Afghanistan President Asraf Ghani is scheduled to visit the U.S. this month.  He said in February that peace talks with the Taliban would start soon, and reports say the talks could also start in March.  Let's hope so. For the past year it's been hard to see progress through the bombs and bullets.  Afghanistan is a place where peace just won't stick, and women are all but shut out of negotiations.

March 8 is International Women’s Day, so it’s time to check in on where the good old U S of A stands in relation to the rest of the world when it comes to gender equality.  Spoiler alert – we’re not number one.

There’s been a lot of controversy over the movie Selma and the Academy Awards. Selma is rightfully centered on Dr. King, and has been rightfully criticized  for the way it portrays President Lyndon Johnson.  But there’s another slight that also distorts history, and that’s the role King’s wife Coretta played in the civil rights movement.

The red carpet rolls out next Sunday – and hopefuls, hacks, and superstars alike will be chasing the most coveted prize in show business. But are women getting equal treatment in filmdom?   It took the Academy 45 years to nominate the first woman director, in 1976.  Since then, a whopping three more have been nominated.  

In the all the years we've celebrated President's Day, we've never honored a female president, because we've never had one.  It's not that women haven't tried, starting with Victoria Woodhull in 1870.  Eleven more women have run since then.  Could it be time for a female in the White House? 2016 might be our lucky number.

Lately we’ve been awash in a debate over the term “radical Islamist.”  Should we use it or not?  In addition to savage beheadings and mass shootings, they want to send women back to the stone age.  But as a woman in the U.S., I don’t fear them nearly as much as I fear the “radical Christians.”  

Priorities for women in 2015

The U.S. Senate convened on January 6th, with 13 new members. he new crop includes twelve Republicans, and a single Democrat.  Some people think 13 is a lucky number, but when it comes to votes in the new senate, it could be very unlucky for women.

The mediocre movie "The Interview" catapulted to international fame when Sony pictures caved to the North Korean government and scuttled -- but later reinstated -- the picture’s opening.  That caused "Interview" to rake in $20 million bucks in its first couple of weeks.  The bonanza was triggered by a major hack of Sony’s computers that revealed the movie’s comical plot about assassinating the North Korean president. But something else was revealed in the hack that is no laughing matter. Sony is guilty of sex discrimination in pay –  the gender pay gap is alive and well, even at the highest levels.  Case in point: Jennifer Lawrence.

Well we did it.  Made it through another year. Women have had some good news, and some bad news. And what with wars, floods, domestic violence, police shootings and all the rest, we’ve probably missed a few things. So let’s review some items that didn’t make the front pages in 2014.