President Obama has called for economic and political empowerment of women globally. The Equal Futures Partnership promotes removal of policy, legal, and regulatory barriers that hold women back at local, state and national levels.

President Obama has a good sense not just of the economic requisites for financial crisis firefighting but also how you build political support for moving forward on reforming the financial system, making sure that the banks are carrying enough capital.

Here at home, President Obama early on made the connection between growth and economic opportunity for women. In the depths of our crisis in 2009, one of the first laws the president signed was the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act. He established an Equal Pay Task Force led by Valerie Jarrett to help women get paid what they earn.

Women with minimal access to resources and no access to child care have limited choices that too often mean low-wage and part-time labor. In rural communities in the developing world, when women farmers have unequal access to fertilizers or training, their farm productivity lags behind men.

World leaders and, particularly, Muslim religious leaders need to stand up and protect the oppressed.

Chinese companies, in their well-capitalized, rapidly growing, and surprisingly lightly regulated markets, have become global innovation leaders.

Reducing carbon emissions is important, but it is shortsighted if not coupled with reducing the toxic emissions from our heart; and that is something spiritual leaders are supposed to teach and something all thinking people, regardless of their beliefs, should practice.

So I just got on the phone and the engineer just patched me in and I did reports. I'd get a community leader and bring him to the phone, call up the station and do an interview over the phone with the guy.