balaker, and edited by Alex Manning.

Remembering Friends Gone Too Soon

I’ve had several friends and acquaintances pass away lately, or this time of year is the anniversary of their death. Today was the seventh anniversary of my dear friend’s death. She was Irish American and loved this song.

Danny Boy, performed by Eva Cassidy

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Remembering Karen

Gone too soon. We feel you still,
My sister dear, sister in the spirit,
Co-madre, in memory of you here.
May you and all our dear ones up there
Join together, help each other
In your heavenly work,
And I hope to gosh some play.

Gone too soon. We feel you still.
Today. I know it’s odd that we recall you
On the day on which you left
More than the one on which you came.
But, now, listen, I’ll tell you why:
Most of us didn’t know you then,
And your absence was so deeply felt,
So we remember that one,
And we cry.

Gone too soon. We feel you still.
Look at all the good
That has been done to help the world,
Because of who you were,
And all the gems you left for us
Get passed along like pearls.
Our kids have sent you through
To carry on, and in your name decreed,
Will your and their great missions
Be fulfilled and well succeed.

Gone too soon. We feel you still.
Mostly the songs of love,
And how you held all dear.
You did so minus thought or judgment,
You did so minus fear.
Thank you, my dear, fine sister,
For who you were on earth.
Reminding us to take the time
And also to revere:
The magic that we have
And that we make
Is happening right here.

LB