We cannot ensure that women will be free of discrimination in the workplace and everywhere as long as women are not universally defended under our Constitution. As it stands now, the equal rights of women are subject to interpretation of law. That is a risk our mothers, sisters and daughters cannot afford.

We need a mayor who knows how to balance a budget, who understands the urgency of delivering all the services that a great city needs, who understand the need of working families.

In my research, I found that since 1979, women have lost the equivalent to one night's sleep due to the pressures of balancing work and family. And as more women have gone into the work force because they have to, and when you discriminate against a woman's pay you discriminate against her children or her husband or her significant other in terms of what the family income is.

Nine out of ten adult Americans have a checking account. It's the most widely used financial services product in the United States.

We have not ratified The Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination Among Women. I think 194 countries have signed onto it, but the United States has not. And CEDAW to the United Nations is what the Equal Rights Amendment or the women's equality amendment is to the United States. I think we should pass the women's equality amendment and a lot of these other fights would go away.

The only way to ensure equality for women is to clearly declare it in our Constitution.

Healthy moms mean healthy families. When my Republican colleagues held a hearing about birth control and refused to include a single woman on the first panel as a witness, I asked, "Where are the women?"