Originally Posted by: ChristophThe Patriot Act - can you name one instance of how a regular, everyday, law abiding citizen has had their freedoms restricted by this act? And not just made-up ones from far left websites. I think it's done more good than harm. I agree with the spirit of your post though. Freedom is not to be given up lightly, especially not for a false sense of security.

In regards to the patriot act, I am both for and against it. Kinda torn. I can not name a clear accident off the top of my head, where is it was used on a innocent american civilian. Not saying it has happened or hasn't. However all I would need is to know your name, where you live and I could just call any agency an accuse you of being a terrorist and your rights and freedoms would be questioned. I can't and would never do that. However many tyrannical governments have had similar rights. Russia under Stalin and Germany under Hitler, where all it took was an accusation to destroy what we think is freedom. Their cases were much more severe and I hope we will not go that far but it's questionable. Think if the threat of terrorism increases, or more attacks occur will we be forced to give up more? This terrorism threat seems to be giving the government a good excuse to pass such laws. These laws we're never questioned until we experienced terrorism. Seems like the take alittle now and then, and the people won't notice. But taking alittle alot does add up to be alot. Like the snowball effect. I also can't blame this solely on Bush, Reagan started it. But as time has gone on, more freedoms are being rewritten. Just alittle bit at a time, like the patriot act. How far will it go? If we continue to go down this path as we have in the last 20 years, it should be a concern to every american citizen.

Minium wage - I believe everyone should be able to maintain a decent standard of living. After all, if people get too poor then you end up with revolutions and all that messy stuff. But if the government raises the minimum wage too high then where is that money going to come from? From businesses of course. And if businesses have to pay all their employees more then they won't be able to hire as many people and more jobs will go overseas. Inflated wages and unions is what caused jobs to go overseas in the first place.

I agree, that is definitely a problem. However there are several businesses out there that makes hundreds of billions of dollars, yet their employee wage is ridiculous. Wal-mart for example. I don't know if you have seen it in the news lately, but they are being questioned and there's a great concern over them. Why? Because it is taking out small town independant businesses left and right. A company that has made trillions of dollars can't pay there workers more than 7.50/hr?? My store made over a million dollar profit over the summer months.