States with higher percentages of people without degrees tend to be more conservatives. It makes sense why conservatives don’t value education – it would eliminate them. View the interactive map with degree statistics here.

“While polls show Americans remain sharply divided over the Democrats’ landmark legislation, they aren’t clamoring for its repeal.”

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The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the stimulus provided jobs to between 1.2 million and 2.8 million people during the first three months of this year.  The stimulus also raised GDP by as much as 4.2%.

Raised the level of real (inflation-adjusted) gross domestic product (GDP) by between 1.7 percent and 4.2 percent

Lowered the unemployment rate by between 0.7 percentage points and 1.5 percentage points

Increased the number of people employed by between 1.2 million and 2.8 million, and

Increased the number of full-time-equivalent (FTE) jobs by 1.8 million to 4.1 million compared with what those amounts would have been otherwise. (Increases in FTE jobs include shifts from part-time to full-time work or overtime and are thus generally larger than increases in the number of employed workers.)

You can read the full CBO post here.

“Teams of American special forces have been authorised to conduct spying missions intended to pave the way for a military strike on Iran in case President Obama orders one, US government sources have confirmed.

The military units would penetrate Iranian territory to reconnoitre potential nuclear targets and make contact with friendly dissident groups, according to a secret directive written by General David Petraeus. The document’s existence was disclosed for the first time yesterday.”

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New York Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg expressed outrage over a federal loophole that allows people on the FBI terrorist watch list to legally purchase guns and explosives.  Being “known or reasonably suspected of being involved in terrorist activity” is currently not a reason for someone to be denied purchasing weapons or chemicals that could make bombs.

The Government Accountability Office said that individuals on the terrorist watchlist attempted to purchase potentially legal equipment 1,228 times in the past six years.  Background checks were ran on all of these individuals and they were easily identified as being on the terrorist watchlist.  Out of the 1,228 potential terrorists that attempted to legally purchase guns and explosives 1,119 of them were allowed to.  The statistics show that this is not something that rarely happens.  If terrorists are allowed to legally purchase weapons in this country, then it gives them easy access to anything they need to pull off a terrorist attack.

The National Rifle Association and gun lobby are adamantly opposed to the bill that would close this “terror gap,” H.R. 2159.  They argue that even though they are potential terrorists, they have a right to purchase weapons and deadly explosives.  Republicans are backing the NRA and attempting to block the legislation.

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The U.S. would most likely not repeat our counterinsurgency strategy in any new situation that we used in Iraq and Afghanistan.  The new counterinsurgency strategy will focus on having less U.S. forces in the area, more training of local forces, air-strikes, and special forces.

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Republican voters are now not as excited about the upcoming election as they were.

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Crime Rates have remained stable in Arizona over the past decade, despite claims that drug cartels are flooding into the country from across the border.  FBI crime statistics show that violence is actually down in border towns and across Arizona.  The nations illegal immigrant population has nearly doubled over the last decade, but violent crime has dropped in Arizona by 1/3 during that same time.  So why the renewed fear of immigrants and newly perceived violence?

There have been a few instances that Arizona and the media have pointed to in order to say that there is more violence now than there used to be.  There was one murder of a rancher that was suspected to have been killed by an illegal alien, which led many to believe that violence has been escalating.  Politicians like John McCain have been forced to ratchet up the rhetoric against minorities because new anti-immigrant groups like the Tea Party.  McCain recently told the The Arizona Republic that “the violence is on the increase” and the federal government not being able to completely secure the border “has led to violence – the worst I have ever seen.”  In fact, the border is more secure now than ever before.  There are more than 6,000 federal law enforcement agents patrolling the borders in Arizona alone and they are equipped with high tech cameras and sensors to keep an eye on parts of the border that people may not be able to.

A tough new immigration law has been passed in Arizona because of the fear of violence that forces local police officers to stop and detain anyone they believe may be an illegal alien.  This misguided law requires any citizen to be arrested if they do not have proper identification when questioned by police officers, who do not need probable cause or any reason other than racial profiling to stop someone.  American citizens can then be arrested and possibly deported if they do not have their driver’s license on them at the time.

Republicans say that the new Arizona anti-immigrant law may not be perfect, but it’s a response to the federal government not solving the immigration problem.  This seems absurd since the Republicans refuse to debate a national immigration bill.  Harry Reid recently explained that “we have Republican legislators all over the country focused on Arizona particularly, saying we are concerned about this because the federal government is not doing anything,” Reid said. “The two senators from Arizona won’t work with us, it’s illogical to hear the state of Arizona complaining about the federal government not doing anything and the two Republican senators from Arizona won’t join with us to do anything.”  Republicans seem to get elected specifically to stop the federal government from functioning, so they can show that the federal government can not solve problems.

The Obama administration has been able to successfully start indirect peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians.

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