here’s my favorite part:

For Spanish feminists, the small shock of that moment is exactly the point. "It's an important image precisely because it conveys normality," says Marisa Sotelo, president of the Madrid' based Women's Foundation. "It serves a pedagogic function: it shows that women can be and are everywhere." .... And that's not the only lesson. By appointing Chacón (who lacks military training), Zapatero may also be making a kinder, gentler statement about the armed forces.... Among the largely pacificist Spanish population, support for military participation in combat is weak (over 50% of Spaniards support withdrawing their troops from Afghanistan altogether). But humanitarian and peace-keeping missions are another story: a 2005 poll by the Madrid-based Center for Sociological Research puts public support for those military efforts at more than 90%. The figure of a pregnant woman — "a woman in full womanhood," as Montaño puts it — only drives home that distinction. "It shows that the army doesn't just have to fulfill this masculine role of force," she says. "It can be more feminine, more humanitarian."

okay, that wasn’t actually a favorite “part” of the article, it was more like half of it. BRILLIANT, JUST BRILLIANT!

*i had caffeine today(!).