My idea is that we've worked so many years for equality, but the only area where we've achieved equality, with men, is in job loss. We are still 77 cents to the dollar.

The reports that Media Matters have done about sexism in our society and really the mainstream media called Hillary Clinton castrating, they called her the B word, they called her all kinds of horrible things. And I think in a sense that it raised the awareness in our country, so that we can have a national discussion about it.

I would say that the race of Hillary Clinton was very important to this country, because it showed that a woman could win the state, that a woman could raise money. I think that every woman is sitting a little taller, not only in our own country, but I think women around the world watch what's happening in the United States.

We're going to school for higher education in higher numbers, but the numbers still show we're not breaking though the glass ceiling. For every Nancy Pelosi and Hillary Clinton there are millions of women stuck in cement on the floor that are not getting up.

The proposal that men and women should be treated equally under the law is hardly a controversial concept.

When I started working, women were working at 59 cents to the dollar. We got a raise, but it's still unfair. We're still 16 percent of Congress, even though we're 51 percent of the population. We're a low percentage of our CEOs. We're a low percentage of boards and being part of boards.

I was proud to be an original cosponsor of the Violence Against Women Act when Congress passed it in 1994, and was proud to support the previous renewals in 2000 and 2005. These bills always enjoyed large, bipartisan support.

I think in a society where you can't even pass the Equal Rights Amendment, it's very difficult to women make a progress. Incidentally, we are exactly 160 years after the very first women's public rights convention in Seneca Falls, New York, when a handful of women started it all and began the movement to make women equal.

I believe very strongly in paid sick leave.

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.

While men's rights are guaranteed by specific language in the Constitution, women's equal rights aren't mentioned.

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?