Blog Critique

In the blog, The Real Threat to the economy next year isn’t thefiscal cliff; the author simply states that no matter who wins the election who wins the government budget will do us a lot of harm economically. Those leaders in both parties have been silent about the expiration of payroll tax holiday. That would create a significant tax increase for many middle class income earners, but it would help reduce the deficit by $100 billion or more next year. If Obama wins the election the Democrats will force the House Republicans to end the Bush tax cuts for high income earners, which will bring tens of billions of dollars out of the economy and into the Treasury. This would help stall unemployment. That is only based on Okun’s law a rule of thumb that allows them to estimate how changes in GDP will impact employment. The estimates don’t take into account that certain budget cuts hit the economy harder than others.  Obama says that the most frightening of the tax cuts is payroll tax cuts, because it’s a lot of money and most of that money goes to people who need it.  In the end it scares a lot of the senior lawmaker because you are threatening sudden austerity, and the lapsing payroll tax cut. Brian Beutler, the author, is TPM's senior congressional reporter. Since 2009, he's led coverage of health care reform, Wall Street reform, taxes, the GOP budget, the government shutdown fight and the debt limit fight. I feel like he is trying to tell the middle-class and low class earners to watch out for next year. And that she feel we should be prepared for the worse. She is arguing with the fact that the ones who are going to be most affected next year by tax cut are going to be those who are the middle-class families. And that the rich no matter how high the tax is they will always find a way around it so it will accommodate them.  I completely agree with him about how the government is still making those who are working hard into more and more dept. but then again he also stated that it would many who are unemployed. But who knows what will happen next year. To me he has a bunch of persuasive facts but how would we know until then. So I guess right now we will just sit, wait, and hope for the best.

Critique

In the editorial, The Pentagon’s war on theAmerican dream, an course called Power and Privilege which is offered by Defense Equal Opportunity Management Institute is suppose to help teach those who are going to be in the Defense Department how to promote human dignity and that every individual is equal to you no matter if you are rich or poor, black or white. Its purpose is to teach students that a misunderstanding between power and privilege can lead to discrimination. What caught my attention in this editorial is the fact that in explains a slide on socioeconomic privilege features a picture of a happy-looking white family of four sitting outside of a middle-class home. that is suppose to illustrate to the student that the American dream is only reachable if you believe in the idea that what you get out of the system is the same as what you put in. This to me isn’t always true if you really get what you put in then my parents lives would be just peachy. Which inevitably I agree with what the editorial said about how only suckers fall for that one. Another thing that caught my eye was the fact that race was brought into the concept of what individual equality is. On another slide it shows white men playing golf. That picture to me feeds the stereotypical view of what our society “should” look like. In a way the editorial describes this as being a war on class-stereotypes and how if it were a different picture for example Tiger Woods playing golf with those four white men then it would be a different story. To me I feel that the author is targeting Congress and the people so that Congress can either change or cut the program completely because it does not claim to teach what it is intended to teach. Well, at first glance. To me I feel that the author is taking this class and the pictures a bit too much out of proportion , yes I agree that some of the slide look like they represent something other than what it’s intended to teach. But what do the rest of the slides contain? How can I fully respect his or her view without more representation of how bad this class is? To me I feel like the Defense Department is doing an outstanding job at teach their students. In no way will this simple class effect the outcome view of its students in a negative way towards politics and/or the government.

It's a new hot link!

In the article, Top Senate Democrat pushes tax hikes on wealthy, Charles Shumer, the No. 3 Democrat in the Senate, feels we should cut the traditional tax reform model that is being used by Mitt Romney and some other democrats. Also trying to replicate the same tax reform of the 1986 effort by President Ronald Regan would end with increasing the tax for the middle class destroying any recent rise in income inequality. Thus we should raise the tax rate on the wealthy.  But in order to do this and have the middle class remain with the same tax rates the government will have to raise enough money to both reduce rates and the deficit, then cut deductions and credits. But they would have to cut it at a far greater scale than in 1986. Right now it is unclear about how this would play in the debate. Including that this approach is unpopular with most republicans. I feel this article is interesting because if you have been in either the middle or lower class it has been hard to live in comparison to the wealthy. So to be considered as equals we have to raise their taxes so it can help benefit or nation.

My political autobiography

My name is Ivan Segura I am 19 years old, I am starting my first year of college. My reasons for taking Government 2305 are to obtain more of a political background, and an understanding of our government and how it has evolved into what it is today. I have witnessed the tragedy of 9/11, nearly a decade of our troops trying to hunt down the man responsible for that tragic day, and then finally the killing of that man. I like any other person knows what is right and wrong in this country. All of which is a matter of opinion in the eyes of him or her. My views right now are more post-modern than anything. I feel that diplomacy should be used more than force. I support the government in what it has done to help those who need help but also understand that we are falling more in dept and need to fix it. Although my views of our government are set right now, they are still a bit shady because I am young. This is just another beauty of growing up. As I age my beliefs and opinions of our government can still change.