Fiscal Cliff

With the fiscal life almost upon us, the American public waits while both parties duke it out and try to get their policies put through so much so that they are currently at a stalemate. The main cause of the stalemate is whether or not the Bush tax cuts will expire and taxes will raise for the wealthy (those that make $200,000 if single and $250,000 if married). I think that the Democrats have to hold firm on that issue and let it expire (no negotiation). Those tax cuts were created with hopes that the wealthy would spend the money they saved and promote an increase in the economy, but they didn’t so why continue to give them more tax breaks?  That isn’t all that needs to be done in these fiscal talks, like Rep. Steve LaTourette said we all “need to focus more on the cost of programs like Medicare and Social Security. We need to fix the models they created in the 1950’s and crack down on health care fraud (last year alone, the government’s health care fraud prevention and enforcement recovered nearly $4.1 billion in tax payer money).  Both sides need to come together and work as Americans, not as Democrats or Republicans.

I wish I could give more information on the Republican stance on the issue, but their main focus is on the prevention of ending tax cuts for the upper class, decrease spending on programs such as Social Security and Medicare, and the increase in the debt ceiling. I for one don’t believe that decreasing funding to SS and Medicare will fix the problem; I think they just need to look at the programs and reevaluate them completely.  Democrats proposed an increase in the debt ceiling and $50 billion dollars for a stimulus program. I don’t know why they would want an increase on the debt ceiling, because the main goal of these fiscal talks is to decrease the debt so in my opinion I don’t understand these demands.

All in all, I think the two parties need to work together and solve the debt issue if not, we will all see a tax hike of $2,200 each. With that said, I still believe that taxes for the upper class need to increase.

Works cited

http://bonds.about.com/od/Issues-in-the-News/a/What-Is-The-Fiscal-Cliff.htm

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-pn-boehner-fiscal-cliff-taxes-20121129,0,4107018.story

http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2012/11/could-outgoing-republicans-hold-keys-to-fiscal-cliff/

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2012/11/30/fiscal-cliff-both-sides-harden-positions-next-steps-unclear/

http://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/2012/February/12-ag-213.html

Abortions

The article I chose to comment on was Natasha Atmadja’s article titled Don’t Abort. In the article she states that abortion or the pro-choice view on the topic is all about killing children “if a woman didn’t want to deal with a ‘mistake baby’ or felt that children would be too much of a hassle.” While I know that there are some women who get abortions because of these reasons, I don’t think all women should be denied the right to have an abortion if they feel it is what they need. However, I think if women don’t want kids they should take preventative measures or put the kids up for adoption. In addition, I believe it is morally wrong to force a woman to have a child if the child is a product of rape. This is a topic that isn’t black and white, there are so many different sides and facets to this topic.

"The House has been voting to roll back environmental laws and endanger public health" - Congressman Henry Waxman

Since 2001, environmentally conscious legislations started becoming less popular. The Environmental Protection Agency, Army Corps of Engineers, and the Clean Water Act (among other acts created to protect the environment) have been increasingly weakened, mostly by House Republicans. According to Chairman John Mica “The Obama Administration and Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) are pushing a dramatic expansion of federal jurisdiction over waters and wet areas in the United States… Broadening the scope of the Clean Water Act and the federal government's reach into our everyday lives would adversely affect the nation’s economy, threaten jobs, invite costly litigation, and expand the federal government’s authority over state, local and private property rights.” I beg to disagree, having clean drinking water, being able to go kayaking, swimming in the lake, and fishing those are all things we hope to be able to do, those are all rights we deserve as humans. Claiming that those rights threaten jobs is a sorry excuse for weakening such helpful legislations.

During the summer of 1969, a fires broke out on the Cuyahoga River in Cleveland, Ohio. The river was filled with industrial pollution and oily waste. Earlier in 1952, the river caught fire and cost the city of Cleveland $1.5 million (it would equal $13,098,509.43 today). There were plenty of cases like this, there were also instances where people fell ill due to drinking contaminated water and in one occasion 26 million fish died from contamination in one lake. Between 60 and 70 percent of the water in and around the US was deemed unsafe for fishing, unsafe for swimming, and most of all unsafe for drinking. After seeing how badly things were going environmentally, both parties rallied together and created the Clean Water Act (an add-on to the Federal Water Pollution Act of 1948) and the Environmental Protection Agency. Their hopes were that the EPA would clean up the water, and create guidelines and regulations that would make “a clean and safe environment a reality.”

The Act and the EPA have accomplished many feats since their creation. It has created the structure for regulating pollutants discharges in the waters of the US, made it unlawful for any person to discharge any pollutants into water without a permit; it has also cleared waterways and made public drinking water cleaner. While great, there are still problems that the EPA and CWA face at the moment.  Rivers and lakes still get contaminated through stormwater runoff which is a mixture of rain, oil, and toxic chemicals that seep into our water sources. The EPA hasn’t been granted the ability to combat such pollution and it seems like it won’t be able to for a while. Since the 112^th Congress the House of Representatives have voted 191 times to weaken the CWA claiming the act will cause the EPA to become too powerful and will take away the power from the states. Congressman Waxman said it best “the House Republican’s assault on the environment has been reckless and relentless… the Republican anti- environment agenda is completely out of touch with what the American public wants.” One can’t simply ignore the fact that better jobs, cleaner jobs will be created if only the EPA could expand. These are people who are trying to make the world a better place for everyone not just a few money hungry companies that would trample on the rights of everyone because of money.

                                                    Works Cited

"40 Years of Achievement, 1970-2010." EPA. Environmental Protection Agency, n.d. Web. 03 Nov. 2012. <http://www.epa.gov/40th/achieve.html>.

"Background: Restoring Clean Water Act Protections | Clean Water Action." Background: Restoring Clean Water Act Protections | Clean Water Action. Clean Water Action, n.d. Web. 01 Nov. 2012. <http://www.cleanwateraction.org/feature/background-restoring-clean-water-act-protections>.

"Clean Water Act (CWA)." EPA. Environmental Protection Agency, 27 June 2012. Web. 03 Nov. 2012. <http://www.epa.gov/agriculture/lcwa.html>.

Mica, John L. "Preventing Clean Water Act Expansion." Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure. N.p., n.d. Web. 03 Nov. 2012. <http://republicans.transportation.house.gov/singlepages.aspx/807>.

"New Report Details "The Most Anti-Environment House in the History of Congress"" Committee on Energy and Commerce Democrats. N.p., 15 Dec. 2011. Web. 03 Nov. 2012. <http://democrats.energycommerce.house.gov/index.php?q=news/new-report-details-the-most-anti-environment-house-in-the-history-of-congress>.
 "Clean Water Act Still Essential." POLITICO. N.p., n.d. Web. 03 Nov. 2012. <http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1012/82590_Page2.html>.