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| WOMEN TODAY |
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 Washington Times
Paige rejects major Title IX changes in school sports 2-27-03
Mr. Paige said he would only consider recommendations that drew unanimous support from his Commission on Opportunity in Athletics.
The unanimity requirement would kill at least eight of the 23 ideas, including the most-contentious ones that came under the harshest feminist criticism, including a proposal to change how schools can show they don't discriminate.
Christian Science Monitor
Abortion protesters grab a victory in court 2-27-03
In an 8-to-1 ruling announced Wednesday, the US Supreme Court overturned a civil jury's verdict that anti-abortion leader Joseph Scheidler and the Pro-Life Action Network had violated the civil racketeering law (RICO) through their aggressive protests and other tactics employed outside abortion clinics in the 1980s and '90s.
Analysts say the decision could spark an upsurge in anti-abortion protests, but it will not lead to a repeat of the kinds of aggressive tactics employed prior to the RICO suit. That's because Congress in 1994 passed the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrance Act (FACE), which specifically outlaws many of the tactics used by abortion protesters in the 1980s.
San Francisco Chronicle
Sex trade uses Bay Area to bring in women, kids 2-26-03
The Bay Area is a key port of entry for foreign women and children kidnapped or lured here under false pretenses to work in prostitution or pornography, State Department officials and advocates said Tuesday as the Bush administration vowed to combat what it called a fast-growing "modern-day form of slavery."
The comments came as President Bush issued a directive to crack down on the sex trade during a three-day international summit hosted by the State Department and the War Against Trafficking Alliance, the first such conference on the topic in the United States.
As Annika Sorenstam, the world's top female golfer, prepares to play at a stop on the men's tour, she represents an evolution in the aspiration of female athletes. No longer are some elite women content simply with an opportunity to compete, a freedom hard won in the gender struggles of three decades ago. Increasingly, according to athletes, coaches and women's sports activists, women are seeking challenges to explore the full potential of their skills.
President George W. Bush on Tuesday signed a national security directive solidifying the United States' commitment to stemming flow of human trafficking of women and children who are often forced into prostitution, pornography or unpaid labor in foreign countries.
"The United States is committed to the eradication of human trafficking both domestically and abroad. It is a crime that is an affront to human dignity," the White House said in a released statement.
NYTimes
Albany Puts Contraceptives Center Stage 2-25-03
Thirty-three years after New York became the first state to repeal the ban against abortion, it is emerging as the latest battleground over reproductive rights, with city and state lawmakers divided over whether emergency contraceptives should be made widely available to women.
These contraceptives, also known as the "morning-after pill," are concentrated doses of birth control pills that can prevent pregnancy by stopping an egg from becoming fertilized or by stopping a fertilized egg from becoming implanted in the uterus.
Two of the three female athletes on a government commission that reviewed Title IX, the landmark law that bans sex discrimination in school sports programs, are disappointed with the panel's final recommendations and will send a minority report to Education Secretary Roderick R. Paige, one said yesterday.
The report "does not acknowledge the very important issues on the women's side," said (Julie) Foudy, president of the Women's sports Foundation, an advocacy group. It also does not "acknowledge that women are still being discriminated against, and that over 80 percent of schools are still not in compliance."
Fifty years ago, a casual gesture at a laboratory in London became a defining moment in the history of science. James D. Watson was visiting King's College late one afternoon near the end of January 1953, when a researcher named Maurice Wilkins showed him an X-ray photograph of a molecule of DNA.
The scientist who took the picture was Dr. Rosalind Franklin, and though they cited other work she had done, Dr. Watson and Dr. Crick did not acknowledge the photograph itself, or additional work by her they had used, in their paper.
This is not to say that black women have climbed the storied crystal stair. They remain “in the proving stage,” observes Alabama Power executive Alice Gordon. Nearly 14 percent of working black women remain below the poverty level. And women don’t yet out-earn black men. But the growing educational-achievement gap portends a monumental shifting of the sands. College-educated black women already earn more than the median for all black working men—or, for that matter, for all women.
And as women in general move up the corporate pyramid, black women, increasingly, are part of the parade.. .
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WOMEN
INTERNATIONAL |
Unita soldiers have been arriving at the quartering area of Uamba, in northern Angola ever since their leaders signed a peace accord with the Angolan Government in April last year.
But in the last few months, there have been new arrivals.
Women have come in search of their husbands who, during the war, left their wives in the towns, while they went off to fight for Unita.
ABC News
U.N. Asks Pakistan to Review Laws Against Women 2-26-03
The head of the U.N. human rights agency said Wednesday he had asked Pakistan to review laws that discriminate against women, particularly those which make them vulnerable to violent crimes and murder.
Sergio Vieira de Mello, the U.N. high commissioner for human rights, said he had expressed concern about Islamic laws dating back to the 1980s that activists say make it difficult to prosecute crimes like rape and so-called honor killings.
Guardian UK
Inquiry launched into women and justice 2-26-03
Women are still overlooked by government policymakers despite six years of "mainstreaming" of female issues, a Labour MP alleged yesterday at the launch of an inquiry into women in the criminal justice system.
Research repeatedly illustrates the failure of the criminal justice system in its dealings with women. Domestic violence, experienced by one woman in three, is a notoriously difficult area in which to secure convictions, while only seven out of 100 reported rapes result in conviction.
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| THINKING
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Guardian UK
Sex, secrets and lies 2-23-03
A campaign of slurs against the first woman to head London's Stock Exchange came to a head last week. Allison Pearson, who interviewed scores of City women as research for a bestselling novel, here reveals the true scale of chauvinism inside the Square Mile
The case of Clara Furse may be a lot harder to clean up. In 2001 Furse was named chief executive of the London Stock Exchange, the first woman to take the helm in the institution's 242-year history. It was a landmark appointment. Furse, 45, is the person they point to when equal opportunities busybodies complain that City guys are like the middle drawing in the Ascent of Man: the mono-browed one with the knuckles scraping along the ground.
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| WOMEN'S HEALTH |
BBC News
Breast cancer danger cells found 2-26-03
Scientists have pinpointed the cells within a breast cancer that are capable of forming new malignant tumours.
They believe that as few as one in 100 cells within a cancer have this capacity.
This may explain why current treatments sometimes fail.
CNN
Study: Underaged drink 20 percent of U.S. alcohol 2-26-03
Attempting to correct botched statistics they released a year ago, researchers from Columbia University's National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse analyzed three sets of data from 1999 and said underage drinking amounted to 19.7 percent of alcohol consumed that year, or $22.5 billion.
The previous estimate -- now discredited -- was 25 percent.
BBC News
Cancer patients 'not told enough' 2-26-03
Half of breast cancer patients are given "incomplete or incomprehensible" information about their disease, researchers have found.
The study of 1,000 women also found more than half wanted more opportunity to talk to medical staff.
CNN
Clearing up picture on laser eye surgery 2-26-03
Millions of Americans are flocking to eye doctors, wanting laser surgery to correct their vision problems. Many people are happy with the results, but for some, it can do more damage than good.
Experts say finding the right doctor and understanding the risks can help prospective patients get a clearer picture of the results they can expect. doses of an old-fashioned blood thinner can safely and sharply cut the risk that people who have survived life-threatening blood clots will suffer a recurrence, according to a major new study.
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DESIGN STUDIO |
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NYTimes
Libeskind Design Chosen for Rebuilding at Ground Zero 2-27-03
An open pit, the crucible where the fires burned for weeks after Sept. 11, 2001, and the ground that held most of the bodies of the dead, will stand as the centerpiece of the city's effort to memorialize and rebuild after the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center, under a decision made by city and state officials last night.
NYTimes
In Love With Asia, Muse and Market 2-25-03
The pricing of Prada's foray into chinoiserie seems more arrogant than it otherwise might, given the luxury emporium's newest neighbor, Pearl River Mart, a 25-year-old Chinese department store that relocated from Canal Street to Broadway and Broome Street earlier this month. At Pearl River, where traditional Asian dress is sold alongside sake cups, lotus-flower night lights and green-tea sucking candies, a short-sleeve silk mandarin-collar shirt costs about the same as a bus ticket to Philadelphia: $47.50.
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STYLE.COM
Vogue and W online
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| CREATORS
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NYTimes
Open to the Stars, Indoors and Out 2-27-03
The showman behind Mr. Altério's $1.3 million party house is Isay Weinfeld, a São Paulo architect whose boldly scaled spaces have attracted a high-powered following and comparisons to Oscar Niemeyer, who created an unmistakably Brazilian brand of modern architecture at Brasília and elsewhere more than 40 years ago. Mr. Weinfeld's popularity derives from his use of Brazilian materials and textures, which yield an inviting tropical modernism that serves as an antidote to the chilly monastic minimalism of recent years.
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AMERICAN
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President Bush declared tonight that removing Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq would bring stability to the region and could set the stage for peace between Israel and a "truly democratic" Palestinian state.
In his first significant remarks about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in eight months, the president, under pressure from European and Arab nations to re-energize the lapsed Middle East peace negotiations, reaffirmed the United States commitment to a Palestinian state and to a three-year timetable outlining the steps for its creation.
Economist
Trouble at home 2-27-03
WHY are they doing it? Contemporary politics is supposed to be all about focus groups and responding to the voters. The caricature of a modern politician is someone who dares not utter a word, let alone formulate a policy, without first clearing it with his pollsters. Yet the small group of leaders providing the strongest support for President George Bush in his tough stand on Iraq seem to have thrown caution to the winds. Britain’s Tony Blair, Australia’s John Howard, Spain’s Jose Maria Aznar and Italy’s Silvio Berlusconi are all backing Mr Bush in the face of considerable opposition at home.
The thinking behind the New American Century helps to explain why the current gulf exists between the United States and some of its allies.
European accusations that George W Bush is a "cowboy" or worse are countered by American descriptions of Europeans as "EU-nuchs" in general and of the French in particular as "cheese-eating surrender monkeys".
In September 2000, as Mr Bush was running for the presidency, the New American Century team produced a report called "Rebuilding America's Defences".
The goal was to "promote American global leadership", the report stated.
The six, normally second- or third-tier powers on the diplomatic stage - Angola, Cameroon, Chile, Guinea, Mexico, and Pakistan - are the undecided Council members who are likely to determine the fate of two competing visions for Iraq.
On the one hand, the US, backed by Britain and Spain, will seek the six countries' support for a new UN resolution introduced Monday that would place an international imprimatur on the use of force to disarm Iraq. But also on Monday, France, Germany, and Russia began circulating in the 15-member Council their own proposal for enhancing weapons inspections as a way to put off war.
President Bush's tax-cut plan is getting a tepid reception from the public and has failed to stem a steady erosion of his ratings on the economy. Barely four-in-ten Americans (43%) approve of his handling of the economy, while 48% disapprove. This marks the first time in Bush's presidency a Pew survey has shown his economic rating in negative territory. His approval mark on tax policy is equally low (42%), despite a high-profile campaign on behalf of his tax plan.
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PBS
FRONTLINE
serious tv journalism
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NYTimes
Experts Fault Bush Plan to Study Climate 2-26-03
A panel of experts has strongly criticized the Bush administration's proposed research plan on the risks of global warming, saying that it "lacks most of the elements of a strategic plan" and that its goals cannot be achieved without far more money than the White House has sought for climate research.
The 17 experts, in a report issued yesterday, said that without substantial changes, the administration's plan would be unlikely to accomplish the aim laid out by President Bush in several speeches: to help decision makers and the public determine how serious the problem is so that they can make clear choices about how to deal with it.
Washington Times
Court toughens jury selection 2-26-03
The Supreme Court yesterday made it tougher for prosecutors to exclude from capital murder trials black jurors who oppose the death penalty.
By an 8-1 vote the court ordered a hearing for Thomas Joe Miller-El on assertions that he was denied a jury of his peers when prosecutors dismissed 10 of the 11 black prospects in a jury panel.
Christian Science Monitor
Scandal's fallout: the new struggle of Catholic schools 2-26-03
In the past decade, the number of Catholic schools in the US fell nearly 5 percent, from 8,508 to 8,114. And despite a burgeoning Catholic population, enrollment at church-affiliated schools also declined slightly for the first time in decades - from 2,645,462 students in 1997 to 2,616,330 last year, according to the National Catholic Educational Association in Washington.
Washington Times
Suspicious minds 2-26-03
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At the national level, black and Hispanic leaders continue to call for coalition and common cause between the two groups, downplaying conflict over such issues as affirmative action, immigration policy, bilingual education and redistricting.
But some ugly political fights at the local level foreshadow the increasing difficulty of embracing a common agenda as Hispanics, lacking blacks' racial solidarity and still fragmented by their nations of origin, test their political muscle:
LATimes
The state of attentiveness in this nanosecond world 2-25-03
The arts have always been about directing attention to places it might not otherwise go. And paying attention has conventionally meant an alert, studious, single-minded concentration. But suddenly, things seem to be changing. The rapid pace of modern life, the compulsion to multitask, the weapons of mass distraction that global corporations and the media have unleashed make us different readers, viewers, listeners. Attention spans among the young keep getting shorter. In my neighborhood, distracted drivers, with cell phone in one hand, grande latte in the other, keep crashing their SUVs. Is this crisis or opportunity? Should we put on the brakes and smell the coffee? Or will we, by mastering the multiplicities and new technologies of the modern world, expand our potentials as human beings?
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