Comment on Obama's Deficit Reduction

   I agree with Edwin's editorial Obama's Deficit Reduction that the deficit is not President Obama's fault. His actions were what he and his party thought would be best for the nation as a whole. His attempt to kick-start the economy via stimulus programs sounded good on paper and the results of said programs are still to be seen in many areas. On eliminating tax cuts for the wealthy, I agree wholeheartedly that this needs to be done.

Who's Plan is Better in the Ongoing Budget Crisis?

   Democrats are accusing Republicans of trying to abandon the elderly and less fortunate under their newly proposed budget while Republicans are saying Democrats do not want to change anything and just keep increasing the debt ceiling.  President Obama outlined his plan that would reduce the deficit by $4 Trillion over the next 12 years.  Under his proposal, funding would not be cut for medicare and other welfare programs, but instead he would eliminate tax cuts for the richest of Americans.  The Republican plan, on the other hand, seeks to reduce the deficit by $4.4 Trillion over the next 10 years.  It of course details plans for reforming and trimming the fat of many social programs. 

   As for this year's budget, Republican leaders in the House believe the proposed cuts in the budget are insufficient to start the process of cutting back federal spending.  It would produce only $350 million in savings this year and would need to work exactly as outlined to fully feel the relief of $312 billion over the next decade proposed by its creators.  Unlike President Obama, Republican leaders such as Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, the chair of the House Budget Committee, also want to fundamentally reconfigure Medicare over the next few years to control the outrageous amount of spending the program requires at this point and the increases in funding it will require as currently operated in the future.

Comments on Libya

http://robertsgovt.blogspot.com/2011/03/libya-yeah.html?showComment=1302194460003#c4162438713916202404
I agree with your stance that it is important for us to provide a helping hand to remove ruthless dictators from office and allow the citizens to establish a democratic government and give themselves a voice without too many ideas of how to do so from the United States and other world powers. The people know what they want and usually have some ideas of their own on how to best establish a governing body that would benefit the country as a whole. The importance of technology to these revolutions has been greatly evident. Young people especially in these countries have seen online what life is like and how much better it is by comparison in places like Western Europe and the United States.

A major opinion I possess on the use of military force to remove those in power is that when our leaders do make the call to go in, I believe we should go in with force and get the job done quickly; wasting time and letting said dictator and his supporters oppress the populace even further only breeds feelings of contempt for us among those we are seeking to help.

Energy Policy: No Solutions

   Daniel Greenfield's blog posting on Free Republic titled "A Little Energy is a Dangerous Thing" is a right-leaning commentary on our nation's lack of planning for the future.  He lauds the steps currently being taken by China to invest in their nation's infrastructure to keep winning in the future when and if the value of the US dollar increases in strength.  The audience the author intends to reach is a wide-ranging one because many American readers and also many around the world will find his points about American leaders lacking planning and innovation and instead sticking to dogmatic principles when confronted with problems interesting and convincing. 

   Although Greenfield's argument centers around a lack of planning for the future, the examples he uses to make his points are mainly centered around energy policy and regulations in the energy industry that he believes have led to the loss of many American jobs.  Greenfield states that "there is no such thing as clean and safe energy. Energy is inherently dangerous and polluting."  Green energy options, in the opinion of Greenfield, are at this point still way too expensive to be feasible as energy providers for a nation that uses energy as much as we do.  He also points out that all forms of affordable energy have a human cost.  "Technology isn't magic.  It's a set of implemented techniques that work around the laws of the universe to achieve human ends."  Here Greenfield is making a strong conservative point that the primary goal is to make available as much of a good as possible to the public and take care of humans first.  Going on to make the point that our politicians continued to regulate industry until most of our factories moved to China, Greenfield casts this as a parallel to increased reliance on government to help provide Americans with the opportunity to land a good job, through such programs as financial aid for college and welfare programs. 

   Finally, in attacking our nation's leadership, or lack thereof, Greenfield defines real leadership as "planning for the future by balancing risk against reward, setting goals and achieving them", going on to say that it has been quite a long time since American leaders followed that path, instead concentrating on rewards and claiming any policy that will meet their desired rewards is risk-free.  This, he says, is the circular logic of children.  "We no longer consider whether things will work--instead we decide that the must because we want them to." 

Houston Rep. Lee Opposes Budget Cuts

Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee of the 18th Congressional District in Texas wrote an editorial for the Houston Chronicle published March 10 attacking most of the proposed budget cuts made by the Republican majority in the House of Representatives.  In her editorial, titled "Republican budget cuts will hurt American public", Rep. Lee pleads her case against the intended shutdown of government activities and states that the Republican majority "would rather throw a tantrum" than proceed in a thoughtful, bipartisan way.  Lee also writes that proposed budget cuts would cause schoolchildren to go without education.  This remark especially stings me because of my belief that education starts in the home; my mom and my older sister took the necessary steps to ensure that when I entered Kindergarten at age 5, I was reading at a very high level and could already perform the basic four mathematical functions.  Last month on his radio show, Mark Levin took a call from a woman who was bashing the educational system in general because her son at age 16 struggled with basic schoolwork such as reading comprehension and had repeatedly failed standardized tests, which as most of us in Texas know are a complete joke and a severe waste of time.  Teachers in the Houston Independent School District receive performance bonuses, the largest of which was $25,000, based on how their students perform and improve on standardized testing.  Levin asked her how much time she spent working with her son throughout his adolescence and she responded by saying that it was not her job to ensure that her son was well-educated and prepared for post-high-school life and that the public education system had failed him.  I strongly believe that you only get out of education what you put into it.

Lee devotes quite a bit of her editorial to budget cuts and how they would effect the economy in its current state.  She wants to follow the advice of the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform that recommend halting cuts until 2012 or 2013.  I believe this has been one of the primary problems lawmakers have caused by standing pat and hoping things will recover or alternately throwing money at large corporations whose problems mainly resulted from major mismanagement, plowing us ever further into debt. 

The Ever-Expanding Bureaucracy

    Judson Berger's article posted to Foxnews.com and titled "Obama Draws Fire for Proposing New Education Agency to Develop Classroom Gadgets" is of course written from a conservative perspective.  The article details a proposal by President Obama to create a new agency to be called the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Education with the purpose of giving money to companies to create high-tech gadgets for use in school classrooms.  The proposed agency would cost $90 million in its first year of operation.  Many republican Congressmen have voiced their displeasure with the proposal.  The article also points out a recent report released by the Government Accountability Office that found many duplicate programs already in existence in the Department of Education.