Who is still Voting for Kasich? And Why? OR Kasich, the Contradictions and the Campaign Continue

John Kasich, current Republican Governor of Ohio, is still campaigning for the Presidency. He has somehow convinced himself and those in his immediate circle of staffers that there remains a plausible as well as possible way to the White House. Reliance on the remote possibility of a brokered convention is not a political strategy of any merit or substance. In fact, the argument can be made that such poorly spun strategy disenfranchises or at least marginalizes those who fall victim to this unique form of folie a deux, so often seen between conservatives and their candidate. The campaign continues more for the hubris of said candidate than to effect change or influence the national conversation. Kasich's campaign calculus is rooted in fiction much more than it is in fact. This scenario then begs the question--Who is still voting for him? And why is anyone, irrespective of party affiliation, supporting his campaign?
Kasich is against paid maternity leave; opposes the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA); opposes equal pay for equal work; and is governor of a state which has yet to pass into law any legislation against female genital mutilation (FGM). And arguably the most nonsensical, contradictory part of this candidate's composite is that he is father to twin daughters.
Recent studies show that less than one-third of working women in the United States are employed by companies that offer paid maternity leave. In addition, 40 percent of the Nation's labor force remains ineligible for the paid leave mandated by the Family and Medical Leave Act. Consequently, women who are either the sole or primary wage earners for their family have a vastly reduced or completely evaporated income should they become pregnant and take leave to deliver. When Kasich was in Congress, he voted against the FMLA not once but twice. Apparently, Governor and Candidate Kasich is either too arrogant or too inept or a combination thereof to ever imagine either of his daughters being single mothers or working mothers or mothers. Because if he did, the following series of sentences would never have been spoken in response to a reporter's question regarding paid maternity leave: The one thing we need to do for working women is to give them the flexibility to be able to work at home online...The reason why that's important is when women take maternity leave or time to be with children, then what happens is they fall behind on the experience level, which means that the pay becomes a differential. Besides the fact that his response is barely coherent and makes absolutely no sense either economically or sociologically, somebody keeps voting for this man and electing him to office. And even more frightening is the fact that in the US, Kasich is considered an educated man. An educated man votes against legislation that could only benefit his daughters, their future children, their future families? An educated man believes that his daughters deserve to earn less than a man for the same work? An educated man does not see female genital mutilation as a human rights violation?
Again, Governor Kasich does not support equal pay for equal work, nor does he support the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act. This is demonstrated by the gender-based disparity in pay among those employed by his campaign. For example, the average salary for a woman employed by the Kasich presidential campaign is $55,300, with a  median salary of $44,900; while the average pay for a man employed by his campaign is $60,700 with a median salary of $60,000. Of the ten highest paid Kasich campaign employees, nine are men.
Only 23 states in the US have specific laws against female genital mutilation, despite the remote and recent passage of Federal legislation proscribing the practice. Ohio, the state to which Kasich is governor, does not have legislation prohibiting FGM practices nor does it have legislation prohibiting parents, grandparents, legal guardians, from taking girls out of the country for the purposes of female genital mutilation. The World Health Organization recognizes four types of FGM: Clitoridectomy, total or partial removal of the clitoris or prepuce; Infibulation, the most radical form of FGM in which there is removal of all external genitalia and the vulva is stitched closed; Excision, partial or complete removal of the clitoris and the labia minora, with or without concurrent removal of the labia majora; Other, all other procedures, practices done to female genitalia for a nonmedical purpose.
FGM is performed for several reasons: to control a woman's sexuality, i.e. maintain virginity before marriage and fidelity during; to increase a girl's eligibility/attractiveness for a marriage match and ultimately make her more accepted within her ethnic/religious community; and as a traditional rite of passage. According to a January 2016 survey conducted by the US Department of Health and Human Services, more than half a million women in the US have either been subject to FGM or are at risk for an FGM procedure. Internationally, female genital mutilation is recognized as a form of torture and extreme violence against women and girls, and is a human rights violation. It is performed without benefit of anesthesia, anesthetic or analgesia; it can and often does cause sepsis, infection, incontinence, miscarriage, hemorrhage, as well as birth and pregnancy complications. It is also a cause of neonatal and maternal death.
Maybe, Governor/Candidate Kasich doesn't believe that Republican girls have these parts and could never be caught in a scenario where they or their daughters could fall victim to FGM. As a physician, I feel compelled to inform Mr. Kasich that Republican girls, in fact all biological and some not so biological girls, are endowed with this anatomy and can be subject to FGM if not granted legislative protection. In Ohio, according to the Population Reference Bureau, 24,320 women and girls are at risk for FGM; 12,079 are under the age of 18 years, while 12,241 are older than the age of 18 years.
In fact, women are vulnerable to all sorts of equal rights violations and indignities when legislation is not put into place to offer protection and deterrence. By choosing to exclude women from such considerations as equal pay, paid maternity leave and protection from female genital mutilation Kasich squarely disqualifies himself from consideration for President of the United States, as he does not feel an obligation to advocate for more than 52 percent of the population, women--a special interest group to which three members of his immediate family belong.

Please reference: law.cornell.edu, equalitynow.org, theslot.jezebel.com, dispatch.com. npr.org, prb.org

Female Physicians Earn Less than Male Physicians

In a profession as seemingly as objective as medicine, gender-based discrimination is alive and well. Any physician, irrespective of specialty or gender can testify to the significant sacrifices required to be accepted to, navigate and finally graduate from medical school. The debt is nothing short of overwhelming. And if the newly minted physician had any graduate degrees prior to his/her admission to medical school, that debt remains and invariably complicates post-graduate financial existence.
This next statement may sound incredible but please persevere--Male and female medical students are charged the exact same amount/rate of tuition per year of medical school education. One's cost of tuition is, to my knowledge, not based on the presence or absence of certain gender-specific organs. That being said, why then has it become accepted throughout the world of physicians to pay women less than their male counterparts? Even after residency, loan repayment schedules are not based upon projected earnings for each gender. Financial expectations, as regards loan obligations, tuition obligations, etcetera, are constant across the board. There exists no uterus-friendly clause that offers a reduced rate of interest to female med school grads and residents.
However, before we all rush to implicate motherhood, two-income households, and this mysterious desire for part-time employment so many partially informed critics have assigned to us, as female physicians, let's examine the numbers.
The existence of gender-based pay-disparity is not a new or novel economic phenomenon. For more than a few decades, American society has compensated female employees at a rate of about 79 cents for every one dollar earned by a man. For female physicians and surgeons this disparity is closer to 62 cents for every one dollar earned by a male colleague. Recent surveys and several well-crafted studies have found that female physicians, irrespective of specialty, make on average $168,000/year; for male physicians, that figure is much closer to $200,000/year. When distilled further, mid-career female physicians, again irrespective of specialty, earn between $12,500 and $15,000/year less than their male counterparts; when these figures are extrapolated over a projected 30-year career--women, as physicians, earn $350,000 less than male physicians. This very significant gap does not account for all of the financial potential and opportunities lost which are irrefutably contained in a figure as formidable as $350,000.
At first blush, the aforementioned salaries for both male and female physicians may appear substantial enough to afford a certain immunity to internecine criticism; in that, the very weightiness of a physician's income, when compared to the yearly salary of the primary school teacher or factory worker neutralizes any call for equity among the genders. Many men and non-physician women have been overheard more than once to comment, "How much money does she need?" "She's a doctor, she'll always make enough money." "Her husband is probably a doctor too." The best and most simple response to this variety of commentary is by way of extant legislation, i.e. the Equal Pay Act of 1963, Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009. Equal pay for equal work is not a complicated issue--two workers that perform comparable job duties with comparable responsibility, having completed all requisite training, certification and licensure are to be paid the same hourly wage, receive the same percentage of reimbursement with comparable benefits and insurances.
This disparity will only be brought to an end within the field of medicine when female physicians-- academics and clinicians alike--find the strength and necessary courage to challenge and ultimately silence pay discrimination. I truly believe if we needed to accomplish something this seemingly Sisyphean for our patients, it would've happened years ago.

Please reference: eeoc.gov, mobile.nytimes.com, todayshospitalist.com