Here’s a bipartisan effort, with support from libertarians as well as progressives, to end America’s addiction to war and violence. Specifically, it calls on a speedy withdrawal from Afghanistan. http://www.comehomeamerica.us/ Check out the list of signers and add your comments. I received email about this website from a libertarian email list.

ProgressiveCongress.org and Progressive Action Fund are sponsoring a public event on July 23 at South Seattle Community College. Here is their blurb (copied from a pdf file they sent): It’s not often that lawmakers come to our community to ask directions, but that’sexactly what they’re doing. Our community has been hit hard by the economy….

Over the past 30 years, our political leaders have pursued increasingly immoral, unconstitutional, and destructive policies: fraudulent wars, torture, rampant corruption and mismanagement, reckless deregulation, tax cuts for the rich, erosion of civil liberties, bailouts of culpable billionaire corporations, outsourcing of jobs and profits, dismantling of public journalism, fixed elections, corporate personhood, and prosecution of…

In order to obtain emergency funding for public transit, the King County Council, specifically, Larry Phillips, has proposed a congestion fee of $20 to be charged for every automobile.  I am writing in strong opposition to this fee and hope that others will also oppose this regressive tax and testify at the upcoming hearings unless…

Prominent conservative David Brooks has some harsh things to say about the Republican Party in this New York Times editorial: The Republican Party may no longer be a normal party. Over the past few years, it has been infected by a faction that is more of a psychological protest than a practical, governing alternative. The…

Last Friday, Linda Boyd, Robert Sargent, and I (Don Smith) had a meeting with 8th CD US Congressman Dave Reichert (R), at his Mercer Island office. This was the third time that I’d attended a meeting with Reichert. Each time we told him we were loosely affiliated with MoveOn. The affiliation with MoveOn has been…

[Note from the editor:  Last Friday, the author (Linda Boyd), Robert Sargent, and I had a meeting with 8th CD US Congressman Dave Reichert (R), at his Mercer Island office.  My report is here.  — Don Smith] Representative Reichert, It  was a pleasure to meet with you on Friday and to express my views about…

On June 22, I attended a public forum, “Law and Politics:The State Budget—Searching for Long-Term Sustainability”, at the Rainier Square Atrium in downtown Seattle. The panelists were Representative Reuven Carlyle (D-36), Washington State Legislature Representative Bruce Dammier (R-25), Washington State Legislature Paul Guppy, vice president for research, Washington Policy Center Marty Loesch, director of external…

“The top five U.S. banks paid staff a combined $119 billion for 2010, according to bank consolidated income statements.”  from this Reuters article: Compensation seen rising among bankers: poll.  Add in Goldman Sachs and the compensation comes to about $140 billion. According to Dollars&Sense Wall Street financiers received $20.8 billion in bonuses last year on…

Last weekend I hosted a free screening of the movie Inside Job at the Kent Library. This documentary shows us how the financial industry pillaged the American economy during the Banking Crisis of 2008. One of the key causes of the Great Recession was the transfer of assets from the balance sheet of banks to…