Thursday smattering (belated)

Just a few -- there were stories about Independence Day and about the slave quarters underneath Washington's house on Independence Mall, as well as incremental updates on the Fumo case and other local stories. Most interesting to me, however, were these:

• The State House unamimously passed a bill to protect breastfeeding mothers from getting hassled in public places. (Philadelphia has had such a law locally for ten years.)

  In children, breast milk protects against infectious disease, obesity, sudden infant death syndrome, and diabetes, among other illnesses. Breast-feeding mothers recover more quickly from giving birth and have a lower incidence of breast and ovarian cancers. Yet, despite its numerous health benefits, public breast-feeding remains contentious.
  . . .
  Mothers with young infants often breast-feed every two hours, so in many cases they're forced to feed the child while out in public, Lawrence said. "No woman who has a young baby heads to the mall to breast-feed," she said. "They're there because they have to be."

  Since the Senate already approved the measure, it's headed for the governor's desk. Great news for families.
  
  
• DN columnist Phil Goldsmith had a funny column paralleling the Declaration of Independence in tracing the woes of life under Harrisburg's tyrranical thumb and citing various ways that local entities are kept from exercizing their own judgement on a wide range of issues. Amusing and serious both.
  
  
• Ben Waxman takes the soapbox to argue that young conservatives are suggesting poor solutions to the state's financial decisions.