L.A. County Democratic Party

Los Angeles County Democratic Party

2007 Democratic Club Summit

Saturday, June 16
Plummer Park, West Hollywood
7377 Santa Monica Blvd., West Hollywood

In preparation for the 2008 elections and beyond, the Los Angeles County Democratic Party will host a day of presentations.

The one-day summit will feature interactive workshops, training sessions, and discussion forums on a series of subjects that will help maintain, activate, motivate, and mobilize Democratic clubs, such as:

Campign Finance and Reporting
Becoming More Active in the Democratic Party
Grassroots Organizing and Mobilizing
Building and Maintaining Your Democratic Club

Contact: Clark Lee
Political Director
213.382.1211

Dear Democrat,

The federal government is on the verge of turning over a huge portion of our public airwaves to companies like AT&T, Verizon, and Comcast—who will use them for private gain instead of the public good.

These newly available airwaves are a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to revolutionize Internet access—beaming high-speed Internet signals to every park bench, coffee shop, workplace, and home in America at more affordable prices than current Internet service. Phone and cable companies don’t want this competition to their Internet service—they’d rather purchase the airwaves at auction and sit on them.

In June, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) will make a major decision: Use the public airwaves for the public good, or turn them over to big companies who will stifle competition, innovation, and the wireless Internet revolution.
The FCC is only accepting public comments for a few more days. Can you sign this petition to them today, and send it to your friends?

“The public airwaves should be used for the public good. The government must protect our airwaves from corporate gatekeepers who would stifle innovation and competition in the wireless Internet market.”
Sign here:
http://www.civic.moveon.org/airwaves/?id=10433-418283-GZlzl0&t=3

We’ll deliver your petition signature and any accompanying note directly to the FCC’s public comment record, which FCC Commissioners use to guide their decisions.

There are many innovative companies jumping at the opportunity to forge ahead with the wireless Internet revolution—bringing us high-speed wireless networks from coast to coast and all sorts of innovative wireless devices. But the old phone and cable companies are aggressively trying to block this progress. They’ve spent billions laying wires, and they enjoy having their customers locked in with few alternatives.

Without access to the public airwaves, wireless innovators can’t enter the marketplace. So the strategy of companies like AT&T, Verizon, and Comcast is to buy the administrative rights of our airwaves at auction—and then use those rights to block competition. They also stifle the development of new wireless devices by only letting their own endorsed products work on their networks.

We’re urging the FCC to protect the public good by setting auction rules that prohibit this anti-competitive behavior. If the government auctioned off the right to maintain a public highway to Ford, we would certainly not let Ford block Toyotas from the roads. Likewise, big phone and cable should not be able to keep innovative companies off our airwaves.

They also shouldn’t be able to tell their wireless Internet customers which websites they can access—as they do now. And just as phone companies can’t tell customers what phones can be plugged into a wall jack, cell and wireless companies should not be able to dictate which phones or wireless devices people use on their networks.

The opportunity to revolutionize the Internet and wireless world is at our fingertips. The only question is whether our government will embrace it, and whether regular people will fight for it.

The FCC is only accepting public comments for a few more days. Can you sign the petition to them today, and send it to your friends?
Sign here:
http://www.civic.moveon.org/airwaves/?id=10433-418283-GZlzl0&t=4

Thanks for all you do.
–Adam Green, MoveOn.org Civic Action

PS—Most people haven’t heard about this critical issue yet—so it’s really important that we spread the word and get others involved. As you consider who else to tell about this issue, here’s what innovation and competition in the wireless world means for regular people:

• Families would no longer be forced to choose solely between high-priced phone and cable Internet. A new wireless market—including lots of competition within that market—would mean more affordable Internet access for families.
• Poor and rural communities which phone and cable companies never bothered to wire with high-speed Internet access could now have high-speed Internet signals beamed directly into their homes.
• Blackberry and other handheld wireless users are currently blocked by phone companies from accessing Internet-based phone service and other innovative services.2 The FCC could stop these anti-competitive, anti-consumer practices by mandating wireless Net Neutrality.
• Socially responsible buyers could someday go to a store, scan the bar codes of products with an Internet-equipped cell phone, and find out which items are socially responsible. Phone companies can currently block such innovations from working with their devices (they often try to shake down innovators into giving them a massive cut of their profits)—but the FCC can prohibit such practices on these newly available airwaves.
• Technology consumers in America are currently denied all sorts of cutting-edge technology that people in other countries have—like using Internet-equipped cell phones to buy products, transfer money, or give to charity. By opening the doors to competition and innovation, the FCC can change that.

Trust and Betrayal

By Paul Krugman - May 28, 2007, The New York Times

“In this place where valor sleeps, we are reminded why America has always gone to war reluctantly, because we know the costs of war.” That’s what President Bush said last year, in a Memorial Day ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery.

Those were fine words, spoken by a man with less right to say them than any president in our nation’s history. For Mr. Bush took us to war not with reluctance, but with unseemly eagerness.

Now that war has turned into an epic disaster, in part because the war’s architects, whom we now know were warned about the risks, didn’t want to hear about them. Yet Congress seems powerless to stop it. How did it all go so wrong?

Future historians will shake their heads over how easily America was misled into war. The warning signs, the indications that we had a rogue administration determined to use 9/11 as an excuse for war, were there, for those willing to see them, right from the beginning — even before Mr. Bush began explicitly pushing for war with Iraq.

In fact, the very first time Mr. Bush declared a war on terror that “will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped and defeated,” people should have realized that he was going to use the terrorist attack to justify anything and everything.

When he used his first post-attack State of the Union to denounce an “axis of evil” consisting of three countries that had nothing to do either with 9/11 or with each other, alarm bells should have gone off.

But the nation, brought together in grief and anger over the attack, wanted to trust the man occupying the White House. And so it took a long time before Americans were willing to admit to themselves just how thoroughly their trust had been betrayed.

It’s a terrible story, yet it’s also understandable. I wasn’t really surprised by Republican election victories in 2002 and 2004: nations almost always rally around their leaders in times of war, no matter how bad the leaders and no matter how poorly conceived the war.

The question was whether the public would ever catch on. Well, to the immense relief of those who spent years trying to get the truth out, they did. Last November Americans voted overwhelmingly to bring an end to Mr. Bush’s war.

Yet the war goes on.

To keep the war going, the administration has brought the original bogyman back out of the closet. At first, Mr. Bush said he would bring Osama bin Laden in, dead or alive. Within seven months after 9/11, however, he had lost interest: “I wouldn’t necessarily say he’s at the center of any command structure,” he said in March 2002. “I truly am not that concerned about him.”

In all of 2003, Mr. Bush, who had an unrelated war to sell, made public mention of the man behind 9/11 only seven times.

But Osama is back: last week Mr. Bush invoked his name 11 times in a single speech, warning that if we leave Iraq, Al Qaeda — which wasn’t there when we went in — will be the winner. And Democrats, still fearing that they will end up accused of being weak on terror and not supporting the troops, gave Mr. Bush another year’s war funding.

Democratic Party activists were furious, because polls show a public utterly disillusioned with Mr. Bush and anxious to see the war ended. But it’s not clear that the leadership was wrong to be cautious. The truth is that the nightmare of the Bush years won’t really be over until politicians are convinced that voters will punish, not reward, Bush-style fear-mongering. And that hasn’t happened yet.

Here’s the way it ought to be: When Rudy Giuliani says that Iran, which had nothing to do with 9/11, is part of a “movement” that “has already displayed more aggressive tendencies by coming here and killing us,” he should be treated as a lunatic.

When Mitt Romney says that a coalition of “Shia and Sunni and Hezbollah and Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood and Al Qaeda” wants to “bring down the West,” he should be ridiculed for his ignorance.

And when John McCain says that Osama, who isn’t in Iraq, will “follow us home” if we leave, he should be laughed at.

But they aren’t, at least not yet. And until belligerent, uninformed posturing starts being treated with the contempt it deserves, men who know nothing of the cost of war will keep sending other people’s children to graves at Arlington.

CLICK HERE TO LINK TO ARTICLE

Important Action Alert - Please Act Now!

TELL CONGRESS: DON’T SURRENDER TO BUSH ON IRAQ

Today Congress will vote on a proposed Iraq War funding bill that fails to hold the President accountable for progress in Iraq, fails to set a withdrawal date, and fails to bring our troops home. This so-called “compromise” legislation is in fact a complete capitulation to the President’s demands to continue this war indefinitely, and must be opposed.

There is still time to call your Congressmember and ask that they vote “no.” Please take a minute THIS MORNING to let your Representative know you oppose continued war funding legislation without a *binding withdrawal timeline* attached.

TELL CONGRESS: DON’T SURRENDER TO BUSH ON IRAQ

Please call NOW toll free at 800-828-0498, 800-459-1887 or 800-614-2803 and ask for your own House member and Senators. And ALSO leave separate messages for both Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi at their leadership offices. They represent you too!

Post from Barack Obama’s Official Blog:

Happy Mother’s Day

By Barack Obama - May 12th, 2007 at 11:28 am EDT

I would not be who I am without the mothers in my life.

My own mother, Ann Dunham, was the kindest, most generous spirit I have ever known, and what is best in me, I owe to her. My grandmother, Madelyn Dunham, loved my mother and me so completely that she rejected the bigotry that might have torn other families apart, embraced my parents’ marriage, and helped raise me. Today, there is another mother in my life – the mother of my two lovely daughters – my wife Michelle, a woman who radiates beauty, strength, and integrity, and continues to make me a better person.

But our mothers deserve more than just a holiday. So on this Mother’s Day, let’s rededicate ourselves to lifting those burdens that make the difficult job of raising children that much harder. Let’s care for them when they get sick. Let’s make sure they’re getting treated fairly at work. And when their working days are over, let’s make sure they can retire with dignity and financial security. And let’s also remember those mothers who can’t be with their families today because either they or their loved ones are serving our country.

In the end, this campaign is all about doing what my mother taught me to do when I was growing up – to keep working until the world as it is and the world as it should be are one and the same.

Happy Mother’s Day.

Barack
http://my.barackobama.com/page/community/post/obama/CcYY

Clinton Honors Mother’s Day, Calls for Health Care for America’s Children

WASHINGTON– Hillary Clinton celebrated Mother’s Day today by calling for health care for every child in America, urging Congress to pass the Children’s Health First Act and give mothers the gift of peace of mind. The campaign also posted a video of Hillary discussing the important role her mother played in her life, and encouraged supporters to send Mother’s Day eCards through Hillary’s website.

“Nothing keeps mothers up at night more than worrying whether their children will have the health care they need if they get sick,” Clinton said. “We have a moral obligation to our children to give them a healthy start in life.”

Clinton introduced the Children’s Health First Act in March to extend coverage to the 9 million uninsured children across the country. As President, she is committed to providing affordable, quality health care for all Americans.

According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, the ranks of the uninsured are growing–low-income children made up 23% of the 1.3 million newly uninsured between 2004 and 2005. And children without insurance face far more difficult lives, as needed care is more likely to be postponed and they are less likely to see a physician or dentist for standard preventive care. Uninsured children admitted to the hospital due to injuries are twice as likely to die while in the hospital as their insured counterparts.

Hillary’s legislation allows States to expand children’s health coverage to families up to 400 percent of the Federal poverty level (which is $70,000 for a family of three) through the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) and receive increased federal payments.

Her bill includes incentives for states to expand children’s health care to those who are not eligible, and identify and enroll uninsured kids that already qualify for coverage. The bill offers a new affordable coverage option for both families and employers by allowing them the opportunity to buy health insurance coverage through SCHIP. And it provides new incentives to strengthen and protect employer-sponsored coverage, something more than 50 percent of children enjoy today.

http://www.hillaryclinton.com/news/release/view/?id=1612

A MESSAGE FROM HOUSE SPEAKER NANCY PELOSI

I had hoped that President Bush would accept my offer to work together on a New Direction in Iraq and sign crucial legislation holding the Iraqi government accountable. Instead, the President chose to continue to isolate himself from Congress, the international community, and the American people by vetoing the Democratic plan for change in Iraq.

The President isn’t listening to the American people’s call to end this disastrous war. What further proof do they need than the timing of his veto? The President vetoed our bill that would end this war and bring our troops home the week of the fourth anniversary of his infamous “Mission Accomplished” speech that declared an end to major combat operations in Iraq. Four years after that misguided speech, the President keeps making the same mistakes in Iraq.

Our bill achieved exactly what the American people elected us to do in November 2006. It would have fully funded troops on the ground, started to bring them home responsibly, held President Bush accountable, and ensured our veterans get the treatment they deserve back home.

Congress has responded to the will of the American people. President Bush has not. The President is clinging to his failed stay-the-course strategy in Iraq, while brave servicemen and women risk their lives for his mistakes.

House and Senate Democrats offered a plan for change in Iraq that gave the President every penny he requested for soldiers on the ground and more. But it also gave him something he’s tried to avoid: accountability.

President Bush may have the bully pulpit - but we have you. Close to 60,000 of you signed the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC)’s petition to the President telling him not to veto our plan. The American people are with us and the fight for a New Direction in Iraq is not over - we hope you will continue to stand with us.

We are counting on you — and millions of Democrats across the country who are united and energized as never before — to help build an unstoppable Democratic Majority and put a Democrat in the White House in 2008.

Thank you for your continued dedication.

Sincerely,

Nancy Pelosi
Speaker of the House of Representatives