People are often surprised that we are still fighting this battle for freedom of choice after so long. I’m not. I’ve come to understand that anti-choice and opposition to contraception has nothing to do with pro-life or pro-fetus; it has everything to do with power and who has it. It represents a mindset that values women mainly for their services as wives and sexual partners to men and as producers and rearers of children.

Reproduction and sexuality are keys to women’s empowerment. If a woman is able to determine the reproductive and sexual aspects of her life, it means she can also control and determine many other aspects of her life. When women are robbed of reproductive health and contraceptive decision-making, they loose an essential element of what it means to be a full human being.

This is a power struggle that has existed from the very beginning of the 120-year fight over reproductive rights. Every dictator—Stalin, Ceaucescu, Hilter—has made anti-choice a central component of their agenda. The anti-choice movement has used different strategies over the decades, growing more strategic and virulent in reaction to the modern U.S. women’s movement. Granting personhood to the fetus is only the latest incarnation and now the Stupak/Pitts Amendment shows how clever the movement has become. Most folks blame the Bishops without realizing the most pernicious part of it all.

Reproductive health has to be understood from a woman’s point of view. How a woman manages her fertility comprises a whole spectrum of factors — her relations, sexual and otherwise with her partner; her economic and psychological circumstances; her status within the family and in the community; her future security. Health factors are only one among all these others and since childbearing and child rearing is a complex social and economic undertaking that affects a woman’s economic, social, sexual, and emotional life, and the life of her family and her community, this undertaking cannot be decided by a medical doctor who is weighing it from the point of view of health risks, or of policy-makers who may view it subjectively as a moral issue. This makes the woman an “object” and it dismisses her knowledge about her own body and her own life and instead of enhancing her dignity and self-respect it belittles and disempowers her.

It reflects a mindset that believes that women cannot be trusted to make decisions that will be good for their families and society; that what is good for a family and a community and a society or even a woman’s own health is something that must be determined by others who “know better” and then imposed on her.

The strategy of the anti-choice forces today is not to oppose abortion frontally but, instead, to wage an incremental assault in a long-term effort to win the hearts and minds of the American public. The Stupak/Pitts amendment is a good example.

Let’s not let this pass.

The campaign calls on supporters all over the world to tie a black ribbon around their wrist signifying a call for Saudi women to be given equal rights to men and an end to the male guardianship system, in which Saudi women are represented by men in all public and official spheres of life.

“We are calling on everybody, both Saudi and non-Saudi, to show their support of Saudi women,” Wajiha Al-Huwaidar, the leader of the campaign, told The Media Line. “It’s not just about the right to drive, it’s everything,” she said. “We want to have our lives back, which the male guardianship system took from us. So we are calling for everyone to wear this black ribbon and spread the word.”

A statement by campaign organizers called for women to be given “rights to marry, divorce, inherit, gain custody of children, travel, work, study, drive cars and live on an equal footing with man.”

“We, Saudi women activists, appeal to all those who support Saudi women’s rights, inside and outside the Kingdom, to participate in the campaign by wearing a black ribbon on their wrists as a symbolic and peaceful gesture of their advocacy to Saudi women’s rights,” the statement read.

Under the motto “we will not untie our ribbon until Saudi women enjoy their rights as adult citizens”, the “Black Ribbon Campaign” was launched Friday to mark the anniversary of a famous event on November 6, 1990, in which 47 Saudi women publicly drove cars through the Saudi capital, Riyadh, in a protest calling for Saudi women to be given the right to drive. The women were subsequently detained by Saudi police, had their passports confiscated, and some were fired from their jobs.

Al-Huwaidar said she expected to receive significant support for the campaign throughout the weekend.

“I am expecting many people to wear it, especially people outside Saudi Arabia,” she said. “Teenagers wear the black ribbon anyway as a fashion. Now they have a reason, so that when someone asks, they will say ‘We are supporting Saudi women.’”

“I am hoping to get famous people to wear it and a group of us will be walking around throughout the day recruiting women,” Al-Huwaidar added. “I’m trying of course to avoid the religious police because they are always around, but we are just asking for our rights.”

Saudi Arabia has seen growing social tension as the younger generation demands a liberalization of the hold the kingdom’s strict religious establishment has over the country’s laws.

JOIN THEM AND ME—WEAR A BLACK RIBBON!

I just took this picture shooting up into the overhead mirror while lying in bed. That is my granddaughter scratching Tulea’s tummy. Sometime I’ll photograph the bed and post it. I’m a fool for unusual beds and this is definitely the most unusual, one of a kind, canopied, mirrored one I’ve ever seen. Richard hasn’t seen it either. My bed at my ranch is pretty unusual as well. (Come to think of it, I have a picture of that one and will post it now). The problem is I got them when I was solo and they’re antique so not very big. If Richard and I are still together in a year I’ve promised to get a king-sized one as he’s 6’3.”

Shucks. I erased the photo of my ranch bed so I’m sending this one, a bed that is outside on the portale. My favorite napping place (and sometimes overnight place) cause I can hear the river close by and see the stars.

———
The fight in the House is over, but the fight in the Senate is just beginning. It’s time to use our strongest weapon: the White House.

Join us. Ask President Obama to live up to his campaign commitment and stand with us to protect women’s health care today and every single day until reform is passed.

Click here for more information and to contact President Obama

Dear Jane,

Yesterday was brutal.

While there are some who are satisfied with the health care reform bill that passed in the House of Representatives late Saturday night, I am not one of them.

When it came down to it, Congress passed a bill that will undercut women’s access to comprehensive health care. Despite hundreds of thousands of voters like you and me who called on members of Congress to include women’s health care in health care reform, the bill that passed Saturday night includes a ban on private abortion coverage for millions of women and would prohibit it in the new “public option.”

At Planned Parenthood, we fought together with you until the bitter end (thank you), and once we lost the vote on women’s health, we started to do what we do best — gear up for our next fight.

http://www.ppaction.org/campaign/hcr09bse_afw?qp_source=hcr09bse_afhp

Opponents of legal abortion and health care for women are emboldened by Saturday night’s vote and ready to bring their ban on abortion to the Senate floor. But now it’s our turn. And this time we are going to use our strongest weapon: the White House.

That’s why, today, we are calling on President Obama
http://www.ppaction.org/campaign/hcr09bse_afw?qp_source=hcr09bse_afhp
to ensure that lawmakers, especially those in his own party, support health care reform that protects women’s access to reproductive care as the next round of debate and voting occurs in the Senate.

Please, join us by asking our president to stand with us to protect women’s health care today and every single day until reform is passed.
http://www.ppaction.org/campaign/hcr09bse_afw?qp_source=hcr09bse_afhp

President Obama campaigned on a promise to put reproductive health care at the center of his reform plan. Supporters of women’s health voted for him and contributed to his campaign in record numbers — and now it’s time for the president to reaffirm his commitment to women’s health, and demand that Congress reject any bill that leaves women worse off under health care reform than they are today. Take a moment right now to tell President Obama that we need him to stand with us — in both his words and in his actions.
http://www.ppaction.org/campaign/hcr09bse_afw?qp_source=hcr09bse_afhp

If there’s anything we learned yesterday, it’s that women’s health is being targeted as expendable in health care reform. We also saw that anti-choice forces are working round-the-clock to roll back women’s health benefits. We will each need to take action many times over the next few weeks, and we need strong and public support from the White House to help us.

I’ve said this before, and it deserves repeating: without access to abortion care, and to comprehensive reproductive health care, there is no choice. Please, take action now http://www.ppaction.org/campaign/hcr09bse_afw?qp_source=hcr09bse_afhp
 — and then spread the word on Facebook, among your friends and colleagues, via e-mail — whatever it takes.

Thank you so very much for standing with us and the women, men, and teens who rely on Planned Parenthood.

Sincerely,

Cecile Richards, President
Planned Parenthood Federation of America

mock up of a solar racing car

sample of new solar hot water tubing

sample of a solar house heater

I guess Coke is displaying here because they are using biodegradable packaging and shipping materials

The audience in the symposium where i spoke. My message was about the importance of empowering women and educating girls if we are to eradicate poverty and create sustainable development.

It is said that you educate a boy and you change his life. You educate a girl and you change her life, her family, her community and her nation. Every research study on development indicates that countries with the highest population of uneducated girls are at the bottom of the economic ladder and at the bottom of every development issue. We know that every year of education increases a girl’s income by 15 to 30% and every year she stays in school is a year later that she will marry and begin to have children.

Longitudinal research shows that when women (rather than men) control the family income, more money goes to education, health and nutrition. Increases in female income improve child survival rates 20 times more than increases in male income. Likewise, female borrowing, rather than male borrowing, has a greater positive impact on school enrollment, child nutrition, and demand for health care. This is why enabling women and girls to become wage earners, entrepreneurs and micro credit borrowers has become such a powerful force for development.

I got a big laugh and round of applause when I said that New York Times writer, Nicholas Kristoff, writing about the financial crisis asked, “Would there have been a global recession had Lehman Bros been Lehman Sisters?”

I also bragged a little about the fact that my ranch uses solar panels for hot water and home heating and solar photovoltaic cells for electricity and that I have a septic tank that recycles all water, including toilet water, so that it can be reused for irrigation etc. I also drive a Prius (Toyota Hybrid car). My daughter drives an old Mercedes that she fuels with vegetable oil that she gets from various restaurants around Atlanta.

The first of many individual TV interviews following the symposium

A beautiful woman who has wanted to meet me since she was a teenager because I inspired her to become an aerobics instructor

It’s been frustrating because the Dusseldorf hotel server was down so I haven’t been able to send my blog and now it’s a day late. Oh well… I have to remind myself that, not so long ago, we couldn’t have imagined communicating this way with so many people and be grateful anything works at all.

SO….to continue from the symposium where I gave my speech and girls. I was told Yusuf Islam (used to be known as Cat Stevens) and his wife, Fauzia Mubarak Ali, wanted to meet me. I so love his music which wallpapered so much of my middle years–”Where Will the Children Play,” “Moonshadows,” “Tea for the Tillerman,” “Wild World,” “Peace Train,” “If You Want to Sing Out, Sing Out” among many others. As you may know, Cat Stevens almost died of tuberculosis in 1968 when he was 19. This began his spiritual quest. Brushes with death can do that. His second near-death experience happened when he almost drowned off the coast of Malibu, California. He called out, “God, if you save me, I will devote myself to you.” A wave came just then and swept him to shore. That was when he left his music altogether to search for what form his commitment to God would take. In 1977 he became Yusuf Islam, a devout Muslim.

Yusuf Islam (used to be known as Cat Stevens) and his wife, Fauzia Mubarak Ali

I was not sure what to expect when we met. Would he be a dour, overly serious, proselytizing man? Would his wife be silent and subservient? Would he shake my hand or refuse to be touched? How happy I am to say that the playfulness, the twinkle from the Cat Stevens days, (and the good looks) are still very present. He laughs, jokes, asks Fauzia if he’s correct in his interpretation of some aspect of the Koran. She listens and adds her two cents. She seems a woman of strength, centeredness and peace. She is also beautiful, with large, dark, soulful eyes. Fauzia is dressed in a crème colored robe but not veiled. My camera wasn’t working so I asked someone else to take our photo. The problem is they never sent it to me, so I took a picture of the two of them at our dinner table later on.

The three of us spoke about God, spirituality, how fundamentalism has distorted what the Koran actually says just as Christian fundamentalism has distorted Christ’s teachings; How the Koran actually speaks of women being equally regarded by God, not blamed for sin as Eve was in the Christian bible.

Yusuf gave up making music for years, unsure if music was accepted by the Koran. Then he learned that, in fact it was Muslim travelers who first brought the guitar to Moorish Spain. He started making music again in the 1990s. The tragedy of 9/11 showed him that while the extremes had becoming more dangerous, the middle was growing stronger. It was to the “middle” that he has directed his music, communicating through metaphor rather than politics. Music, he feel, is what is needed to sooth and uplift the troubled soul. Yusuf goes beyond metaphor, however, donating the proceeds from his music to a non-profit organization he founded, Small Kindness, which has helped survivors of 9/11, victims of the tsunami in Indonesia, victims of genocide in Croatia, children in Gaza among others.

He will soon begin a concert tour that will also introduce a portion of his new musical to the public for the first time. I hope he comes to the U.S.

Yusuf Islam performing a new song, 'Road Traveler,' that will be part of the musical play he has developed

Stefan Schulze-Hausmann, CEO of Coment, the organization that produced the event, presenting a Sustainability Award to Yusuf Islam.

Joschka Fischer

I sat at an interesting table at the evening ceremony. To my right sat Joschka Fischer, one of the founders of the German Green Party who was the first Green to be elected to the German government and later became Germany’s Secretary of State. He now focuses his work on encouraging corporations to become green and, together with our former Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright, works on solutions in the Middle East.

Sky

On my left, the most handsome Sky, the well-known actor and TV personality who interviewed me for his TV show a year ago while I was staying at Troy’s.

It was a late evening, little sleep before I had to get on the flight to Frankfurt and then on to Atlanta. I took my grandchildren to dinner last night and had a fun sleepover. I was exhausted but this was a perfect, grounding way to end a fascinating trip and welcome me home. By the way, unbelievable as it may seem, even to me, I return in 5 days to Dusseldorf for a UNESCO event!!!

Home at last, having dinner with my grandchildren, Viva and Malcolm (and Tulea)

See you next time

PS: OMG! I cannot Believe that it took my daughter, Vanessa, to remind me that Cat Stevens lived on our ranch above Santa Barbara, the Laurel Springs Ranch, in a beautiful house on a hill, 3000-some ft above the Pacific. Tom Hayden and I later ran a performing arts children’s camp there for 15 years. For some reason, I never met Cat then. Maybe he’s the one who told Joe Cocker about the place cause Joe lived there for a long time, later marrying Pam Baker, one of our camp directors. (There were many houses on the property and the Hill House had a separate entrance…)

The cobblestone street where the Museum is located

I arrived in Dusseldorf early this morning. This city is the capital of the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia. Situated right on the Rhine River, it is the second most economically important center of Germany after Frankfurt. After a short nap in my beautiful suite, a driver took me on an hour drive to Bonn where Dr Michael Ladenburger, Director of the Beethoven House and Museum, met me at the entrance of a narrow, picturesque, cobbled street, closed to cars, where shops and restaurants surround the birthplace and museum of the world’s greatest and most interesting composer. (That’s my opinion)

The old bar in the restaurant where Dr Ladenburger took me to lunch

Outside the Beethoven museum and Archives

The plaque

Outside the Beethoven House

On the left is the Beethoven House. The garden is behind.

This statue of Beethoven was sculpted by Naoum Aronson who trained with Rodin

The small dormer window above was the room where Beethoven was born

Another view of the house

Cello, flutes and other instruments used in Beethoven's day

A violin used by Beethoven

This is a piano forte that Beethoven played. Unlike the clavichord, the piano forte could be soft or loud as the name suggests

a bust of Beethoven made from a life mask (made of his face while he was alive)

Beethoven's desk

There's the room he was born in. Check out the beautiful slate tile roofing

This is the room he was born in, a small room where his parents lived as well. She would have 7 children only two of whom survived. Those are the original floor boards

This is the piano where '33 Variations' was first performed. I wish I was actually playing but I flaked out as a kid in spite of years of piano lessons. Dr Ladenburger played the beginning of 33 Variations on it for me.

There is a room filled with computers where scholars (or any interested party) can pull up all of his manuscripts, even details like these where you see he wrote with ink over the original pencil when he’d decided to keep something.

With Dr Ladenburger in front of Beethoven's house. The good doctor looks sterner than he is in life.

The archives are in a basement vault beneath the beautiful concert hall. I tried to photograph this hall but the pictures didn’t come out. Dr Ladenburger said the idea is that when the musicians perform, they can feel and be inspired by the presence of the great master beneath them. I was not allowed to take photos in the archives. It is a hallowed place where few people are allowed. I felt so privileged and moved. Dr Ladenburger handled the pages of manuscript so carefully, never touching them directly with his fingers.

Here’s a photo of a white truffle, in case you’ve never seen one.  Not that money always equates with quality but this truffle costs $400 but a friend gave it to Paula. Good kinda friend to have, huh? It was Paula’s first time cooking risotto but it came out scrumptious and with the shaved truffles on top and a good green salad we were in heaven.

Simone and my goddaughter, Hannah. They seem to like each other, huh? Hannah showed us her sketch book of figures and fashion designs. She's really talented.

Troy with Tulea. (I can't seem to get rid of the glare in her eyes. Sorry.)

Simone and Paula

I leave at the crack tomorrow for Dusseldorf, Germany. I go there twice in the next 10 days! Once to make a speech on sustainability and earn money for my non-profit. The second time to get an award from UNESCO. Thursday I will travel the short distance to Bonn, birthplace of Beethoven and the city where his archives are located. Almost no one can get access to the archives but during the run of “33 Variations” (about Beethoven and the play took place in the archives) I met the man who runs the archives and he invited me to see them. Some composers (like Mozart) composed in their head. Beethoven composed on paper so there are 1000s of sketches that record every thing he ever wrote, every false start, every rewrite, all there. Can’t wait. I’m told Dusseldorf is a charming city.

In between the two trips I will be in Atlanta seeing friends, Daughter and grandkids. In fact we’ll have a sleepover on Saturday.

I’ll blog from Dusseldorf.

See you next time.