Yesterday, Donald Trump addressed the nation for the first time as the Republican Party nominee. While he remains a divisive hatemonger, voters around the country are starting to buy what he's selling—which means that there's a very real chance that we'll be looking at President Donald Trump come November. According to Nate Silver, Trump has a 40 percent chance of taking the White House in November. And, coming out of the Republican National Convention, his numbers are likely to jump up. That means that there's a very real chance that this reality television personality could become our next president—no joke about it. We've been in denial long enough. We now have a little over 100 days to make sure that Donald Trump is not sworn in as our 45th president.

On June 16, the House narrowly failed, 204-216, [1] to ban the transfer of cluster bombs to Saudi Arabia, which has used them in Yemen in violation of U.S. law. [2] The Senate has not yet considered the measure. We know where Illinois Senator Mark Kirk's Democratic opponent in the November election stands. On June 16, Rep. Tammy Duckworth voted to ban the transfer of cluster bombs to Saudi Arabia. [3] Urge Senator Kirk to publicly oppose the transfer of cluster bombs to Saudi Arabia by signing our petition. References: 1. http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2016/roll327.xml 2. http://www.noclusterbombs.org/news/2016/05/28/transfers-ksa/ 3. http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2016/roll327.xml

The Republican National Convention may be over, but with Donald Trump at the top of the Republican presidential ticket, voters are in for a long election season filled with inflammatory rhetoric and blatant lies—unless we take action now. The fact-checking site PolitiFact found that 76% of Trump's statements were lies. And it doesn't stop with him. Earlier this week at the Republican National Convention: - Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions claimed that wages are falling and more Americans are unemployed than ever before in the past 40 years. Both statements are false. - New Jersey Governor Chris Christie claimed that Hillary Clinton tried, for two years, to keep the terror group Boko Haram off the terrorist watch list. This is also false. Terrorist watch list designations are not made by the Secretary of State, and the group Boko Haram was added to the watchlist in 2013. - Florida Governor Rick Scott claimed that our economy is not growing, despite the fact that the GDP increased every year since 2010. The list goes on, but one thing is clear: without reporters holding these Republicans accountable, they will continue to tell lie after lie in their bid to win back the White House. Without on-air fact-checking, these mistruths are corrected in small print, sometimes days later, which means that viewers may never hear the correct information. That's exactly what Donald Trump and his cronies are counting on. Our media must do better by its viewers and all voters.

Transparency and accountability are what we should aim for within the Democratic Party. It's time to have Democratic Party leadership which is elected for the people, and by the people. Let delegates, alternates, and standing committee members elect the Democratic Party leadership, including the National Chairperson, the five Vice Chairpersons, the National Finance Chair, the Treasurer, and the Secretary.

In the 1870s, the grandfather of the modern political cartoon, Thomas Nast popularized the donkey as the “part and parcel” symbol for the Democratic Party. The Democratic symbol of the “donkey” first appeared in the noxious presidential election of 1828, when a print portrayed democratic nominee Andrew “Old Hickory” Jackson as an unruly jackass. However, rather than rebuff the label, Jackson embraced the drawing, and channeled the “donkey” on the stump depiction. Fast-forward to 2016, and the removal of Andrew Jackson from the front of the 20$ bill planned. In Adolph Hitler’s attempt to exterminate the Jews he modeled his prison camp system after the US Indian Reservation system. Andrew Jackson coined the issue as the “Indian problem.” Jackson, in his tyrannical advocacy of Indian removal as his core mission, had opponents in Congress claiming his concept of an “imperial presidency” would ultimately destroy what the founding fathers had envisioned. And now, similar to the inane Pokemon Go, a scavenger hunt released by the 2016 Host Committee for the DNC “Donkeys Around Town,” a game for people to play on their smartphones through an app is being marketed. "It did come out of my fertile and overactive mind, but it had some rational basis," said former Gov. Ed Rendell, chair of the Democratic National Convention's host committee, at a news conference announcing the donkeys. According to Rendell, "I thought, what a great idea to have 'Donkeys Around Town.' [We] want this to be a great convention for the Democratic Party and its nominee, but we also want to make it a great convention for the people of Philadelphia." The objective is simple; find the DNC Donkeys to win prizes, while being further disenfranchised from democracy. The same Ed Rendell who took to the New York Daily News op-ed page back in 2013 with a message to local officials: stop worrying and learn to love fracking. Rendell invoked his own experience as a Democratic governor who presided over a fracking boom. Rendell argued for embracement of the nation’s “fracking revolution.” He rejected what he called the “false choice” of “natural gas versus the environment.” What Rendell’s passionate plea failed to note was this: since stepping down as governor in 2011, he has worked as a paid consultant to a private equity firm with investments in the natural gas industry. Let's not be associated with these jackasses, and let's ditch the donkey. Respectfully, Eric Sterling IL-16 CD Pledged Delegate for Bernie Sanders

I am sick of the corruption that pervades our lives. We are always asked to vote for the lesser of two evils. If there is no profit, ever, the American people have a better chance of true representation. Keep politicians working for the people. No gifts or considerations at all from special interest groups, including but not limited to high-salary jobs or consultancies, from campaigning through public office and until the end of their working lives.

Shutting down the Carroll County Farm will result in a loss of services and revenue (jail inmate employment, hay and wood sales income, produce income and offsets to the cost of feeding nursing home population, income from county water customers served by the farm, maintenance performed such as mowing and plowing, etc.). The money saved on salaries will fall far short of cost of contracting for services lost, revenue lost -- to say nothing of the social benefits and the benefit to local agriculture.

Several speakers at the Republican National Convention have been reinforcing the falsehood that undocumented immigrants are more likely to commit crimes, playing to the GOP's xenophobic agenda to "build a wall." There is no data supporting their false claims. In reality, research has shown that undocumented immigrants are less likely to commit crimes than native-born citizens. (1) If this misinformation goes unchecked, this kind of racist, anti-immigrant rhetoric can turn into immigration policies—like Trump's wall—that will hurt communities of undocumented immigrants, break up families, and fuel further division and distrust in our country. These speakers have a national stage, and leaders with the authority and platform to correct these mistruths must step up to do so. Tell Rachel Maddow, Anderson Cooper and other reporters covering the RNC to help counter the anti-immigration rhetoric that affects more than 11 million people in the United States with this simple truth: undocumented immigrants are LESS likely to commit crimes, including violent crimes, than native-born citizens. (1) "The Criminalization of Immigration in the United States," American Immigration Council, July 2015 http://www.immigrationpolicy.org/special-reports/criminalization-immigration-united-states

Republican Congressman Steve King started the Republican National Convention by making a case for white supremacy. In the days after, the Republican leaders have continued to define the RNC with racist attacks and fearmongering. Iowa senator Joni Ernst insisted there is an ISIS presence in every state in the country. Rudy Giuliani, the former mayor of New York City, said in his speech that Syrian refugees are harboring militants. Even President Obama's religion was called into question. None of these claims are true. But the established theme of the GOP's message to "Make America Safe Again" is based on racist and false misinformation. The National Hispanic Leadership Agenda, a coalition of 40 Latino groups, called the party out for racist and offensive speeches happening throughout the convention. The coalition points out that American citizens are much more likely to commit violent crimes than undocumented immigrants. Not only that, the American members of the Soldiers of Odin, a national white supremacist organization, are in Cleveland celebrating Donald Trump's nomination. And while it's no surprise that Donald Trump has been silent about the rampant racism—including the anti-Semitic comments in the convention's livestream chat—happening in Cleveland this week, other Republican leaders should stand up and condemn these divisive attacks.

The Democratic Party is about to hold its national convention—and now is the time to end superdelegates once and for all. Without a massive change, these insiders could overrule the voices of voters. The party's "superdelegates" system means that insiders could have a voice as loud as the pledged delegates from the District of Columbia, 4 territories, and 24 states combined. That's why progressive organizations and voters are coming together to demand an end to the superdelegate system. Voters should decide. The system undermines representative democracy and means that the electorate is not necessarily decisive in determining who will be the Democratic nominees for president and vice president and dilutes the voters’ say over the party’s platform and the rules under which it operates. The system also undermines the Democratic Party's commitment to gender equity. While the party’s charter rightfully mandates that equal numbers of pledged delegates be male and female, a near super-majority of superdelegates are men. And while the Democratic Party prides itself on its commitment to racial justice and the racial diversity of its ranks, the superdegelates system appears to skew the party away from appropriate representation of communities of color: Proportionately, approximately 20% fewer of this year’s superdelegates hail from communities of color than was true of the 2008 and 2012 pledged delegate cohorts, or of the voters who supported President Obama in those years’ general elections. And the system failed to represent young voters. In recent years, America’s younger voters have overwhelmingly supported Democrats. The party’s own charter lays out broad, noble principles – including fair representation and gender equity. It's time for the delegate system to reflect those principals. We urge members of the Rules Committee to introduce, demand a vote on, and support language that reflects our shared values – and if needed, issue a minority report in support of such measures to be taken to the floor of the convention. We encourage all delegates who believe that the will of the electorate should reign supreme to support these efforts.

Shutting down the county farm will result in a loss of services and revenue (jail inmate employment, hay and wood sales income, produce income and offsets to the cost of feeding nursing home population, income from county water customers served by the farm, maintenance performed such as mowing and plowing, etc.). The money saved on salaries will fall far short of cost of contracting for services lost, revenue lost -- to say nothing of the social benefits and the benefit to local agriculture.

No matter how careful you are about what you eat, your food could be loaded with toxic chemicals called phthalates. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is considering a petition, filed by Earthjustice and several partner organizations, asking the agency to withdraw its approval of all 30 phthalates currently allowed as food additives. Please tell the FDA that phthalates don’t belong in our food. Phthalates (pronounced THAL-ates) are a class of hormone-disrupting chemicals that have been linked to severe genital birth defects in baby boys and to other reproductive health problems. They’re also linked to deficits in child IQ, developmental delays, and other learning disabilities. It’s hard to avoid phthalates because they’re used in many of the materials that come into contact with our food—from the plastic gloves that food workers wear to plastic equipment used in processing food to the plastic packaging our food is sold in. Phthalates leach out of these materials and seep into our food, ending up in all of our bodies. Despite powerful scientific evidence of the harmful health effects of these chemicals, the FDA still allows the use of 30 different toxic phthalates as “food additives,” meaning that they can be used in food-handling equipment and food packaging. Please tell the FDA to keep toxic phthalates out of our food!