Legalize Drugs to Eliminate Terrorists Income Source

We cannot bring the Taliban to its knees unless we deprive them of their principal source of income, drug money. Therefore we should legalize, medicalize and tax hard drugs (LMTD) (or copy Switizerland’s successful Fourfold Drug Policy). This will end the war faster than sending in troops and will add billions to the US Treasury. Look at the facts:

a) Our government has not been able to stop the flood of drugs into the USA despite spending $50 billion every year for the past 30 years;

b) Americans are spending over $65 billion yearly on drugs despite their illegality; and

c) The 50 billion spent trying to keep drugs out could be better spent educating Americans against drugs (just as we educate against alcohol and smoking)

d) Medicalizing access to drugs for addicts would reduce crime, thereby saving money usually spent on the criminal justice system and saving many lives.

e) Legalizing drugs would be an open admission of the fact that millions of Americans who use drugs are not criminals (just as those of us who drink alcohol are not considered criminals).

f) Legalizing & taxing drug sales would take billions away from terrorists whose principal source of support is drug sales; and best of all

g) Taxing drugs will put billions of dollars into the US Treasury and deprive the terrorists of their principal source of income.

Will Afghanistan be Obama's Vietnam?

I am one of the 75% of Americans who wants to stop spending one billion $$$ per week on the Iraq war. The last thing we want to see is an even bigger war costing more dollars and more lives in Afghanistan (Peter Wallsten, LA Times 1/26/09, p.1). Putting troops into mountainous, alpine terrain is ludicrous, will cause many unnecessary deaths, will drain precious resources from our Recovery, and will not make us any safer. Moreover, there is ample evidence that centuries of fighting in Afghanistan have proven disastrous for every foreign country that attempted it. Is our principal goal recovery in America or recovery in Afghanistan? Do we have the resources to accomplish both?

Help Renters as well as Homeowners

The New Administration Should Help Renters as well as Homeowners

Fact: The federal tax code favors homeowners over renters, through mortgage interest deduction.

Solution: Figure out a way to level the playing field, perhaps allowing renters to deduct all or a portion of their rent as homeowners deduct their mortgage interest.

SAVE MEDICARE BY CHARGING MINIMALLY

Many of us can afford to pay something for a medicare doctor visit so......

In addition to putting medical records online and saving millions, why not charge something, even if a minimal amount, for those who still earn over $250,000 after entering medicare? (Many people don’t need medicare to be completely free and could help support it instead of being a drain on it and many would do so gladly. We are certainly not rich and yet we would gladly pay $5-25 per doctor visit, for example, to help those who cannot afford it.) Don't forget we over 65'ers are the largest growing demographic so if we each contributed something for each doctor visit Medicare would be funded.

Bill Moyers has guts

January 19th, 2009 8:47 am

We should all be grateful to Bill Moyers, not condemning him as William Kristol did this morning, for his courageous program on Jan.9 on PBS. Bill Moyers was the only media to cover Washington's March of the Dead, staged to remind us that the Iraq war has cost thousands of lives (and billions of our tax dollars); Moyers final segment condemned the Gaza effort and noted only conversation between Israel and Gaza has a chance to bring peace, yet Congress ignores the obvious and does exactly what AIPAC wants. To assume as Israel does that the people of Gaza can get rid of, or stop Hamas, is a sick joke: could we get rid of George W. Bush or stop him from prosecuting a wasteful unnecessary war?

Leslie

ONE SOLUTION TO HELP FORECLOSURE PROBLEM

ONE SOLUTION TO HELP FORECLOSURE PROBLEM

The NY Times editorial, Government’s Promise, Jan. 20, 2009, complains there is nothing in Obama’s plan to stop foreclosures. Here’s one idea that should be considered: the Federal Government should take over /buy foreclosed houses and RENT them back to the "owners" as subsidized rental property.

One reason for this mess is the shameful lack of affordable housing for hard working Americans. Most working Americans had to borrow and go into debt because their salaries did not go up.

Renting these foreclosed houses back to their owners will:

1) allow Americans to stay in their homes

2) taxes will be paid to hard hit towns

3) neighborhoods will stay intact (not boarded up)

4) working families will have a decent place to live

Two obvious ways to fix/fund social security

Two obvious ways to fix/fund social security:

1. Do not pay out to people earning over $500,000/yr after retirement.
(Perhaps let them consider their payments tax deductable contributions to help the entire country.)

2. Lower the payroll taxes on 95% of workers. To pay for this realignment of funds, raise the payroll tax on workers earning over, say $500,000. (The cap at $102,000 is way out of date. The average NYC Fire Department worker now earns $180,000 and the average Municipal Worker earns $107,000 per NPR this morning; thus the $102,000 cap is way out of date). The percentage taken out for payroll taxes should increase exponentially on salaries over $500,000. You should know that people earning $250,000 in big cities are not rich; they can barely pay their mortgage and put the kids through school, so the hikes should start at $500,000 and make the % slide upwards exponentially after $500,000 and $1million etc.