The Foolishness of the New FDA Labeling Requirements

This past Tuesday, the FDA finalized new regulations, obligated by the Affordable Care Act, that mandates the display of calorie counts on menus and vending machine labels and covers food and beverages, including alcohol, as well as businesses like “’movie theaters, sports stadiums, amusement parks, bowling alleys and miniature golf courses that serve prepared foods.’  Moreover, the new rules “would apply to any restaurant or other establishment...

New Ozone Rules: Maybe Not So Good?

The National Weather Service’s air quality index for ozone reports that 60 - 75 ppb is “moderate” while 0 - 59 ppb is “Good”. The EPA(Environmental Protection Agency) has recently proposed to strengthen air quality regulations so that ground-level ozone levels are between 65-70 parts per billion(ppb) down from the current 75 ppb set in 2008. The EPA predicts that this will prevent up to a potential 960,000 child deaths from asthma. The agency also...

Money in the air!! I don’t care!

Tom Steyer, a billionare hedge fund manager, reportedly spent $57 million of his own money on this November’s midterm elections to elect democrats. You would expect money = win, but things didn’t exactly turn out that way. Of the 7 democrats that Steyer and his group, NextGen Climate, spent a total of $85 million on, only 3 won. This sounds like a tremendous lost of money to a poor little soul like me, but apparently the money was “incredibly well...

Open Borders - For Prosperity and for the Future of America

On Thursday, President Obama revealed a comprehensive executive order on immigration policy, "offering temporary legal status to millions of illegal immigrants, along with an indefinite reprieve from deportation."  Currently, there are 11.4 million undocumented immigrants living in the United States and both political parties agree that the immigration system is broken and needs major overhaul.  However, conservatives...

Environment v. $$$$ Round 2: The Keystone XL Pipeline

The expansion of the Keystone Pipeline system that runs from Alberta, Canada to Oklahoma has been a controversial topic in the U.S. since its completion in 2010. Obama has opposed it multiple times especially its job projections. But lets look at the environmental concerns that many critiques are worried about. 1. Crude Oil from Albert has been reported to leave a bigger carbon footprint than conventional oil. The Time article states that...

Support for the Keystone XL Pipeline

On November 14, the House successfully voted 251-161 to approve the Keystone XL pipeline, leaving the bill to be sent to the Senate that will vote on Tuesday. In the last six years, the Obama administration has repeatedly stalled any attempts to pass the bill through the State Department's approval process of the pipeline over environmental concerns and objections to claims about increased jobs and prosperity resulting from the pipeline. ...

Solution Aversion: Say what? I CANT HEAR YOU

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency itself acknowledges the continuous breakdown of our Earth’s natural environment and the dangers that it imposes. On the EPA’s website, a page dedicated solely to future climate change lists the key U.S. and global projections on issues such as temperature, precipitation, ice, and sea level changes. These include: Southern U.S. states are expected to experience 2x more days with temperatures above 90°F...

A Free Market for Illicit Drugs

On November 3, 2014, 55% of Oregon voters approved the Oregon Legalized Marijuana Initiative, Measure 91 that would legalize recreational marijuana for adults ages 21 and older and allow these people to possess up to eight ounces of "dried" marijuana and up to four plants. In addition to this passage, Alaska and Washington D.C. have also passed similar measures nearly a year after Colorado and Washington's legalization of marijuana. Nevertheless,...

Introduction to Environmentalism and Libertarianism

Hi fellow Americans, as political bloggers, we hope to foster new discussions on environmentalism as well as libertarianism through discussing our perspectives on current issues. For the uninitiated, environmentalism is a broad movement focusing on employing individual and governmental power to address the health of the environment and for environmental protection. On the other hand, libertarianism is a distinct philosophy dedicated towards advocating minimal state intervention in people's lives. These two ideologies often conflict with each other...

Will Tom Wolf take Pennsylvania by storm or will Corbett remain on his throne?

With Wolf up 15% in polls 2 days before game time, Corbett's run as governor is on the ropes. Pennsylvania has had enough of Corbett's ignorance of schools and support of big business. One major issue that is attracting many voters across the state is education. Wolf has advocated for strong education policies that will both fuel the economy and satisfy the many unhappy citizens of Pennsylvania. 50% of voters cite dissatisfaction with Corbett, something...

The 2014 Pennsylvanian Gubernatorial Election and Liberties Beyond

Due to the political attack ads and misleading information from both sides of the political aisle characterizing the 2014 Pennsylvanian gubernatorial race, PA voters remain uncertain of who to vote for in the Tuesday election. However, one thing is clear; voting for Wolf will affirm his planned disastrous economic policies of instituting a progressive income tax that differs from PA’s 3.07% flat rate tax, a 5% severance tax on PA fracking, and disregarding...