the house. sponsored by ted kennedy, signed by president clinton. this past week, every senate democrat voted to overturn the hobby lobby decision which was based on protections in that bill. we are not dealing with our democratic party any more. not even close. all this attention to how the republican party has gone to the right. they never talk about how radical the democratic party has become. [applause] so i wanted to make that point, which is not responsive to the question, but it is important to point out. >> we are on a hard break. i need any more to. >> i will now -- a name or two. >> i will answer that question. i have watched with scott walker has done in wisconsin with great admiration. they have thrown everything they have at the guy, and he has d out theto them, lai

facts, treated the people like ,dults, got his agenda through and he is in for a very tough fight again this year. the media is out to get him. the long knives are out. if you can win for the third time in wisconsin, he should at least get a look from our side heading into 2016. [applause] >> he looks great kicking off the summit a year ago. lots of us were here. as we wrap up the panel, we catherine hamm, james goldman and guy benson, and as the rookie,, katie, we want to initiate you. i hope we have the slide. -- thanks. back up

>> a group of leaders advocating for social, economic, and political justice talk about their work and communicating their message on reproductive life, racial profiling, health care, and lgbt rights. this is part of the net roots nation meeting in detroit. >> i spent most of my days on twitter and use the tool to test

out jokes and content. i get the feel of how many people who follow me follow the news. you get smart people who say hello to you a lot. and, i think, what separates us from them is is not being afraid of reality and science. and, one experience is ever was the debate at the creation museum. somebody tweeted at me that they had proof that the earth is 6000 years old. i am like, you know, awkward. fire was created ten thousand years ago. he tweeted back. i said, i may be a whore. you are still wrong. and so what if i am? what does that have to do with a thing.

i know many sex workers who are smarter than me and believe in science. [applause] my favorite thing is when you talk about -- it is my personal belief that earth control is a human right and should be free for anyone who wants it. anybody who needs an abortion should get one without apology. [applause] popular things to say outside of these walls. super-popular. i am telling you. people love it. my favorite thing that i put up in the universe and people come back at me with is, why should i have to pay for your birth control? i do not want to pay for your birth-control. i think it is funny. i would pay any amount for yours. [applause]

without further ado, i will reset what we are doing. this is ignite. without further ado, jean pittsburgh. >> hi. i am the founder and i am talking to you about how we took over the world and build a community in less than a year. lesbians are taking over the world. what is this? we are a community of queer women. if you take nothing else away from today, high-fives are magic. give your neighbor a high five. it is tradition.

you nailed the high five portion of today. what problem are you try to solve? for lesbians in tech, we can go to events and they look like men. we can go to lgbt events and they also look like this. we decided to do a series and -- how to provide value. we decide to host happy hours and we were not sure if women in tech exist. i have done gay events and it is hard to get women to show up. i thought one of thing -- one of three things was happening. there are not lesbians. that is not true. they are home with their cat or girlfriend. no judgment. we wanted to create value.

we had to figure out how to provide value. something magical happened for me. lesbians showed up to something. it was crazy and they kept showing up. all of a sudden, people in other cities e-mailed me and all we did was provide value by connecting. it turns out that finding lesbians is not easy and there is no secret handshake. i am upset about that. we can start one. i said, yes. we can host one in chicago. if there is a happy hour, i will do it. this is the best ever. there are lesbians in tech. we have happy hours in 14 different cities and three international cities. london, berlin, toronto. we have built a community of 4000 queer women in tech. we all have passion projects and it turns out that sleep is not

totally overrated. we had to figure out how to make it sustainable. we became too broad. it turns out that lesbians all need to connect. we lost the tech focus. people started calling us "lesbians with jobs." we had to figure out how to get back to the value. we hosted a series of hangouts and people attended the events from all over the world. they said that they wanted deeper connections outside of happy hour. that is how we got to our first summit in san francisco back in february. we have people like megan smith. people wanted role models. i said, who is a career woman in tech you would want to hear speak and 95% did not have one name. the other one said megan smith.

people wanted this. how did we get that many? i stock people on twitter. -- stalk people on twitter. if you put handles in your twitter name, that would save me time. tell your friends. people would say, what is your vision. screw that. strategic plans suck and they are a waste of time. run experiments. in san francisco, they got jealous. i said i would listen to my community. if we can sell tickets, i will do it. they proved it to me and we had a summit. the white house called and asked

us to plan the first innovation summit. i said, i have to check my calendar. i can work something out. i said, yes. of course. we are going to host another summit and it turns out that people really like summits. you are all invited. there are going to be a lot of high-fives and allies and friends are all invited. how can you build a community that takes over the world that takes over the world? start with value. do not go too far ahead. do not create the strategic land yet. when in doubt, give high fives. thank you. >> please welcome, depak borgava. >> last year, i met a smart and courageous young man named robert day.

he works at a pot belly's in washington d.c. and he makes less than $10 an hour with no benefits. he told me that he barely exists. rent, food -- it has to be paid, he said. he said, how can i get ahead on poverty wages and no benefits? last year, even though they had a mediocre year, the ceo doubled his pay to $2.3 million a year and his wage is $1000 an hour. robert is not fighting for $1000 an hour. he knows he deserves to be paid more and that is why robert has joined with his coworkers in washington and across the country, bringing others with him, to the fight to higher wages and the fight for $15. this fight has inspired millions

who see themselves in robert's story. one third of our country live below 200% of the poverty line and earn less than $47,000 for a family of four. how did we get into this mess? between 1959 and 1973, there was a strong relationship between economic growth and reductions in the poverty rate. they broke apart in the 1970's. had they stayed together, the poverty rate in the united states would have fallen to 0% in 1986 and stayed there. if wages had kept pace with productivity, america's lowest paid workers would be making $17 an hour. for 50 years, we have been lost in the haze of a tired and stale

debate. conservatives blame the victim and promote trickle down. many liberals say that there is not much we can do about inequality and poverty generated in the market and through the market. we can have ameliorating programs to help at the margin. both miss the big problem. we need to value labor in proportion to the contribution to the nation's bottom line. the best anti-poverty program is a job that pays a living wage. we can break out of the debate we have been stuck in for the last 50 years and reduce poverty by 80% by taking three simple steps. we can raise wages so that workers earn a living wage and wages catch up with productivity growth. the minimum wage would go up a lot, like in seattle. and, we need to make it easier for workers to bargain with

employers through collective bargaining at the workplace. number two. we need to eliminate racial and gender inequity in the labor market. poverty is not just economic. it is a racial justice issue and a women's rights issue. we need to tear down the obstacles to employment and we need to create workplaces that recognize that workers are people with families. clearly, we need to change things so that your paycheck is not smaller because of your skin color or that you are a woman. number three. we need full employment policies in this country and we have to invest in key sectors of the economy. the green economy. early childhood education. we need to create millions of jobs and make them accessible to people who need them. this strategy would reduce poverty in united states of america by 80%.

this is the moral crisis of our time and this issue ought to be at the center of progressive politics in our country and in the 2016 election. we now know what to do and we need to build the public will to do it. big change in america comes through social movements. social movements help to make the impossible possible. few in this country would have believed that marriage equality or a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants would move to the center of political debate and now, it is a question of when they will be achieved and not if. we can do the same on this issue. we at the center for community change are launching a campaign to do just that. join us. this is the richest country in the history of the earth. we can build a society in which everyone has not just enough to survive. they have enough to thrive. thank you very much. [applause]

>> so, i hold the dubious distinction of being a repeater. i was here last year and it was terrifying. i am your token misogynist. not misogynist. masochist. i am going to look at the incoherence of innovation. you look at machines and apps. we have subverted everything natural and necessary to a mechanistic view of the world. look at how we look at human needs. food. shelter. education.

we are fully in a mechanistic place. we used to have a metaphor of education that was a garden and we would nurture the intellect and cultivate interests. it entails that children are organic matter and they are all different with known things that they need. in the analogy, soil, water, sunlight. there is a magical alchemy that educators are responsible for. we have moved to a language of the factory. we have inputs and outputs. the kid is a product of a good school. the entailment is that children are uniform widgets. why do they need art? the teachers are factory workers and it is a conveyor belt.

a stamp is put on their ass. none are left behind. we have now monetized children. we invest in the future and our kids. they are too small to fail. we can kid ourselves. the prevailing understanding is financial return and that is how it is used. we say that a reason to do anything is because it is lucrative and we have fallen so far into this paradigm of reifying the economy that the basis on which we decide something is right or wrong is whether or not it grows or shrinks gdp. we have wandered so far from the reasons that we exist as humans that we are the adults in the charlie brown cartoon. what the fuck are we even saying?

i know that when i look in my baby's eyes, i definitely think, man, i love that sweet roi. that is how parents feel about our children. right? we think, that is some money. children are not just giant money suckers. within this monetary framework, if you want to hang out there and you do not believe me, investment language is bullshit. we are talking about miniscule amounts for social issues. what we are talking about is adding to -- more appropriately, not taking away from food stamps

-- it is a fucking ketchup packet. it is insulting to the people who need this. we have wandered so far into this innovative paradigm of loving the economy and we are in plato's caves. we think we are looking outside and we are looking at shadows on a fucking wall. look at the place on the slide. the opposition is going away from us and the persuadables are getting on board. they love this message. do you know what is being said in this moment? america is a nation of values founded on the idea that all men and women are created equal. we hold that all people have rights, no matter where they come from. the reason we do things is because it is more or less lucrative and that is the basis of judgment in our society.

that is not even particularly innovative. we do not need to say that. we need to say that all people have rights. do you? that is a conversation we want to be having and the conversation that our opposition is thrilled that we allow them to avoid. [applause] >> yes. i'm going to say one thing. that is a good take home for all of us. we are going to see a lot of people with a lot of interesting ideas and we have been in a conference with a lot of people with ideas. commit this year to being a pack mule for someone in this room. be a grunt for that project. it is their voice.

you will help them elevate up. can you make that commitment? that is what we need to do. we need to focus on ourselves and what we are doing. you can focus on your project and be the legs, the body, the hands of someone else. moving on. rinku. [applause] >> when i was in india and preparing to move to the united states, one of my teachers told me that the next time she saw me, i would be an american. as excited excited as i was by the prospect and it turned out to be a lot harder to fit myself into my new country than i would have hoped. i watched hours and hours of television every day to figure out how to be american and i

think that i was doing ok. something happened. all of the white girls were supposed to come to my birthday party and did not show up. i try not to see color. i know. i was always really aware of my own and felt so strange. my friends told me that they did not see me as indian and i was just like them. i went to my first rally under duress. i was taught that changing the roles around race had nothing to do with me. something miraculous happened at the rally. for the first time in the 12 years since my family immigrated, i felt a sense of belonging and i understood that being an american is not about looking like marcia brady. it is about working with the people around you to create the most compassionate, effective community possible. as the demographic change, lots of people imagine that racism will just fade away and we will fall in love, marry each other,

have millions of babies, and have exotic looking hair, skin, and eyes. you can trust me on this. we cannot just date your way to racial justice. [applause] what we can do is organize our way there. there are three things that i have learned about how to build multi-racial communities and organizations. the first thing that is the most important is the real and complete self-acceptance. clear-eyed self-acceptance. the white suburbs had excluded black families from buying or

getting mortgages for their homes. by the early 1970's, indian middle-class families had been explicitly chosen by congress as being ok to emigrate because we were privileged in our home countries. we were considered ok to move in and i felt guilty about that for a long time. i felt so bad about it that i would build community with all kinds of people other than my own. your community has to include you, with all of your privileges and oppressions. we have to talk about racial hierarchy and discrimination. color blindness is a corrupt concept that is based on the idea that our brains can do something that they are not capable of doing. [applause] in a context where the universal is white, we have to be clear about who and what we are talking about.

the third lesson is that equity has to be the goal. not simple diversity. think of our project as a party and you can invite me to the party. i could be interested enough to go. if the music does not suit me, i find it boring, and i did not have a way to change it, i will not stay very long. in politics, this plays out as people of color invited to a meeting and nobody listens to a word they say. that is called tokenism. in this framework, we acknowledge that all the good things at the center of our society, the great education, the safe housing, the excellent health care, all communities contribute and deserve to have access to those good things. in this framework, we do not craft a strategy until all of the communities we are concerned about have a chance to shape it.

we do not set the play list for the party without asking what they want to listen to. working in a multiracial community is beautiful and it has excellent reward. you laugh at everyone's jokes and eat food. you get to release the potential in every human being. that is our job as progressives and the key to a great life. thank you so much. [applause] >> why are you so funny but your content sucks? i'm not talking about you or you. i'm talking about all of us. progressive and earnest

do-gooders. how is it that we make up such a dynamic and hilarious group of people but, when it comes to putting out content for our issues, we struggle. we struggle to find humorous ways to talk about issues we care about. we often beat people over the head with jargon or difficult realities or sad stories. there is a reason. the issues we work on are serious and the solution requires serious investigation. are they not going to take us seriously if we are too funny? who has the luxury to laugh? i do not have time to laugh. think about this. humor gives us the opportunity to tackle difficult issues in new ways. a video used humor to talk about

an issue that is incredibly difficult. interpersonal racial aggression. humor also motivates us to get off our asses. sometimes they need a push and they are more likely to do something if you make them laugh about it. we all remember the great schlep. there is a science to this. upworthy did a study and you will not believe what they found. [laughter] people love stories they can relate to. they like stories with heroes and villains. they like underdogs. they like to be shocked. and, they like a gotcha moment. the next time you think about making content, think about how you can connect on a human level and what is something that happens every single day that you could connect with somebody on.

this is an example of a video that we did with the aclu on reproductive rights. this is a legislator pretending to be a doctor. taking a highly contested issue to a logical conclusion. we do not want random medical advice from bozos. think about this video that we launched. santa is pretending to be the nsa. this was widely popular. most people think that santa is as creepy as the nsa. [laughter] do not be afraid to say what everybody is thinking. sometimes, it is most obvious answer that gets the biggest response and resonates the most. [laughter] meet people where they are at. if they want cat videos, give them cat videos. the internet survives on the systematic humiliation of animals.

talk about your issues in the simplest way possible. the majority of people do not know as much as you do and what is the one thing that they need to know when they walk away from talking with you. do not be too literal. you are right that it is your health care decision. when was the last time someone has talked like that? do not be afraid to use metaphors or layman's terms. think about what motivates your audience. why should i care? why should i care about your issue? your state? your e-mail list? remember that humorous content is a nonoffensive pickup line at the bar. how you follow through means everything.

we want to inspire people. if we want the numbers of people we need to make a change we want to make, we need to get new strategies to engage new people. making them smile is one of them. whatever you do, do not try too hard and do not start a joke with -- -- not a blank but we all know where that ends up. use an authentic voice and humor in your everyday life. have fun with it. [applause] >> amy lynn smith.

>> hi, i am amy. i am an obamacare success story. i am one of the millions who can help democrats win in november. it has been proven that the attacks of obamacare do not hold up and they cannot even poke holes in the success stories. the success stories have the advantage of being true. democrats need to tell those stories. a lot of democrats are not using obamacare success stories to their full advantage. more than 20 million americans and counting are benefiting and it is awesome. it is what we have been fighting for and the fact does not change minds. what changes minds are personal stories of how americans benefit a value statement. what is in it for the voter?

when a cancer patient shouldn't says that if it was not for obamacare, i would be dead, the value is obvious. use stories to show what people get. they get insured, despite pre-existing conditions. they did to keep their doctors and the peace of mind that, even if you are diagnosed with an aggressive cancer, the coverage you pay for can never be taken away and you will never hit a lifetime limit. let me demonstrate with my story. i have to buy my insurance and the cost kept going up. i was paying last year $1400 a month. why did i not shop around? i could not. i am a woman and i could be charged more because of that. obamacare gives me the right to buy the same plan as everybody else.

i am not discriminated against for being self-employed. i have the same coverage i have before for $900 less a month. i did not get a tax subsidy. my premium sounds expensive and i would pay more for the insulin to stay alive if i had to buy it without insurance. i'll never pay more than $5,000 a year in out of pocket costs and my previous plan did not guarantee that. i told my story and help others tell theirs. they cannot afford coverage and they cannot afford to do without. they take 19 different medications for different conditions and they qualify for tax credits. they got covered for $227 a month. i was told, in tears, that without insurance, she did not

know how long they would last, she was not sure that they would make it to the wedding this summer. they did. there is linda. charles' cancer treatment will be covered. the coverage will allow charles to keep all of his doctors. this is what linda told me. "i see these advertisements with people saying that they cannot keep their doctors and i know that is bullcrap." those are her words. the truth needs no embellishment. desiree will tell you the same. she says that she knows about people because she works in a pharmacy every day and has not seen a person's costs increase and she has seen a lot of costs go down. she has held a woman who has not had insurance for entire life. she filled a prescription to manage a condition. it was a condition that was copy for it turned serious. other young people get it.

he has a black mark on his credit record because he had to use the emergency room for routine care when he did not have insurance. while he pays off his debt, he got covered for $20 a month. karen knows the cost of getting injured and she avoided going bankrupt because she has insurance she could only afford because of obamacare. the cancer patient who would have been dead in 12 months if not for obama care -- let's not forget the cancer patient who would have been dead and 12 months if not for obamacare. she has been given an optimistic outlook for covering. as we are heading into the elections and beyond. tell the stories and give people a reason to vote for a democrat. people want to vote for the things that matter the most for them. one day, the life saved by

obamacare maybe their own. >> christopher. >> there have always been gay people. we were so in the closet that we did not know each other. in world war ii, we enlisted and we found each other. san francisco was a major wartime port. now you know why the city by the bay is so fabulous. a man named frank was fired from his job in 1958 because he was gay. rather than cower, he became an organizer and activist. 50 years later, president obama would formally apologize to him. an executive order will ban any business who ever does business

with our government from doing that again. in 1978, harvey milk became the first openly gay elected official in california. he was gifted and inspiring. a former colleague killed him. after his death, america was faced with the aids crisis. the government did not seem to care about the rising death toll. imagine all your friends dying in a few short years. for many americans, that is what the 1980's were like. they gave rise to a generation of lgbt activists who fought for the rights that we have today. this is barney frank in 1987. that is me. barney came out and was reelected. i am from massachusetts and that was the first time that i had ever heard about gay people and he was in a place of power.

our ranks in washington have swelled. we have seven members of the house and one senator. we have wisconsin and arizona. we have a lot of work to do and we only have two women. only one person of color and no republican. gay republican makes my skin crawl. if you are not at the table, you are on the menu. they do not make it easy for us. this is mike fleck. one of the only two openly gay republican legislators. this year, he lost his primary to an anti-gay tea partyist. some of his colleagues said that, we knew he was gay and he did not have to come out. had he stayed in the closet, he would not have these problems. basically, if you come out, we turn you out.

this is not just a republican problem. this is patricia todd from alabama. you heard me. alabama elected an out lesbian. the democratic party tried to stop her and the establishment candidate she beat try to knock her off the election ballot because they thought her lesbian status would be bad for the party in november. victory fund stepped in and she won the right to be on that ballot in november. this is my first time in michigan. what a great state. you do not have any openly lgbt legislators. you are going to change that and these are the candidates who are going to make history in michigan. i want to end this talk on the

optimistic note -- 500 openly lgbt americans in office today. i think harvey milk would be proud of what they and we have accomplished, especially the biggest accomplishment. in 2012, we elected the first openly-gay united states senator. baldwin said she did not run to make history. she ran to make a difference. harvey milk would be proud. gay people are like straight people and use their spouses and children in their campaign ads. we just got the right to get married and now, we use it to get votes. harvey milk would be proud. i do not think he thought he would end up on a stamp. it is the first time a gay man had the honor. my partner and i went to a

reception to celebrate the release. he said to me that if it was not for the work of harvey milk and everybody who has come since, he would not have the privilege of working there. i think harvey milk would be proud and he is smiling knowing that millions of americans are licking his backside. thank you. [applause] >> i am from minnesota. an incredible state legislator is a guy named scott dibel. he is the guy who proposed the, the, the reason we have marriage in minnesota. scott and his partner have been my friends for a long time and when they tried to get the constitutional amendment in the minnesota constitution to have marriage be between a man and a woman. whatever.

so exhausting. i went to minnesota to do some door-knocking. this is turning into a funny story. i am super-fantastic. the giveback that i do is epic. so, bow to me. i was going door to door and i was in a neighborhood that is a neighborhood that is sort of -- it could go either way. it is conservative, white, middle-class, and there are some hipsters. you do not know what you're going to get. this woman opens the door and says, come on in. i am like, ok. she is like, why are you here? i was like, maybe you should have asked me before you let me in. i am here to talk you about amendment one.

i just want to know how you feel about it. she said, i am so conflicted. i said, ok. she said, here is my deal. i am not sure that i am ok with two guys getting married, but i do not want to be a jerk about it. [laughter] that is the summary of minnesota and a metaphor for the way it works with people who are not psyched about it. maybe you are not for it. do not be a jerk about it. please welcome, laura windsor. >> thanks. i was raised in nashville, tennessee by a single mother who worked as a secretary.

she married a stockbroker and we went from working class to middle class. i was an over achiever and i graduated high school with honors and college credits, working two different jobs. by the time i graduated, my parents divorced and it was clear i would be on my own. i moved to new york and i got state residency by attending community college downtown. on september 11, i witnessed the attacks on the world trade center. after watching people jump out of burning buildings and running from their collapse, i spent a lot of time thinking about what america could have done to provoke such an atrocity. this experience fundamentally changed my understanding of the negative impact of american

capitalism abroad. i had grown up in the 1980's as a child of capitalism with an unwavering faith in entrepreneurialism. ayn rand had been a favorite author. years later, i found myself at the center of another ground zero, moving to los angeles and witnessing the mortgage crisis firsthand through my boyfriend. his business catered to the subprime mortgage industry and i became a poster child for the recession. my boyfriend's business tanked. i had a full-time job as an office administrator and i picked up a second job cocktailing on the weekends. my mother was laid off and looked for work for three years. she moved to four different states and work at target during the holidays, not earning enough to go off of unemployment.

she had a heart attack and did not have health insurance. the doctors at a walk-in clinic forced her to go to a private hospital and she ran up a $25,000 bill. she was slowly losing everything and there was nothing i could do to help her. in 2009, i was laid off and i went back to school full-time to complement my bachelors in business with an associates in fashion design. i worked two different part-time jobs but did not make enough to go off of unemployment. i found a full-time gig and business was slow. i had three different part-time jobs and, even then, was scraping by. all of this, while going to school full-time. the american dream seems impossible now and i grew up with the promise that, if you went to college, if you got a degree, any degree, you would be set. the 2008 financial crisis exposed that the game is rigged.

the bankers escape prosecution and the negative impacts of capitalism that i have observed happening abroad are hitting home. my anger -- my apathy turned to anger and i started a blog. i joined the occupy movement. i naively thought that everybody could agree that we need to restore glass-steagall and reform the banks. when it is clear that wall street would avoid substantive reform, politicians were in the pockets of the financiers who bankrolled the campaigns. the root of the problem is money in politics. i started a show called, "the undercurrent" with the young turks. i think we have an obligation to try to prevent another ground zero. as we are gathered in detroit

and arguably ground zero for the destruction of the middle class. we are at a critical juncture for more ground zeros, economic and otherwise. the transpacific partnership has been shelved until after the midterms. if the republicans retake the senate, these issues skew in favor of the corporate agenda. we are creating video content to change the conversation to one of economic populism, videos like this to educate people about the transpacific partnership and the ever-expanding power of corporations. deregulating across industries and shredding the social safety net. altering the climate past the point of no return. we know the root of these problems and now, we must be bold and get money out.

[applause] thank you. >> semanita jones. >> good evening. i am a storyteller. i use social media to tell my stories, with the hope that my openness inspires others. over the last four years, i have received hundreds of letters from fans and readers around the globe. they tell me that i help in so many ways. i am going to share a few of those with you. i have been following you on twitter for a while. you have taught me so much and i will always thank you for that. i have family on twitter and have not been able to openly share with you as others.

thank you for sharing your story about how you discovered feminism through hip-hop music. you make it accessible and your younger sisters appreciate you. i never realized as a black woman, i can stand up for being a woman without betraying my race. you helped me see that. thank you. feminista, thank you for putting a name on what i have experienced over the last 20 years. i never realized that there were others who felt as bad about being harassed on the street as i do. i have had grown men try to have sex with me since the age of 10 and i have gained 100 pounds from 18 and 35 to deter attraction to me. i wish someone would have asked me if i was ok then. thank you.

feminista, for the first time in my life, i feel strong enough to tell my mother that my stepfather raped me. reading you helped me more than you can ever know. thank you for your courage in sharing your story. feminista, i love reading about your passion for writing. your articles inspire me so much. feminista, i am a 56-year-old white woman from austin, texas and you and i have nothing in common. i want to reach out to you and let you know that listening to you opened my eyes. i am not a feminist but i believe in equal rights. i realize that i have a lot to learn about you afro-americans. thank you for being you.

ms. jones, i just want to say that i appreciate how candid you are when it comes to sex and sexuality. i have never heard of pan-sexual before you talked about it. you probably hear this a lot and i want to thank you for encouraging me to explore my sexuality and be more honest with my boyfriend. i want to be choked when he fucks me. over the last year and change, i have lost 80 pounds. i am aware of your weight loss journey and the negative experiences that you have shared. it takes a lot of courage to talk openly about weight issues. just know you inspire many. the last 3.5 years of my life have been difficult and, in 2009, my partner of 13 years committed suicide. i found her body one morning and

my life has not been the same since. i gained 30 pounds and everything hurts. being part of this community, i have learned that it is important to be deliberate about self-care and it is not selfish. thank you so much. you have done so much for so many. feminista, i am e-mailing you as one social worker to another. we need more like you. your blog about suicide not being selfish came at the right time. i was at my end. i am still there and your story about how you wanted to take your life is important. you have no idea. you wrote like you knew me and your words saved my life. two years ago, my son went to live with his father because i had been struggling with depression. i love my son more than life itself. i felt like a failure. when you talk about your son, you helped me realize that i made the best choice for mine. thank you so much.

feminista, you are always meticulous when explaining to people on the internet and your levelheadedness sets the bar. thank you for sharing your voice and being a constant inspiration. you help me channel my frustration and sadness. words are powerful and you never know when somebody is listening when you share your stories. somebody needs to hear what you have to say. even if you do not feel very strong about it. you have a voice. use it. [applause] >> sara. >> hi. i was born in iran and moved to new york two years ago. my accent has a hint of kangaroo. now, you know why.

i came here before september 11. my mother and i took a look at our passports and asked us to follow him. to put this in context, i had been lavished with toys from flight attendants for 12 hours and i thought this was going to be awesome. what happened was that we were taken to a small room and my mother was fingerprinted. he took a mug shot of her and fingerprinted me. he found a stool for me to stand on because i was too short for a mug shot. i was crying because i had only seen bad people in movies be treated this way and i did not know what i had done wrong. i know that my story is not unique and i know that there are countless others who experienced racism and racial profiling on a daily basis and fight back.

i want to shout out that the people who are fighting against stop and frisk and are at the forefront of the immigration debate, i was proud when they held the vice president to account on the stage. we need to do more in the realm of foreign policy. i do not have time for applause. we need to do more. i talk about foreign policy and i do not mean a savior complex or colonialism. i'm talking about foreign policy as a gateway that encourages -- erodes our civil rights and goes into our everyday rights. a lot of people sought entire communities labeled as extremist and, as a result, the patriot

act said that if you talk to anyone suspicious, we are allowed to take away your rights. as a result of that, we saw mosques infiltrated and it was applied to drug raids and impacting people of color. thanks to edward snowden, we found that the patriot act has become the basis for the government to listen into every single one of our conversations. i just want to say that this all comes from foreign policy. that is not the only example. i know that many of us grieve when we heard about soldiers and civilians losing their lives. it is great that the wars are coming to an end and are winding down.

what is scary is that the military is donating the equipment to local police forces here in the united states and we are seeing tanks in suburban streets. that is not ok. only a few weeks ago, on a drug raid, a police officer threw a flash grenade into the crib of a toddler. here in the united states. it does not have to be this way. this is why it is so important for progressive voices to be part of the foreign-policy debate. foreign policy is just what we allow our government to -- how we allow our government to treat people who did not live in this country. who might look different. they have different beliefs. they speak different languages. we can make a huge difference and that is what we do. it means "let's go" in farsi. we work to push for foreign policy that makes sense and we

push for foreign policy that lets people have space. to do the organizing and inspiring work they do that safeguards our civil rights and insurers that money doesn't get wasted on useless wars in the middle east, where it can be used in our hospitals and in our schools. that is the piece does patiently took to d.c. a few months ago. were only a year old, but in a year we now are up to 55,000 strong. it's incredibly exciting. so i wanted to say thank you for this community and the work you do and thank you for being the type of people who stand up. i look forward to marching alongside you in the future. [applause]

>> jolena maxwell. >> you were drinking, what did you expect? those were the first words someone told me when i confided in him eight years ago that i had been sexually assaulted. it was these questions about my choices, as opposed to saying the choices of my rapist, that were in some ways more painful than the violent act itself. i stumbled into rape culture, a world in which rape is seen as the norm and victims are blamed for their own assaults. there are many myths about rape. it is a myth that there are blurred lines of consent. it is that myth that rapes are committed by strangers jumping out of the bushes. it's also a myth that rape cannot happen to men. what's true is that rape culture is very real. i know you've all seen this picture before. this picture is supposed to represent love and patriotism and romance.

what you might not know is that these two people are strangers, which makes this picture an assault. fast forward to last summer when robin thicke's blurred lines was the number one song in the country and feminist spoke out and spoke up and said no, enough is enough. i refuse to accept this. he went from number one on the charts to the number one creep just a year later. when you see us a statistic like this one that only 3% of rapist ever spend a day in jail, i want you to be as horrified as i am. this is not just my issue. this is not just a feminist issue. it's everyone's issue. last year when i went on fox news and said i should not have not have to have an ar-15 order to not be raped, i was told by the right wing that my statement was shocking and bizarre.

i'm here to tell you that know, we need to be true to the people about consent and bystander intervention. i should not need a gun on every first date to be safe from sexual assault. [applause] the morning after the segment, i was sent this rape threat at 8:00 a.m. in the morning, and it was one of hundreds of threats. i am here to tell you that i can't be out here alone. survivors cannot be the only one speaking up and speaking out. that's where you come in, allies. rape is not an inevitable occurrence. it's not something we should trivialize and it's not always boys will be boys. i'm here to tell you that rape culture is real and we must end it. when you see an advertisement like this one, you call it out in public. you don't just turn to your friend and say that is offensive. you stand along side me and say no.

this is not just an issue for women or for feminists, like i said before, or for people who have survived it. it's everyone's issues. boys will not be boys. this is ridiculous. because rape culture is a spectrum, it also includes street harassment. i know i'm flawless and i woke up like this, but stop telling me to smile. [applause] when you see someone catcalling a woman on the street, i want you to speak up and speak out and go up to the woman, like feminista jones says and go up and call them out for their harassing behavior. don't just ignore it and pretend it's not a problem, because it is. do not say what an administrator said to my friend, rape is like football, you might want to review your plays and see if you would have made different

choices. you going to more like john kelly and stand up and say that rape can happen in any kind of relationship. he is the first person to testify about rape in same-sex relationships. talk back to george will who made this idiotic notion that being raped is somehow a privilege that contains a coveted status. all survivors spoke out using that # to say no. i'm here to say that you need to make your move now. you need to stand alongside survivors and the allies in public. i know it is easy to be cynical, but i'm optimistic because campaigns like this one are shifting the conversation away from what women can do to prevent rapes and onto maybe we

should change the behaviors of the potential rapist. i want to get to the point with an answer to the question i posed in the title of this presentation. i want the answer to that question, how do we end rape culture, to be, we already did. thank you. [applause] >> let's talk about corruption. when i say corruption, i'm not talking about the sleazy guy with a shoebox full of $100 bills. that's old-fashioned corruption. i'm talking about corruption in the year 2014. the enormous amount of money pouring into american politics. i could show you all kinds of scary charts or numbers, but everyone here already has an intuitive sense of this problem.

if you can afford a lobbyist, if you can put money into campaigns, you get a better version of the government than everyone else. that's why we keep seeing headlines like this. the matter how common sense the solution, unless the money is there, your issue gets stuck over and over again. this is an immensely complicated problem. when i say money and politics, most people say the money going into campaigns are citizens united. there is the revolving door. it's just a big incestuous -- this is the reaction you get when you talk to people about money and politics. today i'm going to talk about the solution, how we win this thing. i'm so sick to death of seeing this headline over and over again, seeing the same great reform ideas show up in washington, get some democratic

votes and zero republican votes and then -- then die the same slow, painful death. let's talk about strategy. this absolutely has to be a bipartisan movement. i know what some of you are thinking, who is this asshole telling me we have to work with this party of the koch brothers. when we talk to republicans about the issue, they say the exact same thing, but instead of the koch brothers, it's george soros. everyone is angry about the same thing. if you look at the numbers, more importantly, you see that both sides support the same policies we need to fix the problem. it's not a left-wing or right-wing issue. it's an american issue. until we start treating it like one, we're not going to win. so when you are dealing with the problem this huge, you cannot just nibble around the edges. there are all these different things we've got to fix. conventional wisdom would say let's take one at a time.

what we have found is if you put them all together in one big omnibus piece of legislation, it's more powerful together than it is along. this is all stuff you can do without amending the constitution to overturn citizens united. that is to say that the strategies work in tandem because like the majestic full vultron, we are so much more powerful when we unite as one. also that is an awesome picture and i needed an excuse to put it in this slideshow. we got something called the american anticorruption act. i don't have time to get into the policy stuff but i would love for you to check it out online. i want to talk about the name. when you call this issue corruption, not money and politics, not campaign-finance reform, you get a 50% bump with conservatives. it is honest, because that is what this is.

for those of you, i know what some of you are thinking now. this all sounds great, but do you really expect this to get anywhere in washington? i answer is no, absolutely not. we need to stop throwing ourselves at a brick wall with reforms in washington that are clearly going nowhere and focus on the 13 states where tomorrow we could put a statewide anticorruption act on the ballot. it's a game changer for two reasons. one, there are certain states where this is just good policy. number two, it's good politics because every single win at the state level goals momentum for national reform. we have done the polling for a hypothetical state act. i am from the great state of colorado so i'm going to be the guy who brings up marijuana

legalization. here is an issue that 20 years ago was a late-night punchline, but using the strategy, by building a coalition and going state-by-state, they have legalized it in two states and we are doing the same thing with money in politics. check us out and i will do a quick shameless plug, we are running a fake candidate in kentucky. thank you so much. [applause] >> are you having fun? i just had to say one thing because it is important to announce. shannon moore and jeannie have worked for 10 years tirelessly to end the mine in alaska. the pebble mine will not be

built in alaska. i think it's so important to give them a shout out. they were tirelessly on issues that are hard including water and climate. these women have made it so compelling and interesting, and they are tireless fighters. i just want to give them a shout out because i love them. i have been to bristol bay and seeing what this place is, and for them to work this hard to preserve salmon and fisheries and our environment, thank you. [applause] ladies and gentlemen, jessica morales. >> i just want to take a moment to have a moment of silence for eric gardner, who was killed yesterday by the nypd in a choke hold. in 1964, young people from

around the country went to the south. in mississippi they registered voters, they got arrested, they lived and worked and some even died, and they change this country. they were willing to risk everything because they lived in an america that told them that their lives didn't matter. and those radical idealistic organizers became today's icons. the names are mary king and hollis watkins. 50 years later, two young leaders, the son of a preacher from florida fighting stand your ground and sophia, who is fighting for undocumented immigrants as a daughter of peruvian immigrants, were invited to speak at the march on washington, and they were not able to speak. we came together in boston, in north carolina, and on a tiny island in georgia. we are adopted in southern and organizers and artists, and we are all of those things at once.

which side are we on? are we on the side of an america that continues to incarcerate people at a higher rate than any other nation? that rips families apart by deportation? what side are we on? are we on the side of an america that continues to allow black and brown used to struggle for quality education? what side are we on? are we on the side of an america that fires and believes and even kills people because of who they love? it's ok with them getting married but isn't ok with him having full federal equality under the law. last week, our freedom fighters went to national governors association meeting in nashville, tennessee to demand a meeting with our elected officials. and they were arrested while black. the charges were eventually dropped as having no probable cause.

they were calling for our demands. free, fully funded public education for all. [applause] two, to stop deportation and keep our families together. to end the school to prison pipeline, equal access, opportunity and protection under the law, and free and fair elections and the right to vote. we know that another america is possible, and we are building it. dream of an america where we can be educated without crippling debt. we dream of an america where family stay together regardless of their status, where educational institutions build a school to power pipeline. we dream of a true democracy that represents us, where we have the safety to pursue our dreams. we need to know, what side are you on?

it's not enough to celebrate the 50th anniversary of freedom summer. we have to use the precious gift they gave us to take the power away from those who are still trying to silence us. i'm on the freedom side. what side are you on? we are in a fight for our lives and the very survival of our communities. for too long, our government has denied people of color the basic freedoms of liberty and life that are the very foundation of this country. i'm on the freedom side. what side are you on? half a century after the brave men and women risk of bodies and lives in freedom, america still holds little regard for black and brown youth. if you're ready to be on the freedom side, i need you to take up ledge to be with us this summer and beyond. our voices matter, our votes matter, our lives matter. if you are ready, stand and repeat after me.

this summer, i pledge undying hostility to any government restrictions on the basic rights and freedoms of marginalized youth. i will use the power of my vote to remove policymakers from office who support measures that harm people of color, and replaced them with people who care about us. we're going to ask you to join us in a chant. she was a freedom fighter and she taught us how to fight. we're going to fight all day and night until we get it right. what side are you on, my people? what side are you on. we're on the freedom side.

she was a freedom fighter and she taught us how to fight. we're going to fight all day and night until we get it right. what side are you on, my people? we are on the freedom side. what side are you on? we are on the freedom side. [applause] stand up for yourselves, you guys. thank you so much. thank you all. i just want to say this community is one that i'm very proud to be part of. i love that you are here. i love that you care. i love that you often times work way harder than the pay that it means to work for other people, and i love that you consider other voices and other perspectives. please always do that when considering how you want to push things forward.

let's go drink and have fun. thank you net roots nation. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2014] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] >> during the weekly addresses, president obama talked about military strikes. the republic address was delivered by mike mcfadden. he criticized president obama's economic policies. >> this week, i authorized two operations in iraq. first, i directed our military to take action to protect our american diplomats and military advisors serving in the city of erbil. in recent days, terrorist forces neared the city.

thursday night, i made it clear that if they attempted to advance further, our military would respond with targeted strikes. that's what we've done. and, if necessary, that's what we will continue to do. we have americans serving across iraq, including our embassy in baghdad, and we'll do whatever is needed to protect our people. second, we've begun a humanitarian effort to help those iraqi civilians trapped on that mountain. the terrorists that have taken over parts of iraq have been especially brutal to religious minorities -- rounding up families, executing men, enslaving women, and threatening the systematic destruction of an entire religious community, which would be genocide. the thousands, perhaps tens of thousands, of iraqi men, women and children who fled to that mountain were starving and dying of thirst. the food and water we airdropped will help them survive. i've also approved targeted american airstrikes to help iraqi forces break the siege and rescue these families. earlier this week, one anguished iraqi in this area cried to the

world, "there is no one coming to help." today, america is helping. the united states cannot and should not intervene every time there's a crisis in the world. but when there's a situation like the one on this mountain, when countless innocent people are facing a massacre, and when we have the ability to help prevent it -- the united states can't just look away. that's not who we are. we're americans. we act. we lead. and that's what we're going to do on that mountain. as one american who wrote to me yesterday said, "it is the right thing to do." as commander-in-chief, i will not allow the united states to be dragged into fighting another war in iraq. american combat troops will not be returning to fight in iraq, because there's no american military solution to the larger crisis there. what we will do is continue our broader strategy in iraq. we will protect our citizens. we will work with the international community to address this humanitarian crisis. we'll help prevent these terrorists from having a permanent safe haven from which

to attack america. and we'll continue to urge iraqi communities to reconcile, come together and fight back against these terrorists so the people of iraq have the opportunity for a better future. the opportunity for which so many americans gave their lives in iraq in a long and hard war. today, we salute our brave men and women in uniform, especially our courageous pilots and crews over iraq. they're protecting our fellow americans. they're helping save the lives of innocent people on a mountain, people who today know that there's a country called america that cares for them, too, and that is willing to stand up. not just for our own security, but for the dignity and freedom that belongs to all people. >> hi. my name is mike mcfadden and i'm running for the united states senate from the great state of minnesota. to get there, i'm in the midst of an 87-county tour. today, i hit county number 80 and i'm speaking to you from the minnwest technology campus in willmar. we have a wonderful state, and

minnesotans work hard, but no matter where i go, from winona to warroad, people tell me the same thing -- we are heading in the wrong direction. america is experiencing one of the slowest economic recoveries in our nation's history. minnesotans feel like we're falling behind. wages have been stagnant but the cost of everything from gas to groceries keeps going up. here in minnesota, over half of our workers are underemployed and weekly wages have gone up by just pennies. this is not what an economic recovery should feel like. minnesota is the land of 10,000 lakes. but when it comes to the challenges working families are facing, all we get from democrats is 10,000 excuses. we can do better. i'm running to bring real independent leadership to washington, to help get america back onto the path of growth and prosperity. there are many ways we can turn this economy around, but let me touch on two of them today. the first is regulation.

president obama and the senate democrats are great at creating regulations. but when it comes to jobs? not so much. to create jobs and unleash our full economic potential, we need smarter regulation, not overregulation, so that the american free enterprise system can do what it does best -- innovate. let me give you an example from my state. we are sitting on one of the largest copper and nickel deposits in the world. there is a company that wants to use advanced technologies to safely mine these metals and bring good jobs back to minnesota's iron range. but seven years and $150 million later, we still don't have an answer because there are seven different regulatory agencies responsible for making this decision, which is crazy. i believe there's a better way. through smarter regulation and a little common sense, we can develop our natural resources in a way that creates jobs and

protects the environment. whether it's the polymet mine in minnesota, or the keystone pipeline, there are good-paying jobs waiting to be created if we just use more common sense in regulation. the second way to get this economy going is education. to move our economy forward, it is absolutely vital to have a well-educated and highly skilled workforce. for the last five years, i've been involved in a fantastic inner-city school in minneapolis called cristo rey. the students come from some tough neighborhoods and very hard backgrounds, and our typical freshman test one to two grade levels behind when they enter our school. yet for the past two years, we've had a 100% graduation rate and every student being accepted either into college or is serving in the armed forces. when people hear about cristo rey's success, they want to know how we do it.

and the answer is simple -- because we care. we care enough to develop a curriculum that conforms to our own standards -- not a one-size-fits-all approach from washington. and we care enough to direct money into the classroom where it can benefit the students the most. we are changing the trajectory of these kids' lives -- their possibilities are endless. among them are future doctors, educators, and engineers. president obama and senate democrats have had their chance to turn our economy around, but all we're doing is running in place. we can do better. this november presents a tremendous opportunity for america to elect new leaders, with the vision to turn our country around, and get us back onto the path of growth and prosperity. which will allow us to pass on to our children, and those kids from cristo rey, a stronger country than the one we were given. thank you and god bless america.

>> two former secretaries of states, condoleezza rice and madeleine albright and robert gates talked about foreign u.s.-russiading relations. here are secretary rice's comments. >> well, yes, it is serious. the crisis and to be and of the cold war in a large part because it has been a long time since a country, a big power in europe. powers start behaving badly, it gets really dangerous. malaysian plane that was shot down was shot down because the sophistication of the equipment. way up.eet is a long when great powers start behaving bad, it becomes a dangerous. vladimir putin never