Some of those men in power, we just have to change their faces because we're not going to change their minds.

More than 10,000 ballots in Miami-Dade County have been rejected by some machine without any opportunity for a human being to take a look. That is just not right.

Some of us may just, in one-on-one conversations with our family, with our friends, over the back fence with our neighbors, talk about the reality of our lives and realize that we're not alone, that we have a right to be physically safe and emotionally safe in our own homes.

And of course we are familiar with the English common law rule of thumb that said a man could in fact use a stick no bigger than his thumb to discipline his wife and family.

When I started law school I was shocked to learn that our legal system traditionally had the man as the head and master of the family. As late as the '70s and '80s when we were fighting for the Equal Rights Amendment, states like Louisiana still had a head and master law.

Some campaigns are not worth waging if you can't win; others have to be fought on grounds of principle regardless of the chances for success.

When I hear traditional family values raised, I hear that effort once again to re-establish the man as head and master of his family. Who had the, not only the right, but the obligation to discipline his wife and children to keep them in line?