From My Soapbox

March is the designated month to honor women and they should be and not just the month of March or Mother's day, but every day. We are indeed slowly making our way to having equal rights. At the present time, we appear to be moving backwards now that the Republicans are in office. Sometimes I wonder where their brains are or if we now have a recession in the intelligence of the people in this party. At one time I was considered a Republican and I will admit I had a one-sided view on many things. However, the Watergate scandal of Richard Nixon cracked my cosmic egg and I began to see another view of the world. I bless him and his cronies for the evolution of my mind.

I really can't blame it all on the Republicans as we also have a few pea-headed Democrats. The House just pass a bill to ban Planned Parenthood. Women are the ones who suffer from this as well as the potential of banning abortions. As I recall, medical funds for abortion are becoming very limited. I have often wondered how there can be such limited pea-headed brains and this is both men and women who think that an abortion kills a living fetus and is a crime. Have they every considered that there is no difference between aborting a fetus and raising children only to have them go into the military and be killed or maimed for life? Somehow, there is an imbalance in this crippled thinking.

Speaking of crippled thinking. The following is pretty scary. "Tea Party favorite Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minn., has unveiled a plan for cutting $400 billion in federal spending that includes freezing Veterans Affairs Department health care spending and cutting veterans’ disability benefits. Her proposed VA budget cuts would account for $4.5 billion of the savings included in the plan, posted on her official House of Representatives website." And this from a woman. Shame on her! Having been married to a career military man for 23 years who spent 2 tours in Vietnam, I can tell you that being affected by the Agent Orange does not produce health. He died with the side-effects.

I often think of the geat women who fought for women's rights to vote. Women such as Elizbeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott who were the first to approach this. It took Alice Paul, who with other women picketed the White House, "In 1913, Paul led a march of eight thousand participants on President Woodrow Wilson's inauguration day. (Half a million spectators watched; two hundred were injured in the violence that broke out.) During Wilson's second inaugural in 1917, Paul led a march around the White House." President Woodrow Wilson ordered her to be taken to jail where she and other women were subjected to many indignities and brutal treatment. Finally in 1920 the 19th Amendment was passed giving women the right to vote. Unfortunately the Equal Rights Amendment for women has not been passed. It only needs three states to ratify it.

Women who are in politics should be grateful to the women who have gone before them and yet, today we have such women as Sarah Palin who reflects the mindlessness of women. How have we women regressed instead of moving forward?

One woman who should be honored is Marie Curie. She was the first woman to be given a Nobel Prize. First in 1903 for physics and the second time in 1911 in the field of chemistry. From 1903 – 2009, there have only been 41 or 42 women who received Nobel Prizes and the largest number are in Literature and Peace. I don't think it is due to the lack of a woman's ability. One woman who should have been recognized for a Nobel Prize was Rosalind Franklin. James Watson and Francis Crick are credited for discovering DNA and were awarded Nobel Prizes. What most people do not know is that they used Franklin's papers on her discovery of DNA as their basis. The rest is history.

It is up to each individual woman to take a look at her life and decide what kind of a woman does she want to be. Knowledge is power. We do not have to be mental wizards, but we do need to determine our own lives and not allow the political arena to determine what we can and cannot do. It is time to take our power back and to use our voices. Bigotry and prejudices should have no room in our lives. We are here to evolve.

Am I too hard on the men? Perhaps. However, I have three sons who have determined their own lives and I am proud of them. I practically raised them alone because their father was away so much. I also cut the apron strings to allow them to determine the course of their own life.

As we move into the month of March, join me in being a voice for women's rights – each in our own way. Honor those women who have gone before us and choose a future that you want. It is time we move out of oppression and suppression, however it is an individual choice.