Growing up, I remember making a pact with myself. As an adopted child I promised to find my family in Korea, but how exactly that would occur remained a mystery to me. I luckily had the unconditional support of my American family, even if they were stumped by my vague plan.

I later came out as a trans woman in 2003. I was also fortunate enough to receive an outpouring of love, acceptance and support from family and friends.

But there was always one barrier to my life of intersecting identities that I struggled to overcome.

The transgender population is a small population, and to my knowledge until this election trans voters haven’t been systematically targeted for voter suppression. Well, this year trans people are being targeted for voter suppression by True The Vote. A graphic from True The Vote’s Virginia training materials shows what the organization thinks about trans citizens.

Trans people have a stark choice.

With Todd Akin standing firm in his decision to remain on the Missouri ballot as the GOP candidate for US Senate, it falls to the rest of the Republican party leadership to flip-flop on their condemnations and fall into line.

And they have.

What’s curious, though, is that one of the flip-floppers is former MO senator and current Romney security affairs advisor Jim Talent, who is rumored to be in line for a possible cabinet post should Romney win. Either Romney will soon flip-flop on Akin as well, or Talent has decided that there will be no Romney administration come Jan 21, 2013, and he’d better help the GOP take the Senate. (Or, of course, both.)

Here’s the GOP’s current political calculus, courtesy of Todd Akin: The more Romney’s fortunes founder, the more the GOP needs to pull out all the stops to win the Senate, and if principles like “women are human beings, too” need to be sacrificed to the cause, so be it.

European Union Justice Minister Viviane Reding proposed requiring 40 percent female representation on all European Union (EU) public company boards by 2020 (state-owned companies must meet the requirement by 2018). This is a strong-arm tactic to address gender disparity on corporate boards, which is common worldwide: European corporate boards have roughly 12 percent women, and globally women make up about 10 percent of corporate board members.

One of the very first books I read after beginning my transition in 2003 was Kate Bornstein’s Gender Outlaw. My first thoughts were “She is so wrong about transsexual people — we are NOT in between male and female! I know I’m a woman!”

And I still know that as truth about myself, and it’s a different personal truth than the personal truth Kate has embraced for herself. But what I’ve come to realize is that Kate, through that book, taught me that there is no right way to be trans.

For years conservatives have been bemoaning that classic “liberal” piece of legislation intruding on their lives, Title IX, as a soul-sucking piece of legislation that harms American sporting culture and society.

I was so impressed by the Movie Night that Lisa hosted with the remarkable women who made Pink Ribbons Inc. It’s always a delicate and often radical matter to talk about fundraising and awareness raising around illnesses – and in many ways any challenge to pink ribbon land is a risky undertaking so these women – Ravida Din; Barbara Brenner, and Dr. Samantha King are my heroes. I hope folks will see the film and read the superb discussion that took place in the thread here.

Violence. Against women. Who are Senators.

It’s almost poetic that this year’s Equal Pay Day—the one day of the year when Americans are supposed to reflect on the value (and undervaluing) of women’s work—coincided with the media firestorm surrounding the American stay-at-home-mom. The “controversy” over Ann Romney’s decision to stay home rather than work a “regular” job should highlight some of the continuing struggles of women to be valued and respected for their work, in and out of the home.