I’m so glad to be an American woman

Add comment October 22nd, 2008

Parwez Kambakhsh, 24, got 20 years for blasphemy after he ran afoul of Afghan authorities last year when he circulated an article about women’s rights under Islam after downloading it from the Internet, according to today’s Los Angeles Times.

Whenever I hear anything about Afghan women in the news, I feel sad and angry, but it also makes me rejoice to be an American.

I learned, though, by reading “The Kabul Beauty School” by Deborah Rodriguez and Kristin Ohlson (available through the Rockford Public Library) that despite the horrendous abuse and difficulties Afghan women face, that their dreams and small wonders keep them going. The book is a true story about Rodriguez leaving the U.S., setting up a beauty school in Afghanistan and marrying an Afghan man. It’s revealing and saddening, yet humorous in parts and more uplifting than I expected.

I highly recommend reading it.

Kudos to Wisconsin newspapers pushing tougher drunken driving laws

Add comment October 22nd, 2008

This Chicago Sun Times story says that this week “the state’s largest newspaper, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, is running a five-part series that examines the state’s drinking culture and drunken driving. That series follows an analysis and series of stories done by the newspaper group Gannett Wisconsin Media this summer that looked at alcohol’s impact in Wisconsin.”

“Momentum is building in the Wisconsin Legislature to increase penalties for drunken driving in the wake of two extensive newspaper series on problems associated with drinking in the state.”

The Journal Sentinel reported that “almost two-thirds of people sentenced under a state law that makes a fifth-offense drunken driving a felony spend less than a year in custody. State records show that last year alone one-third of those convicted of drunken driving in Wisconsin were repeat offenders.”