The Federal Budget- Social Security

In the issue of social security, when the article was written there were two opposing sides which were generally members of congress, and president Bush and his supporters. Those who supported bush took the point of view that the social security system needed to be radically changed. Because the amount of money it gives out is predicted to exceed the amount of money that is collected for it, like Medicare's current condition, they support dramatic changes to reduce benefits or otherwise diminish the program's output. Bush supported allowing Americans to divert their social security to private investment accounts, but Congress rejected the idea. Others wanted to reduce the program so it would only benefit those deeply in need, and claim that it was never ment to become a nation wide retirement program. Critics say that doing so would undermine the positive effects that social security is having on our econmy and would result economic growth. They say it should be changed in a minor way such as changing the earings that can be taxed for social security (currently $90,000) or gradually raising the retirement age. Both agree that something needs to be done to fix social security

I personally think that social security is an important matter. It is important to tax the wealthy end so that the middle and low wage earners will have enough to retire, since they make much less and will have difficulty paying for retirement and shortcomings, especially in an economically low time. I think we should elimante tax breaks for the high end and thus have extra money for the low end. Also, it may be mandatory to raise the retirement age, considering the fact that the economy is doing poorly and we have fallen behind somewhat in terms of technology and education. We will have to work harder if we want to catch up with the rest of the world and get out of debt. If you want to learn more about this sort of point of view and why I choose it, look up the Democratic Strategis @ Politics1.com

Issue 1, War debt:
http://alexscurrenteventsblog.blogspot.com/2011/02/issue-1-war-dollars.html

Issue 2, Spending what we can afford:
http://earlyushistoryblog.blogspot.com/2011/02/spending-what-we-can-afford.html

Obama unveils $3.73 trillion budget for 2012

The article laid out the new budget that Obama made for the upcoming decade, over which he hopes to reduce the national debt by 1.1 trillion dollars in 10 years. Obama was encouarged to make further cuts to medicare and social security but did not. He was criticized by Republicans and even some Democrats for not making enough cuts. He increased spending on education, clean energy, and high speed rails.

I believe that Obama was wize to try to reduce that national debt and to try to reduce it slowly and over a long period of time. There are however a few problems with this. Obama may plan to make changes and affect our nation's long term future, but if future polititians don't uphold his plans, they won't have any affect. He should have made more changes while he was in office but that was not really possible because of the recession. I don't want him to have to make changes that might affect MY medicare and social security but I understand that there are not that many other things that can be cut. I am very glad that he is considering the future and removing tax breaks for the old energy companies while further funding other aspects of the future like education,clean energy, and high speed rails.

original article found at http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/41575850/ns/politics-white_house/

Factories boom, but with few new workers

Article Summary:                   
         The basis of the article is the changing economy. It is improving back to a state it was in previously, but technology and automation continue moving forward. As a result, businesses are not looking to hire back alot of unskilled labor, but rather are searching for more skilled workers are a trainable as programmers. As well was being able to make more money with less labor, this will also allow America to increase its production by producing more valuable and specialized products.

My Opinion:
         I think that it is natural for Americans to move forward and try to continue becoming more powerful in the world of production. We cannot go back and wait up for unskilled workers, giving them jobs when there are more effecient ways to get work done. What we need to do is instead improbe education so that there is more oppurtunity for those trying to find work. The economy will continue to improve only if we look out for the future and make sacrifices in the present. The only other thing that could work is if we found some other job openings that would be appropriate for unskilled workers but these jobs must not slow down the mainstream economy. Americans have too much of a tendency to cater to the weak and not leave anyone behind but this is going to hurt us in the long run.

Original Article: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/41415001/ns/business-stocks_and_economy/

'Hacktivists' launch second attack on Egypt

Article Summary:

Activists in Egypt are acting out in order to try and gain democracy and overthrow the oppressive Egyptian Government. This is causing unrest in the United States. Anonymous is a group that previously led attacks on some websites including Amazon, PayPal, and MasterCard when it found out about its business deals with Wikileaks. A method called distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack is was used then and now again in the Egypt case. Last week the FBI carried out search warrants in connection with Anonymous-led DDoS attacks.

My Opinion:
In my opinion, the United States needs to get its priorities and values straight when dealing with this kind of issue. The problem is, they cannot remain in control and remain successful without somewhat compromising their values of freedom. If the United Staes allows Egypt to turn into a democracy, and the power shifts from its current rule to being ruled by the people, then it is very likey that Egypt would turn against Israel and in end turn against the United States because of their backing of Israel. If the U.S. tries to track down and punish Anonymous members who contributed to the attack, it will almost ensure that they remain friendly with Egypt. This will keep the U.S. supplied with oil and its economy in a more stable condition. It is a hard choice but I really believe that we must set an example and try to create democracy whan we have the chance to support it. If we do not do that, there is simply no reason that we should want power that we can not use rightly since we have it.

original article found at http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/41407082/ns/technology_and_science-security/