The recent and anti-immigrant rhetoric spouted by some of the Republican presidential candidates is deeply disturbing and unacceptable. Rather than promoting inclusion, many Republican candidates, such as Donald Trump and Jeb Bush, are fostering racist and xenophobic fears towards Latinos, Asian-Americans, and immigrants. This is creating a hostile and dangerous climate for immigrants and people of color, as evidenced by the recent beating of a homeless Latino man by Trump’s supporters. The Republican Party must stand for tolerant dialogue on these and other issues affecting Americans.

During the first Democratic presidential debate, CNN journalist Anderson Cooper challenged Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders about his supposed “electability” issues in this way: “The question is really about electability here, and that’s what I’m trying to get at. You — the — the Republican attack ad against you in a general election — it writes itself. You supported the Sandinistas in Nicaragua. You honeymooned in the Soviet Union. And just this weekend, you said you’re not a capitalist. Doesn’t — doesn’t that ad write itself?” [1] Anderson Cooper is showing his pro-Empire bias by trying to re-write the history of U.S. foreign policy in Nicaragua on the side of the Empire. Millions of Americans “supported the Sandinistas in Nicaragua.” In 1979, the Sandinista National Liberation Front overthrew the US government-installed Somoza dictatorship in Nicaragua, promising to address Nicaragua’s extreme poverty and the lack of basic government services like education and health care for the majority of the population. In 1982, Nicaragua was recognized by the World Health Organization as the third world country that had made the most progress in health care. Under the Reagan Administration, the CIA organized a terrorist army (the “Contras”) to attack the Nicaraguan government. Millions of Americans participated in a solidarity movement to oppose US military intervention in Nicaragua, including public radio host Ira Glass [2], actors Ed Asner, Mike Farrell and Diane Ladd, civil rights leader Julian Bond [3] and engineer Ben Linder, who was killed in a terrorist attack by the CIA’s army. [4] The US-Nicaragua solidarity movement succeeded in passing the Boland Amendment in Congress, cutting off US funding to the CIA’s terrorist army, which led the Reagan Administration to try to fund the Contras illegally through arms sales to Iran. When this illegal arrangement was exposed, it became the Iran-Contra scandal. [5] Challenge Anderson Cooper to provide evidence for his unsubstantiated claim that having opposed the CIA’s illegal war against Nicaragua in the 1980s is a political liability in the United States today by signing our petition. References: 1. http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/14/us/politics/democratic-debate-transcript.html 2. http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/378/transcript 3. http://www.csmonitor.com/1984/1123/112357.html 4. http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1996/09/23/in-search-of-ben-linders-killers 5. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boland_Amendment

This television show is one of the all time most dreadful things in existence. The fact that humans actually indulge in torturing innocent animals is bad enough, but to glorify it by creating a mock competition is unredeemable and repugnant, comparable to the mass slaughter of Christians and Jews and all the disenfranchised throughout history.

Too often, unauthorized gun buyers are able to sneak past background checks; this is because background checks are conducted by fax machine, voice mail, and email. Too many straw purchasers are arming inner city gangs; they do this because we have no data analytics on bulk purchases (nor do we analyze who habitually reports bulk gun thefts). I have no faith in the Congress to pass meaningful gun legislation. Thus, it is up to the Executive branch to manifest change via legal executive action. The Executive branch has been tasked with conducting background checks, and have been blessed with a budget to execute these laws. It is well within the legal purview of the executive branch to implement these tools. It would take a big effort, but at least its possible. Legislative change, sadly, is not. We need to modernize the system anyway; it is no longer the 1990's. Let's stop talking about banning guns, and start banning fax machines instead.

Our health is at stake. Leaf blowers are deleterious for many reasons: the horrendous noise, the carcinogenic emissions, and, the stirred -up particulate matter. There is a reason why many communities around the country are banning leaf blowers, and, not other landscaping equipment. In November, 2015 the Newton Aldermen will be voting on an ordinance to limit the use of leaf blowers. It is crucial that citizens sign this petition and write their Aldermen, now!

Texas A&M is changing, and sometimes those changes happen too quickly. Such is the case with Cain Hall. Moving student services to West Campus creates considerable distance between students and the help many of them need to successfully matriculate through A&M. Students in crisis can't get a counselor without travel; physically disabled students must travel on buses to reach accommodations. This means that our more vulnerable populations are at risk. And we ask President Young to refrain from moving these offices until new on-campus accommodations are built or found.

When this petition is signed by 100,000 people I will deliver it to my representatives in the Senate. Senator Ben Cardin and Senator Barbara Mikulski.

As the mother of two elementary school children, I believe that schools should remain gun free zones. Weapons do not belong in the classroom, concealed or otherwise. Guns on schools premises, other than on trained law enforcement officers, allow for a greater chance of an unintentional or accidental shootings. Vote NO on Senate Bills 442 and 561!

I am a human rights lawyer who represents immigrant and refugee children. Following last year's "surge" in families and children seeking refuge in the U.S., the Obama Administration increased funding to Mexico to step up arrests and summary deportations of Central American refugees so as to prevent them from reaching the United States. As the New York Times and the Guardian have recently reported, Mexico is carrying out these deportations in wholesale disregard of its obligation under international law not to return persons to countries in which their lives are at risk. The United States must stop funding Mexico's deportation program until reputable international bodies determine that Mexico is complying with its obligation to provide asylum to those fleeing horrendous violence.

I am starting this petition because Big Money has stolen our government. Big Money controls the political agenda infused with propaganda as legitimate dialog while disregarding the priorities of a nation desperately in need of honest debate and solutions to its many problems.

A woman was jailed for 30 years for an act of a man, who served only 2 years for the same act. This needs to stop. This is currently the law in too many (29) states and they are called "Failure to Protect" laws. In 7 states, LIFE IN PRISON can be a sentence for a woman for a man's violence.

Residents of the small town of Franklin, NY are the latest eminent domain victims of the natural gas pipeline companies. This will be the fate of many more small communities across the state and the nation. Please watch our YouTube video. CUT AND PASTE THIS LINK: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXbPhy8Gh2Y and sign a petition to Governor Cuomo to enforce the Clean Water Act to stop the pipeline from using eminent domain for corporate gain.