Happiness for Her Kids: Even Lynne Cheney Wants it Now

JeanneSager — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 14:33:00 GMT

While the world’s been watching a hockey mom who’s seen Russia attempt a move cross country, the current resident of Number One Observatory Circle has been making some big moves of her own.

Lynne Cheney earned some fans in the GLBT community this week for sort of, almost, but not exactly putting her seal of approval on gay marriage. Congratulations Mrs. Cheney, you’ve taken the next step in what it means to be a mommy.

The vice president’s wife was on CBS’ Early Show to promote her new book, We the People: The Story of Our Constitution, not talk about her openly lesbian daughter Mary. But when CBS co-anchor Harry Smith pressed for her take on Star Trek actor George Takei’s marriage in California to his long-time partner, Brad Altman, Mrs. Cheney quoted one of her husband’s speeches embraced by gays and lesbians back in the 2000 campaign.

“Freedom in this country ought to mean freedom for everyone,” she said, paraphrasing Dick Cheney’s comments during the 2000 vice presidential debates (the exact context of the statements is available here). You know, the comments he conveniently forgot when it came time to stand by his boss and support the constitutional amendment banning gay marriage.

But I digress. This is about his wife, the mother of his children, after all. “I would wish my daughter to have happiness and freedom to make her own choices,” Mrs. Cheney told Smith.

Even skirting the words “yes, I support gay marriage,” she’s come a long way from the mom who made a political attack against John Kerry during the 2004 campaign for discussing Mary’s sexuality. She pulled the mom card when she called out Kerry to lend credence to her claim that he was “tawdry.” Now she’s pulling the mom card to turn her back on the Republican line.

If she were a politician, I’d call her out for being a flip-flopper. But she’s not a politician. She’s a politician’s wife, and she’s a mom. And I’m just too darn hokey to believe that moms don’t always want their kids to be happy. Call me Pollyanna, but come on. If they’ve got blue hair, a bull ring through the nose plus a lesbian girlfriend, they’re still yours.

So congratulations, Mrs. Cheney. You picked your daughter over the devil perched on your shoulder. Score one for motherhood.

DVD Review: Our Country, USA to Z

Brett Singer — Wed, 02 Jul 2008 19:00:00 GMT

With July 4th coming up in a couple of days, many of us are feeling patriotic. But in our current political climate, patriotism can be a highly charged topic. Personally, I think you should be able to love your country without buying into the ideology of a particular person or political party. More "celebrate what's great about America" and less "keep the immigrants out."

"Our Country, USA to Z" (Team Baby Entertainment) is more the former than the latter. Narrated by Whoopi Goldberg in her usual slightly sleepy-voiced style, this is (mostly) politics-free patriotism.

The disc opens with a relatively painless song (performed by John Lennon Songwriting Award winner Joe McDermot) about our nation and how good it is, with shots of cute babies dancing around. Football, kids, cities, Native Americans, Statue of Liberty – pretty straightforward stuff, pleasantly presented.

Then come the letters. (The chapters on the DVD, available in the main menu, are helpfully split up by letter so you can skip around if you need to.) A is for America (duh), B is for Bell, as in "Liberty Bell," C is for Columbus (with no mention of Native Americans), D is for Diveristy, and so on. My favorite segment was J, which is of course for Jazz. Whoopi should do a whole DVD for kids on the history of jazz. M is for Military was a little weird, but kids will like the trucks and Coast Guard boats. There is a slightly right-of-center leaning revealed (I think) in the choice of "great presidents" (the letter P, of course): George Washington, Abraham Lincoln (a "civil war hero", no mention of freeing the slaves), Teddy Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan. It's not a huge deal, but I'm guessing that the Democratic version of this disc might not mention ol' RR in this grouping.

There is a teeny amount of suspense when you watch "USA to Z" for the first time – what the heck are they going to do for X, for example? Since K was for King (as in Martin Luther King), I thought maybe we'd get Malcolm X, but they went with Railroad Crossing, which is a little lame, but at least features subways as well as railroads. Then there's "Road Trip," another original tune with a nice montage of video from the 50 states. These include cities as well as purple mountains majesty and amber waves of grain, something that, as a lifelong city dweller, I always appreciate. As always, there are cute kids of various colors and creeds bouncing around.

"Our Country, USA to Z" is a little different from the DVDs that Team Baby Entertainment typically puts out. Most of their content (which I've never seen) seems to be geared towards indoctrinating young children in the ways of sports fandom – Mets Baby, St. Louis Cardinals Baby, Red Sox Baby World Series Edition narrated by Ben Affleck (ouch, that was hard to type – guess who my favorite team is?), and of course, Yankees Baby, which I've never seen but is of course the best of the bunch (that would be my team.)

For the most part, this relatively short DVD is cute, harmless patriotism that does a decent job of including the different types of people and places that make up the United States of America. There is no mention of more controversial topics – Native Americans, slavery – but it is geared towards very young children; 2 or 3-year-olds is about right in my view. "Our Country, USA to Z" is educational, colorful, and doesn't go too far to the right. And when it does skew a little bit more Red State than Blue, that's tempered by the presence of the Whoopster's narration. Whoever hired her deserves a big, fat all-American raise.

image: Team Baby Entertainment

Strollerderby : politician

Happiness for Her Kids: Even Lynne Cheney Wants it Now

DVD Review: Our Country, USA to Z

The Human Element of War

Iraq War Takes Its Toll on Officers’ Marriages

Brad and Angie, What Will They Do With The Money?

Political Nanny: Obama Gives MoveOn a Stern Talking To

Son Gives Jolie a Gun

Afghanistan War Veteran Assaults Infant Sons

Jolie-Pitts Give $1M to Iraqi Children

Parody of Mother's Plea to John McCain