G10: News Analysis

100 Americans die of drug overdoses each day. How do we stop that?

• In response to Phillip Seymour Hoffman's recent death, the Washington Post brought attention to the startling amount of drug overdoses that occur everyday in the United States. I believe that if the Government and personal families made help readily available, there would be less overdoses.  Drugs are a huge issue, especially in low income areas, and if healthcare was more available to people in situations where they couldn't really afford it, issues like this would be fixed. Not only issues about drugs, but other issues like disease and simple health issues. 

G9: Budget Games

1. To fix the deficit, I would cut spending and raise taxes. I would cut spending on things like "The War on Drugs", and cut military spending. I would not want to cut Veterans benefits though. I would raise taxes on the higher income people, and require people who received bailouts to pay back the money. 
2. To reduce the deficit in the games, I decided to reduce the military to half it's size, reduce Social Security for higher incomes, and place a Millionaire's tax on people who make more than 1 million dollars. I decided that we didn't need a huge military, and even if we did cut the military in half, we would still have the biggest military in the world. I put lower Social Security for higher incomes and a millionaire tax to give people with lower income a chance to live a happy retirement. I avoided affecting the lower classes because they tend to be the first ones hit by economic reform. 

G4: Presidential Powers

(a) Executive Orders and Powers as Commander in Chief give the President complete power to take out orders that are important for our country. Executive orders have the full power of any law, and can be put into effect immediately. This overrules all of the checks of congress, but the judicial branch can still take down this law if it is seen as unconstitutional. Prior to the War Powers Resolution, Presidents could send in troops to different countries without congress approval. Now, they have certain guidelines in place to limit the powers of the president, although they are rarely followed.

(b) The budgetary powers of congress limit the amount of money that the President's Office of Management and Budget can receive. After Nixon's Presidency, and his refusal to spend money the way that congress wanted to, they came up with the Congressional Budget Act of 1974. Legislative oversight powers are used to control the power of the president and make sure that everything occurring in the government is constitutional.

G2: Current Events Connection

1. LINK: 
• Web Story 
2. UNIQUE SUMMARY: 
• The article describes Obama's changes for Immigration laws. Although they are good, republicans are skeptical because of Obama not following the Immigration laws already in place. 
3. FORMAL POWERS: 
• Since the president can make laws dealing with foreign policy, he can use that to decide what he can do to make his immigration reform into law. 
4. INFORMAL POWERS: 
• The president can enact executive orders, which puts laws in place almost immediately.