My favorite quote of the season comes from Hillary Clinton during her confirmation hearings, pledging that women’s treatment in the world would influence policy: “Violence against women is not culture, it’s not custom — it’s criminal.” Hallelujah!

WMC Awards
We are pleased to announce that The Women’s Media Center has won another award, this time from Women’ s Way, a consortium of organizations in the Philadelphia area. We are honored to follow in the footsteps of one of our own founders, Gloria Steinem, and Coretta Scott King, among previous winners of the Lucretia Mott Award. We were chosen for the “groundbreaking work of the WMC as a strong advocate for the rights of women.”  Ceremonies will be held May 6. 

We want to thank all of you who sent congratulations on The North Star News Prize, awarded on January 15. It was a moving event — involving critical discussion with Katrina vanden Heuvel from The Nation and my fellow honorees: Deepa Fernandes, founder of the People’s Production House; Jeff Chang, journalist and author; Laura Flanders, host of GRITtv; and Maria Hinojosa, host of NPR’s Latino USA. We need your help to contiune to fighting sexism in the media. Please make a donation.

Progressive Women’s Voices
The WMC’s remarkably successful media training and placement program is back for its second year! In 2008 we trained 33 incredible women and helped them get over 1200 media hits – that’s 12 hundred cracks in the media glass ceiling. Our PWV women have been in CNN, MSNBC, PBS, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, as well as hundreds of other significant media outlets in print, online, radio, and broadcast.

This year, we faced a difficult task: to select only eleven women from the 150 applications that poured in for our first Progressive Women’s Voices class of 2009. The candidates were outstanding, and we regret not being able to take everyone. Our first class is — well — first class! You can read brief bios of these highly accomplished women here. We will be accepting two additional classes for training later this year. So please, keep those stellar applications coming so we can continue to diversify the media landscape and “change the conversation” by infusing it with powerful, progressive women’s voices!

Other WMC News
Congratulations to WMC Board Member Jodie Evans and Medea Benjamin, co-founders of CODEPINK. The Nation magazine has designated the anti-war group as “the Most Valuable Progressive Organization of the Bush years.” Writes John Nichols: “If someone shouted an objection at a congressional hearing — where members of the House or Senate should have been objecting — it was almost always a Code Pink member. If someone was chained to the gate of an official building, dragged out of an official meeting or otherwise upsetting the status quo, it was usually a Code Pinker.  Code Pink did not just object, however. The group delivered humanitarian aid to those who were suffering in Fallujah and New Orleans, sent peacemaking delegations to Tehran and gave millions of people — at home and abroad — a reminder that even if our President had forsaken reason our citizens (at least those wearing pink) had not.”

And break-a-leg wishes to WMC co-founder Jane Fonda, who begins previews of her Broadway play, 33 Variations, on February 9. Fonda plays a musicologist obsessed by Beethoven. The play was written and will be directed by Moisés Kaufman (The Laramie Project), and the two will discuss the work in a Times Talks event on February 23. The play officially opens on March 9 and runs through May 24.  Get your tickets now!

Media Women
Breaking news! Just announced yesterday — Christina Norman, formerly president of MTV Networks, is the new CEO of Oprah Winfrey’s media enterprise OWN (Oprah Winfrey Network). A combination of television and new media projects, OWN is 50/50 owned by Oprah’s Harpo Productions and Discovery Communications. OWN will debut in 2009 in more than 70 million homes and will be based on Oprah’s “Live your best life” branding. Fortune’s Patricia Sellers reports a good story of how the talks between the women — over a year’s time — finally came to a happy close. Also onboard at OWN — President Robin Schwartz formerly of Regency Television and Chief Marketing Officer Liz Dolan. Dolan was in marketing at Nike, but I am a huge fan of the radio show she does with her 4 sisters, called “Satellite Sisters“.  

Carol Bartz, the new CEO of troubled Yahoo!, is getting her fair share of praise — so far. According to Kara Swisher of the digital blog BoomTown: “It’s clear Bartz is a very new twist-a tough-talking, take-no-prisoners CEO for a company that needs one desperately.” Bartz’s most famous quote so far: Give Yahoo! “some friggin’ breathing room!”  This is a good beginning.

Katie Couric is getting a new round of positive press — and ratings. I watched the “one-time prime-time” edition of her evening news on Wednesday night — and think 8PM is a great time for some information. So, apparently, did other viewers. The show came in second place. Tom Shales showered praise on her — pre-show — in The Washington Post.

Essential Reads
Two opinion pieces you may want to check out: Anne Kornblut discusses Caroline Kennedy’s abrupt leave — taking of the political scene, positing a persisting double standard.

Barnard College President Debora Spar’s Washington Post story, “Gender Crash” on the men who brought down the economy — and the reason we need more women.

Coming Up
Fem 2.0 takes place in DC on Monday, February 2. This conference for and about women and technology is essential. Read WMC Vice President Glennda Testone’s thoughts about Fem 2.0’s on their blog and register here.

Washington Report
Watching Lilly Ledbetter walk through the “Presidential doors” with President Obama yesterday was inspiring. I’ve had the pleasure of spending time with this down-to-earth, sincere woman (and fellow Alabamian) whose courageous struggle has benefited us all. As the President said in signing the first legislative bill of his tenure, The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act: “There are no second class citizens in our workforce.”  WMC Washington correspondent Peggy Simpson explores the President’s mixed week of successes in “President Obama and Women’s Rights Activists: Celebration and Bumps in the Road.”  For a series of cogent articles about the case, and our continuing crisis, please see the Center for American Progress.

It was the President’s first bill and Michelle Obama’s first duties as First Lady. Here’s Rachel Swarns’ pool report.

Inaugural Notes
On January 20 I was there on the National Mall for the swearing in of Barack Obama as our 44th President.  As I write in my commentary on the WMC website, I was, like many others, “carrying my ancestors on my shoulders to get a good look at what was about to happen.”

We attended several key women’s events during the Inaugural week:

Saturday, January 17. Peggy Simpson writes on the WMC website about the People’s Inaugural Women’s Leadership Luncheon organized by DC mover and shaker Karen Mulhauser. WMC founder Gloria Steinem was among participants warning against complacency.

That evening, the National Council of Women’s Organizations hosted its elegant ball in the James Monroe Home, honoring extraordinary women in politics. Chair Susan Scanlon and President Kim Otis honored two influential members of the Obama administration: Tina Tchen and Caroline Brown. Tchen (pictured left), receiving her award from Dr. Heidi Hartmann, heads up the Office of Public Liaison. Brown, who worked for the campaign in North Carolina, will be in women’s outreach. Among other honorees, Maryland Congresswoman Donna Edwards, here with NCWO Vice Chair Shireen Mitchell (right). 

Sunday, January 18. Ellen Malcolm, founder of EMILY’s List packed some 2000 people into the Washington Hilton Ballroom for a well deserved celebratory gathering. One of our favorites, Rebecca Traister of Salon, does great justice to the event in her piece, “Hillary is back.” But suffice it to say that the roster — Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, Labor Secretary Hilda Solis, North Carolina Senator Kay Hagan, North Carolina’s first woman governor Bev Perdue, New Hampshire Senator Jeanne Shaheen, Wisconsin Congresswoman Gwen Moore (who stole the show with a Nancy Pelosi shoe) and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton gave those in attendance a great show. It was also good to see Ellen Moran, departing EMILY’s List for the White House Communications Director post, in the mix.

Tuesday, January 20. Even though it was not one of the official balls, Code Pink’s Peace Ball was the most fun: Alice Walker, Eve Ensler, Dick Gregory, Harry Belafonte, Laura Flanders, and Kim Crenshaw were only a few of the activists who interspersed marching orders with dancing the night away.  

Now that we have our orders for 2009, we’re working to make women visible and powerful in the media. Please join our efforts!

Warmest Wishes,

Carol Jenkins
WMC President