I know lots off women who answered emails, manned phones, read work-related documents, typed, or brainstormed while pumping. I have done all of the above, and graded papers and sewn (part of my job) while pumping.

I also know plenty of employees who are not pumping who need to take frequnt breaks during the day to smoke a cigarette, go to the bathroom, get a cup of coffee, gossip, walk back and forth aimlessly, or stare into space.

Pumping does not necessarily hamper productivity, nor does not pumping necessarily enhance productivity.

Pumping is not a relaxing spa moment. It is work, necessary work, undertaken to properly feed a child while geographically separated. It should not be viewed as a privilege or perk.

Breastfed babies get sick less often than formula-fed babies. (Go look up the stats yourself at American Academy of Peds, the WHO, the CDC, or La Leche League). Sick babies are much more disruptive to the workplace than healthy babies.

Dogs (and cats, and ferrets, and any other pets you can name) are not babies. They never will be. Don't make the comparison.

Instead of whining about how much "extra" pumping moms get at work, why not do your job, and thank the pumping moms for not needing to take moere sick time away from the workplace?

Having done both (and contuning to do both: home with the kids 5 days a week, working out of the house 2 days), neither one is a vacation. There are tremendous rewards and tremendous annoyances. There are days when I can't drive the car out of the daycare parking lot fast enough (Hooray! Eight hours without having to hear the soundtrack of "Highschool Musical" being sung at top volume by a 4yo!"). And there are days whenI think "Damn. I'd rather stay here with you and fingerpaint than go to work."

I will say that parenting/housecare is a more thankless job: no one really notices when you're doing it well, but everyone notices when you flub. And given the nature of most out-of-the-house work - rewards in the form of a paycheck, a promotion, a notice by a peer or a boss, the self satisfaction of a job well done - and the reality of work's necessity - kids or no kids, spouse or no spouse, mortgage or no mortgage, rent or no rent, evberyone needs to eat, so most everyone needs to work - a spouse cheering with pom-poms when you come home seems superfluous.

But spouses should remind each other how they appreciate what the other does to keep the family running.

I suppose house-husbands make the news for the same reasons that so many sit-com households seem to be run by single dads (but almost never single moms): dads doing housework and caring for kids is funny. Maybe we just need to watch more "I Love Lucy" reruns?

what it must be like to hate myself so much that I must enact laws that would prevent me from enjoying my life were I brave enough to accept my own desires. It must be nightmarish.

That said, I'm sure Hitler had self-esteem issues. Compassion has limits when the object of compassion would happily destroy the compassionate.

"He's an elected *representative*. It's his job to represent views that aren't necessarily all his own."

But the rabidly anti-gay views *were* his own. He was representing himself, and I doubt if a majority of his constiuients were pro-gay marriage he would have represented their views.

I'm sure the parents of these children whose photographs or descriptions appear on the pedophile blog feel like stalking victims. These children are being stalked. Though this guy hasn't "done" anything (yet, that we know of) physical to any child, every child he has mentioned on his blog is now a target. What he has "done" is taken away their sense of security and safety, impacted on who/where/with whom the kids play, and cause everyone wholoves them to be continually looking over their shoulder.

Yes it's a dangerous world and everyone can be a potential victim. But that's different than seeing your kid singled out as pedophile bait and slobbered over. There is a victim, even if there's no recognized "crime". And that victim's life is changed, significantly.

Much as I dislike the notion of "thought police," we as a society have deemed certain attitudes to be unacceptable. It is unacceptable to use children for erotic pleasure. This is why we have laws against kiddie porn, and even laws against photo-doctored kiddie porn (where children appear to be engaging in sex acts, or appear to be naked, when they weren't photographed thusly). This man may non be saying "On Sunday next I will kidnap and rape this child", but his blog certainly demonstrates that he takes erotic pleasure in children in general, and particular children in specific.

Homeland security empowers law enforcement to criminalize certain thoughts. This pedophile is a terrorist in the truest sense of the word: he may not fly planes into buildings, but he makes people terrified for the safety of their children.