This week we're breaking actions down into categories. Be sure to click on the "Continue Reading" link for all this week's important actions.
Protect the Constitution
The FISA compromise bill can still be stopped! Senator Russ Feingold is working hard to strip retroactive immunity for the telecommunications companies that allegedly cooperated with the President's illegal warrantless wiretapping program from the bill. But that is not the only problem. This FISA legislation gives enormous powers to the government: including the ability to read emails and text messages and listen to phone conversations of anyone communicating with their family members, friends, associates, reporters, ANYBODY who may be overseas -- all with zero court review. Nobody should be supporting this legislation. Sign the petition to stop the FISA compromise.
Help Workers
Why is the Employee Free Choice Act so important? Record numbers of workers feel that the American Dream has slipped out of reach. The surest way to accomplish that mission is to bring back the force that created the American middle class -- good union jobs that protect workers. That's why we need the Employee Free Choice Act -- critical legislation that would give more workers a way to form unions and negotiate for better wages, health care, and working conditions. Sign the petition: One Million Strong for the Employee Free Choice Act
Help Kids
A Black boy born in 2001 has a 1 in 3 chance of going to prison in his lifetime a Latino boy a 1 in 6 chance of the same fate. CDF's Cradle to Prison Pipeline Campaign is a national call to action to stop the funneling of thousands of children and teens down life paths that often lead to arrest, conviction, incarceration and even death. Disparate educational opportunities, intolerable abuse and neglect and ineffective juvenile justice systems are prominent examples of systems that fuel the Pipeline. Below are two opportunities to step up and take action today to dismantle the Pipeline and help solve this problem.
The Stop Child Abuse in Residential Programs for Teens Act of 2008 passed in the House of Representatives last week. The bill will protect thousands of youth against physical and mental abuse by employees of private and public residential programs, such as boarding schools, wilderness camps, boot camps, and behavior modification facilities. The maltreatment of youth in residential programs is a nationwide problem, but solvable. This legislation takes a step in the right direction toward protecting our children. Find out if your Representative voted in favor of this legislation and send them an email thanking them for their support. Don't know who your Representative is? Check here.
Last week, the House of Representatives also passed the Fostering Connections to Success Act marking a significant step toward protecting children in foster care from abuse and neglect. The bill will help ensure permanent families for these children who are being raised by relative guardians, provide notice to relatives when a child enters foster care, offer grants to help connect children with relatives to the supports they need, and require steps to help ensure that siblings will be placed together in foster care. Action is now needed in the Senate where similar bills (S. 661 and S. 3038) are pending. Please call your Senators (1-888-226-0627) and urge them to support children being raised by grandparents and other relatives now by voting for the Kinship Caregiver Support Act (S. 661) and the Improved Adoption Incentives and Relative Guardianship Support Act (S. 3038).
Catch up on your reading
The Aunt Lute Anthology of U.S. Women Writers
Volume Two: The 20th Century
The story of U.S. literature in the twentieth century is in many ways the story of the hard-won emergence of women's voices--all kinds of women's voices--into print. The Aunt Lute Anthology of U.S. Women Writers, Volume Two: The 20th Century is an unprecedented effort to capture, in all its scope and variety, the extraordinary result of that florescence.
The Annie E. Casey Foundation's 19th annual KIDS COUNT Data Book, a national and state-by-state profile of the well-being of America's children, is now available. The Data Book ranks states on 10 key measures and provides data on the economic, health, education and social conditions of America's children and families.
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