The government has several reasons to legalize marijuana now. The costs associated with marijuana for the government are huge. A study by Jeffery Miron, a professor at Harvard, said that legalizing marijuana would save the government $7.7 billion a year. Second, legalized marijuana would bring in a large amount of tax revenue. Miron estimated that it would bring in $6.2 billion if it were taxed at the rates of alcohol and tobacco. Next, many studies agree that marijuana is actually safer than alcohol and tobacco. It doesn’t really make sense for marijuana to be illegal while alcohol and tobacco are sitting on shelves in the store. Finally, the prohibition of alcohol should have taught us something. Making it illegal made it much less safe and only served to make organized crime rich. Illegal marijuana is making our government broke and drug dealers rich. Read more…
Right.org has a site devoted to stopping the bailouts that have have been stealing taxpayer money all year. Here is a tidbit from their front page:
TARP and the bailouts of Bear Stearns and Citigroup are just the tip of the iceberg. So far, our government committed more than $8 TRILLION to funding failed companies (that’s over $60,000 per family in America!), and has spent $1.4 trillion of that in just a few months.
This is what we are fighting against. Sign the petition to Congress asking them stop the bailouts. If they don’t, vote them out of a job next election cycle. For more information on the bailouts, check out a few of our past articles:
I’ve already talked about the problems with the Obama administration’s goal to require that all firearms be child-proofed as well as the misinformation about the “Gun Show Loophole” (That isn’t a loop hole at all). I wanted to finish this series with a discussion on the Federal Assault Weapons Ban. The sad truth of this legislation that Obama administration would like to make permanent is that it doesn’t do anything. This legislation does nothing at all, it did nothing the last time it was enacted except serve as a way for politicians to look tough on guns. Read more…
Derek outlined a few of the details of, and pork found in, the Government’s Stimulus Package. There have been some updates since then. Sadly one of the primary changes was the reduction of one of the very few Republican ideas. Senate Republicans had originally insisted on a $15,000 Tax Credit to home buyers but this was reduced during the House and Senate negotiations to 8000$ and the deadline shortened to September.
The biggest change the average Joe will see is that they will not be getting the “Stimulus Check” they thought they were going to get. Besides reducing the “Stimulus Check” from 500$ a person to 400$ a person the way in which this money will be distributed has been changed. Instead of a check mailed out in one bulk payment we will each be getting 13$ a person a week. They plan to do this through our tax withholdings by withholding 13$ less per week than they would have otherwise.
What this means is that they don’t want us to be able to use our stimulus money responsibly. Instead of allowing consumers to pay off their car, add to their savings, pay a month of rent, we will be given 13$ a week that will vanish into the ether through small things people never notice: A trip to the local burger joint, an extra couple beers when you are out during the weekend, etc. The government believes that spending money loosely when you can’t afford it will repair the economy and they don’t believe that saving money and paying off your debts will improve your personal financial situation.
So everyone go out and tell little Tommy that someday he can be a Senator, all he has to do is start spending money and running up a massive debt early in life.
Special thanks to reader Keith for showing me this video on immigration. It does a great job of pointing out the effects of our current immigration policies on our current and future prosperity as a nation.
So I sat down in front of my TV this evening looking forward to another great episode of House. What I got was very disappointing. Our new President had a press conference instead. I wish House had been on as opposed to the fear mongering I was subjected to. I am really sick of hearing the phrase “worst since the Great Depression.” We are in a recession. Things are rough. Guess what, it isn’t the first time and it won’t be the last. At this point, the recession we are currently in can’t even compare to the recessions of the 70’s and 80’s let alone the Great Depression. Read more…
3 Republican Senators have agreed to vote with the Democrats on the government stimulus package. Senators Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe of Maine, and Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania have all agreed to cross party lines and vote with the Democrats on the stimulus bill. With RINOs like these, the Democrats don’t need 60 in the Senate to avoid filibusters.
In this video Ron Paul discusses the stimulus package and the dollar.
Now, I really wish that those Senators would not go along with this spending bill. However, as Congressman Paul points out in the video, where were all the budget hawk fiscal conservatives for the last eight years when they actually could have done something. Keep in mind that our huge national debt has skyrocketed under a Republican Congress and White House. While the Democrats took control of Congress 2 years ago, there was still a Republican in the White House for the huge bailouts of the banking and auto industries.
The Republicans in the Senate are going to have to grow some backbone or the spending that occurs in the next four years could cripple our nation for a long time. This bill is just the start.
In my previous article discussing the folly of the Obama Administration’s impending legislation I tried to point out the three primary problems that each of their goals share and specifically how these problems apply to the ‘Gun Show Loophole‘. All three of these problems are equally true for the Obama Administration’s goal of requiring all firearms to be ‘child proofed’; The legislation will be ineffective at accomplishing it’s intended goals, it will impede the Second Amendment rights of Americans, and it will further reduce the powers of individual states to create laws commiserate to their citizens.
