Cameras and summer bodies are never on the best of terms.Too much flesh, so many over-exposures. No body is safe. I know a good-looking guy who was basking pool-side when he looked into his friend’s sunglasses and saw a reflection of his bare chest. Scrambling for his T-shirt, he declared it was time to go on a fast.

There are so many ways to get caught. Just hope no one in your family is carrying one of those tiny sneaky video cameras. It’s bad enough that anyone can point their cellphone at you and send off an unflattering image to friends and family before you can say “cheese.” And you know what happens when your photo ends up in computer-ville. It hangs around forever, like cellulite.

Smarter to be the one with the camera. That way even if you become part of the photo you can delete the picture before anyone else sees it. This is the good thing about digital cameras. In the old days you had to wait until you got your prints back before ripping up what no other human eyes should be allowed to witness.

By the way, I consider it a matter of etiquette and loyalty to automatically kill all noxious photos of friends, sisters and mothers.

This concern came to mind following claims that photographs of the Real Bodies of Real Women in the Dove ad campaigns were digitally altered. Dove says no. The photographer, the famed Annie Leibovitz who cleverly makes sure she’s always on the safe side of the camera, says no.

The Dove people have been champs about celebrating women of all ages and shapes in their ads and billboards. Their products have the revolutionary label of Pro-Age, rather than anti-aging. And the women who appear in their undies and even less are truly proud of how they look. You wouldn’t see them hiding in the back row in the family barbecue pictures.

I consider it a matter of etiquette and loyalty to automatically kill all noxious photos of friends, sisters and mothers.

It’s a relief to see real bodies selling shampoo and moisturizer as an alternative to the hungry waifs that most in the beauty industry use to hawk their stuff. If the photos of the Dove models were altered at all – the photographer said only minor color corrections were made – it wasn’t enough to skew the message, which is that imperfection is the norm. One woman’s hefty backside is another woman’s generous belly.

This is something that we need to keep in mind as the sun burns down and we begin to strip. Suck in what you can, lather on the attitude, keep to the shadows and when someone calls for a group photo, be ready to say, “Let’s use MY camera.”

Listen to the audio version of “The Naked Truthiness” on the podcast page under Another Voice.

It’s time for us to get it together, and I don’t mean the push to get Hillary Clinton supporters to back Barack Obama. I’m talking about standing with Michelle Obama. And against those members of the media who degrade the national discussion with their grade school taunting.

The ones who get nervous around powerful women, like that silly Tucker Carlson who giggled that Hillary Clinton made him want to cross his legs. Grow up, boy.

I find Michelle Obama brilliant and passionate and think she’d be exciting to have in the White House. All the reasons that some will want to attack her. Assertive, brainy, poised women scare some people, make them hostile.

I don’t think that sexist members of the media defeated Hillary. She made her own blunders. But the braying and the cackling that came from the press was a real pile-on, including some women pundits who were just as smarmy as the men.

But now Clinton has gone away, at least for the time being, and the media dog pack is hunting for someone else. The Republicans are also ready to pounce.

Assertive, brainy, poised women scare some people…

Newsweek columnist Raina Kelley, an African American woman, wrote that Michelle Obama fits the public ideas of a black woman - “unafraid, confident and blunt.” Three qualities that make a Tucker pucker.

At least some defend Michelle’s patriotism, even the usually silent Laura Bush, who said she doesn’t believe Michelle Obama was being un-American when she made that statement about being proud of her country for the first time in her life. The jackals went wild with that. But they ignored the rest of the quote.

She was talking about hope making a comeback. She said, “I have been desperate to see our country moving in that direction and just not feeling so alone in my frustration and disappointment. I’ve seen people who are hungry to be unified around some basic common issues, and it’s made me proud.”

Then there was the bumped fist she gave her husband the night he secured the nomination. Made some people crazy. What’s the big deal? We see that everyday at the ballpark. All it says is good going, baby.

Some people simply want strong, capable women to disappear. When Hillary Clinton conceded more than a few pundits declared that feminists had lost. A newspaper headline said “Feminist Dream Fades Today,” ignoring the fact that many feminists voted for Barack Obama and their dream was quite intact.

Also ignored is that every time some talking head smeared Hillary Clinton because she wore pantsuits or sounded shrill or looked tired it made a lot of us think more of her and less of the media.

I really don’t know any woman who would vote for John McCain to spite Obama. That’s just plain stupid. But I do know women who supported Clinton just to spite the media.

Back to Michelle Obama. I don’t think she’ll be silenced. She’s said to have an edgy sense of humor so maybe she’ll be able to laugh off the jeers from the playground. And for the rest of us – we can just turn those silly people off our TV.

Listen to the audio version of “Hands Off Michelle!” on the podcast page under Another Voice.

Photo courtesy of Getty Images

A group of guys meet every week at a bar in Santa Rosa, Ca. for a different kind of men’s night out. They’re all fathers of young children and the purpose of their gathering is to discuss kid stuff - everything from time outs for toddlers to the best pre-school.

Basically they talk about the same parenting issues that typically consume mothers who generally end up being the higher authority on child-raising.

These guys see parenting as a 50/50 partnership. Not only do they do diapers and make lunches, they expect to be involved in every aspect of their children’s lives, the tedious part like scheduling and the memorable moments like first tooth, first word, first temper tantrum.

You may think this sounds too evolved to be true, but I happen to know a couple of the guys in the group and have seen dual parenting in action. One of these super dads is my son-in-law, father of our super grandchild.

Son-in-law Jay joined the dads group before he became a father, which gave him a head’s up on the huge job ahead. He read the recommended books. Back then it was “The Expectant Father.” Today his favorite reading is “The Happiest Toddler on the Block.”

You may think this sounds too evolved to be true…

The dads group, which has a core membership of six guys, calls themselves Beer and Babes, which it says on their T-shirts. Each Wednesday, after their kids have gone to bed, they meet for beer, chicken wings and kid talk.

One of the instigators of the group is Maas, a teacher and father of two_– a five-year-old and a three-year-old. Maas remembers one night when the dads spent three hours talking about how to enforce naptime. He’s past that challenge but can share his wisdom, along with what he knows about potty training and the terrible twos to the fathers with younger kids. Jay says he gets better advice from the other dads’ first-hand experience than he would from going on the internet with a question. And he gets a peek at what’s around the corner from the fathers with older children.

Getting together and talking about kids, and sometimes spouses and jobs and lately the tough economy, makes them feel like they’re not alone. They talk a lot about the cost of balancing family needs with work. And how work gets put in second place when you try to be with your kids as much as possible. Maas, the father of two, says that dads who are around more are often money poor. They’re not taking a second job or working overtime like some of their own fathers who felt they had to put work first.

It’s an interesting new direction these fathers are taking. Society still considers mothers the primary parent and expect dads to be back-up. So these guys get bonus points for their efforts. And they also get one night out a week. But then that means the mothers do, too. Except they don’t go to sports bars.

Listen to the audio version of “More Babes Than Beer” on the podcast page under Another Voice.