Barack Obama - This is for you Hektor

I was going to let it go, the comment that I recieved to my post to raise money to help Obama.

But then putting an end to ignorance won me over. So as you see in the title, this is directed at the post author "hektor" who would rather call names, pass judgment and act radically instead of making informed comments.

Here is what Barack Obama says he will do about the ten most important issues that America is facing right now. I would like to point out that his plans are PROACTIVE. His plan is make it so America is able to get on its feet and take care of the American citizens without penalizing them and restricting thier freedoms and rights. I urge you to take a look at the mandates and restrictions that other candidates are saying they will make BEFORE you make statements.

Energy/Global Warming

Obama is calling for a cap and trade systen to cut carbon emissions by 80% by 2050. He also plans to invest $150 billion over the next 10 years to advance clean energy technologies. He plans to double the fuel ecoomy standards for vehicles within 18 years.

Trade

Amend the North American Free Trade Agreement to better benefit US workers (gosh that is a novel idea... taking care of our own people). He plans to pressure the World Trade Organization to enforce trade agreements (gosh make people honor what they agreed to!) Update Trade Adjustment Assistance by extending it to indsutries and create flexible education accounts to help retrain workers.

Iraq

He was never for the war to begin with. He will bring out troops home, one to two brigades a month and his plan is to have them all home by 2009.

Foreclosures

Penalize predatory lenders and then use those penalities to help the victims of the predatory loans. He will also give a tax credit to struggling homeoners that would cover 10% of the interest on thier mortgages every year.

Abortion/Stem Cell

He not only supports Roe vs. Wade. He would like to see access to contraceptives expanded so that preventing unintended pregnancies. Obama also supports stem cell research.

Education

He plans to provide money to the states for early childhood development programs. He would like to have a new accountability system that is not so focused on standardized testing and extra pay for teachers who serve as mentors to colleagues. He also proposes a college education tax credit adn he would pay for many of his educational proposals by reducing funding for NASA.

Immigration

Obama supports a broad immigration reform that would help illegal immigrants become citizens as long as they met certain criteria. This criteria includes learning English, passing a criminal background check and paying any fines that they have. He is also in favor of giving illegal immigrants driver's license.

Social Security

Obama would increase the maximum amount of earnings which is currently $97500 to which the Social Security payroll tax applies. Obama will also work with Congress as well as the people of America to come up with a plan that would keep Social Security around for at least another 50 years.

Health Care

Barack supports a universal portable heatlh care plan. His plan would allow people to buy coverage similiar to what federal employees have. He would make the coverage mandatory for all children and optional for adults. Barack supports income related subsidies that would help with the cost of health insurance premiums. Costs would be contained by modernizing the health care system and focusing on PREVENTION.

As a former nurse I think this is outstanding! I can't tell you how many time I was on the phone arguing with insurance companies for my cardiac patients to have testing done that would save thier lives but were being denied by the insurance companies. Once the patient had the heart attack, or open heart then they would cover testing!

Taxes

Barack would reverese the tax cuts for the wealthiest taxpayers, end offshore tax havens and eliminate special interest loopholes and deductions. He would also implement a tax credit of up to $500 per person and $1000 per working family.

So, this is by no means everything that Barack Obama plans to do. This is just a highlighted list, and effort to educate the ignorant so that before they want to call names they atleast know what they are talking about.