When I was growing up my father always said that a policeman was your friend who would always help you out.  In the United States and world wide that is no longer an accurate description.

     The increased use of violence without justification by police both here and abroad can no longer be regarded as isolated incidents. From the massive tactics used to break up Occupy and other democratic movements coordinated by the Federal Government to increasing unjustified violence to the increasing purchase and use of military vehicles all indicate a disturbing trend. Further, this violence seems to be increasingly directed against innocent protestors or other victims.

     The reason I have so many references is to show this is a steadily increasing trend that I continuously update. It is not a vanishing blip on the radar. Failure to deal with this trend will have disastrous consequences for the future.

In 2012, the New Progressive Alliance (NPA) started by endorsing 54 candidates from 23 states who publicly endorsed and pledged to work for the commonsense policies outlined in the Unified Platform (UP).  This page provides more information about the brave men and women who are blazing the trail for the future of democracy in America. If you would like to join them check Elections and So You Want to Run for Office.  That trail is wholly different than that which the Democratic and Republican parties take us down election after election, with the same predictable result: A disenfranchised working class and ever-more enriched military-industrial-Wall Street complex.

We are a 501c4 educational organization, not a political party. We cannot help a candidate directly, but we can note by endorsement when a candidate pledges to support the Unified Platform. We can also disavow a candidate  when through his actions or statements it becomes clear he does not support the Unified Platform.

Also as a 501c4 educational organization, we are  moving towards becoming more of a think tank which supplies documentation to support people and organizations that back the Unified Platform. We will still list candidates that support the Unified Platform, but we will not seek them out.

Chris Hedges is a man who has devoted his life to revealing unpleasant truths, even on pain of being fired from the New York Times or imprisonment. His writing is insightful and useful for those of us striving for real change.

An entertaining 2 minute animation on Bill Moyer's website with more than a grain of truth can be found by clicking here.

This article has been revised to include updated references. See The Environment.

We do not become a safer or stronger nation through civil rights violations. We all should be concerned about the ever increasing number of rights we are losing that this article documents.

(Cartoon: Khalil Bendib / OtherWords.org)

Though economics is a dry subject, there is a very real human cost to getting economic policy wrong. Sondra Miller points this out in The Price of Economic Ignorance.  

One of the greatest economic failures in history was a gamble not justified by any economics text. The references here show that - though they claim to be different - both parties in the United States have been following the same disastrous policies.

Though economics is a dry subject, there is a very real human cost to getting economic policy wrong. Sondra Miller points this out in The Price of Economic Ignorance.  

Often graphs, charts, and videos can display a large amount of information clearly to make it easy to see trends. Many here illustrate how we are are trending in the wrong direction and have been for decades. These charts and graphs also serve as a supplement to the article The Economy. Some may not be recent, but they illustrate concepts being proposed now. This is continuously updated with new references.

A decline in public education and making higher education largely unaffordable except to those willing to become indentured servants for most of their lives means we are becoming more and more like a third world country.