Being a Congressperson or Senator was never meant to be a career or lifetime position. No one should be supported by the citizens of the US for the rest of their lives for working as a congressperson for 5 years.

With only days remaining until the August 9 recall elections, right-wing groups are on overdrive trying to steal the election with shady and potentially illegal tactics. We have seen numerous accounts of voter suppression and confusion by groups such as Americans for Prosperity, We're Watching Wisconsin Elections and Right to Life.

As President, Bill Clinton signed the Defense of Marriage Act, putting discrimination against lesbians and gay men into federal law. DOMA is terrible public policy. The Obama administration has decided the act is unconstitutional and will no longer defend it in federal court. Sen. Dianne Feinstein has introduced legislation in Congress to repeal DOMA. What better advocate for repeal of this highly discriminatory law than the man who put it into effect? Let's ask former President Clinton to actively join the effort to repeal DOMA.

Greater Glasgow and Clyde health board wants to close the children's ward, at the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Paisley. This would force families to travel with sick children to hospitals in Glasgow, often with poor public transport access. The closure may also have a catastrophic domino effect on other services at the RAH.

Pennsylvania Governor Tom Corbett said that he wants to privatize Pennsylvania's state parks. According to the Philadelphia Inquirer, "Corbett was asked what, besides the Liquor Control Board, might benefit from private-sector control. He replied: 'Prison health care and running state parks.' " We can't allow corporations to control state parks, using them to line the pockets of billionaires. Tell Gov. Corbett to stop selling PA to the highest bidder.

Congressional Reform Act of 2011

US (the United States) needs jobs, at least 8 million of them to put ourselves back to work. We call upon the six major U.S. banks that were saved by the taxpayer-funded bailout to make the American economy whole by funding 1 million public service jobs and funding the Small Business Lending Fund, which is already in operation.

As concerned parents of the Conejo Valley Unified School District, we are writing to enlist your support in cultivating a healthier environment for our children. 72% of the US population is overweight or obese with one in three children overweight or obese. Obesity is the leading cause of death in America after smoking. Unless measures are taken to reduce obesity and improve the health of youth today many may live shorter lives than their parents for the first time ever. The Centers for Disease Control have stated: "Schools may have an ethical obligation to act in response to the precipitous increase in the incidence of obesity among children. Because children are required to spend half their waking hours in school and because they consume a substantial portion of their daily food there, school is a logical focus for efforts to encourage healthy dietary behaviors to prevent obesity and its consequent individual and collective costs...Opponents of school food regulation argue that people have the right to choose the foods they eat. However, we structure and regulate many student activities in the school setting and do not consider doing so an abridgment of children’s rights....For example, parents would rarely serve candy alongside vegetables on the dinner table and expect their children to choose the vegetables instead of the candy. Similarly, school authorities are responsible for offering foods from which the child can select but limiting choices to those that provide nutritional benefit rather than harm." Currently the majority of the food served in the CVUSD cafeterias is processed, re-heated meals which are high in sodium, preservatives, additives, and low in fresh vegetables, fresh fruits, freshly cooked meats, whole grains/pastas, etc. We want to have the staff of CVUSD kitchens to be trained in ‘scratch cooking’ and for fresh food to be purchased and prepared for school lunches (elementary, middle and high school). This approach has been successful at many local school districts (Oak Park USD, Ventura USD, Santa Barbara, and Carpentaria). We want our kids to eat healthy, freshly cooked meals instead of meals consisting of mostly processed food. While salad bars have been utilized in many Conejo Schools it does not undo the damage to our children being served a diet of mostly processed foods. Intervention is needed and we recognize the cost to staff training, which we parents will look to local donations to pay providing the district, cannot find funding for the project at this time. We want the district food service to agree that if training of staff can be funded, that they will in turn agree to fully support the scratch cooking project (buy fresh food, raw commodity foods, and assist and support staff in being adequately trained to produce more healthy meals). We would like outside, professional consultants to assist in menu development, training, and implementation of the new program that will meet the new recommendation put forth by the USDA School lunch program. Please see the other petitions involving healthy changes for CVUSD: http://www.parentsforhealthyschoollunch.com/sign_the_petitions_.html

My petition is about prosecutorial misconduct, malicious and wrongful convictions against the poor, and tax dollar waste in America. My petition is about my son, I, and others. Please read our story. I was falsely arrested, maliciously prosecuted and later convicted because I exercised my 1st Amendment Right to redress government by filing a complaint against the D A and Judge, and putting my story on Youtube, when I was falsely arrested on a felony theft charge. I stopped payment on a check to a bad contractor, whom I overpaid, during the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. The contractor was able access my checking account illegally and get the funds, $7,574. My C U (Pelican State) gave me a forgery affidavit (wrong form) to dispute the illegal transaction. The contractor used this error (forgery affidavit) alledging I said he forged my name. I was arrested and jailed, and place on a $15,000 bond,(Excessive Bail). The contractor never finished the work, was unlicensed to work in Louisiana. No investigation was done by the D A's office prior to my arrest. I was convicted of felony theft, jury trial,(Our Tax Dollars at Work). I was placed on a $25,000 bond (More Excessive Bail) and spent another night in jail. My CU sent a letter apologizing to me for what happened, and to Probation and Parole (Presentence Investigation) after I was admitting, they erred in not stopping pay on the check, and giving me the wrong form to dispute the transaction, and further stated that they had done me wrong. My conviction remained. I was sentenced to 3 yrs. hard labor,suspended sentence 3 yrs. supervised probation@ $50 per mo., $10,251.46 restitution, $1,200 court fees, and 45 days community service. Cruel and Unusual Punishment! I appealed, through the Louisiana Appealant Project. The appeal was denied, (our tax dollars at work). I am now appealing to the Louisiana Supreme Court, (Our Tax Dollars at Work). This was a civil dispute, not criminal. When is it a crime to protect your interest when you have overpaid someone. This was federal grant money I received to rebuild/repair my home. Approximately 6 months after this happened, an Administrative educator(predator) accused my then 17 year old son of indecent exposure, she saw his private parts while walking on while working at his school during the summer of 2009. He remains adamant that he did not behave inappropiate in anyway toward this senior citizen educator. He had worked at his school 2 previous summers with no incidence. It was puzzling to me that he would wait until the threshold of graduation to behave this way, toward her of all people. When I began to question her about suspicions I had, like why didn't she call someone,etc.Others were in the building, including his supervisor. Buzzers were at her disposal. Her actions and her story didn't add up! She became irate with me. There weren't any witnesses in the area, so I asked to see school cameras, but was denied. My son was fired from the summer job. When the D A found out he was my son, he pursued him. The D A serves as legal counsel to the school Board, worked as a teacher in the school system prior to becoming D A. And already had a personal vendetta against me. He threatened he would lock my son up and did follow through on it. My son attempted to return to his school after summer break but was turned away. After the Louisiana Board of Ed. said he wasn't a student at the time this supposingly happened and they couldn't legally keep him form attending his school. They told me to file civil damages against them if they continued. (I wish I had). They got a teacher in another school to say she saw him too, but didn't say anything until 2 months later, after the LA Board of Ed. said they couldn't keep him from attending. Again there were no witnesses. Again I asked to see cameras in that school, but was denied. My son was arrested and removed illegally from his school, and spend 6 days in jail (our tax dollars at work). He is being tried as adult and is currently under $50,000 bond, charged with 2 felony counts of indecent exposure, obscenity. Unless my son takes a plea deal of 1 felony indecent exposure, 2 years probation, community service,etc. (pipeline to prison). He will be tried on both felony charges. Neither one of us had any prior criminal record until this happened to us. My son will not get a fair trial in this corrupt court, I didn't. I have had 4 paid lawyers on his case, and 2 on mine. What does tht say? None would present the evidence, afraid of this corrupt court, and looking out for their own interest. I wanted to share our story to bring much needed attention to blatant prosecutorial misconduct, malicious and wrongful convictions against the poor in America. And the moblike behavior of the officers of the courts. How our tax dollars are being wasted, misused and exploited this way. I would like to see serious investigations into prosecutorial misconduct and wrongful convictions across america, beginning with my son, and I, in Louisiana. I feel that when an officer of the court/ law authority takes an oath to uphold the laws of the U.S.Constitution, so blantantly, and openly misuses his/her power to inflict harm on others, namely the poor is nothing more than, " Hate Crimes," and should be treated as such. These are dangerous criminal minded individuals and should be immediately removed from their positions and severely punished. I would like the D A's offices and Judges recused from our case. I would like an opportunity to show evidence to a right authority before my son is malicously convicted as well. I would like to see serious legislature on malicious and wrongful prosecutions and convictions, from the federal level of government. I would like to see random audits of criminal cases, merits of charges being prosecuted with taxpayer dollars, etc., investigated. I would like to see an organization within our federal government that agg...

Rep. Kern has stated that gays and lesbians are a "cancer" and warned that they would bring civilization to an end if granted legal and social equality. Kern claimed that societies that have accepted homosexuality in the past "lasted [no] more than a few decades" and declared that America’s tolerance of homosexuals constituted a "death knell of our country." Kern also claimed that gays and lesbians were "the biggest threat our nation has, even more so than terrorism of Islam," and said that "gays are infiltrating city councils.... They are winning elections." "To me what is hateful is when those people who say, ’You’re born this way. There’s no hope in change. You’re stuck in this, deal with it,’ that is hate," Kern said. "There’s no hope in that." When a recording of her comments was leaked, Kern found herself at the center of a firestorm. She refused to apologize for her comments, however, stating that had she known her remarks were being recorded, she would not have changed them.

With the 2012 election fast approaching, we are gonna get stuck with two dismal choices: A potentially insane Republican candidate or a weak and timid Democratic incumbent who doesn't really work for progressives. A lot of us have come to the realization that Obama is not the progressive that he pretended to be in 2008. He is worse than a Republican because he uses his position as a Democratic President as cover to pass conservative legislation. Even if a progressive primary challenger lost to the President, it would at least force Obama to move closer to his base, the people that elected him in the first place. Howard Dean would be a great choice. Let's call him to action so that he can push the President in the right direction and maybe even replace him.

Social Security is not an 'entitlement' program. It is an insurance program, and citizens have been paying its premiums all along. Social Security is money owed to all Americans who are elderly, disabled, orphaned, widowed with small children. Social Security is money from Americans which is being held in a fiduciary account for the time when citizens are not able to earn money due to old age or unfortunate circumstances. Social Security is an insurance program that helps protect us from severe hardship, hunger, undue suffering.