The Answer to Childhood Obesity? Mothers.

This column originally appeared in Palo Alto Patch.

Did you know McDonalds sells 6.5 million cheeseburgers a day?

Childhood obesity is in the news again. The California Center for Public Health Advocacy, in partnership with UCLA, recently released its report: Overweight and Obesity among Children by California City.Turns out 38% of the children in our state are significantly overweight. And that means we’ll be hearing yet again about all the things we should be doing to solve this epidemic.

If we don’t watch out, we may get misguided ideas like the one Daddy Warbuck s Bloomberg is advocating to combating obesity: tax super-sized soft drinks. Seems kind of like shooting fish in a barrel if you ask me, but then again I am not expert on issues of weight, health, and nutrition. Wait, maybe I am.

The Future of Feminism And Why Women Still “Can’t Have It All”

This article was modified for a feature in Diablo Magazine. Given the current (and yet ongoing) discussion regarding women’s choices and the future of feminism, I thought I’d post the full article here.

It had been a busy week for Katrina Alcorn of Oakland. She’d worked late to meet a client’s deadline, she’d missed putting her three children to bed one night too many, and now she was racing off to Target to buy diapers. Afterwards, she’d go home to her husband and together they would clean the house, do the laundry, get dinner ready, put the kids to sleep, and then they would each spend the rest of the evening responding to work emails before falling into bed, exhausted. Suddenly, Katrina realized it was all too much. She pulled the car over to the side of the road, called her husband and said, “I just can’t do it anymore. I have to quit.”

Getting Off the Sidelines (and Into Politics), One Woman at a Time

This essay originally appeared in Palo Alto Patch.

It’s Time To Exercise Our Rights.

Last fall when my friend, the documentary filmmaker and activist Michealene Risley, told me she wanted to run for president, I thought she was joking. We were having breakfast at the Palo alto Creamery talking about the plight of the economy and the deep concern we both have about the ongoing war in Afghanistan among other simmering issues facing this country.