Oprah/ Marriage Uncensored / Second Time Around / Dollars and Sense - 4/28/08

Mon Apr 28 17:35:53 EDT 2008

- REMINDER: HARVILLE HENDRIX ON OPRAH TOMORROW/TUES ON ADDICTION
- MARRIAGE UNCENSORED HITS 150TH MILESTONE/WILL EXHIBIT AT SMARTMARRIAGES
- THE SECOND TIME AROUND
- THE DOLLARS AND SENSE OF MARRIAGE

###################

- MARRIAGE UNCENSORED HITS 150TH MILESTONE/WILL EXHIBIT AT SMARTMARRIAGES

Marriage Uncensored with Dave and Christie Hits Landmark 150th Episode

April 21, 2008  When Marriage Uncensored aired its first show, no one
imagined it would be more than a local cable show. Fast forward five
seasons, and Marriage Uncensored with Dave and Christie is now broadcast
across North America on PBS, the E! channel, and CanWest Global Television
and is about to tape its¹ 150th episode. That's remarkable when you consider
that less than 5% of new shows make it a full season (13 shows) and less
than 0.5% endure to 150 episodes. All this for a show about marriage!

The 150th landmark episode will feature special guest, Dr. Bill Doherty,
author of ³Take Back Your Marriage - Sticking Together in a World that Pulls
us Apart². Doherty has appeared on Oprah, 20/20, The Today Show and the CBS
Morning Show. 

The 30-minute talk show, hosted by family coach, Dr. Dave Currie, and
Christie Rayburn features topics ranging from parenting to intimacy and
everything in between  offering couples real answers and real hope.
Upcoming guests include Michele Weiner-Davis, author of Divorce Busting and
The Sex-Starved Wife and Harville Hendrix, listed as one of Oprah¹s all-time
top 20 guests.

BE CERTAIN TO STOP BY THEIR EXHIBIT AT THE SMART MARRIAGES CONFERENCE WHERE
HOSTS DAVE AND CHRISTIE AND PRODUCTION DIRECTOR JANICE NIKKLE WILL BE
LOOKING FOR TOPICS AND TALENT - and where they plan to set up a studio
on-site.  

Janice Nikkel
tel: 604.514. 2144 
http://www.marriageuncensored.com/

###############################
- THE SECOND TIME AROUND

This is a video clip.  If you're divorced and have kids, bring Kleenex.
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/localnews/content/news/interactives/thomson/

#############################

- THE DOLLARS AND SENSE OF MARRIAGE

There has been excellent coverage around the world on the "Costs of Divorce
to the Taxpayer" study released on April 15th.  I'm sharing one more article
because it's so well written and it ties into the impressive Every Marriage
Matters coalition in Clackamas, Oregon. - diane

THE DOLLARS AND SENSE OF MARRIAGE
Sunday, April 27, 2008
David Reinhard
The Oregonian

Divorce and the breakup of a family are still seen as their own social
tragedies, and unwed childbearing and cohabitation can still provoke
religious and/or moral objections. For the most part, however, our
nonjudgmental age leaves it at that. The citizens of "Whatever" America
either say nothing about the broken American family, lest somebody's
feelings get hurt, or take the view that it ain't nobody's business but my
own or their own. It's all so very civilized or so very tolerant. And so
very wrongheaded.

You see, we now know, for the first time, what the breakdown of the family
is costing all of us in terms we can all understand: dollars and cents.

Oh, we have an excellent sense of the breakdown. More than a third of all
U.S. children are born out of wedlock today -- 25 percent of non-Latino
white babies, 46 percent of Latino babies and 69 percent of African American
babies. Though the divorce rate has tapered off in recent years, it remains
high compared to the years before 1970. This and the number of babies born
to unwed mothers have changed the makeup of the American home. From 1970 to
2005, the proportion of kids in two-parent homes declined from 85 percent to
68 percent.

We also have an excellent sense of social-educational impacts of this family
fragmentation. Kids from broken or never-formed families are at higher risk
of poverty, mental and physical illness, juvenile delinquency and adult
criminality, sexual and substance abuse, and educational failure.

But not until this month did we have a sense of what our broken family is
costing taxpayers -- even those who think somebody else's family problems
are not their concern. The Institute for Marriage and Public Policy, the
Institute for American Values, the Georgia Family Council and Families
Northwest commissioned a study of the taxpayer costs of divorce and unwed
childbearing. Its finding? Family fragmentation costs federal, state and
local taxpayers $112 billion a year. It costs Oregon's taxpayers $361
million, Washington's $711 million and Idaho's $127 million a year.

The costs come in the form of money that the federal, state and local
governments spend on anti-poverty, criminal-justice and educational efforts,
and lower tax revenues paid by adults who earn less because they were more
likely to grow up in poverty.

If the $112 billion a year figure is huge -- and it is -- it's still a
lowball figure. The study only included costs stemming from divorce and
unmarried childbearing's widely accepted impact on poverty in female-headed
households. It excluded other costs that result from family fragmentation
but are unrelated to higher poverty rates. As the Brookings Institution's
Ron Haskins, an outside adviser, said at a news conference, the authors
overestimated the underestimation.

The study is not a policy document. Rather, it's a dollars-and-cents
reminder that no American family -- broken, unbroken or never-formed -- is
an island. Concern about the breakdown of the American family is a
legitimate public concern.

The $112 billion-a-year loss for taxpayers -- a trillion dollars a decade --
also points up the cost-effectiveness of public- and private-sector
marriage-enhancing initiatives. Reduce family fragmentation by 1 percent and
taxpayers save $1.12 billion a year.

It's not impossible. In Clackamas County, for example, 157 churches came
together in 2001 under the "Every Marriage Matters" banner
(everymarriagematters.org). The churches committed to meeting minimum
standards before marrying couples -- premarital counseling, mentoring to
make good marriages stronger and other efforts to save marriages in
distress. "Every Marriage Matters" is based on the premise that marriage is
skill-based. Today, the number of participating churches has grown to 173.
Oh, yes, and the Clackamas County divorce rate has gone down 17 percent
since 2001.

Of course, that's not all due to "Every Marriage Matters," as its founders,
Tom and Liz Dressel of Oregon City, make clear. Some of it, in fact, is a
result of the rise in cohabitating couples. Some reflects a lower divorce
rate nationally, though it hasn't gone down by 17 percent. Still, the
Clackamas initiative shows that preventing and repairing the broken American
home is possible, just as the new study shows that "Every Marriage Matters"
-- to everyone. 

Send submissions and comments for the listserv to: diane at smartmarriages.com
Do NOT hit "reply". If you hit reply your email will disappear into
cyberspace.  

This is a moderated list. Submissions and comments are read by Diane Sollee,
editor. Please indicate if your comment is NOT to be shared with the list.
PLEASE include your email address and/or url as part of your signature.

With thousands of subscribers, not all comments can be shared. Also realize
that opinions expressed are not necessarily shared by members of the
Coalition.

To SUBSCRIBE, UNSUBSCRIBE, or Change your subscription address,
visit: http://www.smartmarriages.com/app/Newsletter.Subscribe

To read past posts to the listserv, visit the Archive at:
http://lists101.his.com/pipermail/smartmarriages/

12th Annual Smart Marriages® Conference, Hilton San Francisco Hotel,
June 30-July 6, 2008  (General Conference July 2-5)
Pre-Conference Training Institutes June 30-July 2
Post-Conference Training Institutes July 6
DOWNLOAD a conference brochure and register at:
http://www.smartmarriages.com/download.brochure.html

List your program and resources on the Directory of Classes at
http://www.smartmarriages.com/directory_browse.html

Order conference audio & video CD/DVD/MP3s: 800-241-7785 or
http://www.iPlaybackSmartMarriages.com

Coalition for Marriage, Family and Couples Education, LLC (CMFCE)
Diane Sollee, Director
5310 Belt Rd NW, Washington, DC 20015-1961
http://www.smartmarriages.com
202-362-3332

FAIR USE NOTICE: This e-newsletter/site contains copyrighted material the
use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright
owner. We make such material available in our efforts to advance
understanding of marriage, family, couples, divorce, legislation, family
breakdown, etc. We understand this constitutes a 'fair use' of such material
as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with
Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed
without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the
included information for research and educational purposes. For more
information: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml. If you wish to
use copyrighted material from this site for purposes of your own that go
beyond 'fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner.