Major quake

On Monday a large earthquake hit the western parts of Indonesia. This earthquake hit a 7.5 on the rictor scale. on Monday at about 10:30et this quake devastated the area. the temblor was 8.8 miles deep. this area is very prone to earthquakes as it is located in the ring of fire. similar quakes have hit this area before. the death and damage tolls have not been calculated yet.

I think it is good that the scientists in the area were able to predict that this quake may hit and that they also warned the area of a potential tsunami that could have devastated the area if it really did hit. keeping data on this type of accident is very important and i think that they are doing a good job of it because scientists are becoming better at warning or predicting of accidents like this.

source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/39831929/ns/world_news-asiapacific/

drone attack

Eight people were killed on Monday after a U.S. drone attack. This took place just outside of Afghanistan. three missiles were shot and they hit a home in the town of Mir Ali bazaar. According to the report many Germans were living in this house. These men were believed to be linked to the terrorist leader Osama bin Laden. This is not the first drone attack the U.S. has sent out in this area and probably wont be the last as some Europeans have turned on the U.S.

I think that this is a good sign for the US using these unmanned air crafts we can make sure we are saving American lives and possibly preventing more terrorist attacks against other Americans. I think it is important for our troops and all Americans that we are now using this technology for a very good cause. Using things like this will help end this war much faster.

source: http://www.msnbc.com/

Issue #3 Social Insecurity

Entitle­ment programs like Social Security will soon be in big trouble. In the next few years the social security program will now be spending more money than it can bring in. There are many views on how we can fix this. Some people think that nothing is wrong and we just need to ride it out making only minor changes. Others have the belief that the system needs to be overhauled to compensate for the high number of people filing for social security. If this problem is not solved soon entitlement programs like social security will be using about half of the yearly federal budget.

I agree with the people who think that we need to make minor changes and that we should do small thing to keep this program running without using a lot of the federal budget. these minor changes could include things like raising the cap for earnings that can be taxed or raising the retirement age from what it is now. all of these small changes could all heavily affect the amount of the federal budget that would be used on programs such as social security. To learn more about social security you can visit http://www.ssa.gov/ for more info.

Issue # 1  http://briansoccer77.blogspot.com/2010/10/federal-budget-blog-issue-one.html

Issue # 2 http://beireis.blogspot.com/2010/10/issue-2-spending-what-we-can-afford.html