I Think I'm James Carville

I filled out a survey for the Obama campaign today and said this in the comments field:
I think the campaign should focus on the historic twin pillars of American culture - sacrifice and innovation - that will heal our economy and environment, and reposition America as a global powerhouse.  Forget about critiquing McCain & Palin - leave that to us bloggers - get back to Obama as an active positive.  Remember, Kerry mostly ran as the anti-Bush and look where that got us.  People need more than "I am not like him,"  they need "I am a leader."  And Obama has everything a great leader needs in spades: an inspiring, articulate rhetorical style; an easy grace with others; intellectual curiosity and a lightning acumen; and a commanding presence of body and mind.  That is why I chose him over Hillary Clinton in the primary - even though it broke my heart not to vote for a woman - because I believe he has the stuff to beat McCain and remake the American presidency into an institution of which we can all be proud once again.  I love Obama - let everyone else love him too.

The No Twilight Zone

Faced with a bizarre barrage of odious press releases, emails, backroom comments, and rally speeches from the McCan't campaign, Jason, James, and I decided to launch a blog to discuss our mutual nausea (and hopefully provide some relief to ourselves through expiation).  From now on, all political sugarpoet posts will go onto The No Twilight Zone as well (anything baby, musical, opera, or tech-related will publish solely on sugarpoet).  Progressives and pragmatists, give yourself a big hug...visit notwilightzone.blogspot.com for some regaling rants and snappy snippets on the race of our lives.

Misery, Thy Name is Sarah Palin

Sarah Palin...governor to a backwater state, mayor to a backwater town, lover of lipstick-smeared dogs on ice, hater of polar bears, one-time media darling and scourge of America. As a voter, my penultimate question to Palin (after asking first, "Why are you here?") is "Why do you hate women, and especially mothers?" Actually, this is more of a question I would put to the Republican Party. Palin claims she can balance her newborn special needs baby with first a cross-country no-holds-barred presidential campaign and then one of the most demanding positions in the world (and possibly the most demanding if McCain's 72 year-old body does not hold out). According to an aide, Palin fuses mothering with governing:

“She’ll be with Piper or Trig, then she’s got a press conference or negotiations about the natural gas pipeline or a bill to sign, and it’s all business,” Ms. Burney, who works across the hall, said. “She just says, ‘Mommy’s got to do this press conference.’ ”

By holding herself up as both the paragon of motherhood and the ideal state executive, Sarah Palin is essentially saying that both are not full-time jobs. She is insulting stay-at-home mothers, some of whom have sacrificed career and money to care for their own children, day in and day out, twenty-four hours a day. She is also insulting working mothers, who must daily battle exhaustion, guilt, and separation anxiety in an uneasy compromise between two jobs. And finally, she is insulting women who have forgone motherhood for careers, a great sacrifice in its own right (Condoleeza Rice comes to mind as an example).  Take it from someone who tries to do some piddly consulting work here and there and take care of a perfectly healthy and wonderful eighteen-month old - you cannot work and take care of a baby at the same time without the assistance of another caregiver.  You cannot balance the baby on one knee while you balance the budget.  You cannot breastfeed while composing important legislation.  You cannot resolve the Georgia-Russia crisis during naptime.  You cannot take care of baby at the very same time you are doing something else, because caring for a baby is full-time employment.
Please somebody tell Sarah Palin to stop holding up her position as a working mother as a qualification for the highest office in the land.  Whether it's her knocked-up teen daughter or giving a speech while her water breaks and then waiting to fly back to Alaska to seek medical treatment, or her plundering of tiny Wasilla's budget or trying to use her clout to get her sister's ex fired (and then getting caught), aka Troopergate, she's not doing well at either the mother or the governor thing.  Maybe there is a woman out there that can manage a family of five with one still in diapers, and learn how to lead an entire nation with a complex bureaucracy, a squabbling Congress of an opposing party, a multi-front war, an economic crisis of deep and scary proportions, and many rogue nations itching for a fight.  But the woman who could balance these monumental tasks is not Sarah Palin. To say that this feat of the imagination is even possible for her is a grotesque lie and an affront to women everywhere.
The pig has lipstick and the lipstick is a really ugly color.

CAP is up!

And running. Finally, I can get my life back! Want to see what all the fuss is about? See Citizens for Animal Protection's new site at cap4pets.org. Joomla 1.5, Groundspring for donations and email marketing, EventsList for calendaring, etc.

Baby Stuff

Below are lists of baby stuff - one of items I appreciated during these last harrowing months and one of the not-so-appreciated. My perspective is one of cash-strapped, pseudo-environmentalist, space-limited obsessively-attached new parent. Loved and Liked:

• Slings and Carriers - Ergo Baby Carrier (great as a backpack for later), Wrap Slings (especially for the beginning because your baby is small and testy and wraps let you carry her in a variety of positions) - look at kangaroocorner
• Toys - Whoozit and Whoozit Water Mat from Manhattan Toy, Lamaze musical inchworm, Musical Shakers from International Playthings, Edushape Blocks, Early Years Stacking Cups, Children's Factory 4 x 4 mat (so they don't bang their head learning to crawl), little things to chew on that are easy to clean and you stuff in a diaper bag (like the Bristle Buddy or plastic keys), rubber duckie
• Baby Books - Anything with textures (Fuzzy Bee, Zoo's Who, Dog, Quack Quack, B is for Bear), A Picnic with Monet, The Art of Colors, Colors by Priddy, Olivia, Why is Blue Dog Blue?
• Parenting Books - Our Babies, Ourselves (this changed everything for me), The Baby Book, Baby 411 (good in the beginning to quickly look stuff up)
• Hygeine/Medical - Mustela facial wipes (for their gross neck cheese), California Baby sunscreen (no PABA), Burt's Bees Shampoo Bar, Red Cross nail clipper, First Years aspirator, Feverall suppositories (check with doctor before using)
• Feeding - the Medela Pump-in-Style pump, Playtex Drop-ins 4 oz with slow nipple, the Boppy pillow, Bebe Au Lait nursing cover, freezer bags (Lansinoh or Medela), Svan high chair
• Clothes - Gap (best fit for larger babies and wear very well), Under the Nile (organic)
• Linens - Swaddle Designs organic receiving blankets, fleece or lambswool pads, Under the Nile organic burpcloths, hooded towel
• Diapering - Diaper Dekor diaper disposal system, Seventh Generation diapers (these are sized quite a bit more trimly than the listed weight indicates), Burt's Bees diaper rash ointment, 4-sided changing pad (need straps to come from underneath pad rather than from the top of the pad - I also recommend getting a cover because baby waste tends to erode the vinyl), travel diaper mat
• Strollers - a fold-up stroller like the Maclaren for the subway (you may not need this for a while if your baby remains lightweight - mine got hefty fast) and a substantial stroller for the long walks which will form the basis of your only exercise for months (I like the Bugaboo, which is expensive but has high resale value and is really good for when they're first born because it can be used in place of a bassinet)
• Carseat - SunshineKids convertible carseat (even if you live in NYC and have no car, you will have an occasion for a carseat and this one folds, will last their entire childhood, and can go on an any airplane but it is heavy)

Not so much - I get a little preachy here, please forgive me but I have nowhere else to put negative energy these days:

• Arm's Reach Original Co-Sleeper - if you decide to go with co-sleeping, try having the baby in the bed with you first. Then if that doesn't work out, put them in the bassinet of your big stroller or the crib in your room. Abby wouldn't sleep in the co-sleeper and it's really a separate surface anyway, so you might as well put the baby in a crib or bassinet if you can't have him or her in the bed with you.
• Baby Bjorn - I used the Bjorn a lot for a couple of months but you can only use the carrier for a short time because of the weight window and it's pretty expensive.
• Wipe Warmer - these things are a stupid waste of energy (plus they have a filter in them that gets really nasty) - baby does not need warm wipes.
• Ring slings and pouches - I found that Abby, because of her reflux, would not lay on her side in a sling after she was a couple of weeks old. Wrap slings or rebozos really allow so much more flexibility for positioning that once you get the hang of tying them, they're much more useful than rings slings or pouches.
• Infant car seat - these contraptions are completely useless after eight months if your baby gains weight rapidly (as mine did) - better to get a convertible with a body pillow if you really need to have a car seat.
• Crib bumpers - even if you use a crib, crib bumpers are a waste of money, albeit often a beautiful, irresistible one, because they have to be removed at six months (they can use the bumper to climb out of the crib). The dust ruffle is a necessity for some cribs where the bottom part of the crib is all machinery.
• Wooden blocks - Baby is virtually guaranteed to strip the paint off the blocks within seconds once teeth start arriving. Maybe the paint is non-toxic, but it's disconcerting to see green paint chips on your baby's tongue. Besides, baby probably won't stop at removing the painted surface and will continue on into splintering the wood. Much as I hate plastics, plastic blocks are the way to go for a real mouther such as my kid.
• Baby gyms or entertainers - I know people love these but I feel that they take up a lot of space, are fairly unattractive, don't hold much sway with baby for long, and are a substitute for entertaining your baby yourself (which is not the anti-thesis of fun I always thought it would be).
• Expensive clothes - they grow out of and utterly ruin everything in two seconds. Buy everything on sale and not far in advance since you may not be able to predict their growth well.