President Obama has the power — and responsibility — to help end the nationwide crisis of police violence and its unjust consequences.
Urge Pres. Obama to issue an executive order directing the Department of Justice to rigorously enforce and expand civil rights law and federal bans on violent and discriminatory policing:
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I want to take this opportunity to wish you and yours a very happy new year. I also want to express my gratitude to you for the political support that you have given to me, and for all of your efforts in trying to move our country and the world in the direction of peace, justice and environmental sanity. As we survey our country at the end of 2013 I don’t have to tell you that the problems facing us are monumental, that the Congress is dysfunctional and that more and more people (especially the young) are, understandably, giving up on the political process. The people are hurting. They look to Washington for help. Nothing is happening.
Clearly, if we are going to save the middle class and protect our planet, we need to change the political dynamics of the nation. We can no longer allow the billionaires and their think tanks or the corporate media to set the agenda. We need to educate, organize and mobilize the working families of our country to stand up for their rights. We need to make government work for all the people, not just the 1 percent. |
My take on failed promises, past present and future, which is what we are all experiencing under the Republican controlled House of Representatives versus change to or redirection of promises that President Obama has had to make on numerous occasions. It is obvious the two situations are quite different. The first two years of the Obama Admin the RTP as we know was spent on the floor of Congress saying no, blocking, making the Democratic Party scale back or run away from legitimate bills that RTP attached felonious amendments to that no member of Congress could in good conscience vote for. Then came the campaign for the midterm election that if you know your history gets few voters out to vote though in what definitely is a first of many first in this Presidency, the midterms were important yet folks did the same ole same, some opted out on purpose and even more voted right of center on purpose. While most know the outcome of the midterm elections, I think that many people do not understand what truly happened. President Obama said he got a shellacked and would try to make a move to be more bipartisan, though senator McConnell said if he wants us to consider compromise he would have to do, say and act like we want him to, essentially bow down to the Republican Tea Party. For the last 4.5 years, Americans have been hearing Republicans say that we need to create jobs. Mr. Boehner and his comrades definitely used the jobs, jobs, jobs slogan to win the House or Representatives. Sadly, these carpetbaggers have been waving one hand in the air while using the other to attack, slash, cut, and burn every effort to get our economy back on track. It may sound dramatic, but it feels as if the Republican Tea Party has wanted to eliminate the middle and lower class since then Senator Barack Obama became President and now I certainly feel our country is at risk with reckless, seemingly uneducated Republican members of Congress.
Contrary to most if not all polls the anger or feelings of distrust and failed promises should be pointed at the way in which President’s govern? It was done poorly for eight years during the house of Bush, because when he took office there was a surplus… Question is, what did he do with it and how do we make sure this cannot happen again lest we talk about in times of American crisis both Political Parties and any entities involved must all come together to fix the issue … leaving ideology at the door!
… Community Organizer and Senator Obama watched from the sidelines, watched, heard, and knew the status quo had to change though we had no financial crisis to speak of things were not as they should be or more importantly not as they could be. The change we Americans need is one that moves all of us into the 21st Century. This effort to change has been misinterpreted in my opinion of one of socialism… folks have to know that our current system is outdated does not represent all of the people and if you are really listening. The Republicans want to go backward to a time when life was good but it was only good for the rich. Then Presidential candidate, Barack Obama had a plan for America. There were some financial issues are brewing, the house of Bush was focused only on the Iraq war, Obama’s ideas seemed far ahead of the other competitors. Americans saw and heard what he wanted to do and agreed, well at least 53% believed a change was needed in the way things are done on the Hill. However, change takes time maybe years. If we had all participated, it could happen sooner with GOP co-operation but as the months passed by there were more rumblings of financial problems and then Senator Obama faced with lots of criticism became the main target and NOT our finances heading toward the ditch. We voters heard or told to ask if Obama was an American, did he pal around with terrorists, could he bring in the vote of not only women but also white women and men on top of it all. I really feel people need to be reminded of when, what, where and who got us into an economic downward spiral. However, weeks went by more and more information is coming out, people notice that there were many layoffs happening, businesses closing up and some notice Bush is less available every day and while the backroom deals made by the house of Bush, McCain tells Americans that our economy is still sound and strong. In what seemed like only a month or few weeks before Americans had to vote for President of the United States. The House of Bush slowly opened the doors of pain and the possibility of our economic collapse. I still want to know why did they wait until the next administration was about to be put into place? Some say there is no such thing as a coincidence.
Wall Street, Main Street, AIG and a lot of Banks Crashed … with the house of Bush and Paulson making back room deals …
The day they swore in President Obama everyone knew there was quite a different Presidency he had walked into than most Presidents. This President has faced one crisis after another and contrary to what “the Media” wants us to feel or believe he has made failed and false promises. I do not believe he has made false promises, he has had to contemplate and change directions, he is still working for all Americans, and I am so proud to have voted for President Obama.
While the forces of the RTP say otherwise, we all need to understand the change, redirecting any and quite possibly all campaign promises if needed. Why? Because our lives have changed, they are more of a challenge now and the elements(theGOP) needed to create a better situation did not play by the rules choosing to sit on the sidelines. The banks flexed their muscles, lobbyists are stood in the way, Republicans/Conservatives cannot accept Obama as our President and have become more than just the party of no, some are trying to provoke fear and hate not bipartisanship, and I keep asking is socialist a code for the n word?
ConservaDems and definitely Republicans are not all in for the change the rest of us believed in want or voted for twice. We need to tell members of Congress! be outraged at the nonsense going on…We need to continue reforming that part of our economy monopolized by parts of Corporate America given the right to do so by folks on the Supreme Court. Vote out the TeaCarpetbaggers for a positive change.
While President Obama did promise change, he has kept over half of them, he also stated that he could not make changes alone … we all would have to participate. That comment is a hard reality given the crap that the Republican Tea Party keeps pulling out of somewhere disguised with them saying they are listening to what Americans want because Americans spoke thus the outcome of the midterm elections. Even if it were true, the promises the Republican Tea Party made before and have been making consistently are epic failures …like I said could put us at risk and as I finish a rant a rumor from twitter states Republicans might be considering a government shutdown. Republicans talk about not wanting big government but they do not deliver on their promise. In fact, they have been practicing failed promises and lies since the 112th Congress started. Mr. Boehner, Cantor and their comrades have failed to offer up a legitimate JOBS bill, failed to create a JOB and of course we can all debate whether that bush bonus giveaway has helped create, save and or stopped any outsourcing of jobs.
I ask the GOP, where and when are the JOBS among many other issues going to be brought to the floor of Congress! and the Epic Failure Promises describes the Republican Tea Party.
Campaign for a Fair Settlement
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Dear Carmen —
Wall Street bankers are stealing hundreds of millions of dollars from our kids every year. [1]
That’s not a misprint. As part of all the financial shenanigans they engaged in that broke our economy, they managed to entrap school districts around the country in “interest rate swaps” that were sold as ways to guarantee steady income for the critical job of educating our kids. Instead they turned out to be massive drains on school budgets, for example, costing Philadelphia $331 million [2] and Chicago $150 million (and another $36 million every year). [3]
In turn, that financial pressure on school districts (exacerbated by the drop in tax revenues from the Great Recession) has opened up opportunities for Wall Street banker-funded corporate takeovers of our public schools. For-profit charter schools, often online-only, have cropped up nationally, siphoning off critical public school investments, short changing our children’s future to line the pockets of private, usually out-of-state, corporations dedicated primarily to the bottom line.
Parents and teachers around the country have been desperately fighting back against this tidal wave of Wall Street-backed education “reform”. They know we need investment in our public schools so that every child has a quality teacher and access to a well-rounded education that includes history, music, arts, PE and vocational training, NOT investment in Wall Street corporations whose motivations have little to do with kids and everything to do with manipulating state regulation to protect their interests.
A key figure in this fight is prominent public school advocate, Diane Ravitch, whose new book, Reign of Error: the Hoax of the Privatization Movement and the Danger to America’s Public Schools, shows how people are fighting back and winning. YOU CAN HEAR AND INTERACT WITH HER LIVE in a forum sponsored by the Our Schools network on Wednesday Oct 16th at 8pm EDT/5pm PDT. RSVP here.
Actor Matt Damon, the son of a public school teacher, says,
“[Diane is] America’s foremost historian in the areas of education policy, she’s a champion of public education, she’s a courageous speaker and she’s a truth-teller.”
She’s keenly aware of the impact that Wall Street’s stolen money and increased investments in for-profit education are having on our schools.
“We cannot have great, education by having one set of publicly funded schools (charters and vouchers) that pick and choose their students, kicking out the losers, excluding students with disabilities and English learners, and operating free of state laws, and a second publicly funded system, required to take all students, including those rejected or ejected by the other system. Great school systems aim for equity, as the Finnish scholar Pasi Sahlberg says, and get excellence.” [4]
It’s time we started getting those hundreds of millions back.
Brian Kettenring, Executive Director, Action for the Common Good
[1] “Riding the Gravy Train: How Wall Street is Bankrupting Our Public Transit Agencies by Profiteering off of Toxic Swap Deals”, ReFund Transit Coalition, June 2012, page 4.
[2] “Too Big to Trust? Banks, Schools, and the Ongoing Problem of Interest Rate Swaps”, Sharon Ward, PA Budget and Policy Center, January 2012, page 1.
[3] http://www.suntimes.com/news/otherviews/19251143-452/amisha-patel-banks-soak-cps-as-schools-close.html
[4] http://dianeravitch.net/2013/10/10/today-the-blog-has-had-7-million-page-views/
Campaign for a Fair Settlement a project of Action for the Common Good
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Impressive.
We’re getting reports from our partners in California that this is how the people fighting for Local Principal Reduction (LPR) in Richmond are describing all the support and media attention that’s been focused on them since that city started using that policy to move towards helping struggling families stay in their homes.
Thanks to the efforts of supporters like you, 20,000 people have signed on to support Local Principal Reduction and over 6500 have signed on to support Richmond, CA, efforts in particular. Activists at the Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment (ACCE) and the Home Defenders League delivered those signatures directly to Wells Fargo branches the same week the Wells CEO, John Stumpf led the charge of the Wall Street criminals in trying to stop Richmond’s efforts by suing the city the week after Richmond announced its policy. Just last week over 200 of you also called Stumpf’s office to tell him to stop suing and start negotiating.
Another thing that’s impressive is how important this support is in fighting back against Wall Street’s bullying of cities like Richmond. The lawsuit isn’t just about stopping Richmond, it’s about stopping ANY city from trying this common sense solution to fixing what Wall Street broke. The more people standing up the more likely we are to win! Can you help find more fighters by forwarding the Stand with Richmond petition with 5 friends? http://www.homedefendersleague.org/stand_with_richmond_ca You can also share it on Facebook here or on Twitter here.
You can also share this great Facebook graphic that the Home Defenders League created about the LPR fight between Richmond and the criminal bankers led by Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf (it’s the one in the picture at the top of the email).
This campaign is really heating up because there’s finally a way to fix what Wall Street broke and it doesn’t have anything to do with coddling Wall Street criminals; its main priority is keeping struggling families in their homes. Naturally, Wall Street bankers are desperate to stop it. If you want to stay up-to-date on these fights, the HDL has set up a special section of their website with information, updates, and ways to take action: http://www.homedefendersleague.org/local_principal_reduction
Thanks for standing up and fighting back in support of Local Principal Reduction!
In Solidarity,
Brian Kettenring, Executive Director, Action for the Common Good
Senator Bernie Sanders
Be a Seed for Change 
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