Ms. Thompson I love what you had to say on the topic of  Student Loan Debt and agree for the most part but would like to add to the discussion. As we know all too well school is expensive. Most of us are going to community college because it offers us a chance at an education that we may never had been able to get if we had to go to University. The option of discounted college is one of the greatest things anyone could ever dream of. I consider myself extremely privileged to be getting a degree in nursing considering where I am in life, a single Mom of two small children with absolutely no money. I have not had to pay one dime in tuition or books because of federal Pell grants as well as ACC student grants.
My point here is that I believe we are lucky to be in a country that offers so much as far as opportunity for higher education. I believe the government is doing their part and our part is to sacrifice along the way. I see so many young people getting into debt for "college" when in actuality they are living in nice apartments with all the modern conveniences and beautiful furnishings. The money they are spending on "living expenses" could be drastically cut by living with parents or even lowering their living standards.
I have had to live in an extremely low living standards for the past two years while in school so I could afford the loss in work pay. I have not had many things that are a part of normal peoples everyday lives because I am totally committed to sacrifice for the next couple of years in order to stay out of debt and get my degree.
I feel that the government is doing enough as far as loans and grants. In all reality we cannot have everything all at once. If students would consider the debt they are getting into as strictly for school and sacrifice enormously on other luxuries such as their own apartment, cable, smart phones, going out, new clothes then the amount of debt required would be drastically decreased or eliminated.
I say all this with one disclaimer, I am fully aware that the poor have an easier time because of Pell grants and such. If you are someone that wishes to go to school and makes descent money you are at a disadvantage when it come to grants. I still feel a lower living standard would greatly decrease the national student debt.

Buffet Rule

I would like to say a few words about the Buffet Rule or the” Paying a fair share act of 2012”. This bill is described by a White House statement as an assurance that everyone making over a million dollars per year pay a minimum effective tax rate of 30%.  To me this seems like a no brainer. How can we discriminate against the lower income households of America by asking them to pay more percentage wise than the wealthiest Americans pay? And how can Paul Ryan, Chairman of the House Budget Committee, even dare call this Bill “Class warfare”?

I understand that the conservatives like to say these wealthiest Americans are the ones creating jobs and that the tax increase would not make a dent in the national budget or that this rule might discourage investing. First of all I don’t care about how many jobs these wealthy Americans create. Does that mean they should have special treatment? They are already wealthy either way, why do they feel they need to be given tax breaks? I don’t think they are going to go under financially if they have to start paying what others pay. Also the investment issue is not a compelling argument in my opinion for the simplest of reasons; that income is income and it should not be looked at differently because it came from investments rather than the sweat of your brow. Fair is fair and there is no political talk that could convince me otherwise. Second is the national debt; the argument that the increase wouldn’t touch the national debt does not make me have a second thought about the bill whatsoever. In my opinion this increase could help keep some of the social programs afloat that are in danger of running out of money and even if it couldn’t I would still want this Bill passed as a matter of principal.

 According to the United States Congress Joint Committee on Taxation this bill would raise 46.7 billion over the next ten years which is one of the most conservative estimates, a group called Citizens for Tax Justice (a liberal think tank) estimated that this bill would raise 50 billion per year and there are estimates every place in between these two numbers. Either way it is true that this is nothing compared to our national debt but this sum of money could help ease the stress on the national budget.  

A recent Gallup poll found that 60% of Americans favor the Buffet rule and a CNN poll found that 72% of Americans favor this rule. Looks like I won’t be the only disappointed American over the non passing of this Bill.

 Ms. Vasquez in your blog post America is to large and cumbersome to be effective! your argument that the country is too big for the democracy to be successful is not one I can accept. I see what your saying as fare as social programs are concerned but please remember that social security was borrowed from many times to fund tax cuts given by President Bush otherwise social security would still have decades before it needed to be looked into as a possible problem. The country being big is from my perspective a very good thing as long as it is productive, remember the saying "many hands make light work"? That is what I see for our country, a society where everyone that is able bodied is doing his share and the ones that can't are taken care of very well. What we need is a more successful society not a smaller one. We need well educated Americans that have good jobs that can pay taxes, the more people the more tax revenue. With a society that is large we should be more successful as a country.

Health care

The hot topic lately seems to be the health care reform bill that was passed by congress and is in the supreme courts now. The debate over health care has been an exhausting long drawn out ordeal that seems to be hard to find a middle ground on.

The debates over government control and the fear that Americans constitutional liberties are being threatened is not one that I can buy into. I admit I was less than excited when I learned that we would be required to buy insurance, but the new laws for the insurance companies that prevent them denying coverage to children with preexisting conditions quickly got me back on track along with expanding Medicaid and increasing Medicaid taxes by 3.8 percent for household incomes over $250,000, as well as placing taxes on unearned income like dividends, interest and capitol gains. These few things helped me feel that we would not be the only ones having to grow up and take responsibility.

Like many Americans my husband and I are struggling to get by and make ends meet. We live in constant concern that if one of us comes down with a serious illness we will not be able to get treatment. Therefore the requirement to get insured is not absurd to me because I know that it’s the only way we would be likely to break down and find a way to get insured.

The reasons I cannot buy into the infringement of constitutional liberties arguments are because I have watched two people close to me get cancer and not be able to afford treatment for the illness. The harsh realities of watching a loved one die because you have no money for treatment was something I had no idea even happened until it did to my family. The argument of unconstitutional requirements changes after watching a loved one die for lack of treatment. The idea of liberty changes when someone you love is unable to get an operation they need. Being sick and alone does not seem so much like liberty to me anymore; one ends up feeling very oppressed after going through a life changing ordeal like that. 

I think the health care reform is a new wave of civilization for American just as Medicaid was in the 1960’s. Some are crying infringement on constitutional liberties but I will be calling it progress.

Birth Control/ Woman Control

In the blog post entitled “Puritanism: The Haunting Fear that Someone, Somewhere, May be Happy” Ms. Althouse touches on a topic very near and dear to my heart. The issue of birth control not being covered by insurance was not even something I thought was possible till my sister started working for a Catholic hospital and she had to pay for her own birth control at the age of nineteen. She is now the proud mother of a baby boy and still trying to get through school being a single mother.

I believe Ms. Althouses intended audience crosses political lines and is aimed at people that can decipher hoopla over real political issues. In her article she gives those of us that wouldn’t be caught dead listening to Rush Limbaugh a little glimpse of what and how he forms his political arguments and the process in which he convinces his listeners the opposing point of view is ridiculous.

Althouse is an experienced blogger of eight years and is a Professor of law at University of Wisconsin. This woman is no dummy.

In the post Ms. Althouse shows a good sense of humor over the theatrics Limbaugh is prone to and she does not let him get away with calling the birth control debate a “welfare program”. Calling Limbaugh out in her blog post is one reason I enjoyed this article but the best point made in the article was Ms. Althouse’s statement “It is fundamental to women’s freedom that we have the ability to decide for ourselves when our bodies will go through pregnancy and bear children.” This is the crux of the matter, the ability of women to control their own reproduction, whether they are eighteen and can’t afford birth control or middle aged and successful. Birth control should not be excluded from their insurance because it is contrary to some ones belief system.

Ms. Althouse states that the emotional theme of the Republican Party has been religious freedom and I would like to ask what about the rest of our freedom to not have their religious views pushed on us. I guess we should be grateful that cancer treatment is not against theirr religious views.

I love that Althouse exposes the ridiculousness of treating women like they should not be sexual beings and implying that women wanting their birth control covered by their insurance does not make them a sex maniac.   

In the New York Times article Rick's Religious Fanaticism author Maureen Dowd’s target audience is religiously non affiliated liberals that have concerns over the prospects of overly devout presidential candidates. Her concerns are specifically toward Santorum being obliged to integrate some of his beliefs into political policies if he were to gain political power.

Maureen Dowd has been a reporter/writer for 33 years and has covered three presidential campaigns. Ms. Dowd won a Pulitzer Prize for distinguished commentary in 1999.  

Ms. Dowd articulates many concerns I have held toward the candidates in this upcoming election. Ms. Dowd states that Mr. Santorum’s religious beliefs are on the side of extreme and threaten women’s rights. She refers to Santorum as Mullah which is of course the term for a Muslim religious leader; one can see the use of the term for Dowd is to exemplify that Santorum’s belief might as well be the beliefs of mullah Omar’s as far as she is concerned. The dangers of extremist beliefs and oppression are not reserved for the Muslims. For the unbelievers or mildly religious the extreme axioms that threaten equality are scary no matter which religious sect they are coming from.

I think the article does an excellent job at exposing the way in which the candidates are taking a nice American past time of religious values and warping it into a scary political tool,  preying on the beliefs of some devoutly Christian voters with promises of taking America back. Back from what would be a good question, plus the statement seems to contradiction his other statements about not imposing his religious beliefs on anyone.

I love that Ms. Dowd hits the nail on the head as far as I am concerned over the distrust she has for a candidate that displays such extremist religious views. The American people seem to be letting the love we share for religious freedom cloud the reality and practical implications of these candidate's belief systems. Dowd very appropriately gives an example of how these beliefs can easily slip into government policies with the forcing of vaginal sonograms for abortion patients that has been pushed by some.

Expensive win in Florida

The recent win for Mitt Romney in Florida has brought some issues to light that I have rarely even thought of. The article by Jon Cohen, Florida Primary: Mitt Romney wins decisive victory, Jan 1 2012 in the Washington Times brings some disconcerting aspects of the campaign process to mind.

The first issue I was unhappy about was the fact that the negative ads run by Mitt Romney’s super PAC actually worked. I would have liked to believe that these sorts of political games would not work on the general public. Never the less this tactics did the trick and now we are destined to see more of this kind of “advertisements” throughout the primaries.

Secondly is the very excessive expenditure of these ad campaigns is exemplifying the fact that the more money a candidate has the more likely he is to take the election. . The article points out that Mitt Romney’s super PAC spent more than five times what Gingrich’s did. The biggest problem I have with this is that organizations and corporations funding these super PAC’s are going to fund the candidates that will help them succeed.