We want Illinois legislators to ask the question, "shall recreational marijuana be legal in the state of Illinois for adults 21 and older?" on a state-wide referendum.

For years, the University of Pittsburgh Environmental Law Clinic has helped residents in Southwestern Pennsylvania get the legal representation they deserve when pollution threatens their health, their home and their community. But now, our legislators in Harrisburg want to prohibit any funding from the state to support this critical service. Whether it's taking on illegal dumping of fracking wastewater, helping citizen facing damages from coal mining, contaminated drinking water supplies or other pollution sources, the Pitt Law Clinic provides free legal help to people facing these and many other environmental problems. If the legislature does not believe that people of modest means are deserving of representation, it has abandoned its constituents to stand behind industry and the wealthy.

The U.S. Supreme Court has exceeded its mandate under the U.S. Constitution to adjudicate--not create--legislation. We, the PEOPLE have the right to govern ourselves in America. We need to get the power back into the hands of the people through our ELECTED representatives.

To protect the future of my children and yours. To keep American workers from having to compete with nations like Vietnam, where the minimum wage is just 56 cents an hour.

I am starting this petition because our money has been stolen and Social Security is always being attacked and threatened, when in reality, if no money was ever taken from it to begin with, there would be NO problem with it!

Gregg Abbott is disgracing Texas. He is a bigot. He is a moron. He needs to go.

The SEC is one of the financial watchdogs that was too often asleep at the switch in the years leading up to the disaster of 2008-09. It needed an injection of backbone then, and, sadly, it still does. The President will be announcing new nominees soon. Please join us in urging the White House to steer clear of “revolving door” corporate and Wall Street insiders, and find nominees who will help the SEC become the tough and effective rule-writer and watchdog that we need.

The news is out - Chris Christie will announce his candidacy for President this coming Tuesday. But none of us are surprised. In reality, Chris Christie has been running for President for more than a year. In 2014, the Governor of New Jersey spent a total of 137 days out of the state, more than a third of the year. And the cost of his security detail to NJ taxpayers now well exceeds $1 million. New Jersey won't accept a Governor who refuses to make his job here at home a priority. And let's be real - running for President is no side-show. Chris Christie should resign the Governor's seat this Tuesday when he launches his official campaign for the Republican Presidential nomination. Christie simply cannot do his job as Governor while he's flying around the country running for President. And there's something else that is deeply disturbing about Chris Christie running for President while he's simultaneously charged with leading our state. Chris Christie is making urgent, critically important decisions that affect our state and our families based on what the conservative Republican primary voters in Iowa and South Carolina think and want. As long as our state is facing multiple crises - a lagging economy, billions in unfunded pension obligations, a depleted transportation trust fund with no money to repair crumbling bridges (to name a few) - we cannot accept a Governor who will not put New Jersey first. Will you add your voice to the chorus calling on Presidential Candidate Christie to resign? New Jersey deserves a Governor who puts the needs of New Jersey families first. Christie can't possibly run for President and continue on as Governor. He should resign this Tuesday

A few days ago a subcommittee in the House of Representatives approved a bill to underfund The Corporation for National and Community Service. If this legislation is approved by the Full Committee it will likely go to the floor of the House for a vote, from there to the Senate and then finally to the President. If this bill is actually passed into law then AmeriCorps NCCC will be completely underfunded and will cease to exist. So let's take a second and list some quantifiables from NCCC during the year 2014. -removed 1,179 acres of brush/undergrowth to prevent fires -helped to construct 281 houses with Habitat for Humanity -assisted over 17,000 homeless people -over 24,000 at-risk youth I can't even begin to explain how much of an impact NCCC has made when it comes to disaster recovery services. Two examples I can think of are Hurricane Sandy and Hurricane Katrina. This is just a small portion of the impact that AmeriCorps has had in the past year. These numbers aren't even covering what Americorps State/National and Americorps VISTA has done. Not only does Americorps serve local and national communities but they also serve its members. They do this by building and developing leaders, guiding people on the right path and exposing individuals to life experiences and lessons that they may have never gotten if they hadn't joined. I have served two years with Americorps and I am about to serve a third year starting this august. Learning about this bill has made me upset beyond anything. Americorps has changed my life and helped mold me into the person I am today. All I ask is that you stand beside me and help prove to those in the House of Representatives that don't realize how much of an impact Americorps has made throughout the United States in the past twenty years.

As a product of Mexican immigrant grandparents, we are affected by the defaming words of Donald Trump. Mexican, Latino, or not we need to ban together as the human race to show Trump his racist antics will not be tolerated.

Southerners of all backgrounds are generally a proud group. Home is generally important to southerners. Yet, all people native to the southern region need and deserve a fuller and accurate paradigm about how they think of themselves, how they think of each other, how others think of them, and a new and positive symbol to represent that paradigm. The confederate flag does not speak for me and many others native to the south. I have long wanted to see the confederate flag only in museums as an artifact of history. I have also long thought that a new flag, a new symbol of home, that unifies the diverse people in the southern region would be healing and valuable to the region's social psychology and to the country's social psychology. I believe that a cultural commission that is diverse and representative of the South's historical and mutually influencing diversity would be a positive experience for the region and the country especially if covered by the media (C-Span, PBS, et al.) for which the goal is to identify an informal regional flag that represents the distinct and shared gifts from the southern region.

SCANDAL AT THE CIA Do you know that the FBI is covering up the scandal surrounding Ex-CIA Director David Petraeus’s resignation from the CIA? I know because I have first-hand knowledge of the situation. The real reason David Petraeus’s affair with Paula Broadwell was exposed was because someone high up in the CIA wanted to get rid of him because he was not a career CIA man; he came from the military and they were afraid he would investigate them for crimes they were committing against me. The crimes that have to do with me include wiretapping my telephone lines and my internet. They have been doing this for the past several years now. By intercepting my communication, they were able to figure out how I made a living on Amazon.com. They were subsequently able to prevent me from selling the goods I was selling and put me out of business. I went to the FBI about this but they never even conducted an investigation or had a sit down face-to-face meeting with me. And because I went to the FBI, the CIA poisoned and killed my Aunt – Geraldine Valentine – by giving her MDS (a blood disorder). The person responsible for doing all this is Rolf Ackermann (http://rolf-ackermann-namibia.over-blog.de/). He is a former agent for the BND – Germany’s foreign intelligence service. He has also had a career as a journalist and a novelist. We met online. He has had someone high up in the CIA do these things to me and my family. Help me put a stop to what the CIA is doing to me and my family. Remember all the information Edward Snowden leaked to the media and to the public. So don’t go thinking this cannot happen. It is happening. You can do me a huge favor and expose the CIA and FBI for covering it up. Contact the FBI at 212-384-1000 and at 202-324-3000 and ask them why they are covering up what Denise Dow reported to them at least a half dozen times already. If you want to find out the real reason behind David Petraeus’s resignation and the crimes the CIA has been committing, you have to put pressure on the FBI to investigate. So call the FBI at 212-384-1000 or 202-324-3000 and ask them why they are covering up what Denise Dow reported to them. Denise Dow Queens, NY Would you help me file a case against the CIA?