Informed

Reading Time: 3 minutes “I do not support Trump,” she wrote. “I must learn from my mistakes and move forward.”

Ok…

And here’s the thing. At that moment, Caitlyn Jenner joined the ranks of privileged white women who are perfectly willing to follow along until Trump’s tyranny affects them. It’s ok until it comes home and for Caitlyn obviously trampling the rights of trans people was her come to Jesus moment.

She was fine with kids in cages.
She was fine with angry hostile racist rhetoric.
She was fine with sabor rattling with other foreign powers and ditching our long-standing foreign allies while palling up to the world’s most dangerous dictators.
She was fine with an alleged rapist supreme court nominee and mocking a sexual assault victim who came forward.

Hell, she was fine with “grab ’em by the pussy”. Maybe that’s because she didn’t have one when he was bragging about grabbing them.

But Transgender rights – she had to finally draw a line.

Reading Time: 3 minutes Obviously body-slamming a reporter (who was trying to ask a question about the ObamaCare repeal vote, by the way) is not the same as blowing them up with a pipe bomb. But it is absolutely beyond the pale of constitutional democracy. Celebrating such acts by the very top of the party elite does not bode well for the future of the GOP and American politics writ large.

Political violence is a thorny enough problem when it’s carried out by underground extremists. But it is a lot more dangerous when it becomes a tactic for a ruling party. If one cannot win free and fair elections, well then violence might serve just as well — and if it works, then there is no way to stop it.

Reading Time: < 1 minute Confluence Daily is your daily news source for women in the know.     Confluence Daily is the one place

Reading Time: < 1 minute When fascism starts to feel normal, we’re all in trouble.

Reading Time: 2 minutes Trump will be the keynote speaker at Friday’s event, which will also be attended by his former strategist, Steve Bannon. Other speakers include the founder of anti-Islam group ACT for America and former Trump strategist, Sebastian Gorka.

The anti-LGBTQ Family Research Council, labeled as a hate group by the SPLC, has hosted its annual summit since its inception in 2006.

“Values voters have waited eight years for a leader who puts America’s mission first and respects the values that made America into a great nation,” the council’s president Tony Perkins said in a statement reported by The Hill.

Reading Time: 9 minutes Much of the coverage of these events tends to be theatre criticism, or news stories about a single inflammatory line or two, rating Trump’s performance or puzzling over the appeal to his followers. But what the President of the United States is actually saying is extraordinary, regardless of whether the television cameras are carrying it live. It’s not just the whoppers or the particular outrage riffs that do get covered, either. It’s the hate, and the sense of actual menace that the President is trying to convey to his supporters. Democrats aren’t just wrong in the manner of traditional partisan differences; they are scary, bad, evil, radical, dangerous. Trump and Trump alone stands between his audiences and disaster.

I listen because I think we are making a mistake by dismissing him, by pretending the words of the most powerful man in the world are meaningless. They do have consequences. They are many, and they are worrisome. In what he says to the world, the President is, as Ed Luce wrote in the Financial Times this week, “creating the space to do things which were recently unthinkable.” It’s not a reality show; it’s real.

Reading Time: 2 minutes Disasters such as hurricanes, floods, fires and other emergency situations are all too common these days. In fact, about 4 out of 5 Americans live in counties hit by weather events since 2007, according to disaster declaration data from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). That illustrates how these events can impact nearly everyone and the importance of having a plan.

This is particularly true for older people and people with disabilities. Health issues, mobility concerns and use of assistive devices can create additional challenges during emergencies. However, there are simple steps everyone can take to prepare now for what may come later.

Reading Time: 7 minutes Although history books rarely record women’s achievements in anything near equal measure to men’s achievements, women HAVE achieved “it all”. We are doctors and lawyers and Supreme Court judges. We are world leaders. – Even though the United States failed to elect Hillary Clinton as our first woman President, there are plenty of countries that have NOT failed to put a woman in the top leadership position. We are scientists, fighter pilots, authors, psychologists, law enforcement officers, astronauts, teachers, professors, builders, race car drivers, actors, athletes, Olympians, musicians, entertainers, technicians, ministers, entrepreneurs – there isn’t a single field where women have not aspired to, and reached, “the top”.

However, what keeps nagging at me isn’t that we need more women “at the top” (although believe me, it has nagged me plenty) but that we need men to be more comfortable reaching down to what is perceived to be the bottom – the unpaid labor and necessary work that keeps the world turning day after day – the multitude of chores historically given to servants. These tasks are generally carried out by women, both physically and emotionally. The laundry load and the emotional load have predominantly been women’s burden to bear.