Sonar used for military technology negatively affects whales and other aquatic mammals. This includes: strandings, illnesses, and even death. This can potentially hurt our aquatic ecosystems.

THIS PETITION WILL BE PRESENTED TO EVERY NEW YORK REPRESENTATIVE AND EVERY SCHOOL DISTRICT IN NEW YORK WHO HAS NOT TAKEN STEPS TO PROTECT OUR CHILDREN’S PRIVACY. We, the undersigned concerned citizens, have taken the step of writing this open appeal for action to all of our elected representatives (federal – state – municipal) because our children are our future, they are not a commodity to be used and sold to corporations and private investors. When public education accepts private funding, there is a price tag and that price tag is called influence. The impending collection of personally identifiable student information by school districts, its storage on corporate Internet accessible data cloud servers, particularly its transfer by the state education department to inBloom, Inc. and its various corporate partners without parental/student knowledge, permission or review, violates the letter and intent of The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act of 1974 (FERPA). The Electronic Privacy Information Center brought an action against the Department of Education. U.S. Representative John Kline, Chairman of the House Committee on Education, rebuked the action and requested that Education Secretary Arne Duncan not proceed with the revisions but instead work with the Congress to remove impediments to effective education through legislation. The Department of Education failed to do so. On October 23, 2013, U.S. Senator Edward Markey wrote Education Secretary Duncan seeking explanations for the purpose and potential implications of the revisions. The critical questions posed in the civil action and congressional queries remain unanswered. The Department of Education guidance regarding State Longitudinal Data Systems contains the suggestion that states collect sensitive personal information including: (QUOTE) “political affiliations or beliefs of the student or parent; mental and psychological problems of the student or the student’s family, sex behavior or attitudes; illegal, anti-social, self-incriminating, and demeaning behaviour; critical appraisals of other individuals with whom respondents have close family relationships; legally recognized privileged or analogous relationships, such as those of lawyers, physicians, and ministers; religious practices, affiliations, or beliefs of the student or the student’s parent; or income.” The U.S. Department of Education and inBloom insist that the individual states and school districts determine what data is collected and to whom it is provided. The State DOE and the school district have yet to provide a comprehensive list of data points collected or of the entities that it will be provided to. The NY State DOE is unable to specify what information will be made available to for-profit corporations for data mining, marketing and advertising purposes. The Sachem Central School District engaged college prep website service NAVIANCE by Hobsons, owned by DMGT, and AMPLIFY (formerly Wireless Generation), a Wi-Fi enabled tablet provider, owned by Rupert Murdoch (News Corp). So, who is NAVIANCE? The following excerpts from DMGT’s 2013 corporate brochure are instructive: (QUOTED from their website) Data, especially big data, is becoming far more valuable. Businesses are hungry for contextualized information Applications connect with social networking services as a matter of course And it’s a two-way street. More and more businesses want to provide valuable services to customers to win their loyalty and mine their data NAVIANCE encourages school districts to link social media services to the family page to drive student activity through their service. AMPLIFY’s tablets are pre-loaded with Google applications and entertainment applications. Google’s data mining is renowned. Its revelation in August that users have no expectation of confidentiality of information when using their services is sobering. DMGT’s Chief Executive acknowledged the need to develop hybrid clouds to assuage the sensitive data security concerns of the insurance industry to secure their business and Jeff Bezos of Amazon is building a private Cloud for the CIA. So how can their systems be secure enough for our children’s most personal and sensitive data? The recently disclosed Sachem Central School District data system breaches resulted in the compromise of personally identifiable student information and illuminated the nature of the risk. Childhood is the age of exploration. Indiscretion and mischief are functions of exploration. The effort to digitize and record every youthful activity and communication in perpetuity and share it with third parties is pernicious. Imagine if every one of your youthful indiscretions had been recorded and potentially made available to recruiters, admissions personnel and prospective employers. Might your life have turned out differently? Corporations refer to data as the new oil. Apart from the venality of offering up children to corporate data miners, the unprecedented aggregation of such sensitive personally identifiable information exposes children to exploitation by untold number of bad actors into whose hands the data might fall (pedophiles, extortionists, rival peers, etc.). Childhood is also a period of considerable fragility. The incidence of cyber-bullying and resultant suicides is troubling. Responsible policy anticipates and mitigates such risks. Every other state that contracted with inBloom has honored the concerns of parents, acknowledged the gravity of privacy concerns and cancelled their engagement. New York is the only state that is moving forward in spite of the concerns of its citizens and the surfeit of unanswered questions. More than 120 New York School Districts have opted out of Race to the Top yet Sachem Central School District remains enrolled, expanded the NAVIANCE “college prep” service from high schools to the middle schools and intends to issue News Corp owned Google loaded Wi-F...

I believe Flickr can compete with Photoshop one day even have there own hand hend Flickr cam. Poeple just have to believe and stop crying that they are moving forward not still, look what happened when they sat still reaping all the money and fame, there is this little company called Google that came around and well lest just say stole there base and double that.

This petition is to make aware and disassemble the entanglement of the unethical and immoral relationship between Monsanto and our United States government. We the people stand in solidarity to remove capitalist member's of our government who are involved in the largest corporate conspiracy in our nation's history. We the people choose to not be led by a government who's agenda does not protect it's people as is our right. We stand to hold accountable member's of both parties who have neglected their responsibilities as representatives to the people. The sickness and death's this corporation's agenda is causing and this government is allowing, will not stand. Our declaration of independence states we have the right when a government becomes destructive, to alter it as this country belongs to us!

Don't lead us down a path that could lead to another senseless war in the Middle East. This is not the time to play Russian roulette with American foreign policy in Iran. The Stakes are high for the United States to remain steadfast in its efforts to give diplomacy a real chance of success. Placing more sanctions on Iran will not solve anything, it will only continue the stalemate and will delay true reconciliation for decades and will hurt the Iranian people through years of senseless suffering. Failing to promote diplomacy with Iran will hurt the American people. Another major Iraq style war will create a meltdown of the economy. http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2013/09/attacking-syria-or-iran-would-destroy-the-american-economy.html

My husband is a person with a disability: an amputee.. We have a NYC DOT Handicap Tag, we went to Yonkers Raceway and parked in the handicap parking spot at the casino. When we returned to our vehicle we had a $230 dollar ticket issued because we parked in the handicap with a NYC HANDICAP TAG and were found guilty because we were not residents of Yonkers(Though it did not specify Handicap parking for Yonkers residents only). Persons with Disabilities should be able to Park on any NYS casino grounds even if they are not residents of that City.

Solar and wind power have seen an explosion of growth in recent years, due in large part to tax credits. Tax credits for solar give individuals and business incentives to install solar panels. The Production Tax Credit for wind gives investors an incentive to install wind turbines. These credits have helped wind and solar energy become mainstream technologies that create jobs and move us closer to a clean energy economy. But unless Congress acts by December 31, The Production Tax Credit will expire. We are already seeing the impacts of climate change here in the U.S. and we are running out of time to take action. Transitioning to a clean energy economy powered by renewable energy is essential to avoiding the worst impacts of climate change. Unfortunately Congress threatens to undermine the progress that has been made by letting this essential credit expire. We simply can't afford to pass on a chance to gain a competitive edge in the energy economy of the future. Tell your senators not to let critical funding for renewable energy expire on December 31.

Punished while doing what the law allowed in a legal business. At the most critical point of my jury trial and suffering from anxiety attacks, I took a bottle of prescribed sedatives in front of the trial judge who stopped the trial and resumed minutes later. Hugo badgered me to plea by saying I would get forty years to life because my business was not legal. Hugo set up my business as my business attorney. Since then my business was proven to be legal and Hugo stole all the business records as I was led away. Years of requesting their return through the North Carolina State Bar Hugo promised to return my records several times and failed to do so. This prevents me from proving actual Innocence of charges of illegal business and to clear my name. Whoever paid Hugo to throw my case must be caught.

On May 19th, 2013, my 5 year old daughter was sexually assaulted by a 13 year old neighbor. We have an afadavit from his mother that he had previously done this to his 7 year old step sister. He will do NO time. I believe its time to get this age lowered!..Most 12 years old know what sex is. Society has changed. I want to empower my daughter, and even though we live in a bad world, we can all make a difference somehow, someway,

If you want to invest in the future, you must invest in the future generation. 10,000 Millennials turn 21 every day, totaling 95 million of the U.S. population. By 2015 they will make up the majority of the American workforce. Millennials make up 30% of the LGBT population. Further, 39% are people of color, and over 75% are socially networked, and vast majorities support the Dream Act, marriage equality, fair labor standards, and access to education. These voices are diverse, abundant, and educated, but are not being represented in our politics. If you want to move the country forward, you must have progressive leadership. We know investing in young candidates works—over half of members of Congress were elected before the age of 35—but the median age of a Member of Congress has actually risen steadily since 1981 and our current Congress is one of the oldest in U.S. history. Our political infrastructure is risk averse, and it continues to reward politicians who maintain the status quo, rather than invest in a new generation of representatives who will be accountable to our nation's progressive values. We call upon our political establishment to champion young, progressive candidates who will become our nation's future public servants and political leaders. Regardless of party identification, progressive voices need to be empowered. A new progressive generation can lead the way. We ask the Republican National Committee and the Democratic National Committee to adopt policies in their party platforms to recruit and support young, progressive candidates from top to down ballot races.

While useful as a tool for extracting oil and natural gas from the earth, the process of horizontal drilling into unconventional oil and natural gas reservoirs – hydraulic fracturing or “fracking” – has been known to release dangerous chemicals (proppants) into the ground, exposing water supplies to contamination. These chemicals, in turn, pose both environmental risks by causing earthquakes or in the individual level by potentially affecting the brain and nervous system, the immune and cardiovascular system, or even causing cancer in people exposed to contaminated water. While the California Department of Conservation’s Division of Oil, Gas, and Geothermal Resources (“Division”) imposes requirements for the construction of oil and gas wells, it does not require notification to the Division when hydraulic fracturing occurs and a gap exists in the information oil and natural gas companies provide to the Division about hydraulic fracturing operations and steps taken to protect the environment. In an attempt to close this gap, we as Californian’s demand that the Division instill a regulatory process that holds oil and natural gas companies accountable for fully disclosing fracking sites within the state, as well as in providing information to the public about the chemicals being pumped into the earth.

I was arrested and taken to jail in 1997 for braiding hair. The crime was braiding without a Cosmetologist License. Here is the link to my recent case involving unfair laws against braiding entrepreneurs. http://youtu.be/VEbGILPkl8A