Published by ItsGettingHotInHere.org. Great action today in San Francisco. The Mobilization for Climate Justice West (MCJ-West) turned out 150 people on a Monday afternoon and marched to the SF financial district offices of Chevron, the Environmental Protection Agency and BP calling for Big Oil to stop harming our environment and communities and pay up for the damage they’ve caused. [more]

Join PDA's Healthcare for All Issue Organizing Team (IOT); learn more here. Published by PNHPCalifornia.org. See related: Democrats Block California Single Payer Bill. Speaker John Perez of the California State Assembly, on the very last day of the legislative session, pulled SB 810, the single payer bill, from the Assembly floor. This highly unusual move of pulling a bill that had cleared all legislative hurdles except for the final Assembly floor vote was to protect Democrats from having to cast a health care reform vote in a difficult political environment three months before the next election. [more]

Join PDA's Immigration Reform Action Group; sign up here. The Justice Department alleges that an Arizona public college discriminated against immigrant job candidates. The case could pit states' rights against those of the federal government. Published by The Christian Science Monitor. Less than two months after the US Department of Justice sued Arizona over the state’s controversial immigration law, it has filed another lawsuit targeting immigration practices by Arizona authorities. [more]

Join PDA's Healthcare for All Issue Organizing Team (IOT); learn more here. Published by The Huffington Post. See related: Oregon to Look at Single-Payer Bill Next Session. One of the most innovative voices in the health care debate, Senator Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), is accelerating the process of exempting his state from some of the national reforms passed under President Barack Obama. [more]

Published by Health Policy Daily. Speaker John Perez of the California State Assembly, on the very last day of the legislative session, pulled SB 810, the single payer bill, from the Assembly floor. This highly unusual move of pulling a bill that had cleared all legislative hurdles except for the final Assembly floor vote was to protect Democrats from having to cast a health care reform vote in a difficult political environment three months before the next election. [more]

Join PDA's Accountability and Justice Issue Organizing Team (IOT); learn more here. Published by Idaho State Journal. As three judges of the 9th Circuit donned their robes in the federal courthouse, five citizens, several sporting emblems of their military service, stood quietly outside the building, holding signs of protest. The subject of their protest was Chief Judge Jay Bybee. [more]

The following is a letter to President Barack Obama from the Officers of the Progressive Caucus of the California Democratic Party: Dear Mr. President: Your Press Secretary has recently been quoted as strongly criticizing those of us Democratic Party activists who feel that you have failed in some of the most important promises you made, stated or implied, during your campaign and that you are not steering our country in the right direction. He dismisses us as the “professional left” as if we were the ones making a living from politics. We worked very hard for your election as we do for all candidates who seem able and willing to work for progressive social change, and to make a better life for our citizens and for the world. Your rhetoric often suggests that you share this goal, but your actions frequently prove otherwise. We do not simply disagree with you on a single small issue. Unfortunately our unhappiness and disappointment has a broad scope. To name a few examples: [more]

Published by Daily Hampshire Gazaette. Amid the ever-changing political subject du jour--the possible construction of an Islamic community center near ground zero in New York, an aide to President Obama criticizing progressive Democrats, Fox News owner Rupert Murdoch giving $1 million to the Republican Governors Association--there's been one consistent theme running through the media for months. It's this: Two years after Obama was elected president and Democrats strengthened their hold on both houses of Congress, the Democrats are running scared, convinced they're facing a drubbing in elections this November, as the recession lingers and voter anger grows. [more]

Published by Progressive Democrats Sonoma County. August 18, 2010 Dear Representative Woolsey, Things are changing fast for this world, but many of these things are headed in the wrong direction. You are in a unique position—at least in regard to most of the world’s population—to put some very important things on a positive track. And these are things that will reverberate around the planet. [more]

Join PDA's Healthcare for All Issue Organizing Team (IOT); learn more here. Published by Times Argus. Is this our last best chance to get single payer in Vermont? If it is, then look upon it as a political and health policy emergency. [more]

Published by Coloradoan.com. The Progressive Democrats of America and Strength through Peace recently received a response from Rep. Betsy Markey after six months of holding vigils at Markey’s downtown office. In the letter, Markey states that “In FY2011, defense spending and security spending is expected to be nearly $750 billion or 20 percent of the total budget.” [more]

On the strength of the Massachusetts Democratic Party Convention's endorsement of a resolution calling for an amendment of the U.S. Constitution to overturn the extremely undemocratic effects of the US Supreme Court decision regarding corporate free speech rights in Citizen's United, PDA CD3 acting coordinator Elizabeth St. John and the PDA Massachusetts leadership team recently held a well attended community forum on corporate versus individual citizen free speech and voting rights. Addressing the gathering were PDA National Director Tim Carpenter, constitutional scholar John Bonifaz, and a representative from the office of MA State Senator and PDA stalwart Jamie Eldridge, who recently introduced a bill regarding corporate political accountability aimed at addressing the problems created by Citizens United in the Massachusetts Senate. Similar programs are planned for other congressional districts in MA. [more]

How to Deal with the Blue Dog and Still Defeat the Republicans—PDA Breakfast Meeting Discusses the 2010 Election Published by BeaverCountyBlue.org. About 40 seasoned Progressive Democrat activists from the 4th CD gathered on Aug. 7 at the Candlelight Lounge in Economy, PA for a two-hour breakfast discussion. The hot topic of the day was the District’s Blue Dog Congressman, Jason Altmire, and what to do about him in the upcoming election and beyond. [more]

Published by t r u t h o u t. Editor's note: The author of Blood on Our Hands is Nicholas "Sandy" Davies, PDA chapter leader and Brown Bag Lunch Vigil Organizer for FL-17. While most media continue to ignore the US-installed disaster in Iraq, author Nicolas Davies refuses to do so, and his book "Blood on our Hands: the American Invasion and Destruction of Iraq" could not be released at a better time. This sweeping work covers US policy in Iraq that spans decades, and is written as a call to action for the US to begin following international law—not just in Iraq, but everywhere. For it was the US-led invasion and occupation of Iraq that, more than perhaps anything else, continues to defile what is left of the tattered reputation of the US. [more]

Dear Congressman Sestak, As part of a Progressive Democrats of America nationwide effort, members of DelMont PDA and Main Line Peace Action will be visiting your office in Media at Noon Wednesday, July 28. This meeting was postponed from this week at your request. We would like to speak with Anne Vaughan or another aide about two issues that are of great concern to us. [more]

June 6, 2010 Via Email, Fax (202.225.3178) and Regular Mail The Honorable Elijah E. Cummings 2235 Rayburn HOB Washington, D.C. 20515 Re: Request for Meeting Dear Congressman Cummings: The Pledge of Resistance-Baltimore has long spoken out against U.S. wars, most recently those in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Over the years, we have urged your staff, including Michael Christianson, and more recently Paul Childress, to convey our message to you that these wars are the wrong direction for our foreign and military policies, a misguided use of our human and material resources and a tremendous waste of taxpayer dollars. This comes at a time when the State of Maryland and the City of Baltimore are furloughing employees and eliminating social programs, including closing recreation centers in Baltimore. [more]

Published by Beaver County Blue. Cong. Jason Altmire’s office on 2110 McLean St. in Aliquippa has been the site of two vigils demanding HANDS OFF SOCIAL SECURITY. The vigils were sponsored Progressive Democrats and Steelworkers Organization of Active Retirees (SOAR). The gatherings were the third Wednesday in June and July. The next vigil to protest Altmire’s plan to cut social security will be held on August 18th at noon at his McLean Street office. [more]

PDA-llinois is asking folks from across the Midwest to please come to Champaign/Urbana for "Quad Day" Sunday August 22, 2010, to register voters and volunteers for Dr David Gill's election campaign for the U.S. House of Representatives, IL-15. Dr. Gill was endorsed by the 15th Illinois CD, Chicago, and Illinois PDA chapters, before receiving PDA's national endorsement. Join us Sunday August 22 , for 'Quad Day' at the U of I Champaign/Urbana campus. Students are a key group for progressives--we'll be talking to students and residents, passing out fliers, signing up volunteers, and having some fun. [more]

Ten activists marched with signs outside the office of Congressman Sander Levin's Roseville office, while five spokespeople met with his new district manager, Jeff Donofrio. (Spokespersons were PDA coordinators, Joyce Gehringer and Maggie Johnson, and Leona McElevene and activists, Ron Halstead and Vic Macks.) This group asked Mr. Donofrio to tell the Congressman they wanted him to do everything in his power to end the unwinable, life-threatening, treasure-draining and useless war in Afghanistan. They said they would NOT accept an affirmative vote made in their name to send $33 billion more to fund the longest war in US history. The main reason for this request, they said, was that no one in the United States had anything to gain from further incursion into that sovereign country except war profiteers and an enemy that is gaining recruits because of it. They also made it clear that even though everyone in the group had been loyal Democratic Party members (three are precinct delegates), they did not accept a political rationale for casting a YES vote (i.e., “to support the president”). They then demanded that their representative seriously consider the repercussions of a YES vote to fund an immoral, if not illegal, war. [more]

July 21, 2010 BBLV Ten activists showed up for a meeting in Representative Sander Levin’s office to meet with his district manager, Jeff Donofrio. We started by offering our sincere congratulations to the Congressman for being promoted Chairman of the powerful House Ways and Means committee. And we offered thanks for his exemplary work he has done to help the jobless and underemployed of the 12th district. [more]