Posted on February 26, 2016
Celebrating One Year Since the Historic Net Neutrality Victory
Most politicians thought we couldn’t win this fight. Some Democrats joined Republicans on the wrong side. Others expressed support but were simply too timid to speak out on behalf of the strongest rules.
But thanks to fierce activism, millions spoke out for the only solution that would make strong rules on Net Neutrality possible: the awkwardly named “Title II reclassification.” The president joined you in this call and on February 26, 2015, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) voted to adopt historic Net Neutrality rules under the legal framework we had demanded for years.
Posted on February 22, 2016
Get Ready for the New Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge
Samsung just announced the long-awaited details of their new twin 2016 flagship devices, the Galaxy S7 and S7 edge. If you loved your previous Galaxy, you’ll quickly fall for these new devices as they build upon what’s already great about the line.
The S7 and S7 edge are physically very similar to their S6 versions. The S7 is 5.1” and the edge, 5.5”. Both have Quad HD Super AMOLED displays, which means they have broad color gamuts with great contrast. Every type of content will shine on these displays. Each features a faster processor as well as improved cameras with faster focusing and better low-light performance.
Posted on February 22, 2016
How CREDO is fighting for voting rights
Thanks to the Supreme Court’s disastrous 2013 Shelby County vs. Holder decision, which gutted the Voting Rights Act by rendering Section 5 inoperable, 2016 will be the first presidential election in more than 50 years in which voters don’t have the full protections of the Voting Rights Act.
Restoring the Voting Rights Act would only require a simple fix from Congress, but Republicans have refused to hold hearings or allow any votes on either of the currently pending bills that would protect Americans from discriminatory voter suppression laws.
CREDO has been fighting for years to protect and expand voting rights. We’ve donated more than $4.6 million to groups that work to defend voting rights over the years, and millions more to groups that work to encourage civic participation.
Here are just a few of our current voting rights campaigns:
Posted on February 18, 2016
Republican Doublespeak: Supreme Court edition
Immediately following news of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia’s passing, Senate Republican leaders wasted no time in declaring their refusal to carry out their constitutional duty to consider a nominee from President Obama to fill the vacancy.
Republican leaders, including Senators Mitch McConnell, Chuck Grassley, Orrin Hatch, and Jeff Sessions, attempted to cloak their nakedly partisan and ideological obstructionism with logic-defying reasoning: That since President Obama has just a year left in office, and with the country in the midst of an election year, only a new President should be able to nominate the next Supreme Court justice.
Aside from the fact that President Obama was re-elected in 2012 to a full four-year term, and that he has the constitutional power under Article II to nominate a new Supreme Court justice, our research shows that these Republican leaders haven’t exactly been consistent with this line of logic.
In fact, Senators McConnell, Hatch, and Grassley themselves voted to confirm Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy in an election year.
Posted on February 12, 2016
Repeal immunity for the gun industry
It’s appalling. Gun manufacturers and gun dealers are the only industries in America that are protected from lawsuits when their products lead to violence and death.
That’s not by accident. The NRA promoted, and Congress passed, the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA), in 2005. The bill gives legal immunity to the gun industry by preventing lawsuits against gun manufacturers or dealers for negligence that leads to gun-related violence and death.
That kind of one-sided gift to an entire industry could never have been passed if Congress weren’t deeply in the pockets of the NRA. Fortunately, two members of Congress — Rep. Adam Schiff and Sen. Richard Blumenthal — have introduced a bill, the Equal Access to Justice for Victims of Gun Violence Act, that would repeal this horrible law and allow victims of gun violence to hold gun manufacturers and dealers accountable when their negligence leads to death. We need to do everything in our power to get this law passed.
Posted on February 11, 2016
Small providers top Consumer Reports survey
The annual Consumer Reports ranking of wireless providers is out, and we really love the headline: “Small Providers Top the Big Four in New Consumer Reports Survey.” You can see the full ranking here.
We care deeply about our members at CREDO, and we are proud to be joining other smaller wireless providers in changing the all-too-common assumption in the mobile phone industry that customer service can be an afterthought. We’ve made significant enhancements in 2015 to make the CREDO Mobile member experience even better, and we have even bigger plans for 2016.
Just after the new survey was released, I talked with Natalie Beckerman, our Vice President for Customer Service, to learn a bit more about what we’ve been working on and what’s in store for the new year…
Posted on February 5, 2016
Galaxy Tab E review : Meet CREDO’s newest tablet
Tablets are a great way to get the best use of your CREDO shared data plan, so meet our newest tablet, the Samsung Galaxy Tab E.
This tablet sports an instantly recognizable 16:9 aspect ratio, which means the 1280×800 screen is perfect for watching wide-screen video. And you’ll be streaming that video over the built in WiFi or LTE radios, so download speeds shouldn’t be an issue.
Posted on February 3, 2016
Your activism makes a difference: President Obama visited a mosque
Last December, after the tragedies in Beirut, Paris and San Bernadino, more than 46,000 CREDO activists asked President Obama to take a public stand against Islamophobia by denouncing anti-Muslim violence and making his first public visit to a U.S. mosque.
Your activism made a difference.
Today, the President visited the Islamic Society of Baltimore. His visit comes at a time when Islamophobia is leading to an increase in hate crimes against Muslims and to a growing climate of fear in Muslim communities. The message of inclusion and respect that the President’s visit sends is a powerful counterweight to the xenophobia and racism being stoked by right-wing extremists in Congress, in the media, and on the presidential campaign trail.
Posted on February 3, 2016
Why President Obama’s New Rules for Public Land Use are a Big Deal
On January 15 in his final State of the Union Address, President Obama announced a three-year moratorium on new coal sales on federally-owned land. This is an important victory in no small part made possible by years of pressure from CREDO activists and customers—including 18,000 Citizen Letters sent directly to Sally Jewel, President Obama’s Secretary of the Interior, by CREDO customers in 2013 and 2015.
In putting a temporary stop to new coal sales on federal lands—but continuing new oil and gas sales, which in many cases President Obama is working to expand—this announcement is simultaneously a huge step forward, and not enough, given the current urgency of our fight against the greenhouse gas pollution that is heating our atmosphere.
To understand why, it’s worth taking a few steps back to consider the bigger picture of fossil fuels on public lands, and the math of preserving a livable planet.
The Federal Government manages a huge amount of land that you, I, and everyone else in America owns—28% of U.S. land, in addition to all of our coastal ocean waters. There is a tremendous amount of fossil fuel underneath those lands and waters, also owned by all of us. For nearly a century, it has been the policy of our government to sell to fossil fuel companies—at extremely low prices and with no regard for the climate impact—the rights to drill, mine and frack for those fossil fuels.
The result is that burning oil, gas and coal extracted from federal lands accounts for almost 25% of all U.S. global warming pollution.
Coal is a huge piece of that, with more than half of climate pollution from federal lands from burning coal, about 14% of total U.S. climate emissions.
Unfortunately, President Obama’s action doesn’t stop coal mining currently underway—only new coal sales. The Department of Interior says existing sales will allow companies to keep mining federal lands for another 20 years.
What’s more, coal accounts for less than half of all of the potential climate pollution on federal lands.
From an August 2015 report, Potential Greenhouse gas emissions of U.S. Federal Fossil Fuels, prepared by Ecoshift Consulting for Center for Biological Diversity and Friends of the Earth.
In all, public lands and waters contain a massive carbon bomb of 492 total gigatons of carbon pollution—almost as much as the world’s entire remaining carbon budget of 565 gigatons, the amount scientists say we can release into the atmosphere by mid-century and have a fighting chance of staying below 2 degrees Celsius of global warming.
Last year at the Paris Climate Talks, President Obama and other world leaders came to a historic consensus to try to keep global warming below 2 degrees—and to limit it to 1.5 degrees if possible.
To achieve it, the vast majority of all oil, gas and coal on federal lands would need to stay underground. In light of this, it would make sense for President Obama to put a stop to new sales of not just coal, but oil and gas too. But he isn’t—not by a long shot.
President Obama continues allowing fracking on federal lands, and his administration has proposed an offshore drilling plan that would open to drilling new areas of the Atlantic coast and Gulf of Mexico to offshore drilling. The activities directly undermine the President’s international climate commitments, and fly in the face of the clear math of avoiding catastrophic global warming.
The management of fossil fuels on federal lands is under the President’s sole control. And stopping new sales of all fossil fuels—oil, gas and coal—on federal lands would be the largest action taken by the President to keep fossil fuels in the ground. That’s exactly what he should do.
Our voices have helped push the President to take important steps like putting a stop to Arctic drilling, and the moratorium on new coal sales. But the urgency and math of climate change demand that he do far more to keep fossil fuels in the ground. That’s why it’s so important that CREDO activists and customers continue our pressure. Sign the petition to tell President Obama to stop all sales of fossil fuels on federal lands.
Posted on January 28, 2016
It’s time to fix the Voting Rights Act
In 2013, the right-wing ideologues on the Supreme Court handed down a shameful decision that gutted the Voting Rights Act, ending decades of protection for minorities against discriminatory and unfair attempts to limit voting on the basis of race.
Congress should have acted immediately to fix the damage inflicted by the Court – but more than two years later it hasn’t done a thing.Now, more than 50 years after civil rights activists put their lives on the line for the right to vote, state legislatures across the country are still passing laws to disenfranchise American voters.
Fortunately, progressive champions in Congress are promoting legislation that will restore the Voting Rights Act. The Voting Rights Advancement Act would stop Republicans, in states around the country, from enacting racist voter ID and voter suppression laws. With key federal, state and local elections taking place this November, we need to speak out now, demanding Congress crack down on racial discrimination in voting.
