Tag Archives: election

~ 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

~ Culture & History

World’s Oldest Shoe Discovered, Dates Back 5,500 Years


world's oldest shoe brown sheep dung lace-up stuffedYou won’t find this style on Zappos! The world’s oldest shoe dates back 5,500 years. Photo: AP Photo/Department of Archaeology University College Cork
Looks like our ancestors had a little trouble watching their step.

Researchers excavating an Armenian cave have discovered the world’s oldest shoe — a cowhide lace-up encased in a pile of sheep dung, The New York Times reports.

(Ew. We suspect even Imelda Marcos might give this one a pass.)

Tanned in oils from a plant or vegetable and bearing leather eyelets for its laces, the right shoe reportedly pre-dates Stonehenge, the Egyptian pyramids and Joan Rivers.

“These were probably quite expensive shoes, made of leather, very high quality,” Gregory Areshian of the Cotsen Institute of Archaeology at the University of California, a lead scientist on the project, told the paper.

The shoe is estimated to date back to the Copper Age, around 3653 to 3627 B.C., and would fit a woman (or petite man) with a size 7 foot, according to The New York Times.

Scientists told the source that the shoe appears to have been deliberately preserved, with grass stuffing and yellow clay lining keeping its shape intact. (Nice to know ancient gals were as shoe-obsessed as we are.)

“You can see the imprints of the big toe,” another team leader, Ron Pinhasi of Ireland’s University College Cork, told the paper.

“As the person was wearing and lacing it, some of the eyelets had been torn and repaired.”

The discovery was reportedly made after the National Geographic Society-funded researchers found other artifacts, including horns, pottery, and something doctoral student Diana Zardaryan thought felt like “an ear of a cow.”

“But when I took it out, I thought, ‘Oh my God, it’s a shoe,'” she told the paper. “To find a shoe has always been my dream.”

Ah — a woman after our own hearts!

So who was this Copper Age Carrie Bradshaw? We may never know… but it makes for one heck of a good, old-school Cinderella story.

In other shoe news, read about this government-funded “Sexy Heels in the City” college course.

by Erin Donnelly