Blogher: Sisters Are Doing It For Themselves
7/30/09
Times Online, UK: Around 1,400 people have paid up to $200 to attend, making it the most popular BlogHer conference yet. Not only have attendee numbers increased from just a few hundred at the first conference in 2005, but big-name sponsors have taken notice.

California Looks To Republican Women
7/31/09
Politico: California Republicans have never before nominated a woman for governor or the Senate. But with two top prospective female candidates — Meg Whitman for governor and Carly Fiorina for Senate — the party is closer to it than ever before.

Sudanese Woman Uses Trousers Trial To Fight Decency Laws
7/30/09
Radio Free Europe: A Sudanese woman who faces 40 lashes for wearing trousers in public is using the case to challenge the country’s tough decency laws.

Homeland Chief Offers Shift In Tone
7/30/09
NY Times: Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano called Wednesday for closer collaboration with foreign partners, more intensive cooperation between the federal government and local law enforcement officials, and greater involvement by civilians in watching for and responding to terrorist threats.

Ms. McCarthy And The Boys
7/26/09
Boston Globe: No one could argue that it’s politics as usual at Waltham City Hall. For better or worse, there’s little doubt the city’s first female mayor has shaken up the status quo.

Obama Meets The Businesswoman: The Story Behind The Photo
7/30/09
NY Times: It turns out The Agenda [a NY Times blog] is not alone in thinking President Obama may have a public relations problem with small business. Patty Briguglio, who can be seen on the front page of today’s Times, exchanging a wagging finger with the president, agrees, and she should know: She runs a public relations firm, MMI Associates, in Raleigh, N.C. She’s also a small-business owner.

Caller Says Race Wasn’t Mentioned To Officer In Gates Case
7/30/09
NY Times: “The three highly trained guys who acted badly are getting together for a beer tomorrow at the White House, and that’s a good thing,” Ms. Murphy [lawyer of the 911 caller in the Gates case] told reporters.

Pregnant Women And Mothers Deserve Better
7/31/09
RH Reality CHeck: As National Advocates for Pregnant Women’s video, Pregnant Women and Mother’s Deserve Better explains, when individuals and organizations use this language — “violence,” “torture,” “an attack on innocent life,” “executing a child,” “killing,” “baby-killing,” “murder,” “child murder,” “mass murder,” “like slavery,”  “genocide,”  “holocaust,” “worse than any holocaust” — they are not just describing a procedure or the small number of doctors who provide women with abortion services.

Iran Police Clash With Mourners
7/30/09
BBC: State TV said police used teargas to disperse crowds from the grave of Neda Agha Soltan, whose death became a symbol of post-election unrest.

Iran Activists Dread Midnight Knock Of Police Raid
7/31/09
AP via Google: Iran’s human rights activists say they live in dread of the midnight knock on the door or the car that pulls up next to them on the street, fearing that at any moment they might be arrested in the government’s post-election clampdown.

Rights Groups Decry Gaza ‘Honor Killing’
7/30/09
CNN: A 27-year-old mother of five was bludgeoned to death with an iron chain by her father last week in Gaza in what human rights groups report was an honor killing.

Afghan Women Candidates Campaign In Burqas
7/30/09
AP via Google: For women running for office in one of the world’s most conservative countries, getting out the vote is an uphill battle against social norms. In a place where most women still wear the burqa and do not speak to men outside their immediate family, female candidates are courting danger simply by putting up posters of their uncovered faces.

Aung San Suu Kyi Verdict Delayed
7/31/09
CNN: A verdict expected Friday in the closely watched subversion trial of Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi has been delayed until August 11, said a diplomatic source attending the proceedings.

Uighur Leader Says 10,000 Went Missing In One Night
7/29/09
Yahoo! News: Nearly 10,000 Uighurs involved in deadly riots in China’s northwestern Xinjiang region went missing in one night, exiled Uighur activist Rebiya Kadeer said Wednesday, calling for an international investigation.

Crisis In The Operating Room
7/30/09
NY Times:  One woman dies a minute from complications of pregnancy or childbirth somewhere in the world, and 20 times as many suffer childbirth injuries. There’s no mystery about how to save these lives…

China Concerned About Abortions
7/30/09
BBC: Authorities in China have highlighted inadequate knowledge of contraception and poor sex education as major factors in the high number of abortions there.

Embryo Rights Laws Go Viral In Mexico
7/29/09
Women’s eNews: In a backlash to Mexico City’s move to decriminalize abortion two years ago, states across Mexico have been rewriting their constitutions to grant embryos legal rights. So far 13 states out of 32 have approved the changes and six are debating it.

‘Abortion Ship’ Sails Into Christian Storm
7/29/09
Independent, uK: Vessel that made waves by offering termination services in pro-life countries may be sunk by new Dutch law.

Pushed To Return To Rwanda, Women Farmers Uprooted
7/31/09
Women’s eNews: In Uganda’s U.N.-run camps for Rwandan refugees, the July 31 repatriation deadline is causing particular hardships for women. For one thing, it has disrupted many families’ growing season. The last of three stories on repatriation turmoil.

The Best Birth Control
7/29/09
Slate: IUDs are still a contraception aberration in the United States, but if there’s one thing that creates change in America, it’s consumer demand. With Mirena advertising on television, the downturn in the economy forcing people to economize, and more women concerned about the long-term effects hormones have on their bodies, perhaps the IUD’s stigma will finally become a thing of the past.

Blind Women Help Detect Breast Cancer
7/30/09
CNN: Blind women are being trained to use their sensitive touch to help detect breast cancer earlier and more precisely than doctors.

HBO Taps Diane Keaton For (Possibly Another) Comedy About Feminists
7/30/09
NPR: HBO is developing a half-hour comedy about an older woman who’s a former feminist icon…who decides to “reignite the movement by starting a sexually explicit magazine for women.”

Suzanne Braun Levine’s Life In Feminism
7/31/09
Guardian, UK: Suzanne Braun Levine’s new book urges women to embrace their real age. As she turns 65, the pioneering editor of Ms magazine tells Emma Brockes how her own brutal abortion inspired her to follow a life in feminism.

A Young Gymnast’s Distant Olympic Dream
7/30/09
NY Times: Alexis Page [13] cannot afford to think about the Olympics themselves, she says softly. She must live within the moment of the music and the rhythm, and not think how she will pay for all this, or when she will sleep… Her discipline is rhythmic gymnastics, twirling a ribbon, dancing with a ball, an Olympic sport that is obscure just about everywhere except the old Soviet bloc.

Lyn-Z Adams Hawkins Wins Women’s Skateboard Vert
7/31/09
LA Times: The San Diego native pays tribute to herself with an “L.A.” sign after taking the gold medal by executing a kickflip indy and attempting two McTwists.

A Neuroscience Professor Makes Her Move To The Racetrack
7/30/09
NY Times: [Michelle Nihei] could have had a long career as a scientist. Instead, she chose to take her diplomas, her training and her background and virtually dump them in the trash. “I just knew I’d be happiest doing this,” she said.