Congress has 5 days scheduled before the Sep. 30 budget deadline to avoid a government shutdown. But some Republicans won't even negotiate unless Obamacare is defunded — and they're using the deadline to gain leverage. We need Rep. Latham to prioritize expanding the middle class during the budget debate. Unless we act quickly, he may join with Republicans like Rep. Paul Ryan and support more cuts to education, healthcare, and other vital services.

I am a nurse at Northside Medical Center. As a nurse, I care deeply for my profession and for my patients. I take pride in the care I give patients and am proud of the reputation Northside has because of the work I do as a nurse. We’ve been working without a contract for 15 months. Northside and Community Health Systems, the for-profit corporate owner of the hospital, have proposed terms that could undermine my ability as a nurse to speak out in the future about issues including safety and patient care. And I’m very concerned that CHS proposals could lead to rationing of nursing care at the hospital. Nurses deserve a fair contract, fair pay and the right to advocate for the safety of patients and their caregivers. We went on a one-day strike yesterday because negotiations were not moving along and we needed to bring attention to our concerns. But today, when we returned, we were locked out. They have paid strikebreaking nurses taking our place in the hospital. We provide our patients with award-winning, quality care: How can out-of-town nurses match our record? Northside management is keeping me and my colleagues out while letting in nurses who have 24hrs of experience at Northside: who would you rather have caring for you and your family? If we have enough people speak up and sign this petition, Northisde will have to listen. Nurses deserve a fair contract, fair pay and the right to advocate for the safety of patients and their caregivers.

As families have lost their ability to put food on the table or send their child to Head Start, Congress has time and time again refused to pass a bill that supports the middle class. With a Federal Government shutdown looming, we need to let Virginia Congress members know that Virginians should be their first priority, not corporate interest. By closing corporate tax loopholes we could generate enough revenue to keep programs like SNAP and Head Start well funded and get the American economy back on track.

Congress has 6 days scheduled before the Sep. 30 budget deadline to avoid a government shutdown. But some Republicans won't even negotiate unless Obamacare is defunded — and they're using the deadline to gain leverage. We need Rep. Lamar Smith to prioritize expanding the middle class during the budget debate. Unless we act quickly, he may join with Republicans like Rep. Paul Ryan and support more cuts to education, healthcare, and other vital services.

Congress has 5 days scheduled before the Sep. 30 budget deadline to avoid a government shutdown. But some Republicans won't even negotiate unless Obamacare is defunded — and they're using the deadline to gain leverage. We need Rep. Mike Coffman to stop playing games and stand with the middle class during the budget debate. Unless we act quickly and hold him accountable, he and other House Republicans will keep proposing more cuts to education, healthcare, and other vital services.

Congress has 5 days scheduled before the Sep. 30 budget deadline to avoid a government shutdown. But some Republicans won't even negotiate unless Obamacare is defunded — and they're using the deadline to gain leverage. We need Rep. Mike Coffman to stop playing games and stand with the middle class during the budget debate. Unless we act quickly and hold him accountable, he and other House Republicans will keep proposing more cuts to education, healthcare, and other vital services.

Congress has until September 30 to pass a budget and avoid a government shutdown. But some Republicans won't even negotiate unless Obamacare is defunded — and they're using the deadline to gain leverage. We need Rep. Tom McClintock to prioritize expanding the middle class during the budget debate. Unless we act quickly, he may join with Republicans like Rep. Paul Ryan and support more cuts to education, healthcare, and other vital services.

Why individual investors lose all the time? - Company news are leaked to Hedge funds and top financial institutions and major holders of the company - This is illegal and criminal. Company Name: Cycacel Pharmaceuticals This is about Cyclacel Pharmaceuticals (Nasdaq: CYCC) . The company has a outstanding shares of only 17 million and out of which 16 million is the float. Similarly ARNA, DNDN have the same issue. The stock price was at 3.20-3.40 for the last 3 months with an average volume of 350,000 shares. From September 18th to 23 2013, the average trading volume was 3 million and on 20th September, the trading volume was 8 million and more than 5 million was sold short. The price jump in 2 days was from 3.40 to 5.60 and even on the day it reached 5.60 it went down quickly. If this is NOT pump and Dump, then what is PUMP and DUMP? We are filing a case and have copied the US Senators and US house to show that SEC is not taking any action against the Hedge funds and Financial institutions. We believe the following hedge funds are involved in this criminal manipulation supported by the company Board of Directors and Management. Redmile Group, LLC Tang Capital Management, LLC Allianz Asset Management AG Perceptive Advisors LLC Vanguard Group, Inc. (The) Susquehanna International Group, LLP Barclays PLC Invesco Private Capital Inc. Morgan Stanley Geode Capital Management, LLC We also want all major financial institutions who hold brokerage offices to be investigated - including Wells Fargo, Morgan Stanley, Charles Schwab and JP Morgan & Goldman Sachs. And a few Mutual funds maybe involved in PUMP and DUMP and Abusive Short selling Vanguard Total Stock Market Index Fund Spartan Extended Market Index Fund We also filed a case with FINRA and Market Regulators and again no action had been taken so far. We called the company and the company did not reply to our emails and we left a voice to the investor relations and no one had called us back. We, individual investors are constantly creamed by this criminal manipulation and we want a put an end to this robbery. As each and every day passes, the criminal hedge funds are using that opportunity to create huge selling pressure and illegally shorting to keep the value down and force margin calls and profit through illegal shorting. We are planning to submit a high level document with all signatures of shareholders to investigate this manipulation. We DEMAND ALL TRADES ( ALL TRADES) that happened from September 16th to September 24th 2013 to be thoroughly investigated and find out who is behind this criminal shorting/Naked shorting and manipulation. We cannot wait for 2 months or 6 months because in 2 months, the hedge fund companies would have KILLED all individual investors and no one would be left to file a complaint. THIS MUST STOP and WE CANNOT TOLERATE THIS. We urge the SEC chairwoman to take special notice to this complaint or we will have to take this complaint to the higher authorities including the Senate and Congress. We also demand an investigation in to CYCLACEL Board Directors and management and their relations with the hedge funds on this unusual PUMP and DUMP in the last 1 week. We called Cyclacel Pharmaceuticals & sent emails - NO response from them. We believe Cyclacel Pharmaceuticals may be involved in leaking the news to major holders of the company shares and hedge funds. Prior to the press release on Thursday evening, the number of shares traded were very high and the hedge funds involved in shorting knew very well that the company will not release additional news and started DUMPing and shorting shares at 5.60. This is criminal. Why Cyclacel has not released any updates on the RMDS or any other trials? The company is criminally shorted again and we strongly believe the company is working with the major holders in this criminal manipulation. Again the criminal manipulation started from October 2nd 2013. Why is the SEC not investigating all the trades from September 21st 2013? Criminal manipulators are using the govt shutdown to "Naked Short" and illegally short more shares. This NONSENSE MUST STOP SEC TCR1380041819453 ( several complains filed) FINRA: Filing ID: 2238825 (Several complaints to Pat.Clem, FINRA) SEC and FINRA had not taken any action. SHUT DOWN SEC AND FINRA - NO USE INDIVIDUAL INVESTORS ARE TIRED OF LOSING - Mr.President- we don't need words. We need action. The SEC chair person is completely useless. We want the Market regulations- FINRA to be dissolved because Patricia A.Clem has not taken any action and SEC Chairwoman has not taken any action. We are planning to hold demonstrations & give this petition directly to the White house and explain the manipulation.

At $1.5 trillion, Lockheed Martin's boondoggle F-35 fighter plane is the most expensive weapons program in world history. It doesn't work as promised and steals money from urgent priorities. Fat cat Pentagon contractor Lockheed Martin is trying to protect its taxpayer-funded gravy train by pressuring Senator Durbin to keep the F-35 alive. Tell Senator Durbin not to cave to Lockheed's pressure. Senator Durbin has likened the F-35 to a corrupt Wall Street megabank, questioning whether the F-35 is "too big to fail." We'll create more jobs in Illinois and people in Illinois will be better off if we kill the F-35, return the money to Illinois taxpayers, and use the money for Illinois priorities.

Arguing for a drastic cut to the food stamp program (SNAP) Rep. Tim Huelskamp (R-Kan.) had said, "If you're a healthy adult and don't have someone relying on you to care for them, you ought to earn the benefits you receive. Look for work. Start job training to improve your skills or do community service. But you can no longer sit on your couch or ride a surfboard like Jason in California and expect the federal taxpayer to feed you." Here's a message to Rep. Tim Huelskamp from millions of long-term unemployed Americans (including the 99ers and older workers) who are no longer counted in the unemployment rate, as well as the other 11.3 million jobless Americans who are still being counted by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Dear Mister Congress Man Huelskamp: As you very well know, because of very strict "means testing", SNAP benefits are not just given away to anyone who applies for them. Americans who receive food stamps don't have incomes to meet a basic standard-of-living. They either have low-paid jobs, are unemployed, or are elderly (and/or disabled) and rely on a small Social Security income (People such as your friend Jason are a tiny minority). You know all this, or at the very least, you should. Obviously you like to use anecdotal stories from Fox News to back up your arguments and use tainted studies from right-wing think tanks to enforce your ideological beliefs. But please try to expand your intellectual horizons a little more. As a representative of THE PEOPLE, try to see both sides of the food stamp debate. As for most of us, we did earn our food stamp benefits --- many of us have worked and paid taxes for 30 years or longer before being laid off during the Great Recession. And we have looked for work (for the past 5 years) since the mass layoffs. In case you're incapable of doing simple arithmetic, there still are not enough jobs (and even if there were, would you hire Jason?) And speaking of jobs, how many job bills have you voted for or introduced to Congress, and how many have you voted against? And please, tell us where 11.3 million (counted) unemployed Americans can sign up for job training? Most of the corporations that you represent no longer offer on-the-job training; and any form of government-sponsored job training would only defeat your purpose of "smaller government". You said "improve your skills", but please tell us --- what specific skills do 11.3 million unemployed Americans need to fill 3.7 million job openings? The "lacking job skills" argument has been proven to be a corporate myth to expand the guestworker program to hire more foreigners (for less money) in an already over-saturated job market --- a labor market that already pays stagnant wages. And besides, we already have plenty of skills. College graduates (saddled with debt) and those with advanced tech and engineering skills, are still working at places like Walmart and McDonalds (if they're lucky). Either that or they're unemployed. And if people like you and others hadn't allowed for the outsourcing of all our good-paying jobs with "free trade agreements" --- and also stopped insourcing foreign workers with H-1B visas --- maybe then we'd have enough jobs for everyone (jobs that paid a "living wage"). And maybe then, all us "takers" wouldn't need any "government hand-outs" from all the other hard-working Americans who were lucky and managed to keep their jobs. Also, most of us do not ride surfboards. And we also don't "expect" that you personally would have to feed us (just like we don't expect the churches to bail out the big banks) --- but it sure would be nice to eat food after we've exhausted all our resources while looking for all those non-existent jobs that you keep ignorantly babbling about --- jobs that you never helped to create. Instead, you and your ilk repealed Obamacare 40 times! Talk about a waste of time, how moronic is that? Maybe it's people like you who should first be drug tested before collecting your government check. So who's the real pimple on the posterior of our society? Blow-hards like you Mister Congress Man Huelskamp, who receives $174,000-a-year (as a government worker) from hard-working American taxpayers for doing little-to-nothing; or the poor and unemployed people like us, who might only receive a measly $150 a month to eat? And most people who do work pay Social Security taxes on 100% of their earnings (50% of all workers only earn $27,000 a year or less). You however, do not --- your Social Security taxes are "capped", as well as for your wealthiest political donors --- those who earn millions of dollars every single year with capital gains and don't pay any Social Security taxes at all. And they also pay a lower tax rate than does a factory worker who's only earning $40,000 a year in hourly wages. So who is it that's really "gaming the system" --- people like you and your corporate sponsors, or people like us (who are poor) and were forced out of work --- and now need food stamps just to eat? We think it's very repugnant and tasteless that you and your God-fearing Tea Party brethren find it so easy to hurl insults at the abject poor (calling us drug addicts, cheats, alcoholics, liars and lazy), while collecting your "unearned" campaign donations at swanky fundraisers from your "upper-class" supporters --- because if it were not for them, you'd have no class at all. Especially while everybody else is paying for your generous salary, your healthcare insurance and for your congressional expense accounts. And that also includes those who receive an unemployment check, because they too have to pay federal income taxes (depending on their annual adjusted gross income at the end of the fiscal tax year). Mister Congress Man Huelskamp...why don't you do millions of struggling unemployed Americans a really big favor: Either introduce a REAL job bill (without any earmarks, pork, or any other unrelated amendment --- such as more tax cuts for the ultra-rich)...

We want to thank the six council members who publicly supported Measure N--which raised the minimum wage for hotel workers in Long Beach--and encourage them to take leadership to raise the minimum wage at the Long Beach Airport and Long Beach Convention & Entertainment Center.

More than 40 percent of private-sector workers and 70 percent of low wage workers do not have a single paid sick day off of work to take care of themselves or family when ill. In many cases, workers have to make the decision to stay home and take care of a child when sick, or paying bills. No one should have to risk their paycheck and job because they're sick. The city of Tacoma, Washington is considering a new law that will help working people across the country by making sure that all workers have paid sick time off of work to use when sick. Send a message to Mayor Marilyn Strickland and the Tacoma City Council now.