Jane Brown's blog

It was fun standing in the cold rain for two hours for tickets on Saturday and again on Tuesday with the 8,000 students who whooped, hollered, and even amened for Obama. Photos below the fold.

Here's an inspiring video made by a UNC School of Journalism and Mass Communication student about a 12-year-old NC Amendment One activist. He speaks the truth while popping marshmallows. Sweet and powerful.

An excellent new video hitting all the right notes. Pass it on!

I met some folks from Winston-Salem yesterday who said Against signs are all they are seeing. They wanted to know more.

I think we all need to be talking about this with everyone we see cause people still don't know what this is about.

This video will give you some of the best talking points. This amendment is not so much about anti-gay marriage as it is about enshrining discrimination in our Constitution.

The kicker argument for me is that it's so broadly written that a woman who is suffering from domestic violence will not be able to get a restraining order against her abuser if she is not married to him.

Great, let's make sure everyone is married so they can at least get a restraining order when they are abused.

I get to work with a remarkable PhD student from Egypt whose 10-year-old son, Omar, wrote this poem.

Omar is in the 5th grade in the Chapel Hill public schools. His teacher is going to enter the poem in a contest.

I'd say the public schools are doing something right. And we will hear more from Omar in the future as he learns he can say what needs to be said.

The fight for rights

We are fighting for
our right we are.
And you keep putting us down
we can sustain a country oh
yes we can
even though we are
not Jewish or Christian
we have not burned your Holy books
so why are you.
We can sustain a country oh
yes Egypt can and
we have the right
to kick you out.
War is never the answer.
So please can you
get out of our country
and there will be no more war
And I don’t only speak for Egypt.
I speak for all the world.

On Thursday, the Wilmington, DE City Council passed a resolution by an 8-4 vote calling on legislatures to pass laws granting "personhood" rights to eggs and sperm. Authored by councilwoman Loretta Walsh as a protest in the current birth control wars, the resolution read:

"[E]ach 'egg person' and each 'sperm person' should be deemed equal in the eyes of the government and be subject to the same laws and regulations as any other dependent minor and be protected against abuse, neglect or abandonment by the parent or guardian," says the resolution. "[L]aws should be enacted by all legislative bodies in the United States to promote equal representation, and should potentially include laws in defense of 'personhood,' forbidding every man from destroying his semen."

Earlier this month two young women from Boone, NC were attacked by strangers apparently because they looked gay. I've signed the petition their friends have posted encouraging the legislature to include sexual orientation in our law against "ethnic intimidation."

Seth and Amy on SNL nail what's wrong with this crazy debate about/ onslaught against birth control. I especially love their evidence about the effectiveness of the rhythm method. NOT.

I hope my political sisters come out of the woodwork today and sign up to run in every district in the state. If for no other reason than to say you can't just send us home and think we'll go quietly back to being baby machines. Chris Fitzsimon provided the grim numbers yesterday.

Here's a great summary of why we all should have been in the streets a long time ago, apparently written by a Republican to fellow Republicans:

Now, since Obama's regime, all of a sudden, folks have gotten mad, and want to take America Back...BACK TO WHAT/WHERE is my question?

After The 8 Years Of The Bush/Cheney Disaster, Now You Get Mad?

You didn't get mad when the Supreme Court stopped a legal recount and appointed a President.

You didn't get mad when Cheney allowed Energy company officials to dictate Energy policy and push us to invade Iraq.

You didn't get mad when we illegally invaded a country that posed no threat to us.

You didn't get mad when we spent over 800 billion (and counting) on said illegal war.

You didn't get mad when Bush borrowed more money from foreign sources than the previous 42 Presidents combined.

You didn't get mad when over 10 billion dollars in cash just disappeared in Iraq.

Apparently across the country as well as here in NC, lots of folks who had never given to Planned Parenthood decided it was time after hearing about the first Komen Foundation decision last week.

We all heard about Mayor Bloomberg who can easily write a check for $250K, but lots of other folks, who remembered being treated like a human being by a Planned Parenthood at some point in their lives were also moved to write smaller, but as important, checks.

Come on, don't be messing with an organization that has taken care of more than one in five women currently living in this country!