NEW YORK (AP) — Oprah Winfrey was embraced in a hug by longtime friend Diane von Furstenberg as she took to the stage to accept a "Lifetime Leadership" honor at the third annual DVF awards.

"She is the most formidable person I have ever met in my life," the designer and humanitarian said of Winfrey at the event, held Friday night at the United Nations. "What is extraordinary about Oprah is that she has done so much and yet she is still a little girl. She is still very pure and you can make her cry and laugh so quickly."

Upon accepting the award, Winfrey was expected to talk about her career, but instead used the majority of her time to praise another honoree, Jaycee Dugard, who was abducted when she was 11 years old and held in captivity for 18 years by Phillip and Nancy Garrido. She was raped and gave birth to two children before she was eventually rescued. Her captors were convicted.

"I wanted to have the opportunity to meet her and to tell her how much her story and her life meant to me," she explained. "I said to Diane, 'I know Diane Sawyer should be the one to introduce her, but would you please let me do it.'" Winfrey went on to thank Sawyer, who was also in attendance, and praised the television special she did with Dugard.

"Jaycee Dugard, I am so proud of you, your courage, your ability to press onward toward the future and toward a more victorious life for yourself and for using your courage your strength and your power to show the world that you care," Winfrey said.

Following Winfrey's introduction, Dugard took to the stage, getting emotional as she thanked her mother for never giving up hope of finding her. She also spoke about her JAYC Foundation, which aims to give support to families dealing with abduction and other tragedies.

"My hope is to be remembered for what I do and not for what happened to me," Dugard told the audience.

Earlier in the evening, presenter Jessica Alba showed off an acorn necklace she was given by Dugard. The necklace represents Dugard's charity.

The DVF awards honor women who are courageous and fight for justice. Artist Panmela Castro, who battles against domestic violence; Chouchou Namegabe, who fights for women's issues in her native Congo; and Layli Miller-Muro who founded the Tahirih Justice Center, which protects women from human rights abuses, were also honored.

Each honoree receives a $50,000 award from the foundation.

The awards were part of the festivities surrounding the Women In the World conference.

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http://www.dvf.com/The-DVF-Awards/philanthropy-awards,default,pg.html

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Alicia Quarles is the Global Entertainment Editor for the Associated Press. Follow her online at http://twitter.com/aliciaquarles

On the heels of football disgrace in The Big Easy, the National Football League desperately needs a new hero. If at all possible, one who is an Eagle Scout, the varsity captain and a former altar boy. Or maybe the intelligent, well-spoken, athletically dazzling son of two U.S. Army sergeants.

When Commissioner Roger Goodell made his league-shaking "Bountygate" announcement on March 2, he emphasized that: "It is our responsibility to protect player safety and the integrity of our game and this type of conduct will not be tolerated." Of course he did.

Bountygate was not born of young and hungry investigative journalism. It was launched when the NFL decided to listen to their security department and bust themselves -- undoubtedly just before some 21st Century Woodward and Bernstein did it for them.

However, there apparently was a pigskin "Deep Throat" who blew the whistle on the Saints defense after observing what many of us viewed as (at the least) unsportsmanlike hits on both Kurt Warner and Brett Favre during the 2009 playoffs.

But secret meetings in parking structures were not really required. The hits in question occurred on national television, although evidently not in the line of sight for certain referees.

It took the NFL two more seasons to announce the scandal. Yeah. Did you see Brett Favre's ankle after that game? Because the rest of us did, Roger. No. 4 literally shrugged it all off with a typical, "It's football." Of course he did.

I'm not sure that Deanna Favre or Ashley Manning would be quite so understanding. And if you are going to discuss this issue with Brenda Warner, I suggest that you do it from a safe distance.

It's not as if we are truly shocked that football players might intentionally hurt an opponent. We don't let the thought float to the top of our consciousness very often. We want to believe in sportsmanship, competitive fairness and letting the best team win. We know football doesn't always work this way. Life certainly doesn't. But we would like, for a few hours every Sunday, to believe. Especially these days.

To think otherwise would require us to stop loving football -- and that is not a position into which we wish to be forced.

After all, we revere the Steel Curtain and the Doomsday Defense. But there is a difference between:

"The game is designed to reward the ones who hit the hardest. If you can't take it, you shouldn't play."
Jack Lambert

And

"I like to believe that my best hits border on felonious assault."
Jack Tatum

The NFL needs a role model. Preferably someone as yet untainted by the sordid topic of coin. Preferably someone wholesome. Preferably someone with a great smile, a quick wit and a sharp mind. And preferably someone with outstanding athletic gifts. Let's face it; the NFL needs Michael Vick's talent combined with Tim Tebow's character.

Enter Robert Griffin III. Though I haven't found evidence of Eagle Scout status, Griffin may have been too busy starring in three sports and graduating from Copperas Cove High School a semester early so that he could get a jump on completing a Bachelors in Political Science in three years at Baylor University -- while winning the Heisman Trophy and starting his Masters in Communications.

The Mannings are NFL royalty on and off the gridiron. Archie and Olivia certainly seem close to sainthood in the parenting department based on the character of their progeny. But they don't appear to have anything on Jacqueline and Robert Griffin, Jr.

Andrew Luck is purportedly the best rookie QB to come out of college since Peyton Manning. I'll leave that irony for another column.

Luck will be the centerpiece of a publicly rebuilding Colts franchise. The Stanford QB seems to operate more in the unflappable Eli Manning mode than as an "out front" entertainer.

RGIII is the one with the sizzle. Griffin is going to be heralded somewhere as a savior -- hopefully with a small "s." His charisma is going to make him a media lightening rod and probably an instant fan favorite.

The NFL is desperately hoping that he stays healthy, wholesome and successful. It will help a lot of us to believe that football is a game we can still love.

Julianne Moore is certainly changing the way we look at age 51. The actress was stunning at the HBO premiere of her new movie "Game Change" in NYC.

News broke yesterday that Britney Spears was in final talks to join Simon Cowell on Fox's "The X Factor" as a new judge for Season 2, but now reports are swirling that she's rejected their initial $10 million offer.

So the question is: How much is Fox going to have to pony up? Try $20 million.

Julianne Moore is certainly changing the way we look at age 51. The actress was stunning at the HBO premiere of her new movie "Game Change" in NYC.

Rick Springfield is returning to "General Hospital" later this month, and Friday on "The Talk" (weekdays on CBS) soap superfan Sheryl Underwood, who appeared herself on "The Young And The Restless," got pretty excited about it. Springfield will be reprising his role as Dr. Noah Drake on the show, and provided a few details on his return.

"Noah's coming back to support his son because Noah went through the same situation with his wife dying," Springfield explained, before Underwood cut him off to clarify that Noah has two sons, Patrick and Matt. When Underwood excitedly provided even more backstory and key plot-points, Springfield joked that he should've called her to fill him on the latest "General Hospital" developments before he accepted the role.

Underwood did seem to get an interesting detail from Springfield when she suggested, "If you would get with Anna Devane, that would really be good!" Although the audience laughed over Springfield's response, Underwood's reaction suggested that she might have guessed correctly. "Y'all do? Oh my god! Oh my god! Oh my god!" she gushed.

TV Replay scours the vast television landscape to find the most interesting, amusing, and, on a good day, amazing moments, and delivers them right to your browser.

I'm at 27,000 feet, flying high to Kansas City, the city where I was born, for the grand opening of a brand new center for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people called the LikeMe Lighthouse. Although it was a small group of us who had the initial idea for the Lighthouse, it didn't take long for others' enthusiasm to be ignited. After more than a year of very focused and dedicated planning by our LikeMe National Board, the Kansas City volunteer force heard the rally cry, and under the guidance of our Director of Operations, Charlene Daniels, the efforts of the local LGBT community and straight allies have been enormous. Kansas City has a robust LGBT community, and it is our mission that the LikeMe Lighthouse will serve the entire Kansas City area. In addition to having a beautiful library, reading room, and computer lab, the Lighthouse will offer information referral to LGBT resources in the area, connect and support other local organizations, provide workshops and meeting spaces, and, most importantly, promote a renewed sense of community.

Community.

I want to talk about what that word means to me in this context and why, in my opinion, it's so important that Kansas City and other towns like it have a brick-and-mortar LGBT center.

It wasn't until I came out, in May 2010, that I found my community. I moved from Kansas to Tennessee in 1989 to chase my country music dreams and went on to live in Nashville for nearly 20 years prior to my move to New York City in 2008. I put a lot of thought into relocating my life, locking the doors of my beautiful home in Tennessee and driving with a U-Haul trailer behind my SUV with just enough furniture for a small apartment in Manhattan. My reasons for taking such a drastic step were many: I needed to finish writing my memoir; I wanted to further steel myself for my impending, very public coming out process; and most of all, I was in search of my community. Almost immediately following my coming out to the world, I began to understand what importance community could hold in a person's life. I was still relatively new to NYC, but I was making friends -- real friends -- with whom I could be honest, and I was easily appreciating that there were other people in the world "LikeMe." I was becoming closer to people at a much quicker pace than during my time in Tennessee. I'm not saying that my friends in Nashville were the cause of my stunted relationships with people -- they weren't -- and I'm not suggesting that I only want to be friends with people who are just like me -- no, that's not it at all. My point is that I was not truly connecting with my friends and flourishing in Nashville because I was deep in the closet; I was closed-off and isolated.

Community.

It was like magic for me to suddenly be out and to know that there was a place to go. The Center, as New York City's LGBT center is called, is one of the finest and most historic LGBT centers in the nation, boasting decades of service. The executive director of the Center, Glennda Testone (who, by the way, has been a mentor to the LikeMe Board in our strategic planning for the Lighthouse), can rattle off scores of programs and events going on at the Center on any given day, but she'll also pause to look you in the eye to tell you that one of the most important things about the Center is that it is there. "People know we're here," she says. "They know where to find us. They know they're not alone."

Community.

Human beings are not designed to be alone. None of God's creatures are. I could cite some interesting statistic about the lifespan and physical and emotional health of lab rats that are isolated, and the data would be dismal. Well, I guess that all depends on how you feel about rats and their entitlement to happiness, but you get the point. It's unnatural to be separated from the pack.

Think about it. When a kid in school has misbehaved and is sent out into the hallway, it's not because the hallway is such a horrible place. The purpose is to create distance between the child and the other students. That's the punishment.

Another way to illustrate how powerful the tool of isolation can be is to put it in these terms: what do our prison systems do to effectively administer the worst possible punishment to an inmate who's negatively acted out? That's right: solitary confinement. Isolation is the punishment.

Community is the cure.

It is my deepest hope that the LikeMe Lighthouse will stand tall, illuminating hope in every direction for all who have a need, whether it's one of the many great, local LGBT advocacy groups already in existence wanting to hold its monthly meeting there, or the not-quite-out 19-year-old from a small town like the one I grew up in, Wellsville, Kan., or maybe, hopefully, the parents of the 14-year-old who sat his folks down the night before and nervously said, "Mom, Dad... I think I might be gay. There's this place called the LikeMe Lighthouse on Main Street, and they've got a library with books for parents of gay kids."

Community.

I'm so lucky and honored to be a part of Kansas City's LikeMe Lighthouse. It really is a dream come true.

CHICAGO — The man accused of killing Oscar winner Jennifer Hudson's mother, brother and 7-year-old nephew had threatened to kill members of the family at least two dozen times before the October 2008 slayings, a prosecutor said during a Friday hearing in Chicago.

Assistant State's Attorney James McKay said the threats began in February 2008, when James Balfour moved out of the family's house where he had been living with his wife, Hudson's sister Julia. The threats continued right up until the day the bodies were found, on Oct. 24, 2008.

"He said, `If you ever leave me, I'm going to kill you, but I'm going to kill your family first,'" McKay said at the hearing. "'You will be the last to die.'"

Friday's hearing comes about a month before Balfour is scheduled to stand trial in the slayings. Prosecutors allege Balfour shot the family members because he was furious his wife was dating another man. Balfour has pleaded not guilty.

The killings in one of Chicago's most dangerous neighborhoods generated international headlines when the bodies of Hudson's mother and brother were found in the family's home and the boy's body was discovered in an SUV days later.

On the day of the killings, Julia Hudson noticed her estranged husband in an alley beside the home as she was getting ready to head to work and let him inside, McKay said.

The prosecutor said Balfour became enraged when he saw balloons that a new boyfriend had given her and he realized at that point that his marriage was "crumbling."

"All of this is boiling over and when he sees those balloons it's time to act," McKay said.

Julia Hudson worked as a bus driver, and Balfour made one of the threats in person when he got on her bus a month before the killings. He told his wife, "I'm thinking of taking Julian," said McKay, calling the words a clear threat to kidnap her son from a previous relationship.

Seven-year-old Julian King was one of those killed. The others were Hudson's mother, Darnell Donerson, 57, and brother, Jason Hudson, 29.

Police recovered a gun from bushes near the vehicle in which King's body was found and have linked it to the shootings.

Jennifer Hudson, who won an Academy Award for best supporting actress in 2007 for her role in "Dreamgirls," was in Chicago with her family about five days before the killings. She said she'd last been at the family home about two months earlier.

She told investigators she'd known Balfour since childhood and had advised her sister against marrying him. She said the family didn't find out about their 2006 marriage until months after it happened.

John Mayer announced he's canceling his upcoming tour because of a vocal cord injury.

USA Today reports Mayer broke the news on his blog. He had a granuloma on his vocal cord last fall and it's grown back.

From Mayer's blog:

This is bad news. Because of this, I have no choice but to take an indefinite break from live performing. Though there will be a day when all of this will be behind me, it will sideline me for a longer period of time than I care to have you count down.

Mayer goes on to explain, "a granuloma forms and continues to snowball because it’s in a spot where the vocal cords hit together and there’s no way to really give it a chance to heal without a good stretch of time and some pretty intensive treatment."

Earlier this month, the "Your Body is a Wonderland" singer announced a release date for his forthcoming album, Born and Raised. It will come out on May 22 and the first single, "Shadow Days," is available now on iTunes.

Monday night, I checked my Twitter feed before bed, per usual, and like anyone & everyone else on Twitter that night... I saw Joseph Kony, Stop Kony, Kony 2012, LRA, Uganda, Gulu, and child soldiers hash tagged, all trending worldwide on Twitter and my heart skipped a beat.

You see, for the last three years, all of those subjects have been on my mind daily, as I have worked with my mother and our start-up team of our NGO, www.THARCEGulu.org, or Trauma, Healing and Reflection Center for former child soldiers and victims of Joseph Kony and his rebel group the LRA or Lords Resistance Army in Gulu, Northern Uganda.

Efforts to raise awareness and donations for our NGO, THARCE, which provides non-medical integrative therapies to these victims who are of the Acholi community in Gulu have been successful and awe-inspiring, as my social media following showed up for the last two years on my birthday for Tonic.com and Crowdrise campaigns.

I blasted Twitter and Facebook and every Oprah, P. Diddy, Beiber and Kardashian with tweets and messages about our cause and was extremely moved by the support, curiosity and involvement of fans and friends. Twitter founder Jack Dorsey, my Whedon-Buffyverse comrades, Alyssa Milano, George Lopez, fellow Bostonian Mike Chiklis and many others donated and "re-tweeted" for THARCE-Gulu.

There was new awareness, but we certainly hadn't moved the needle the way Invisible Children did this past Monday night. I have met Jason Russell and fellow actress Kristen Bell over the years and we have shared our passion for Gulu and the Acholi people devastated by Joseph Kony and the LRA. I believe they have honest and true intentions, in spite of some of the negative press that has since exploded on the Web about Kony 2012. And, they have trail-blazed in the area that we hadn't quite been able to cover, creating a worldwide awareness through social media and young people, making Joseph Kony a virtual celebrity almost overnight.

This heightened awareness of the 26-year trail of wreckage left by Kony is a good thing. And now, more than ever before, countless people are asking how to help the victims and not only how to help catch Kony.

This is what matters most to me: 30,000 child mothers and fathers, now raising children that came from rape in the bush, make northern Uganda one of the most traumatized places on earth. There is crushing poverty, terrible PTSD, and unbelievably high suicide rates. Traditions, the bonds of family and community, were all compromised by years of captivity and then IDP camps enforced by the Museveni government. The issues are not simple. There are many additional good NGOs working to help the people of Uganda recover.

The Trauma Healing and Reflection Center in Gulu, or THARCE-Gulu is one such NGO. Gulu was the epicenter of Kony's war in Uganda. THARCE-Gulu includes on its staff two former child soldiers who have risen from "victim" to "survivor" then "thriver." They are assisting others to rebuild their lives. Programs to assist with earning a living, developing everyday coping skills, building strong families, and finding ways to creatively express their experiences and take from them their terror, are all part of what THARCE does.

My mother Judy Dushku, a 40+ year African politics professor and historian, is our fearless president, and a number of our family members and close friends, including my boyfriend Rick Fox make up the board and we travel to Gulu to work closely with our staff on the ground. We have done some extraordinary and powerful work over the last three years and have numerous ambitious goals for the future.

You are invited to go to the website www.tharcegulu.org and contribute today. Augment what Invisible Children is doing -- reach out to those who are courageously rebuilding northern Uganda. Click on the "Donate" button on the website and use your PayPal account or to make a credit card donation. Donations by checks made to THARCE-Gulu, Inc. may be sent to Gulu (P.O. Box 261, Gulu, Uganda) or to Boston (P.O. Box 52557, Boston, MA 02205).

While the hunt for Kony goes on, the people in Gulu desperately need your help now. It might go without saying, but please "retweet" and "share" this piece.

Angelina Jolie's desire for a family is what allegedly destroyed her second marriage to hubby No. 2 Billy Bob Thornton.

"Mad Men" has always been set in the '60s ... but what if it wasn't?

The first new photos from Season 5 (two-hour premiere airs Sun., Mar. 25, 9 p.m. EST on AMC) were released today, and we were immediately looking for any clues about what year the show would be set in this season. The show, as we've known it, kicked off around 1960 and took us on a journey with the Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce ad gurus through 1965, where the Season 4 finale left off.

So why is there a LIFE Magazine from March 1954 on the coffee table in the Season 5 cast photo? (You can see the full picture and zoom in on our gallery here and below.) Is someone in the office just a big Rita Moreno fan, or is the show doing a "what if" season and taking us back in time? The cast did tell The Huffington Post that this season felt like Season 1 again ... is it because they're playing different sides to a totally different story?

Here's a side-by-side of LIFE's March 1954 cover featuring actress Rita Moreno and a close-up of the "Mad Men" coffee table magazine, flipped right-side up:

We know that SCDP is still intact (see it on the doors and on Joan's file in the other gallery photos), Bert Cooper is back and they're all still looking fabulously vintage -- and incredibly fresh-faced -- but beyond that, the details are pretty murky. The one thing that's for sure: The show's props and wardrobe departments are insanely vigilant about keeping everything true to the time period. Maybe they're just messing with us ... ?

We haven't seen a second of the new season, so these are just fun, eagle-eyed guesses, but what do you think? Would you like a flashback season of "Mad Men"? Maybe one where Don Draper was still just Dick Whitman? And maybe he was never married to Betty? Would Pete and Peggy even be old enough to work in advertising in '54?

Look at the full gallery of Season 5 pictures here:

Joy Behar tells us how to answer the age old question: "What do you want to be when you grow up?"

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John Mayer has officially canceled his upcoming tour and is going on an unexpected indefinite hiatus.

In the last few years, a number of celebrities have moved from the silver screen to smartphone screens: They've had a hand in founding (or funding) some of the best-known companies in tech.

Facebook, Foursquare, Skype and Myspace are just a few that have benefited from the creative and/or financial help of a well-known celeb.

But what's the impetus for these stars to step from behind the mic or screen and into the tech-funding spotlight? The reasons vary greatly from person to person, but, at least for actor and angel investor Ashton Kutcher, it's all about technology's potential to change people's lives.

The "Two And A Half Men" star, who has invested in more than a dozen different companies, told TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington in September of last year:

I really think that, like, technology probably has the greatest potential to accelerate happiness, of most things in the world....Everybody sort of looks at investing and, you know, for me, if I don't make any money, but what we deliver people -- love and happiness and connectivity and friendship and health and whatever it is, their education, whatever it is that we can deliver that ultimately leads to people's happiness -- I'm fine losing my money, if that's the case.

To discover what other celebrities, from Justin Bieber to Will Ferrell, have tried their hands at scoring big in the tech world, flip through the slideshow below. Make sure to let us know: Which celebrity were you most surprised to see on this list?

Dear Maria,

It's your lucky day! You have no idea what you have gotten yourself into! Ha... only kidding. Or am I?

I've been a lucky guy, partnered with some fantastic ladies in the past, and this year is no different. All my partners have brought a different quality to the table. They have all been different ages and different personalities, but one thing they have all had in common is the drive to prove something to their fans and the audience, and mainly to prove something to themselves.

Even the most confident have a sense of insecurity that drives them to be better. It is an incredible process to see the most inexperienced partner become confident in their abilities. I take huge satisfaction in showing my partners something that they never thought they could do, and then a month later they are not only doing it but owning it. Seeing that light go on when everything starts to make sense is amazing to witness.

Unfortunately, the audience doesn't get to see the first weeks of rehearsal, where I believe the majority of the transformation happens. It's like going from Bambi on ice to actually dancing full routines with all the bells and whistles. It's great to be a part of this transformation and see the process build a personal confidence that makes them feel stronger than ever before. It really is so rewarding for both my partner and me, and I can't wait to see it happen with you, Maria. You are going to shine.

When I first heard you were going to be my partner, I was completely stoked. You have incredible energy and are full of life. Some may even say you are a bit of a looker. I hadn't noticed. (Just kidding!)

I think the way to the trophy is to establish a good partnership from the beginning. Training is rough, and a lot of people may not know the level of seriousness and intense practice that goes into perfecting a routine. I know you understand the focus it takes and are an incredibly hard worker, so I am not worried about it. I can't wait to show the fans the behind-the-scenes video from our practices on DerekHough.com. We will show them where the real magic happens: with the embarrassing falls and your hilarious laugh. Where does that thing come from?

It's going to be tough. Your muscles will ache, you will get plenty of bumps and bruises, and you may even cry (this actually sounds really awful). But I can't tell you how excited I am to see your face when the music stops and we have completed our first official dance together. I envision it looking like a 10-year-old who was just told they're going to Disneyland in the morning: simply ecstatic. I love your energy!

So let's do this thing. Bring it on, Jack Wagner, Melissa Gilbert, Donald Driver, William Levy, Sherri Shepherd, Katherine Jenkins, Gavin DeGraw, Martina Navratilova, Roshon Fegan, Jaleel White, and Gladys Knight!

Here is to a fun, bright, exciting new season of Dancing with the Stars. And let's remember what this show is all about: good old-fashioned entertainment!

Rough and tough out!

Derek

"Where is Lesotho?" my friend asked me as I was sorting through my mail.

I held the envelope in my hand, staring at the smudged postmark that read "Maseru, Lesotho." As I opened it I imagined the worst. Lesotho, a landlocked kingdom surrounded by the nation of South Africa, has faced one of the world's fiercest HIV/AIDS epidemics. Last year, more than one in five adults in Lesotho was HIV-positive, a statistic that has ravaged families and filled orphanages across the country. I imagined that the letter was from a grad school classmate or global health colleague, informing me that the situation in Lesotho was getting worse.

I couldn't have been more wrong.

The letter, written by a young woman named Limakatso Mokobocko, filled me with hope. It was a testament to why we can create an AIDS-free generation: the power and commitment of youth.

Limakatso is an on-air radio host for the Silk-ee^TM female condom program, an initiative operated by PSI, Johnson & Johnson, and the United States Agency for International Development to empower young women to protect themselves from HIV and unintended pregnancies. Her letter recounts, in painful detail, the horrors inflicted on her country by HIV, by gender inequality, and by cultural taboos that prevent young women from asking simple questions about sex that could save their lives.

Limakatso's letter (transcribed below) was not a cry for help or a statement of defeat. Rather, it was a call to action, one that started when Limakatso looked in the mirror and asked, "What can I do?" It's a question I asked myself when I learned that half of all new HIV infections every year around the world are among people under 25. And it's a question that millions of young men and women across Africa -- and the world -- are answering with their actions.

Fed up with watching a disease squander their generation's future, young people are breaking down communications barriers. They are talking to their friends, their families, their boyfriends, their girlfriends, encouraging them to ask questions, protect their health, and pursue their dreams. They are saying, "Enough."

This summer the International AIDS Conference in Washington D.C. will include thousands of youth voices from around their world. If the global community is serious about creating the first HIV/AIDS-free generation by 2015, we need to listen to young people and respond to their needs.

And we need to do it now.

Please read Limakatso's letter:

Dear Ashley,

I just finished reading your book, All That Is Bitter & Sweet. Your book inspired me to share the story of my own country.

Of course, it is hard to compare Lesotho with many of the places you describe in your book. I mean, what can compete with the horrors of forced prostitution in Cambodia or sex slavery and trafficking in India? Those heartbreaking stories ultimately made me feel, perhaps naively, that we here in Lesotho have a lot to be grateful for.

Walking around Maseru, you might find it quiet and orderly. But in a country where 23% of adults are living with HIV, the third highest in the world, this calm surface only hides a pandemic that is wreaking havoc on families -- leaving behind orphans, widows and extreme poverty. Women are especially impacted by the HIV epidemic in my country. HIV prevalence jumps dramatically from about 8% to 40% as women transition from adolescence to womanhood. As a Mosotho woman, I remember the joy and optimism of my youth and it pains me to think about this next generation of young women are faced with a disease that robs them of their youth and shows no sign of retreat.

In Lesotho, it's very common for people to have multiple sexual partners -- a problem that is now one of the biggest drivers for HIV. The situation is so bad that most people do not think it is possible to be committed to just one person. At the same time, many girls in Lesotho often start having sex with older men -- who promise to help them pay for food, books, or clothes. Together, these problems have infected many young girls with HIV.

In our culture, young girls and women are powerless to insist on condom use and are forbidden to talk openly about sex. In reading your book and learning how you've used your position to confront similar issues, I came to realize that few people in Lesotho have the courage to address our issues head-on.

In your book, you talked about how the contributions of every person are important and improve all of humanity. I couldn't agree more, which is why I've recommitted myself to speaking out more about the issues that affect women in my country. I am currently the on-air radio voice for PSI/Lesotho's young women's program, which is called Silkee. I took on this role about the same time that I was reading your book and your words inspired me to use this forum to lead important discussions about sex, condom use and the rights and responsibilities of young Basotho women. In this way, I am trying to live up to your words by making my small contributions to improve all of humanity.

Sincerely yours,

Limakatso Mokobocho

To read more about other young men and women like Limakatso making a difference in the fight against HIV/AIDS, please read the latest, youth-focused issue of Impact Magazine.

NEW YORK -- Meryl Streep is fresh off her Oscar win for playing Margaret Thatcher. But she had an entire theater at Lincoln Center wondering if an even better role for her would be a political icon closer to home: Hillary Rodham Clinton.

The question arose as Streep paid a glowing and affectionate tribute to the secretary of state at the Women in the World summit, an annual gathering of prominent women leaders and unsung heroines from across the globe that closed over the weekend.

"This is what you get when you play a world leader," Streep said Saturday, hoisting up her best-actress Oscar for "The Iron Lady."

"But if you want a real world leader," Streep continued, "THIS is what you get!" Clinton strolled onstage at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts' David H. Koch Theater, and Streep enveloped her in a hug.

The three-day summit, now in its third year, is organized by Tina Brown, editor in chief of Newsweek and The Daily Beast. Besides Streep and Clinton, feminist icon Gloria Steinem and former secretary of state Madeleine Albright, Brown harnessed the star power of Angelina Jolie, who came to read the words of Dr. Hawa Abdi, a Somali humanitarian facing danger from Islamist rebels there.

Also given star treatment was International Monetary Fund chief Christine Lagarde, who delighted the delegates at dinner Thursday when she suggested that the financial crisis might have been averted, or at least been much less serious, if more women had been at the helm of financial institutions.

"If Lehman Brothers had been a bit more Lehman Sisters ... we would not have had the degree of tragedy that we had as a result of what happened," Lagarde said.

She added that recent studies have shown "what the level of testosterone in a given room can produce when you do trading."

Many global problems were addressed by the dozens of panels attended by some 2,000 delegates each day. But a constant undercurrent was an issue at home: the debate in Washington over women's reproductive health care.

Clinton and other speakers referred, obliquely and not, to conservative radio commentator Rush Limbaugh's insulting remarks about law student Sandra Fluke, who came under attack after she testified to congressional Democrats in support of their national health care policy that would compel her Catholic college's health insurance plan to cover birth control.

The 2011 Nobel Peace Prize winner Leymah Gbowee, of Liberia, was the most blunt, saying women had been too passive: "Where are the angry American women?" she asked.

From Liberia to Egypt: Panelists discussed whether the Arab Spring risked becoming an Arab Winter for women, who were central to the popular uprising but now fear being marginalized.

"Tell people there is no spring without flowers and there is no Arab Spring without women," said Dalia Ziada, Egypt director of the American Islamic Congress.

Other popular lines of the weekend included the definition of "glass ceiling," from Jane Harman, the former California Democratic congresswoman: "It's actually a thick layer of men."

How do you puncture that layer? Kah Walla, a political leader from Cameroon, spoke of empowering women across Africa but added that in the United States, too, the level of female representation in politics was a serious issue.

"Every woman here needs to be involved with getting a woman elected," she said.

The opposition leader in Israel, Tzipi Livni, of the Kadima Party, spoke about the nuclear threat from Iran. But she said she would not engage in what she called "megaphone diplomacy."

"Maybe that's something men do," she quipped.

And Steinem had a good line – speaking on a panel about women leaders, moderated by Facebook chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg, she speculated on why some men feel uncomfortable with females in power.

"The last time a lot of powerful guys saw a powerful woman, they were 8," Steinem said. "They feel regressed to childhood by a powerful woman."

Yet men played a role in the summit, too, perhaps none more eloquently than Imam Demba Diawara, a village chief from Senegal. In a powerful discussion of the practice of genital cutting, Diawara, whose own family members had endured the procedure, spoke of how he had gradually come to understand that cutting was dangerous and sometimes fatal. He said he had since visited 378 communities to convince leaders of his view.

"By 2015, we will see the end of genital cutting in Senegal," he predicted.

The conference came to a more lighthearted end with Streep, who spoke humorously of the similarities she shared with Clinton.

They're roughly the same age, she said. They both have two brothers. They both had spirited, big-hearted mothers. They both went to women's colleges and then to graduate school at Yale.

"But there our two paths diverged in the wood," Streep noted, concluding that "I'm an actress, and she's the real deal."

Clinton arrived to deliver a call to arms for women around the world to get involved in effecting change. But not before expressing relief that there was one movie Streep had never made.

"I'm just glad she didn't do a movie called `The Devil Wears Pantsuits,'" quipped Clinton, mixing the title of a Streep film with her favored style of clothing.