Approximately 1 million people will attend the Caribbean Day Parade on Eastern Parkway in Brooklyn on Monday, September 7. Help us spread information about our broken health care system and the Obama plan for health care reform. We will set up tables along the parade route with flyers listing online sources for issues such as comparative costs and results of health care spending (US vs. other countries), the economics of health care, how we will actually save a lot of money by investing in health care reform now, etc. We will also provide info on how to connect with other people who want to bring real change to our health care system and help people to get involved in pressuring Congress to pass a health care reform bill with a strong public option. VOLUNTEERS NEEDED
Details here.
I write to speak to an abominable situation of denying assistance to people most in need...People denied because they have been late in making payments - which is more than proof to me of how financially in need they are.
I recently helped my son, whose family consists of his wife and 2 young children, by paying the $450.00 application charge required for them to apply for mortgage rate lowering under the President's program.
Not only do I think "how unfair" an application fee is...That is to charge people applying for some relief/assistance/the very ones who can't afford to pay anything else...Those who are out of work after being laid off and having severe monetary problems and who can't find work in California with 11.5% unemployed).
But, I now find that the application was rejected (causing them to continue to pay high interest rates and denying the reduction of one month's payment) because the record shows that they were late in making some payments.
This seems like "a no brainer" to me! Aren't these people, who have been forced to make late or partial bill payments, the very people who need assistance? If those who are in dire financial situations and struggling to keep their homes, feed and clothe their children, keep up with much needed medical attention, etc. are those rejected, then there must be a flaw in the President's program that needs to be fixed.
Isn't there some way of helping these good people?
Hello:My name is Allie Feldman, and I'm helping Ben Baruch with Organizing for America here in New York. We just wanted to make sure everyone sees the email and video below discussing OFA's next nationwide initiative -- the Pledge Project. Please feel free to contact me or Ben if you have any questions or concerns.Stay tuned for more updates coming by the end of the week!Thanks,Allie--Allie FeldmanVolunteer Organizing for America | New Yorkallie.feldman@gmail.com 908-370-2689
Ben BaruchVolunteer LiaisonOrganizing for America | New York
bennett.baruch@obamaalumni.com
Just over a week ago, President Obama submitted his first budget and made it clear he was ready for the fight to come.The President isn't alone. We're ready for that fight too -- it's what you built this movement for.Watch a video I recorded announcing our new initiative, the Organizing for America Pledge Project:Americans are ready for the bold new direction this plan offers. It's what they voted for in November, and it's needed now more than ever as we continue to face an unprecedented economic crisis.But the special interests and old ways of Washington won't go away easily. In fact, they'll only fight back harder.It's up to you to organize support for President Obama's plan throughout the country. It's the only way we'll get the change this country needs.Take the next step now in our fight to bring change:http://my.barackobama.com/pledgeprojectThanks,MitchMitch StewartDirectorOrganizing for America
Hello New Yorkers for Obama:
I hope you are as fired up as I am after President Obama’s address to congress the other night! Across the country and here in New York we are inspired by the President’s message and motivated to organize for change.
I wanted to introduce myself to those of you who I don’t yet know. My name is Bennett Baruch and I worked as a grassroots organizer on the Obama campaign. Just like many of you, I knocked on doors, made phone calls and held organizing meetings with teams of volunteers. Together we won this election.
I am excited to serve as New York’s Volunteer Liaison to Organizing for America and I'm thrilled to tell you that Organizing for America is up and running! OFA’s mission is to mobilize our grassroots movement in support of President Obama’s policies for change and to build on and strengthen that grassroots organization we have all built together. I am an unpaid volunteer (not an official OFA staffer) who has been asked to help coordinate our efforts here in New York with OFA’s national office.
I know that many of you are already utilizing the Obama network to organize in your communities. In New York, we held 198 house parties and collected 1,578 stories around the economic crisis. Your efforts helped pass the Economic Recovery and Reinvestment Act and your involvement will be critical to its success.
You can act today to support our economic recovery. We've put together an easy to use online tool to look up the phone numbers of your representatives who voted in favor of the economic recovery plan -- take a few minutes today to thank them for doing what's right.
Take a minute to thank the Senators and Representatives who supported the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, and encourage them to continue working with President Obama to lift America out of this economic crisis. When you're done, report back to us about the calls you made.
Throughout the next weeks and months, I look forward to working with all of you to ensure that Organizing for America is successful here in New York. Please feel free to contact me with any questions or ideas as we continue to organize for change. Many thanks,Ben-- Bennett BaruchVolunteer LiaisonOrganizing for America | New YorkRespect. Empower. Include.
On Valentine’s Day, concerned citizens of Harlem took to the streets against Columbia University's. As a Columbia Graduate and a Harlem Native, I am against the current Columbia Expansion Plan. At Columbia I obtained my master's in Real Estate Development and we studied the expansion plan as a part of our curriculum. A majority of the students were against the expansion. After Columbia I worked in the construction industry for 5 years. As part of the expansion plan Columbia has pledged to hire local labor forces to construct the project. Unless Columbia has struck a deal with the local unions to expand their training programs to residents of Harlem, Columbia will not be able to commit to this pledge. Columbia has the right to obtain properties through the normal channels but it is insulting they are using Eminent Domain to obtain a majority Manhattanville. Columbia's expansion would bring obvious benefits but it will also bring heartache & displacement to many New Yorkers. Harlem needs more schools. Columbia is only building one school for the community, on a 33 acre parcel. As a beacon of education Columbia should have at least built 3 schools for the community. Columbia should also offer 50 full scholarships a year to original residents of Harlem. 30 undergraduate Scholarships
I am not sure how we can stop the Columbia Expansion or 125th Rezoning Expansion since City Councilman Jackson & Dickens have basically given Harlem away in a gift basket. They can at least attempt to care about the community and force Columbia to take Eminent Domain off the table.
I think it is time that a new leadership stand up in Harlem. We need someone who will fight for the people.
This Upcoming Wednesday there is a Civic Awareness Seminar located at PS.92 222 W.134th St
Some of these pols will be on the panel. I will also be speaking at the event. If you come please look for the Uptown Dems Table.
It is sad to see the small cloud at the interior of our very large blue lining. The fact that ballot measures passed restricting Gay rights in four states is such a negative mark on our continuing struggle for equal rights in this country. To know that Gay Americans overwhelmingly supported Obama, the nation's first black president and the first black president of any major western power is testimony to the goodwill of people in general. It hurts my heart to hear that Proposition 8 in California passed narrowly with the help of 78% of African Americans in that state's electorate.
How did this happen? Our sons and our family have friends who are gay couples who have adopted or had surrogate pregnancies or sperm donors. These families are wonderful loving Americans who we should all see as a natural part of human diversity. As a heterosexual Christian family my wife and I don't see the differences in these families. Except, in our case, we see them as being more functional than dysfunctional in terms of their relationship to each other as family. We know plenty of hetero families that are broken, abusive and misguided in our circle of friends and our children's playmates but none, so far, of the Gay ones.
Obama has stated he is not against Gay marriage, but supports federalizing partnership rights, and leaving Gay marriage as a state's right issue. I couldn't more firmly disagree and with him being a constitutional law professor don't understand his reasoning. The preamble talks of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, how can being denied a right to marry into a stable and functional relationship, a core unit of a stable and functioning society, qualify under these words?
The Constitution also demands equal protection under the law and an implied separation of church and state by barring the promotion and establishment of any religion. Surely both of these argue in favor of Gay marriage. Should a state be able to abrogate the constitution in these fundamental areas as well? If your standard for barring Gay marriage is based on moral grounds, what is moral about discrimination and bigotry? If for religious reasons, then these referendums are unconstitutional on their face!
As an African American family, we don't understand African Americans who are amazed and inspired by Obama's win and could at the same time vote for erecting a new set of barriers for a subset of Americans. It seems fear has prevailed and many think they are buying a ticket to Heaven by acting on a religious litmus test. It is time we reject the Christianity of judgement and act on the commission of Christ to love as being the greatest of Christian Acts. Denying others the right to love in the way they choose, to form relationships and functional families in a secular state, is not love. This fundamental freedom of choice is every child of God's divine right.
To think of all the Gay Americans who supported and voted for Obama to help us all be better Americans, better people, only to see Gay Americans rejected as part of that American family that stood up Nov. 4th is painful. The world can no longer legitimately see Black Americans as "less than" with Obama's ascension to the most powerful office in the free world. Can't we see others in our own country in the same way? As we celebrate this great barrier falling we should look to ourselves and see the beam in our own eyes, it is this that will continue to hold us back as a unified and free American people.
I voted for change, this is one change I never expected to see. We can't go backwards, we must push forward to include and support our Gay friends and family.
http://triangle.bizjournals.com/triangle/othercities/phoenix/stories/2008/11/03/daily77.html
Today Jon Kyl of Arizona issued a threat to President-elect Obama on his Supreme Court Nominees. Lets send him a message that change has come to America and we will campaign against him to remove from office. We came close to taking Arizona. Obama will probably nominate Sonia Sotomayor, judge on the U. S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, possibly to replace Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
Write Senator Kyl and let him know how you feel about his obstructionist speech to the Federalist Society. Here is the contact info for an online submission to Sen. Kyl. Please pass this on to your network.
http://kyl.senate.gov/contact.cfm
My faith in humanity has been restored.
Barack Hussein Obama was elected the 44th president of the United States on Tuesday, sweeping away the last racial barrier in American politics with ease as the country chose him as its first black chief executive.
The election of Mr. Obama amounted to a national catharsis — a repudiation of a historically unpopular Republican president and his economic and foreign policies, and an embrace of Mr. Obama’s call for a change in the direction and the tone of the country.
But it was just as much a strikingly symbolic moment in the evolution of the nation’s fraught racial history, a breakthrough that would have seemed unthinkable just two years ago.
Mr. Obama, 47, a first-term senator from Illinois, defeated Senator John McCain of Arizona, 72, a former prisoner of war who was making his second bid for the presidency.
To the very end, Mr. McCain’s campaign was eclipsed by an opponent who was nothing short of a phenomenon, drawing huge crowds epitomized by the tens of thousands of people who turned out to hear Mr. Obama’s victory speech in Grant Park in Chicago.
Mr. McCain also fought the headwinds of a relentlessly hostile political environment, weighted down with the baggage left to him by President Bush and an economic collapse that took place in the middle of the general election campaign.“If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible, who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time, who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer,” said Mr. Obama, standing before a huge wooden lectern with a row of American flags at his back, casting his eyes to a crowd that stretched far into the Chicago night.
“It’s been a long time coming,” the president-elect added, “but tonight, because of what we did on this date in this election at this defining moment, change has come to America.”
The focus shifted quickly on Wednesday to the daunting challenges facing the president-elect, with his supporters offering sober reflections of what lies ahead.
“We’re in deep trouble,” said Rep. John Lewis, a Georgia Democrat and leader in the civil rights movement, on NBC’s Today show.
“We’ve got to get our economy out of the ditch, end the war in Iraq and bring our young men and women home, provide health care for all our citizens,” Lewis said. “And he’s going to call on us, I believe, to sacrifice. We all must give up something.”
Mr. McCain delivered his concession speech under clear skies on the lush lawn of the Arizona Biltmore, in Phoenix, where he and his wife had held their wedding reception. The crowd reacted with scattered boos as he offered his congratulations to Mr. Obama and saluted the historical significance of the moment.
“This is a historic election, and I recognize the significance it has for African-Americans and for the special pride that must be theirs tonight,” Mr. McCain said, adding, “We both realize that we have come a long way from the injustices that once stained our nation’s reputation.”
Not only did Mr. Obama capture the presidency, but he led his party to sharp gains in Congress. This puts Democrats in control of the House, the Senate and the White House for the first time since 1995, when Bill Clinton was in office.
The day shimmered with history as voters began lining up before dawn, hours before polls opened, to take part in the culmination of a campaign that over the course of two years commanded an extraordinary amount of attention from the American public.
As the returns became known, and Mr. Obama passed milestone after milestone —Ohio, Florida, Virginia, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, Iowa and New Mexico — people rolled spontaneously into the streets to celebrate what many described, with perhaps overstated if understandable exhilaration, a new era in a country where just 143 years ago, Mr. Obama, as a black man, could have been owned as a slave.
For Republicans, especially the conservatives who have dominated the party for nearly three decades, the night represented a bitter setback and left them contemplating where they now stand in American politics.
Mr. Obama and his expanded Democratic majority on Capitol Hill now face the task of governing the country through a difficult period: the likelihood of a deep and prolonged recession, and two wars. He took note of those circumstances in a speech that was notable for its sobriety and its absence of the triumphalism that he might understandably have displayed on a night when he won an Electoral College landslide.
“The road ahead will be long, our climb will be steep,” said Mr. Obama, his audience hushed and attentive, with some, including the Rev. Jesse Jackson, wiping tears from their eyes. “We may not get there in one year or even one term, but America, I have never been more hopeful than I am tonight that we will get there. I promise you, we as a people will get there.” The roster of defeated Republicans included some notable party moderates, like Senator John E. Sununu of New Hampshire and Representative Christopher Shays of Connecticut, and signaled that the Republican conference convening early next year in Washington will be not only smaller but more conservative.
Mr. Obama will come into office after an election in which he laid out a number of clear promises: to cut taxes for most Americans, to get the United States out of Iraq in a fast and orderly fashion, and to expand health care.
In a recognition of the difficult transition he faces, given the economic crisis, Mr. Obama is expected to begin filling White House jobs as early as this week.
Mr. Obama defeated Mr. McCain in Ohio, a central battleground in American politics, despite a huge effort that brought Mr. McCain and his running mate, Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska, back there repeatedly. Mr. Obama had lost the state decisively to Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York in the Democratic primary.
Mr. McCain failed to take from Mr. Obama the two Democratic states that were at the top of his target list: New Hampshire and Pennsylvania. Mr. Obama also held on to Minnesota, the state that played host to the convention that nominated Mr. McCain; Wisconsin; and Michigan, a state Mr. McCain once had in his sights.
The apparent breadth of Mr. Obama’s sweep left Republicans sobered, and his showing in states like Ohio and Pennsylvania stood out because officials in both parties had said that his struggles there in the primary campaign reflected the resistance of blue-collar voters to supporting a black candidate.
“I always thought there was a potential prejudice factor in the state,” Senator Bob Casey, a Democrat of Pennsylvania who was an early Obama supporter, told reporters in Chicago. “I hope this means we washed that away.”
Mr. McCain called Mr. Obama at 10 p.m., Central time, to offer his congratulations. In the call, Mr. Obama said he was eager to sit down and talk; in his concession speech, Mr. McCain said he was ready to help Mr. Obama work through difficult times.
“I need your help,” Mr. Obama told his rival, according to an Obama adviser, Robert Gibbs. “You’re a leader on so many important issues.”
Mr. Bush called Mr. Obama shortly after 10 p.m. to congratulate him on his victory.
“I promise to make this a smooth transition,” the president said to Mr. Obama, according to a transcript provided by the White House .”You are about to go on one of the great journeys of life. Congratulations, and go enjoy yourself.”
For most Americans, the news of Mr. Obama’s election came at 11 p.m., Eastern time, when the networks, waiting for the close of polls in California, declared him the victor. A roar sounded from the 125,000 people gathered in Hutchison Field in Grant Park at the moment that they learned Mr. Obama had been projected the winner.
The scene in Phoenix was decidedly more sour. At several points, Mr. McCain, unsmiling, had to motion his crowd to quiet down — he held out both hands, palms down — when they responded to his words of tribute to Mr. Obama with boos.
Mr. Obama, who watched Mr. McCain’s speech from his hotel room in Chicago, offered a hand to voters who had not supported him in this election, when he took the stage 15 minutes later. “To those Americans whose support I have yet to earn,” he said, “I may not have won your vote, but I hear your voices, I need your help, and I will be your president, too.”
Initial signs were that Mr. Obama benefited from a huge turnout of voters, but particularly among blacks. That group made up 13 percent of the electorate, according to surveys of people leaving the polls, compared with 11 percent in 2006.
In North Carolina, Republicans said that the huge surge of African-Americans was one of the big factors that led to Senator Elizabeth Dole, a Republican, losing her re-election bid.
Mr. Obama also did strikingly well among Hispanic voters; Mr. McCain did worse among those voters than Mr. Bush did in 2004. That suggests the damage the Republican Party has suffered among those voters over four years in which Republicans have been at the forefront on the effort to crack down on illegal immigrants.
The election ended what by any definition was one of the most remarkable contests in American political history, drawing what was by every appearance unparalleled public interest.
Throughout the day, people lined up at the polls for hours — some showing up before dawn — to cast their votes. Aides to both campaigns said that anecdotal evidence suggested record-high voter turnout.
Reflecting the intensity of the two candidates, Mr. McCain and Mr. Obama took a page from what Mr. Bush did in 2004 and continued to campaign after the polls opened.
Mr. McCain left his home in Arizona after voting early Tuesday to fly to Colorado and New Mexico, two states where Mr. Bush won four years ago but where Mr. Obama waged a spirited battle.
These were symbolically appropriate final campaign stops for Mr. McCain, reflecting the imperative he felt of trying to defend Republican states against a challenge from Mr. Obama.
“Get out there and vote,” Mr. McCain said in Grand Junction, Colo. “I need your help. Volunteer, knock on doors, get your neighbors to the polls, drag them there if you need to.”
By contrast, Mr. Obama flew from his home in Chicago to Indiana, a state that in many ways came to epitomize the audacity of his effort this year. Indiana has not voted for a Democrat since President Lyndon B. Johnson’s landslide victory in 1964, and Mr. Obama made an intense bid for support there. He later returned home to Chicago play basketball, his election-day ritual.
Elisabeth Bumiller contributed reporting from Phoenix, Marjorie Connelly from New York and Jeff Zeleny from Chicago.
This morning I awoke to a new world!
A world, not just my country, the world that has been transformed.
I woke up at 5AM and went to the computer to see this new world my sons inherited this day and I saw... rejoicing!
I soon found a picture of a celebration in Japan, JAPAN!!!
Then, I wept, I wept and said to my wife who was holding me by then... "I always thought they hated us, I always thought they hated us"... We black Americans, we n-----s, today we are no longer that! My sons are no longer that! In the eyes of the whole world that matters, they have nothing to prove to anyone except themselves!
As a nation, as a planet, we are all human beings and so much more. As I surfed through the Internet pictures from Australia, Africa, the Middle East, Europe, Asia... China... yes China! flashed across the screen. all with a collective exult that the dream, the American dream, is still alive and will thrive, "that all men are created equal" and there are a majority of people of good will in the world who know this in this age!
Humanity spoke last night and spoke to the ancient African slave and one of Rome's greatest poet's words, 'Nothing human is foreign to me'.
A global scream of the words spoke by Martin Luther King, that we demand that we be "judged by the content of ...(our) character."
Obama speaks to our humanity -- a humanity that can no longer be constrained by fifteenth century social and racial constructs. The age of race is dead!
LONG LIVE THE.... THE AGE OF THE HUMAN RACE!!!
I'm sitting at a computer here in Philly at the Philadelphia Field Headquarters for Obama on Sansom Street, and the excitement of the moment is simply breathtaking. I can barely contain my emotions as the hundreds of volunteers chant "Yes We Can!" and "Obama! Obama! Obama!" I am overwhelmed. I just couldn't get myself to drink the champagne before the magic number 270, and now that Barack Obama has attained that seemingly insurmountable goal, I am overwhelmed, and finding it difficult to keep from smiling and crying at the same time.
I wish my dad were alive to witness this moment. He is not, but I am, and I am savoring every moment of this historic moment in honor of my father.
Enjoy this moment America. Because Yes, We Can!
What can one say at such a profound moment?
Words fail,.........
This is it!
We're coming down to the final stretch and Barack Obama needs your help now, more than ever before!
Please bring your cell phone, a charger and a few fun friends who care about change and join with thousands of your neighbors in the largest ever-attempted phone bank effort in New York state history. The Obama campaign is hosting several of these "mega call centers" all over New York, so invite your friends and family to make calls to voters in key battleground states and change America for years to come.
Visit http://my.barackobama.com/page/content/nylastcall to find a location near you.
