Tag Archives: democrats

~ politics petitions pollution and pop culture

Joshua Northrup via Change.org —


I’m a wildland firefighter, and this year I’ve seen even more budget cuts to firefighters across the country despite the fact that fire season is getting worse.   Wenatchee, WA

Sign my petition to tell Congress to stop cuts to firefighters.
                                                C –

My name is Josh, and I’ve been a wildland firefighter for 18 years. The work I do is hard and dangerous, and when I’m fighting fires, I want to be sure that my crew and I are safe.  But Congress has continued to cut the federal budget for firefighters like me across the country, despite ten states battling large fires right now.

In Washington State’s Wenatchee River Ranger District where I work, we lost a twenty person crew and an engine to budget cuts during one of the worst fire seasons in 50 years. This happened just months before the start of a huge fire which burned more than 45,000 acres.  

Firefighters like me do everything we can to protect people from danger, but we can’t do our jobs without adequate crews and equipment. That’s why I started a petition on Change.org asking Congress and the Administration to stop further budget cuts from sequestration to firefighters across the country. Click here to sign my petition.

Reducing the budget for firefighters guarantees the cost and size of catastrophic wildfires to only become worse. What happened in Wenatchee can and has happened all throughout the country. 

When airline customers were upset about federal budget cuts affecting air traffic controllers and causing flight delays, Congress moved quickly to restore their funding. With wildland fires affecting so many states across the country, I believe a public outcry can push Congress and the Administration to stop cuts to firefighters.

Every summer, tens of thousands of wildland firefighters put their lives on the line to keep communities safe from harm. Join me in fighting for the resources firefighters need to stay safe on the job.

Click here to sign my petition asking Congress and the Administration to stop further budget cuts to wildland firefighters.

Thank you for your help.

Joshua Northrup Wenatchee, WA
~ politics petitions pollution and pop culture

Meet Carl Sciortino


Carl Sciortino, the first congressional candidate we’ve endorsed this cycle, who “comes out” as liberal to his Tea Party father in a new ad.

Over 200,000 people watched the ad so far. The election’s one month away and Carl will be on MSNBC’s Hardball tonight at 7pm!

Watch the ad everyone’s talking about — and chip in $3 to make sure Massachusetts voters see it on TV.

Carl is the definition of a true progressive leader — he supports prosecuting Wall Street bankers, increasing Social Security benefits, passing Warren’s student loan bill, and reversing Citizens United.

His special election is right around the corner on October 15, voters are just starting to pay attention, and he needs our support.

Check out the ad, and donate $3 so Massachusetts voters will see it and elect a bold ally for Senator Warren.

Or, watch the ad and sign up to make calls from your home for Carl before Election Day!

Thanks for being a bold progressive.

— Stephanie Taylor, PCCC Co-founder

~ politics petitions pollution and pop culture

Think Progress … sad realities


NAVY YARD SHOOTER’S TROUBLED PAST DIDN’T STOP HIM FROM BUYING GUNS

FATALLY SHOT FOR ASKING FOR HELP?

YOUR GUIDE TO THIS WEEK’S FOOD STAMPS VOTE

~ politics petitions pollution and pop culture

Don’t Be Fooled


By 

Republicans Try to Force Even More Budget Cuts

The government will shut down in 20 days – just nine congressional work days — unless Congress passes a bill to keep funding it. And while most of the media focus has been on the GOP’s unceasing effort to defund, delay, and undermine Obamacare, Speaker Boehner (R-OH) is plotting another, more hidden plan to lock in damaging and unnecessary austerity for the rest of the year and possibly into 2014.

Boehner has promised that to avoid a government shutdown, he will ask the House to pass a “clean” short-term budget resolution, simply extending current spending levels while a longer-term deal is worked out. That may sound reasonable, but hidden behind Boehner’s deceptive claims are some pretty dirty truths.

First of all, current spending levels are already painfully and unnecessarily low, but Boehner’s plan would go even further and lock in another round of deep cuts to domestic spending.

But it doesn’t stop there. Boehner’s plan actually increases defense spending by $20 BILLION compared to the sequester, while leaving spending on non-defense discretionary programs at unacceptably low levels.

You don’t have to take our word for it. Here’s Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) crowing about the cuts they are trying to force on Democrats and the president:

“In signing a CR at sequester levels,” Cantor wrote, “the president would be endorsing a level of spending that wipes away all the increases he and congressional Democrats made while they were in charge and returns us to a pre-2008 level of discretionary spending.”

Wait, there’s more! On top of all of this, House Republican leaders have devised a convoluted scheme to try and trick rank-and-file Republicans into not shutting down the government over Obamacare while still being able to somehow claim they defunded the law. This “smoke and mirrors” plan is already being derided by the Tea Party and recent polling found that just 6 percent of voters think delaying and defunding Obamacare is the right path forward.

(This final scheme comes on top of a separate GOP demand issued today that Democrats either agree to delay Obamacare for a year or Republicans will refuse to increase the debt ceiling, thus creating a world economic calamity.)

BOTTOM LINE: Republicans have scheduled just 9 days of work in September and aren’t even planning on being here the week before funding for the government runs out. Passing a partisan spending plan with only GOP votes is just another waste of time that makes it more likely that the government will shut down because of GOP intransigence, demands for damaging austerity, or both.

For a detailed brief from the Center for American Progress on how all of this adds up — or doesn’t — click HERE.