[courtesy of California Progress Report]

By Pamela M. Prah
Staff Writer
Stateline.org

[courtesy of California Progress Report]

By Rob Richie
Executive Director
Fair Vote

Facts in the Spotlight

• Number of U.S. Senators appointed without election since 1913: 179
• Number of U.S. House members ever to serve without election: 0
• Number of states that always fill U.S. Senate vacancies by election: 3
• Number of states that always fill U.S. House vacancies by election: 50

[courtesy of California Progress Report]

By Joel Barkin
Executive Director
Progressive States Network

The Roosevelt Institution, founded in 2004, is a national network of student-run progressive think tanks. Their more than 70 campus chapters serve as a forum for research and discussion of policy issues, and are linked into the policy process through the help of the national organization. Given their distributed structure and young membership, the Roosevelt Institute is uniquely situated in the think tank arena. Many of their innovative policy ideas can be implemented by state legislatures and local governments.

Every summer the organization meets to select three current policy challenges as the focus for the coming year. Throughout the following year chapters research the year's policy challenges, meet with legislators and experts, and write policy proposals. Regional policy conferences meet, where students present their proposals and are judged by a panel of experts.

by Sheri Divers [courtesy of Blog for America]

David Sirota is a full-time political journalist and best-selling author who has worked on Capitol Hill and campaigns for the nation's leading progressives. He blogs at  Working for Change, and he is the co-chair of the Progressive States Network, which supports state legislators and recently headed a national campaign to have 29 state legislatures introduce anti-war resolutions in the face of President Bush's Iraq escalation. Sirota, the author of the New York Times bestselling book Hostile Takeover, has been a guest on, among others, The Colbert Report, Countdown with Keith Olbermann and Lou Dobbs Tonight.