A curious thing happened in July. The New York Times reported, "The trade improvement in July was driven by a $2.4 billion increase in exports, to $120.7 billion, because of rising exports of computer parts, airplane parts and other types of capital equipment and industrial supplies."

As you may be aware, Sens. Leahy and Sununu introduced a legislation to extend the expiring provisions of the PATRIOT Act by 3 months so that the reauthorization legislation can be debated thoroughly before most of the act becomes permanent.

It is critical to pass this extension before the Senate recesses for the holidays, and I'll leave it to you to imagine the political calculus, given that 16 provisions will expire on 12/31.

The bill number is S. 2082, and it currently has 48 sponsor+co-sponsors. If we have 3 more senators onboard, the bill will have the 51 votes required to pass. Please help push it past that mark.

Key Words: Patriot Act, Defense spending bill, National Deficit, Legislative Activism, Activism