I hope this story will inspire you to join me in urging the House of Representatives to pass the Violence Against Women Act: In 1983, I was a victim of rape at gunpoint. My rapist had already raped four women in my community, I was his fifth victim. He has never been captured. At the time, I was a single mother of a five-year old daughter and attending a local community college. The Violence Against Women Act initially strengthened federal penalties for repeat sex offenders, mandated that women don't have to pay for their own rape exams, and helped communities develop law enforcement units dedicated to violence against women. This Act has been allowed to expire, which is totally unacceptable. GOP members of the House need to stop blocking its re-authorization immediately!

I have been employed at McDonald's since November 5, 2011. I have had to work long shifts on three different holidays: Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Years Eve. They do not offer holiday pay at all. I worked for minimum wage on all three of those holidays and did not get to spend any time with my family. I think it's a travesty of justice that a billion dollar corporation cannot at least pay their employees holiday pay. What then is my incentive to want to work on those special days?

Texas is the 51st out of 51 in services for the Mentally Ill. We need funding for Mental Health Services and Affordable Housing.

Megabanks that were too big to fail gambled with the American people's deposits, lost, and then demanded an American taxpayer bailout. We need to separate deposit banking from investing banking once and for all to ensure this can't happen again.

In the next few months the Republican congressional minority are threatening to hold our economy hostage and threaten the trusted status of U.S. Treasury bonds to undermine Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid as well as public investment in our future and refusing to raise much needed revenues. This blackmail will hurt us all if president Obama fails to stand up to them. Their success would destroy our future.

Fraudulent lawsuits are a $5 billion industry and it continues to grow. One in 11 people will be sued in the next 12 months.

Putting Paul Krugman's head on the trillion dollar platinum coin if it is minted.

For the future of the planet, we must address my petition. We must melt all the guns down . Start with the first and end with the last, no matter how many die until this is accomplished. Include tanks, ammunition, warships, drones, shotguns, rifles, handguns and all weapons that can be used to kill babies.

A courageous nominee needs our support to be confirmed.

The Republicans in the House of Representatives are again threatening to default on our bills that Congress has amassed. This rule simply raises or lowers the debt ceiling to accommodate the spending and revenue levels approved. This would remove the chance of a downgrade in America's credit rating and help keep promises already made.

Nate Silver said it best: the people creating these visualizations "are journalists in addition to being programmers and/or graphic artists: the goal is to communicate complex information clearly and accurately, and not just to make something cool or pretty. There should be a Pulitzer category for this stuff."

In the days following the Sandy Hook shooting tragedy, the NRA offered no reasonable solutions for our national gun violence crisis. And now, a coalition of gun groups have organized a day to honor guns. The deaths of thousands of Americans from gun violence is no joke. NRA, Gun Appreciation Day is offensive and wrong, and you need to condemn it!