Women of the Wall are fighting for the right to pray with equality at the Kotel in Jerusalem. Thousands of girls are sold into marriage each year in India to satisfy family debts. We deplore the abuse of girls and women in countries where it is dangerous for them to walk the streets alone and they are forbidden to be educated. Meanwhile, at home, though not nearly so dramatic, we are ignoring the fact that a woman’s second-class citizens status is being secured through incremental measures. We are walking backward in time to meet that which we protest as abhorrent elsewhere.

Equal Pay Day, April 9, 2013 was used in an attempt to advance the Paycheck Fairness Act that has been on hold or filibustered in one house or another since 2009. Equal Pay Day marks how far into the next year women must work to earn what a man did in the prior year. The Equal Pay Act of 1963 was signed by President John F. Kennedy who declared it the end of the ‘unconscionable practice’ of women being paid less than men are for the same job. Fifty years later, women are still earning on average, 77 cents to the dollar paid to men. Considering that in 53% of households, women are now the primary source of income, we can begin to understand the rise in poverty levels.

Now a further insult is pending. The new proposed guidelines for Family Practice Residents reads, “Residents must care for patients with female reproductive health issues including well woman care. If a FMP has adequate volume of patients with health issues specific to women, this requirement may be fulfilled in the FMP”[1]. This means that training in contraception, family planning and pregnancy options counseling as well as training in performing uterine aspirations, critical to providing miscarriage and abortion care will not be required. Project, if you will, 20 years ahead. Who will be available to provide these medical services when no one has been trained? That is the Idea, isn’t it? Another back door to removing options and subjugating women.

Just as the Supreme Court overturned forty years of precedent by ruling that Lilly Ledbetter should have complained earlier regarding discrimination about which she did not know, this lack of education will willfully deny women first class medical care of their own choosing.  Of course, that is being done already in multiple states where doctors are being told by legislatures what they MUST say to female patients considering a variety procedures.  Yes, medical personnel are given ‘scripts’ with inaccurate medical information which they must recite to their patients.

President Obama righted the wrong in Ledbetter v. Goodyear by signing the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, allowing a person 180 days to file a complaint from the time she learns about the discrimination.  We cannot wait years while medicine walks backward for women. We need to get this right now.


[1] DRAFT OF PROPOSED ACGME Program Requirements for Graduate Medical Education in Family Medicine, http://www.afmrd.org/files/PD%20Toolbox/RC-FM_Handout_2_Draft_Proposed_Program_Requirements_for_GME_in_FM.pdf, 4.23.2013

OCTOBER 30, 2012 (posted originally on facebook)

Posting for those interested in Israel as relevant to their vote:

An Open letter on Israel from the chairman of the senate Armed Service Committee

Dear Friend,

This is the first letter I've ever written in the hope that the "social media" winds take it not just to people I know, but also to people I've never met and to places I'll never see.

I do so because I'm deeply troubled by how the Jewish community is being flooded with inaccurate and sometimes inflammatory attacks on President Obama, claiming that he is not a strong supporter of Israel.

I do so because as a Jewish senator and chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, I feel a responsibility to share what I have personally seen and what I know about Barack Obama and Israel.

As I write this, U.S. and Israeli forces are engaged in a large joint military exercise. We hold these exercises regularly. But this is
the largest joint exercise we have held with Israel, involving over 3,500 U.S. troops, about 1/3 of them deployed to Israel for 3 weeks.

This exercise comes at a critical moment for putting massive pressure on Iran to end any quest for a nuclear weapon.

The joint exercise will dramatize our joint military capability to defend against an Iranian missile attack. The exercise combines U.S. Patriot batteries and Aegis ship radar with Israel's Arrow, Iron Dome and David's Sling missile defenses. These Israeli missile defenses received significant funding by the U.S. and have been strongly supported by President Obama.

As Iran decides whether to try to build a nuclear weapon, Iranian leaders will now have to factor in more than ever that they will not be able to deter a strike against a nuclear weapon facility by threatening to retaliate with their missiles. Iran's leaders can't do so because a retaliatory threat by them or by their allies Hezbollah or Hamas has been degraded by Israel's and our combined missile defenses, as demonstrated by the current joint exercise.

I have seen up close how President Obama has acted in many other ways to strengthen Israel's military capability.


Ehud Barak,
Israel's current Defense Minister and Deputy Prime Minister, recently put it this way:

"I should tell you honestly that this Administration, under President Obama, is dong in regard to our security more than anything I can remember in the past." (July 11, 2012)

Prime Minister Netanyahu himself told the AIPAC Conference in May of this year:

"Our security cooperation is unprecedented. And President Obama has backed his words with deeds."

President Obama has also made clear that he will not permit Iran to get a nuclear weapon. For instance:

"It's my firm belief that an Iran with a nuclear weapon would pose a security threat not only to the region but also to the United States." (November 14, 2011)

"My policy here is not going to be one of containment. My policy is prevention of Iran obtaining nuclear weapons. And as I indicated yesterday in my speech, when I say all options are at the table, I mean it." (March 5, 2012)

Iran must know from the record of President Obama, including his use of force in Afghanistan, Libya, Yemen and Somalia, that he doesn't bluff or bluster.

He is a serious man.
He speaks carefully.
He doesn't flip flop around.
He doesn't throw
words around carelessly.

Iran has seen him act -- his warnings aren't
idle threats.

President Obama has succeeded in unifying the world against Iran with biting sanctions. Those sanctions have done major damage to Iran's oil revenues (they are down by 60% over the last year) and to its currency (the value of which is down by 80% over the last year).

In part because of the respect in which he is held around the world, he has also succeeded in the challenging environment at the UN in preventing unfair damage to Israel at a number of crucial moments, including stopping a UN condemnation of Israel when it prevented a flotilla of ships from forcing itself through its blockade of Gaza.

President Reagan is rightly remembered as a strong friend of Israel, although he led the world's condemnation of Israel at the UN when Israel knocked out Iraq's threatening nuclear facility. I'm amazed how some in our community judge President Obama, who has prevented unfair condemnation of Israel at the UN, by a different standard.

I have seen President Obama act forcefully to protect Israeli citizens at Israel's embassy in Cairo when a violent mob recently came within minutes of reaching and attacking them. Here is what Prime Minister Netanyahu said about President Obama's actions:

"I requested President Obama's assistance at a decisive -- I would even say fateful -- moment. He said he would do everything possible, and this is what he did. He activated all of United States' means and influence -- which are certainly considerable. I believe we owe him a special debt of gratitude."

By any standard, fairly and consistently applied, President Obama has been a proven friend of Israel.

Support for a strong U.S.-Israel relationship has been bipartisan, and it is essential it remain so for our security and for Israel's security. It is harmful to that relationship and to Israel for some in our community to attempt to drive a wedge between the Obama administration and Israel.

I won't comment here on the many other reasons I support President Obama. My goal is to simply express my abhorrence at blatantly unfair, inaccurate and sometimes inflammatory claims that President Obama is not a strong supporter of the U.S. -- Israel relationship, when that relationship is important to U.S. security and to the goal of Middle East peace.

I hope that this effort will succeed in utilizing the internet's ability to have one's thoughts shared broadly. If you believe they are worthy or interesting, please share them with your friends.

Thanks.
Carl Levin