On Thursday, President Obama signed his first bill into law: The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act.  I’m actually incredibly happy about this bill, which only makes sense and ensures that the spirit of the Equal Pay Act is upheld.  Rather than a person only having 6 months to bring a lawsuit after the pay discrimination decision is made-whether or not a person is aware of the pay discrepancy-the statute of limitations begins after the last check is issued.  And after an election where there was no short amount of sexism, and women’s issues were thrust front and center, I’m touched that this was the first bill President Obama chose to sign.

The final senate vote on the bill had an interesting break down, too.  All the Democrats present voted for it.  So did all four Republican women Senators, who apparently understood it’s importance.  And so did Arlen Specter, who’s kinda moderate, and I would imagine keenly aware of Pennsylvania’s blue-ward trend.  And I loved what President Obama said about the bill:

He said [he] was signing the bill not only in honor of Ms. Ledbetter — who stood behind him, shaking her head and clasping her hands in seeming disbelief — but in honor of his own grandmother, “who worked in a bank all her life, and even after she hit that glass ceiling, kept getting up again” and for his daughters, “because I want them to grow up in a nation that values their contributions, where there are no limits to their dreams.”

All in all, it was really a step towards equality, and a beautiful event.  Which is why I do not understand why the New York Times decided to stick this incongruous line in their article:

Mr. Obama was surrounded by a group of beaming lawmakers, most but not all of them Democrats, in the East Room of the White House as he affixed his signature to the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, a law named for an Alabama woman who at the end of a 19-year career as a supervisor in a tire factory complained that she had been paid less than men.

Well.  That was an interesting choice of words.  I might have put, “learned that,” or, “found out that,” or, “filed a lawsuit because…”  Really, anything instead of implying that women just like to bitch about things.

Sometimes I wonder if papers even have editors any more.

Towards the end of George’s lesson, when he’s realizing how truly awful everything would be if he’d never been born, he has a horrible thought. Mary! What’s happened to Mary?! He demands to know from Clarence, who isn’t supposed to tell him. “You’re-you’re not going to like it George!”

And the suspense is killing us. What could have happened? I mean, we’ve already seen the entire town go to hell. His brother is dead, so are all the people his brother saved in WWII. The pharmacist he worked for is a criminal and a drunk, and Clarence doesn’t want to say what happened to Mary? Why? Is she dead? A destitute alcoholic? Married to a horrible abusive man?

But no! It is a fate much worse than all of those put together! Because George was never born, Mary is… an old maid! She-she became a librarian! The horror!!!1!

*screams and faints*

And that, my friends, that is the most questionable moment from “It’s a Wonderful Life.”