Moms Rising helps you tell the Obama Administration to take immediate steps to curb police brutality. They present a long list of reforms we've fought for here at various times, including reforms that directly address the Sterling and Castile killings (like more robust data collection on police brutality) and reforms that go deeper into structural issues with police departments (like limits on asset seizure and transfer of military equipment to police). If you're thinking that presenting this list of demands ensures that some of the demands will get lost, just remember that every time you utter a demand, you get closer to realizing it. And if you're wondering how police are ever going to defend themselves if we don't give them a wide berth to shoot black and brown people dead, do two things: 1) slap yourself, and 2) remember that our legal system presumes everyone innocent until proven guilty -- which is why I don't pass along action alerts demanding convictions or charges for the officers involved, though I will pass along action alerts demanding investigations. If a guy dies after being pulled over for a broken taillight, I can think of no good reason to oppose investigating further -- though I can think of plenty of bad ones.
Meanwhile, if you've missed previous opportunities to tell your Congressfolk to support H.R. 5313, the WATER Act, then Sign for Good still helps you do that. Our federal government has reduced spending on water infrastructure by some 75% over the last 40 years, which has shifted a lot of responsibility for such spending on the states -- which may please those who have a certain philosophical bent, but which does not, presumably, please the good citizens of Flint, MI, whose children now have permanent brain damage thanks to corroded lead pipes resulting from the bold thinking of an unelected "emergency manager." Also, for those of a certain philosophical bent, abdicating responsibility at the federal level doesn't just "leave matters to the states" -- it also leaves matters to corporations, who are hastening to privatize water systems across America as we speak. If it's hard enough to get state and federal officials to redress grievances; how hard will it be to get a corporation, which only owes its shareholders, to redress grievances? The WATER Act -- by funding water infrastructure spending with revenue collected by closing corporate tax loopholes, which I call a win-win -- will begin to break down this dystopia, so let's get to it.
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