meg@megdaly.com    Bi Rite: Jennifer Baumgardner on the Evolution of Bisexual Politics Bitch, Fall 2007      I first met Jennifer Baumgardner at a feminist event in New York City in the mid-1990s. I’ll admit I was a bit starstruck: Not only was she writing smart, incisive journalism for Ms. and the Nation and becoming a major voice for third-wave feminism, she was also (as my friend who’d invited me to the event leaned in and whispered to me) dating Amy Ray of the Indigo Girls. As in, Amy Ray, one of the sexiest out lesbian performers EVER. to read more, download the PDF > Fear of Flying...To the White House By Meg Daly and Anne Stockwell The Advocate, January 15, 2008      Back in the ’70s, America’s founding feminists dreamed of a future when a woman could run for president. Fewer than 10 election cycles later, those feminist dreams are coming true. As we watch girls with i can be president pins cheering for front-runner Hillary Clinton, it’s hard to comprehend just how far we’ve come. Yet for all the symbolic power of her candidacy, Clinton is still grappling with America’s ambivalence on the status of women. The very word feminism remains so divisive that Clinton dared not speak it at a recent debate, instead evoking feminism as “this great movement of progress that includes all of us, but has particularly been significant to me as a woman.” go to original >     read more > REVIEW: The good, bad and in between of bucking the social norm San Francisco Chronicle, Monday, April 9, 2007      Remember the first time you weren’t carded at a bar? You passed. Maybe you were actually 18 and getting away with something. Or maybe you were 32 and relieved to finally pass as the adult you’d been for more than a decade.      In her latest anthology, “Nobody Passes,” queer writer Mattilda, a.k.a. Matt Bernstein Sycamore, takes on passing in its more pernicious social forms. Sycamore, who uses the female pronoun, asserts that passing equals assimilation, and that equals conformity, all of which equals tyranny and violence. Sycamore gathers 26 disparate voices—transgender, immigrant, rural, mixed race and others—to support her maxim. But, it turns out, some form of assimilation may be desired by even the most radical among us. Sycamore’s contributors clearly show that “passing” does not mean the same thing to everybody. read more > Photos Challenge Idea of What It Means to See Jackson Hole News & Guide, March 28, 2007      The latest art exhibit at the Teton County Library sounds like a contradiction in terms. “Shooting Blind: Photographs by the Visually Impaired” features two dozen photos taken by artists who can’t see well, or at all.      On display through May 11 at the library’s Exhibit Gallery, the free exhibit captures the unique visions of members of a New York City art collective called Seeing with Photography. The collective was started by sighted artist, Mark Andres, who has been teaching photography to visually impaired people since 1985. read more > Matt Fagan Punk Planet, January/February 2006       By his own admission, cartoonist and writer Matt Fagan is “an underground press addict.” A regular reviewer for Xerography Debt and proud employee of Chicago’s comics/DVD store Brainstorm, Fagan is the creator of Meniscus, a zine he proclaims is “dedicated to upholding the rights of the ugly—but not the stupid.” read more > Dava Sobel finds lyricism in science with her 'Planets' tour The Oregonian, October 23, 2005      With “The Planets,” Dava Sobel, the best-selling author of “Galileo’s Daughter,” continues her reign as one of the most engaging and lyrical science writers around. She manages to warp time, space and genre to bring into focus the rockiest outcroppings of our solar system. read more > Covering All Partners Oregon Business, April 2005       Human resources expert Jim Morris couldn’t get his spouse on his health plan.       Try as he might, the answer kept coming back “no” from the insurance company that provides health coverage for the two other principals and three employees at MBL Group, a human resources consulting firm Morris co-founded in 1992. His colleagues’ dependents are covered under the firm’s health plan.       Morris’ family wasn’t viewed differently because his spouse has a preexisting condition—unless being a 50-something classical guitarist is a huge risk factor in the eyes of an insurance actuary. The only reason was that Morris is married to Richard Colombo, a man. read more > Master Builder Portland Monthly, May 2005       As if she did not have enough repair work to do helping homeless teens get their lives on track, last winter Beth Burns bought a fixer-upper that she plans to transform into a home. The house’s blue-gray aluminum siding frames a porch littered with drop cloths, random pieces of lumber and dog toys.       “I told my neighbors I’m not really a slob,” Burns said on the day we met. Clad in a mismatched flag-red T-shirt and tomato-red cardigan, the lanky 33-year-old had just returned from her hometown, Chicago, where she caught a cold. But under the weather for her looked like most people’s caffeinated. She jumped up to show me around while regaling me with tales from the Windy City. read more > Home, Queer Home Progress resumes on community center for Portland’s sexual minorities. Willamette Week, 5/4/2005       A plan for a community center where Portland’s queers can take in a concert, get a health checkup or find a lawyer is re-awakening after two years in hibernation.       “People are anxious for tangible results, and rightly so,” says City Commissioner Sam Adams, Portland’s first openly gay council member. read more > One Good Reason Why dykes should fight for reproductive rights Just Out, 4/2/04       “Have a blast!” read the buttons on protesters’ lapels, each with a picture of a bomb. It was May 1986 in Toledo, Ohio, and Roey Thorpe was just out of college, working at the Center for Choice. It was, like many abortion clinics across the nation, the target of increased protesting by abortion opponents. On the evening of May 20, the center was bombed. No one was hurt physically, but the bomber left a lasting impression. read more > Norman (Genderqueer) Rockwell Silverton’s cross-dressing city official Just Out, 12/3/04       Stu Rasmussen is the kind of woman who could stop traffic—and he knows it.       The leggy, 56-year-old redhead is sitting across from me at a cafe table overlooking Silver Falls in Silverton. Dressed in a miniskirt, tall black boots and cleavage-revealing black top, Rasmussen’s appearance invites head-turning. And that is just how he likes it. read more > The Other Healthy Forests Initiative Community-based forestry takes root in the U.S. Grist Magazine, 9/3/03       Can a “forest economy” be good for the forest? A new movement known as community-based forestry says yes. Also referred to as community forestry, CBF is dramatically different from most forest management practiced in the U.S., and increasing numbers of environmentalists are championing the cause. read more >