• "From the beginning, the family lacked men, specially adult men, and always had an excess of women, particularly surviving women, even in periods when it was provided with male heirs." (Corbier 179; spelling mistake in text)
• In any aristocratic marriage, whether for the imperial family or not, women quite often served as "VEHICLES OF POWER"; they were typically betrothed at birth and married soon after the onset of puberty--age 13-15. If they were married later, it was because they were "being saved for a precise relative" (Corbier 182).
• after the Julio-Claudian women had served their purpose, they were often permanently dismissed, either through exile, murder, or remarriage outside of the imperial family. Another way to ensure that the wrong woman would have another child was by refusing requests for her to remarry (Corbier 187).
• Augustus' family, the Julio-Claudian line, lasted for six generations--over 100 years--this is impressive given all the stuff going on for those poor people. Thus, before one tries to make fun of those "crazy" women and the ends they apparently went to, one should first take note that nearly all verbs referring to ancient women are in the passive--quite often, they did not have much of a choice in who they married or in what situation they found themselves in: "The Julio-Claudians did not hesitate to eliminate those who could, potentially, produce rival legitimate heirs" (Corbier 186).
• Augustus himself was somewhat of a hypocrite; he divorced his previous wife Scribonia (Julia's mother) for her "'moral perversity'--her refusal to tolerate one of Octavion's mistresses" (Balsdon 68). Obviously Livia, his next wife, was more appealing. Since rumor had it that he enjoyed deflowering young ladies, she always kept a ready supply on-hand (Balsdon 68). At least he probably wasn't asking Livia if he could keep another mistress...
• In Augustus' "On Increasing the Birth-Rate" speech to the senate during his morality campaign, he borrowed a censor's  statement from 131 BCE:

If it was possible to live without wives, gentlemen, we should all save ourselves that bother. But Nature has ordained that, while life with them is not easy, life without them is quite impossible, and so we must act with a view to our lasting well-being, not to the pleasure of the moment. (Balsdon 78)

One would hope that this may clarify any general questions remaining about the status of most Roman women--according to men, that is.