By Hedge Fund Manager turned fashion designer Britt Lintner

It may seem cliché but since Lehman Brothers filed for Chapter 11, my daily mantra is to STAY PRESENT. Never before has this spiritual phrase held so much significance to me. After an eight-year stint in the company between 1995 and 2003, Read more

In past centuries any woman who asked a question or made a comment about politics or finance was likely to be insulted and belittled by men who would say, ‘Now don’t you trouble your pretty little head about that.’ Thanks to the Women’s Movement of the 1970s, few men would Read more

By Andrea Wong

In less than one month, we will mark the culmination of an incredibly historic presidential election season. As a little girl, growing up as a distinct minority in America, I never thought I’d see the day when an African American and a woman would be represented on the tickets of both major political parties. It just wasn’t in my realm of possibility.

But this year, Senator Obama and Governor Palin are vying for the highest and second highest, respectively, offices in the land. And Senator Clinton was a close second on the Democratic side.

Just think, less than a century ago, women did not even have the right to vote!  When Lifetime brought its Every Woman Counts campaign to the Democratic and Republican conventions, it was right around the 88th anniversary of the passage of the 19th amendment that finally won us that right.

We have certainly made a lot of progress in less than a century since. We’ve actually made a lot of progress in the last four years since the last presidential election. We have the first woman Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi. We have the most women ever serving in the House and Senate. Thousands of women have gone through boot camps to run for elected office, which Lifetime has been proud to support in partnership with The White House Project. And, of course, Senator Hillary Clinton made those “18 million cracks in the glass ceiling” as the first serious woman contender for The White House.

According to a Lifetime Every Woman Counts poll of women likely voters, conducted by Republican pollster Kellyanne Conway and Democratic pollster Celinda Lake, thanks to Senator Clinton, nearly seven in ten believe that her candidacy has helped pave the way for women who want to run for President. And a vast majority said that they now think there will be a woman Commander-in-Chief in their Lifetime.

My own ten year-old niece was obviously not old enough to vote or be surveyed in our poll, but those cracks have indeed reverberated down to the next generation. She told me quite simply that a woman should be President because, and I quote, “Girls are cooler than boys!”

Now, I can’t totally disagree with her logic, but I think what my niece was conveying, in her own words, is what is most important about these remarkable “firsts” and accomplishments achieved by women. And it’s this: they are firsts, and not onlys.

Because young women and grade school girls like my niece have witnessed first hand the accomplishments of Senator Clinton, Governor Palin and Speaker Pelosi. So unlike it was for me growing up, women’s leadership is in their realm of possibility. In fact, it’s more than just possible. It’s probable.

The women who blazed this trail have created options, opportunity and optimism for other women. That is really the mission of Lifetime’s Every Women Counts campaign. It’s why we’re using the reach and power of the Lifetime brand to empower women to speak out on the issues that matter most in their lives.

It’s why we’ve dedicated our resources to encouraging women to register and get out to vote. We’re excited to be launching a brand new PSA campaign starring every female country artist, from Reba to Martina McBride to Taylor Swift. And it’s why we’re invested in inspiring women to lead, whether someday running for school board or town council on up to the White House.

Coretta Scott King once said, “Women, if the soul of the nation is to be saved, I believe that you must become its soul.” I am hopeful that the 35 million eligible women who did not vote in 2004 will show their soul and that we can make sure Every Woman Counts.

Andrea Wong is the CEO  and President of Lifetime Networks. She oversees Lifetime, Lifetime Movie Network, the myLifetime.com website and Lifetime’s public advocacy campaigns, among other areas of the company.

The contrast between San Francisco and London couldn’t be greater: there I can sit outside cafe’s with delicious coffee, soaking up the sunshine, chatting with CA-based colleagues about exciting developments in our industry and the latest cool start-up to hit the news. For me, while on Read more

By Kathy Lette

Since the dawn of time, women have been treated as sequels, instead of equals. 100 years since Emily Pankhurst tied herself to the railings, we don’t have equal pay, we’re still getting concussion hitting our heads on the glass ceiling, plus we’re expected to windex it while we’re up there. So, shouldn’t we be rejoicing at the news that John McCain has nominated a woman as his presidential running mate?

When the Republican candidate made the surprise announcement that a 44 year old, moose-stalking, pro gun-lobby, anti abortionist, creationist, mother of five and ex beauty queen, Sarah Palin, was to be his vice
president, I couldn’t help but scream Why? Well, the woman definitely knows a lot about vice. Her 17 year old daughter, Bristol, is up the duff to an 18 year old who describes himself on My Space as a “fuckin’ redneck…Ya fuck with me I’ll kick ya ass”.

Her husband has been had up on a drink driving charge. And Palin herself has hired a lawyer to defend her in an ethics investigation in which she is accused of abuse of power as Alaska’s governor, over the sacking of her ex brother in law. As McCain first met Sarah Palin last week, there was obviously only time for a cursory examination of her credentials. A case of premature adjudication?

Since Palin’s appointment, the woman who is so aggressive she’s nicknamed Sarah Barracuda, is starting to smell a bit fishy. As the world’s media got all over her life like a fake tan, Palin’s smile became as laquered as her nails and McCain began to look as though he’d been bunjee jumping without a helmet. But the fact that the furore has eclipsed Obama, is causing many Republicans to exceed the 100% Daily
Recommended Allowance of Smug.

Could McCain’s impetuosity prove profitable after all?

For months the American election has felt like a episode of the West Wing. But we now seem to have lurched into a National Lampoon inspired satirical soap opera. Except what’s at stake is the leadership of the free world. And let’s face it, with 72 years and four bouts of cancer behind him, it might be wise if McCain didn’t buy any long-playing records. And who’ll be waiting in the wings, in the West Wings, but this gun-toting fundamentalist, still-born-again Christian, whose experience is limited to 18 months as state Governor and as mayor of a tiny Alaskan town. In other words, fasten your psychological seat belts, people, ‘cause if McCain carks it, we’re in for a bumpy ride.

As for Palin’s claim to be a feminist? Most feminists would agree that Eve was framed, but Palin wants creationism taught in school and books with inappropriate language banned. A case of freedom of the suppress.

The woman may not have been vetted by the F.B.I. but she should definitely go to the vets to get her claws done. An interview has just surfaced from earlier this year in which Palin is heard repeatedly guffawing after a talk show host referred to one of her republican colleagues as a “bitch” and
“cancer” despite the fact that the woman in question, Lynda Green, the Alaskan state senate president, is a cancer survivor. Palin , an ex beauty queen, definitely puts the cat into catwalk.

McCain has obviously chosen Palin because he thinks female voters will stick to her like nylon knickers in a Texan heatwave. But any woman who would allow her 17 year old daughter to play ovarian roulette, then, when she falls pregnant, not be allowed to consider a termination, but instead, thrust her onto the world stage; any woman who would undertake the long hours of presidential campaigning when she has a five month old baby with downs syndrome; any woman who has five children yet remains pro gun, even after the many Columbine type high school massacres - is not a woman’s woman. What she is, is a post feminist. A woman who has kept her wonder bra and burnt her brains.

Kathy Lette’s latest novel To Love, Honour and Betray (Till Divorce Us Do Part) is out now priced £14.99.

For more Kathy Lette click here.

I was delighted when June asked me to contribute to her fantastic website. I really believe that politics is relevant to us all and June is doing a great job in making the political world more accessible to young women.
Members of Parliament can often seem Read more

By Ann Widdecombe

Sarah Palin has put some much needed life into an election that appears to have been going on forever and which will continue to occupy centre stage for another two months. Formidable, controversial, bursting with energy and compromising none of her Read more

By Auschwitz survivor Eva Schloss

Tolerance has positive connotations. We like to think that we act with tolerance and approve of others doing so. It is politically correct nowadays to be tolerant, democracy can function only with a marked degree of tolerance amongst the opposing parties. However on second thoughts, the issue becomes less clear-cut in many situations tolerance is less clearly a virtue and in fact has negative consequences.

Not only may the effect of tolerance vary from situation to situation, there is also much evidence that our judgement as to where tolerance should be exercised has been changing. For example, we are nowadays inclined to be tolerant of young people’s bad behaviour or of waste of energy and food. Read more

Dr Sally Ernst is the Global CEO of SinoCode, a software development firm that develops and implements Microsoft solutions for the UK, US and Australian markets; and, distributes technology products back into China.

Sally-Anne also invests with her husband Lloyd Ernst, a highly successfully entrepreneur, in a number of start up businesses. They have successfully exited a number of these, including the WebCentral business - Australia’s largest hosting service, for valuations of AUD$11-60 million. Here is her blog for PATC

In a flailing economy with a dearth of debt finance, other sources of investment may enable growth, perhaps purely survival. Sharks can eat a good company in a desperate situation alive. Not taking the money can mean sudden death. So the question is:

Swim with the fishes? Or swim with the sharks?

Notoriously when the Mafia “takes someone out” they kiss them on the cheek and bless them to swim with the fishes (albeit difficult with concrete blocks weighed to their feet). In recent press, we’ve seen many businesses caught with the sudden downturn in the economy - from a 40% drop in property sales volumes, to a 40% rise in bankruptcies, to the radical escalation in numbers of companies seeking redundancy advice.

So what does a company do in hard times? Swim with the fishes while the concrete blocks of an economy under the threat of recession weighs its revenues down, or swim with the sharks and take expensive money?

Swimming with the sharks in the throws of desperation (which has a very strong scent) can see you lose an arm and a leg. However, if someone invests their cold, hard-earned cash in you, they obviously believe in you and calculate there is something in it for them. Just make sure there is still something in it for you at the other end. Read more