Stop the Eleventh-Hour Assault on Endangered Species

Target: U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service

Sponsored by: Defenders of Wildlife Action Fund

It may be the eleventh hour of the Bush/Cheney Administration, but that's not stopping their efforts to undermine the Endangered Species Act.

The Administration wants to make serious changes to this landmark law that would eliminate some of the most important checks and balances that protect our polar bears, wolverines, whales and other imperiled wildlife. By striking at the very heart of this landmark conservation bill, these changes would severely limit interagency consultations and would prevent expert agencies from considering how greenhouse gas emissions affect endangered wildlife.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is only taking public comments on this proposal until October 15th – but we need to hear from you by Monday night so we can deliver your comments. Please speak out now for polar bears, wolves and the nearly 1,400 species currently protected under the Endangered Species Act!

'Happy' Halloween from the FDA

Dear Tara,

If the Wall Street bailout was hard to swallow, the government is preparing a Halloween trick that just may be impossible to stomach.

The Food and Drug Administration is opening the way for grocery stores to sell food made from genetically engineered animals. And the agency is proposing that these products, called “Frankenfoods” by some, be sold to you without your knowledge.

Sign our online petition demanding that food from genetically engineered animals be labeled. We have the right to know what we are eating!

Genetically engineered animals are not a far-off, exotic concept. It’s happening right now. Goats are engineered with spider genes to produce silk in their milk. And pigs carry mouse and bacterial DNA to improve their digestion.

The jury is still out on whether food from these animals is safe for humans or the environment. And the ethics of such changes have yet to be considered.
The FDA says they will conduct a safety review before these foods can be sold for human consumption. But consumers won’t know if they’re buying genetically engineered food, because the agency isn’t going to require a label.

We know what’s in the can of soup we buy because the label tells us. Shouldn’t we know if the meat we buy comes from a pig with another animal’s genes, or whether our milk has insect DNA in it?
Sign our petition and show the FDA that Americans want to know what’s in their food!
We have until Nov. 18 to collect signatures. Please forward this message on to others so they can sign too. Let’s stop this Halloween trick before it starts.

Sincerely,
Jean Halloran
NotInMyFood.org
A project of Consumers Union
101 Truman Ave.
Yonkers, NY 10703

Recapture the Flag

Sponsored by: Common Cause

It's been a tough few years for "we the people."

The Bush Administration has seized, consolidated and wielded executive power in ways unparalleled in modern American history. And on January 21, 2009, the next president of the United States and the next Congress will confront a host of critical issues created by our leaders under the guise of protecting America from terrorists.

The abuses of power include disregard for fundamental principles of American democracy -- separation of powers and our system of checks-and-balances; politicization of the justice system; grotesque acts of torture; disregard for international laws and institutions; and violations of fundamental civil rights and liberties at home and abroad.

President Bush will leave the White House in a few months, but these problems will remain. Now, and for the foreseeable future, we as a nation must fight to reclaim and preserve our fundamental values of liberty and justice, and ensure that the unprecedented power grabs of recent years don't set a dangerous precedent for the future. We must stop the erosion of our Constitution. We must recapture the flag.

Sign the petition!

Signature goal: 20,000

Current signatures: 5,969