End of Month Democratic Highlights: 5 Plus ONE

The subtitle of this Blog is 5 Plus ONE because I am adding to the top of 5 "every day" highlights this month the news of the opening of the EDWARD M. KENNEDY INSTITUTE (EMK Institute) this week ~ Senator Kennedy: clearly a Democratic highlight all his own!

First

the public relations details, courtesy of the Institute:

The Edward M. Kennedy Institute for the United States Senate will open with a formal dedication at Columbia Point in Boston on March 30, 2015 at 10 a.m. EST. President Barack Obama, Vice President Joe Biden, and First Lady Michelle Obama will attend. Secretary of State John Kerry, Senator John McCain, Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker, current and former Members of Congress, other government officials, members of the Kennedy family, and friends and colleagues of the late Senator Edward M. Kennedy, also will gather to mark the occasion.

(It's looking as if Secretary of State John Kerry will not be in attendance as he continues his work under President Obama for a peaceful resolution to the Iran nuclear talks.)

Following the morning ceremony, the Institute will hold a special dedication of its full-scale representation of the U.S. Senate Chamber, led by Vice President Biden,  bringing together current and former U.S. Senators with students from across the country as a collective commitment is made to continued service and leadership.

* The dedication ceremony also will be Live streamed: https://www.emkinstitute.org/

and the Institute opens to the public on Tuesday, March 31, Columbia Point – Boston, MA

Second

my brief take on what the event prompted for me I spontaneously posted on my personal Facebook Page to a preview article in Parade Magazine:

Bobby. Ted. John. ... Just a few reasons I am a nudge and remind people, periodically, that I will not support promos that rail against all wealthy people, that advocate for the elimination of all members of Congress and/or that promote legislating term limits -- My experience tells me that it is not the system that is bad as systems are only as good as those who run them (that would be us!). There's not much news here but I found this to be a particularly interesting and timely story because it is a reminder as to how good people, albeit flawed, can incorporate religion into their lives without imposing it on the rest of us.

"Growing Good Citizens"

Teddy believed that when you became a Senator you became something bigger than yourself, that power had been vested in you to do the work of the people for the good of the country,” says Victoria Reggie Kennedy, Ted Kennedy’s second wife and co-founder of the EMK Institute. Although Ted elected to use public office as his instrument for doing good, as did his brothers John and Robert Kennedy, other members of the family have taken alternate avenues of altruism.

(The full Parade Magazine article can be found here.)

Moving on to the more mundane ~ 5 Democratic Highlights courtesy of the White House blog and beginning with my usual End of Month Blog opening:

Democrats need to share Democratic highlights with Democrats. We cannot depend on main stream media to do it for us. Please feel free to share my favorite posts and/or to take action where appropriate. Take the Best; Leave the Rest, but market Democrats!

I know it can be annoying to have to take several steps ~ click, save and then post ~ but  it will be a lot more annoying if we have a GOP Congress AND a GOP President in 2016.

 My personal habit is to save Democratic each highlight on my Desktop; I create a Highlights Today folder and drop each Highlight into the folder; when I have a block of about 15 minutes of time ~ I share them all directly from that folder to my favorite social medium platforms.

I am of the mind that if we are to be an informed electorate we need to begin with becoming informed of the comings and goings of our own Party, particularly our Party Leadership as, opposed to popular opinion, they are diligently working on our behalf. Also, the more space Democrats take up on cyberspace the less space the GOP will have!

 ONE

See What the Most Progressive Trade Agreement in History Looks Like:

Trade is embedded in the foundation of a strong, 21st century economy. It’s been central to our economic resurgence, contributing nearly one-third of our economic growth in the recovery and supporting 11.7 million American jobs in 2014 alone.

Right now, America is in a race with China to secure a trade deal with countries in the Asia Pacific -- the fastest-growing markets in the world. The countries that would be part of our trade deal, the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), received 62% of U.S. goods exports in 2014.

So the question is not whether we will trade, but how?

The blog in it's entirety can be found here. 

TWO

President Obama Launches TechHire:

 Yesterday, speaking to nearly 2,000 local leaders at the National League of Cities annual meeting, President Obama announced his TechHire initiative, a new campaign to work with communities to get more Americans rapidly trained for well-paying technology jobs.

The United States has about 5 million open jobs today, more than at any point since 2001.

 Over half a million of those job openings are in information technology (IT) fields like software development, network administration, user-interface design and cybersecurity – many of which did not even exist just a decade ago.

 The average salary in a job that requires IT skills – whether in manufacturing, advertising, retail, or banking – is 50 percent higher than the average private-sector American job.

The blog in it's entirety can be found here.

THREE

Leading by Example on Climate Change: 

Our New Federal Sustainability Plan Today’s action builds off of the strong progress the federal government has made over the past six years.

 Already, federal agencies have reduced greenhouse gas emissions by 17 percent since the President took office, and increased the share of electricity consumed from renewable sources from 3 percent to 9 percent in 2013. Agencies have also made progress on a number of other fronts, like reducing water use by 19 percent since 2007.

 But there is much more work to do – and that’s what today’s announcement is all about.

To achieve this level of government-wide progress, each of our agencies has had to step up and take real action. And it’s working. Here are a few examples:

The blog in it's entirety can be found here:

FOUR

The People's Lawyer: President Obama Nominates Loretta Lynch to Be the Next Attorney General November 8, 2014: 

Attorney General Holder's fierce commitment to the pursuit of that principle is shared by U.S. Attorney Lynch. The daughter of a school librarian and a fourth-generation Baptist minister, a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School, she is a fair and independent lawyer who has headed one of the most prominent U.S. Attorney's offices in the country -- twice. As the head of the Eastern District of New York:

She successfully prosecuted the terrorists who plotted the bomb -- plotted to bomb the Federal Reserve Bank and the New York City subway. She has boldly gone after public corruption, bringing charges against public officials in both parties. She’s helped secure billions in settlements from some of the world’s biggest banks accused of fraud, and jailed some of New York’s most violent and notorious mobsters and gang members.

One of her proudest achievements was the civil rights prosecution of the officers involved in the brutal assault of the Haitian immigrant Abner Louima. Loretta might be the only lawyer in America who battles mobsters and drug lords and terrorists, and still has the reputation for being a charming "people person."

Driven by the principles of fairness, equality, and justice, Loretta has striven to make a difference for the people she serves. It's in her blood. Her grandfather, a sharecropper in the 1930s, helped folks in his community who got into trouble with the law and had no recourse under the Jim Crow system. She rode her father's shoulders to his church, where students would meet to organize anti-segregation boycotts. The sense of justice she absorbed as a young girl is what she will bring to bear at the Department of Justice.

The blog in it's entirety can be found here.

(For an informational purposes only, the President's March 21st follow up Weekly Address, referencing his nomination of Loretta Lynch can be found here.) 

FIVE

98 Percent of Americans Are Connected to High-Speed Wireless Internet:

 At yesterday's White House Science Fair, President Obama announced that we've reached our major broadband connectivity goal -- 98 percent of Americans nationwide are now connected to high-speed wireless Internet, surpassing any point in history.

"Four years ago, I set a national goal to provide 98 percent of Americans with high-speed wireless Internet so that any young scientist or entrepreneur could access the world’s information," the President said. "Today, I can announce that we have achieved that goal, and we did it ahead of schedule. 

The blog in it's entirety can be found here.

G., aka Partisan Democrat

: