Grow the Hope's Hunger Action Team

On Saturday, June 13th, Sum of Change Productions joined volunteers from Grow the Hope's Hunger Action Team who are organizing food drives to help restock the Manna Food Center in Rockville, Maryland. A sign of the economic crisis, supplies are reported to be down by 50%. The Hunger Action Team is a part of a local volunteer organization called Grow the Hope (GTH). GTH was formed by volunteers from the Bethesda Obama Office (the BOO). David Hart, the founder of GTH, said that they are working to "nurture the spark of creativity and hope that came alive during the Obama campaign."

Utilizing the same tactics they used to help elect President Obama, GTH organized house meetings, calling on members of the community to join the Hunger Action Team and take direct actions to combat the food crisis. On June 13th, volunteers gathered at a Giant in Silver Spring, Maryland, with a shopping list. They asked people to buy some extra food; a can of tuna, a box of cereal, some peanut butter. Anything nonperishable.

When President Obama (then candidate) talked about building an organization that lives on past his campaign, this is what he meant. The same strategies that helped forge a campaign for change, often as simple as volunteering some time outside a grocery store, are the same strategies we can use to make real and direct changes in our communities.

You can join Grow the Hope and build a Hunger Action Team in your neighborhood too. I urge you to sign up and ask how you can help.

Daily Chatterings: Thursday, March 19th 2009

THE BIG CHATTER:
Yesterday, everyone was focused squarely on the AIG testimony on the hill. The night ended with a powerful speech by President Obama. I imagine it will be chatted about a good amount today. As I noted in one of my posts yesterday, I was struck by the comparison of the AIG bonuses to the captain of a ship and the crew stealing life rafts from the passengers. I feel that this truly explains the Wall Street mentality over at least the last decade. I will spend today combing through C-Span footage of the hearing to find the Representative that made that comparison. Hopefully, I can post a video of his comments later today, but I will definitely have an expanded analysis of that comparison coming shortly.

UPDATE: I found the House Financial Services Subcommittee video footage. Sadly, the format sucks (exactly what I expect from a government run website, other than President Obama's of course). I'm combing through it, the printed version would be a lot easier, but that still isn't up.

SOME OTHER CHATTERINGS:
Surely, there will be chatter about the tragic death of Natasha Richardson.

There have been plenty of people blaming Senator Chris Dodd for the AIG bonuses slip in the last bailout bill.

Jon Stewart is having Bruce Springsteen on the Daily Show tonight, and we will probably see Jon drooling as much as when Tom Waits was on.

This one will be really interesting to watch;

"Rep. Charles Rangel says the House plans to take up a bill Thursday that would impose a 90 percent tax on bonuses paid to top-earning employees at AIG and other companies receiving big government bailouts."

You can read the entire bill here (it's a pdf that will download when you click the link).

UPDATE: The house passed the bill. It was a pretty overwhelming vote, 328-93, bringing a lot of Republicans into our realm of socialism. It will be interesting to see if the more reserved Senate does anything on this.

A sort of cool chattering, today is C-Span's 30th birthday! I, for one, am very thankful for everything the good folks at C-Span do.

YOUR DAILY VIDEO TO CHAT ABOUT:


Anything big I'm missing?