Support Reversing Indefinite Detention of Americans!

Bows to a Muslim King and a Communist Ruler, but will kill or detain Americans!

The 2012 National Defense Authorization Act allows the United States military to detain civilians indefinitely and without charge or trial -- even American citizens.

Help us reverse this travesty of justice by clicking here and emailing your senators.

The Senate is taking up the 2013 NDAA this week. Several senators are poised to put forth amendments to revoke or narrow the indefinite detention powers that we've been fighting so hard over the last year.

Demand Progress members have sent hundreds of thousands of emails to Congress and have helped fund the courageous lawsuit by Chris Hedges et al -- which recently spurred a federal judge to rule that indefinite detention is unconstitutional.

Because there are several amendments in play, our ask is broad and simple: Please urge your Senators to support any and all amendments to revoke or narrow indefinite detention powers.

Earlier this year we helped push an anti-indefinite detention amendment to the House's version of the NDAA to the brink of passage. The Senate is friendly turf for us: We have a real chance of winning this fight.

Please email the Senate in front of its critical vote -- it could happen this week.

Popular Food Companies Don't Want You to Know About GMO Foods They Sell!

I just took action on this issue and thought you might find it interesting too. The Organic Consumers Association (OCA) is calling on honest food advocates everywhere, not just in California, to boycott brands for betraying their customers by opposing GMO labeling. It's time we sent a message to the big corporations that we CARE about the food we eat and want it labelled so we know exactly what is in our food!
Won't you join me and take a couple of minutes to fill out a petition to send them this message?

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TAKE ACTION: Join the Boycott!

They stomped on our right to know. Now it's time to get even.

Prop 37, the California Right to Know GMO labeling initiative, was narrowly defeated last week thanks to a relentless, deceitful $46-million advertising blitz. Among the largest bankrollers of the NO on 37 campaign were huge multinational food and beverage companies whose subsidiaries make billions selling some of your favorite organic and "natural" brands.

Brands like Kashi. Honest Tea. Naked Juice. Muir Glen and Morningstar Farms.

It's time to boycott the companies whose dirty money confused and scared millions of California voters into voting No on Prop 37. It's time to plaster their facebook pages with this message: We won't support you until you support us. It's time to call their consumer hotlines, complain to their store managers. It's time to tarnish their holy organic and natural images, to expose their hypocrisy and greed.

It's time to raise a little hell.

The OCA is calling on all consumers to boycott these 10 organic and natural traitor brands:

• PepsiCo (Donated $2.5M): Naked Juice, Tostito's Organic, Tropicana Organic
• Kraft (Donated $2M): Boca Burgers and Back to Nature
• Safeway (Member of Grocery Manufacturers Association, which donated $2M):"O" Organics
• Coca-Cola (Donated $1.7M): Honest Tea, Odwalla
• General Mills (Donated $1.2M): Muir Glen, Cascadian Farm, Larabar
• Con-Agra (Donated $1.2M): Orville Redenbacher's Organic, Hunt's Organic, Lightlife, Alexia
• Kellogg's (Donated $791k): Kashi, Bear Naked, Morningstar Farms, Gardenburger
• Smuckers (Donated $555k): R.W. Knudsen, Santa Cruz Organic
• Unilever (Donated $467k): Ben & Jerry's
• Dean Foods (Donated $254k): Horizon, Silk, White Wave

Tell these companies that if they want your loyalty - and your grocery dollars - they must do two things:

1. Speak out publicly in favor of the pending GMO Labeling Ballot Initiative (I-522) in Washington State in 2013, as well as the pending GMO labeling bills coming up in Vermont and other states.

2. Contribute as much or more money to the Yes on I-522 Campaign in Washington than their parent corporations spent to defeat Prop 37.

Prop 37 was narrowly defeated, by dirty money and dirty tricks. But it spawned a huge, national consumer movement that is fired up and more determined than ever to fight this battle until we win the right to know if our food has been genetically modified. We're already collecting signatures in Washington State, talking to legislators in Vermont and Connecticut. A 30-state coalition is formulating a plan to collaborate on GMO-labeling laws and initiatives.

You are a part of this movement, and today we're calling on you, on the millions of consumers who were outraged by the NO on 37's dirty campaign, to send a clear message to the traitor brands who helped kill Prop 37, in the only language they understand: lost profits and lower sales.

By Ronnie Cummins, Director Organic Consumers Association/Organic Consumers Fund - November 15, 2012

My Claim with the Citizens Financial Protection Bureau

Well, for those of you homeowners in foreclosure or who have been foreclosed upon who don't know about this, I'm informing you about the Citizens Financial Protection Bureau which is set up to help sort out questions and complaints on mortgages, credit cards, student loans and more. So, I filed a complaint against the bank who is foreclosing on me, U.S. Bank, NA. It is taking awhile to get this going, but there is finally SOME response from them. First, US Bank is stating that it is not them, but BoA who is suing me. (Then how come the plaintiff, the lawyers and every piece of paperwork filed by the suing party list US Bank only...not even a mention of BoA!). So, they passed it on to BoA. Here is the correspondence from BoA, and my disputed response!

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Dear Debra Reagan:

Bank of America’s Office of the CEO and President acknowledges receipt of your correspondence on 
November 9, 2012, forwarded on your behalf by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.  We welcome the opportunity to address your concerns.

Some of the concerns raised in your inquiry are currently the subject of an adversarial proceeding (active litigation, mediation, arbitration, etc.) between you and Bank of America.

After discussion with our counsel, we have determined that in view of the connection between some of the concerns raised in your inquiry and the current proceedings, it is appropriate for our counsel to respond directly to you. Accordingly, the inquiry has been forwarded to our counsel, who will respond to you or your counsel as appropriate.  The concerns that are not a part of the legal proceedings are addressed below. 

In your correspondence, you stated that you have been discriminated against due to your gender.  You further expressed that your appraisal was inflated above market value.  I trust I have accurately summarized your concerns.  

As to your claims of discrimination, Bank of America is committed to helping customers achieve the dream of sustainable home ownership.  Our responsibility as a fair, ethical and equitable lender is to ensure that any loan we fund helps our customers meet their goals.  To that end, Bank of America conveys to you that we are an equal opportunity lender and servicer of loans.  Bank of America does not tolerate discrimination on a prohibited basis in any aspect of the lending process.  All of our associates are responsible for complying with the Bank’s Fair Lending Policy and for bringing to the attention of management any questions or issues regarding this Policy or its implementation.  Although your complaint did not include sufficient detail for Bank of America to identify and properly research, if you believe that the allegation of discrimination is still relevant, please provide a more specific explanation of the events that transpired and/or supporting documentation so we may further research your claim.

In regards to your appraisal, Bank of America used an independent professional third party licensed appraiser in order to substantiate the property value in support of your loan application.  An appraiser must meet certain qualification requirements before their report will be accepted by the lender; however, a lender’s acceptance of an appraiser’s report is not an endorsement of either the appraiser or the appraisal report.  

They stated:
Some of the concerns raised in your inquiry are currently the subject of an adversarial proceeding (active litigation, mediation, arbitration, etc.) between you and Bank of America.
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Untrue. It is U.S. Bank, NA who is suing me. BoA might have filed it, as their service agreement states that its their job, but it is actually US Bank, NA who is the plaintiff. Only the "holder in due course" can actually bring the suit. And US Bank states that they are the holder in due course. BoA is only the SERVICER, so is only able to file the suit on behalf of the alleged holder. So, the adversarial party is US Bank. Nowhere on any court documents is BoA listed or mentioned.

They stated:
As to your claims of discrimination, Bank of America is committed to helping customers achieve the dream of sustainable home ownership.  Our responsibility as a fair, ethical and equitable lender is to ensure that any loan we fund helps our customers meet their goals. 
AND
In regards to your appraisal, Bank of America used an independent professional third party licensed appraiser in order to substantiate the property value in support of your loan application.  
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They might actually have these proper business practices, but they did NOT use them in this case, because it was not BoA with whom I originally dealt with. It was Countrywide Home loans, Inc! And they DID take advantage of me being a newly divorced woman (they saw me as an easy mark to not know financial dealings) and, their appraiser NEVER stopped in and inspected the house to appraise it. You cannot properly appraise a house by just viewing the outside! And of course if a lender uses the appraiser's report as a basis for a loan that the home is actually worth what the appraiser's estimate is and allegedly lends money based upon that estimate, then that lender is accepting that the appraiser's report as accurate and has done the "proper" job of appraising the home. But Countrywide has been found to not have done proper and fair dealings when it comes to their loans and appraisals, as BoA is well aware of! And I happen to be one of the many that is a victim of this.
I even have 3 reports from a hand writing expert that states definitely that the signatures on my promissory note and 2 assignment of mortgages of the company officers endorsing and assigning them are forged. 
So, while it may be true that BoA might have proper trade practices, they are not the bank/lender that I did business with! Countrywide is, and they have committed fraud. Even the FTC said that CW committed fraud upon me by overcharging me on fees, and sent me a check (a small pittance of what the actual damage was) to "reimburse" me for it.  
So, as far as this answer goes, it does NOT address what Countrywide did and has no bearing upon my claims nor case because it's not BoA's actions that is at issue here. It's what happened at the origination of the loan with Countrywide that is. Also, it's US Bank, NA's foreclosure suit and their fraudulent paperwork that is at the heart of this suit. Unless of course BoA would like to lay claim that the paperwork is theirs. Then by all means, I'll be glad to include them in my counterclaim as a party of the fraud!
I will be filing these reports in court this week. If needed here, I can supply them, just let me know.

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Let's see how good the CFPB really is in figuring out this mess, eh?

Our 2nd Amendment Right & Holder's Actual Statement

I would like to address an email I've received about Attorney General Holder's "comment" on our right to bear arms.
There is an alleged "quote" from Holder being blindly passed around that he said "We have no right to possess guns". While the MEANING of what he said may equate to that sentiment, his actual comment was different.

What happened was this:
In D.C. v. Heller, Holder joined the Reno-led amicus brief, which urged the Supreme Court to uphold the handgun ban and claimed that the Department of Justice from Franklin Roosevelt through Bill Clinton had always believed that the Second Amendment does not protect any rights of individuals to own guns for personal use.

After the D.C. Circuit ruled against the handgun ban, Holder complained that the decision (and here is what Holder actually DID say) “opens the door to more people having more access to guns and putting guns on the streets.”

OMG! God forbid that us Americans actually exercise our 2nd amendment right, eh? But here is where the liberals say....but the 2nd amendment does no such thing. So, let's visit the 2nd amendment for a wee bit!
"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed".
Now because most liberals see the FIRST part in yellow, they say, that this guarantees the STATES, not the individual, to be armed. But, they conveniently skip over the 2nd half in red! Why do I say that? Because after reading "the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed" part, and a person cannot see what is plainly being said and say that this amendment doesn't give individuals a right to bear arms either has to be only reading the 1st half of that or completely stupid! Now, as much as I would LOVE to think the latter of most liberals who hold this belief, I'm giving them the benefit of the doubt that it's the former and urge them to finish reading the fricking fracking statement!
AND, I urge those who pass on information like this email, to research it before doing so. This way, you'll be educating others (and yourselves) to the facts....and not just blindly passing on information that isn't factually true (although may be sentimentally true).