Congress is attempting to eviscerate women's health care. Like many women across America I am outraged.

Our government has made a number of promises to the men and women who served in our nation's armed forces. Sadly these promises of health care education and other benefits have existed more in rhetoric than in reality.

I know that it isn't just violence against women it's how do we support ourselves and our families how do we deal with health care for ourselves and our families? It's a bigger picture.

Research clearly shows us that the earlier women think about maintaining their bone mass and take the steps to do so the better their health will be in the long run.

It is important for women to have a choice to have an opportunity to plan their families because if they don't the Republicans have said this is an ownership society. You are on your own and they're going to begrudge that child everything from WIC to a Pell Grant to health insurance.

It is essential that the women's preventive coverage benefit including contraception be available to all women regardless of what health plan they have or where they work - as Congress intended. Providing access to birth control just makes good sense.

Decades ago women suffered through horrifying back-alley abortions. Or they used dangerous methods when they had no other recourse. So when the Republican Party launched an all-out assault on women's health pushing bills to limit access to vital services we had to ask: Why is the GOP trying to send women back... to the back alley?

I do see women voters shifting to the Republican Party and doing so significantly. And the issue that's doing this is the fear the federal government will prevail in making the Affordable Health Care Act permanent law and how that will hurt small businesses.

Half of all women who are sexually active but do not want to get pregnant need publicly funded services to help them access public health programs like Medicaid and Title X the national family planning program.

For most women including women who want to have children contraception is not an option it is a basic health care necessity.

Contraceptives have a proven track record of enhancing the health of women and children preventing unintended pregnancy and reducing the need for abortion.

And whether it is equal pay health care Social Security or family leave this Congress has refused to address issues critical to hard-working American women.

Women's health is one of WHO's highest priorities.

Well you know my number one cause has always been that women's reproductive health needs to be protected.

I am passionate about talking to women about their breast health.

And so to those who suggest that we are somehow 'harming' young women by encouraging them to take charge of their health we say this: We are not harming young women by educating them. We are arming them with information that they will carry with them throughout their lives.

Because we spoke so loudly opponents of reproductive health access demonized and smeared me and others on the public airwaves. These smears are obvious attempts to distract from meaningful policy discussions and to silence women's voices regarding their own health care.

Women's health needs to be front and center - it often isn't but it needs to be.

The idea of making access to safe abortions harder and more expensive and more difficult having to travel across state lines - that puts women's health and lives in jeopardy which is something I think no one wants.

Women are half the population and they know how to take care of themselves if they are only given access to health care.

In the beginning when I sat next to Tom Brokaw on the 'Today' show the stories I was interested in were those having to do with women and children and learning and health. In those days 25 to 30 years ago that was called soft news and not in a nice way.

The dual scourge of hunger and malnutrition will be truly vanquished not only when granaries are full but also when people's basic health needs are met and women are given their rightful role in societies.

I think the number one thing Black women and all Black people should be paying attention to is our health.

It's long past time we started focusing on the solutions that actually keep women healthy instead of using basic aspects of women's health as a tool of cultural moral and political control.