America will continue in our mess as long as our leaders and attitudes do not change. America is a nation founded on Christion foundations and guidelines and we have forgotten about God. America has forgotten the very reason this nation was founded - get away from heavy taxation and a freedom to worship. Until we, individually and as a nation, return to God, we will continue to sink. It is not too late for us, but time is running out. Stop and think about where we are and what we are dealing with; then think about your grand parents, what they had, what they endured and what they cherished most. Americans have always been hard working, God fearing and a charitable nation and it worked. However, those past generations focused their lives around God and family and Godly principles. What do we have today without God - hard times, divorce, abortion, school killings, drive by killings, murder, hate, terror, fear, drugs - nothing good. When was the last time you turned on your local news to hear the brightness of our future, the goodness of people, acts of kindness, people going out of their way to make the day better for a stranger or our nation's leaders praising God for just a good day!! It is time for a change, but we must go in reverse to attain the real change this nation must have to survive. America must turn back to God Almighty, or America will go down in flames!!! God is our change, our hope and our future. Man without God cannot and will not fic our problems, only God!!!

Millionaire congressmen and women are out of touch with people who live paycheck to paycheck, are laid-off/unemployed and those who live on disability. It is very difficult in these troubling economic times to keep a roof over our heads and food on the table. Some have lost alot of their investments and their homes. Some are living in shelters. Because of outsourcing and factories closing, many people have lost work and not found new ones.

There are just too many people suffering economically and for too long. I myself am far behind on many of my payments. I am 61 and suffer horribly for years with cataracts, arthritis and a weakened left side. I do not receive disability,food stamps or welfare payments. The price in food and home heating is at an all time high. There far too few jobs out there for a 61 year old with 42 years of work experience.

Even though some may find their way out of these difficulties,many people like me will have a hard time of it. It is time for Washington and the whole country to really know and see what devastation has been done to the "least of us"

I am of the opinion that as long as we have a 2 party system that allows our government to base their decisions on what the party says, we will not get back to economic or environmental health. And this bickering about whose fault it is is straight up b.s. Let's get our government to look out for us, not them or the big business' that gouge our people. I support any local business' that are not affiliated with any big major corporation. Small business owners are what we need to save. They are the ones that create jobs for our communities and citiesl Not the money grubbing foriegn business' like Target or WalMart. Bring back the small mom and pop shops that contribute to the society they work in. And I believe in higher taxes for the companies that are importing everything from China or Japan, and less taxes for companies that are building and buying from the U.S. Manufacturing should stay here. Let's create jobs for our people, not for the Chinese or the Mexicans. I think this will be one of the biggest factors in saving and restoring our county to what it once was.

Our economy is very bad but it is not our number one problem. NATIONAL SECURITY IS. There are millions of people around the world who do not like us or our way of life. They would like to destroy us and take the world back to the sixth century. Bringing all our troops home and not fighting will change nothing in the eyes of our enemy.

We are in a world war with radical Islam.

To win this war we must first acknowledge who our enemy is.

Second, we must secure our borders.

Third, we must become energy independent.

A national move to energy independance will go a long way to getting our economy back on track. Just making the commitment will bring the price of oil down to the $40.00 range. When we actually start producing the price will be closer to $20.00.

Oil at this level will nullify Iran's threat to the world. The rest of the opec nations will have much less money to give to our enemies.

As a small business owner I resent the constant right wing harangues of the US Chamber. The debt was created by Republican wars and tax cuts. Yet Republicans would rather focus on restricting women's choice, and despoiling the world for the benefit of a very few very large businesses. When the US Chamber wakes up from its own groundhog day, we will be able to move forward with policies that benefit us all, particularly small businesses.

As a small business owner, I want to be out of the health insurance business, because everyone has health care at 50% less than we currently spend for inadequate care that focuses on treating disease at high profit and ignores prevention (like in civilized countries). I want the debt eliminated by ending wars. I want my employees to be able to afford to continue living in their homes because rapacious mortgage terms are banned.

Robert Wm Donaldson got it right. US Chamber, please get out of the way of progress and tell the truth to your constituents.

For the life of me I can't believe people and they're opinions of the Obama runaway train. Do you people not see what this group of malcontents are doing to this country. Those of you whom are just coming out of college are needing to really take a look at what made this country great. There are simple answers to most of the issues here but your indoctrination by partisan school professors and radical ideology are not the answer. The Constitution was designed to avoid the issues that are staring us in the face.Read about it. Us lowly peasants currently have the voice and the ability to change this direction our leadership is trying to take us. The most amazing thing we have is the ability to vote and insist on term limits. Failure to apply any of these two efforts are the reason we are in this mess. I do not blame anyone in particular for this problem other than ourselves.
I refuse to give up on the ideals instilled in me by my mother and father, and being surrounded by hard working, people who once took pride in themselves. Getting a hand-out is for those whom cannot do for themselves. We have forgotten, that what we do for ourselves is important and we have a responsibility to ourselves to give back rather than take. The greed and disfunctional abuse of this country and what it stands for is no longer prudent. This President does not have the capability or the fortitude to pivot out of this European Socialist system which has directly effected the reality of this Government to function, and yet you think it is the Republicans which are steering this train into a ditch. Wake up before it's too late. I write this for two reasons, and they are my daughters. I argue with them about these issues. Our biggest issue today, is not who did what, because we can stop it, but more what does the future hold for our families. We have gone from "attitude", to "gratitude". We can no longer continue this rampant disregard for our future. I am not foolish enough to believe that one side or another is any more different than the other but for "Gods sake people, get your head out of the sand. Pay attention to what's going on in you surroundings. Become active in your neighborhoods. Respect each other. I write this comment as a person, scared for the future of my children and they're children which really haven't got a word to say about what the future brings. It almost seems like profound logic has left the building. I understand what this Presidency brings and I think some of the issues are true and correct on both sides, but we better get our feet on solid ground again before we implode. I write this as a citizen concerned. I am also a Democrat by prior choice. But as far as I'm concerned, we are all in this for the long haul. This is a "We The People", issue nothing more and nothing less.

I can't tell you what to do but I can say what I've done myself.
With the real possibility of the GOP giving us a Romney as the Republican challenger to Obama I let them know how I felt along with about one hundred of my friends.
We put the GOP on notice that it's our intent to leave the Republican party as well as not voting for Romney.
Were tired of the weak kneed just compromise attitude while giving 95% of what the Democrats want at our expense and now they offer a equally dangerous Mormon Socialist for their answer to the problem.
Obama's asking yet again for another Trillion Dollar plus increase to the budget but the GOP hasn't even shown us that they have in their shorts something hanging to challenging the issue.
We still don't have the answers to even who were giving all this money to seeing as Obama is still an undocumented worker in Washington.
For all we know all of these tax dollars given could be going to the American Communist Party or a Inner Terrorist Cell while helping Obama to dig our own country's grave to put it in.
I say that we shouldn't give not one more Dime let alone Dollar until we know just who Obama is if that is indeed his true name.
No matter what your ethic background is Americans everywhere better be putting on your boxing gloves when you vote because as Americans were in another battle like it or not.
When you go to the voters box this time know their track records of the past so your not in support of a dead horse in this race.

The debt is a big concern, no doubt. My guess as to why those in power are letting this play out this way has to do with China and its concern for food security and the likes. It also keeps driving them away from pure Communism. (A concern the rest of the world cannot afford to address with force; should one have such a bent in thinking.)

Anyway, the foundational thing that money ideally represents is a reward for generating a benefit. There are two basic realms that are covered presently by the same money. 1) Material resources and 2) skills beneficially applied. The headache that can occur is that one cannot have negative material resources and function. IOUs or secured record systems are just fine for beneficial skills though; and can even help an economy function when the money system is not validly expressing the functionality possible.

One of the most restricting factors in our system is energy. Why there is not more attention being paid to the present ability to generate megawatts of power from a heat source a bit warmer than hot coffee, I don't fathom. This world even has volcanoes that threaten humanity, the most climatic being Iceland's exposed mid-Atlantic ridge. It once have the mouth of the Mississippi froze over one winter in the mid 1700s. It may even be possible to have geothermal energy power anyplace on earth one can drill deep. They can now drill down 7 miles in less than 100 days [Wikipedia]; and find temperatures around waters boiling point. Should one find a natural fault that brings warm water to the surface; fracking is not even a matter to have involved. Should you wish to run your calculator you might validly note that there is more geothermal energy in the earth than humanity could ever sanely use here before the Sun fails us. Anyway, one might wish to check out 'rasertech' on YouTube.

When the evening news started telling us about Free Trade numerous years ago, it put me in a bit of a roar. How could they be doing this? What was to protect us from the low wages and other sub-standard manufacturing conditions that would make it impossible for us to compete against? If Bush, Senior wasn't up in our Administration with his his international leanings giving something of a “nod” of some assurances that such extremes would not stand, I would have thought our leaders had gone absolutely crazy. So I've waited and waited for something to secure our economy with it high standards to come into being. Nothing yet ... Our system still sits as open as a vacated old house to all the whims of those profiting from all the disparity abroad that drags everyone down in a race to the bottom.

The solution seems simple. One politician (Buddy ROEMER) even put the meatiest part of it out for the public to note. That is, put a fee on products made in sub-standard conditions, like low wage labor, and polluting factories. That done, the investors would start to treat us fairer as the profit made from "using" foreign communities, even to their long term detriment would be gone. I would personally go on and use the funds derived by such a fee and try to project our system’s standards into those "used" communities with programs that would given some measure of the reward we see from our standards. Even in areas with limited material resources there should be potential to improve education, medicine and conflict resolution and prevention. Why we even ourselves are not better informed as to the resources per person, and similarly the skill required, for people to live at a desired standard of living, I cannot fathom. It is said that a people without a vision are lost, and similarly information is (em)power(ing). So why not do it?

It may even be wise to establish a Federation of States for stabilizing healthy social and business programs, standards, and agreements between states, foreign and domestic to bring a consistency in methods, and a deeper insight into reality's ways and limits; given the fact that there would likely be serious concerns about integrity in applying such funds into foreign communities. Such an entity may ultimately be able to get social aid programs out of the Federal government's lap where its constitutionality is seriously questioned.

Tell congress? They have been fighting your friend in the white house since the 2010 election.He is the problem;no one else.With his green agenda and regulations,not to mention by-passing congress all the while.For two years he had a majority in both the house and the senate.No budget in almost 4 years! He let it go so that when the republicans got in,he could point to them and say it is the do nothing congresses fault.
This is a man who hates everything America stands for;especiallt capitalism,which you SHOULD be supporting.Get off the blame congress bandwagon,grow a pair,and oppose this maniac before you are all walking in lock step.I won't be;better dead than red,I always say.His entire agenda is to "transform" America.He is seditious to say the least.

The economic shadow we are under is from the monster in our living rooms and work places that very few seem to have recognized as yet: the intentional overloading and wrecking of our economic life and culture by an alinskyite marxist and socialist named Obama.
He should be the subject long before now of an inquiry into impeachment, conviction, and removal from office for failure to uphold his oath of office which requires him to faithfully execute the laws of the United States and to conduct his office in a manner which defends and protects the Constitution.

This appears to be a struggle between these primary groups:
Group A:
Liberals, Progressives, most minorities, people dependent on Government for their income, Unions, Gays, Hollywood, Atheists, fans of the main stream media, college professors and those who admire them, people who may or may not vote (ever), people excited by making drugs legal, welfare recipients, people who actually believe that the Democrats are "compassionate" and that conservatives are not.
Group B:
Conservatives, Republicans, those inspired by the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, people who believe in Freedom, Liberty, the self-reliant, traditional hard working Americans, the U.S. military, the Faithful and religious, Family values people, entrepreneurs, small business people, big business people, people who work for businesses / as opposed to people who work for the Government.

Let's quit the nonsense. Vote for a Conservative / a TRUE Conservative. Otherwise, start looking for a spot to live under some bridge.

Unfortunately the premise that congress can instantly change our course is wrong. We are on a road to a socialistic society. We have been traveling down this road for many years. I am a retired small business person. If conditions existed as they are today when I started my business it would not have happened. I think there must be some major changes in our countries leadership. Our citizens need to be convinced what made this country great. I just hope traveling back down this road starts before the bubble bursts. Congress can start this journey by striving to remove mandates and restrictions on business. Congress can see to it that the Bush tax cuts stay in place; they need to work on incentives to help business expand.
There are so many things that need to go into reverse including the continual increase in size and unaccountability of our Federal and State governments. Also, where in the constitution are entitlements outlined as we know them today?
We have an enormous chore; not one Congress alone can handle before spring.
I cannot comment on the pipeline; it is beyond my comprehension
By John Grover, Wenatchee Washington

As a long time small business owner and successful job creator in a technical field, I tend to look toward scientific and statistically-valid information and models. In politics I look toward respect and collaboration to solve real challenges.

If we work with facts rather sound bites, and science rather than polarizing ideology, I believe we can craft new win-wn solutions for continued entrepreneurship and improved prosperity across American communities.

If we stick with the same kind of polarizing and obstructionist rhetoric, we're likely to keep seeing the same dysfunctional performance around the U.S. as our Congress has been giving us, time and time again, over the last year and a half.

Um, I'm not anti small business, but I am totally against the BS the hallowed Chamber of Commerce is spewing. Large corporations are creating jobs ... in China. They do little to nothing to help the US economy; most pay no taxes. Capitalism as it is so wrongly called in the US, is a failure. What we have here is Corporate Socialism. Bail out banks, bail out corporations, let them break the law, deregulate everything so they can take, take, take. Cut taxes on the extremely rich. The government gives, gives and gives to big business. People suffer. People lose jobs. People cannot afford to eat. But here are you people at the COC claiming that what "people" need to worry about is the deficit. Hmm... raise taxes on the rich. End the wars. End the military jobs program. Problem solved.

But no. Business hasn't taken enough; it's still hungry. Complain about "regulation" that is holding you back from creating jobs. Please. Stop trying to pull the wool over my eyes. Step out of your little rich bubbles, people, and take a walk through my town. See people with blank stares sitting in the unemployment office for three hours to speak with a representative who may or may not renew their claim once again. Spend an afternoon filling out paperwork and sending it in to disgruntled, overworked government employees so that you can get food stamps to feed your three children. Send resume after resume and scroll through 46 cover letters on your hard drive to choose the right one you will need to tweak, just a little bit, to make it right for the job that you and probably 150 other people will apply for. Send that resume and cover letter and wait for the phone to ring... wait for a response... and hope. Never get a response. Lose hope.

Then send me another email, COC, ranting about how big corporations, with their billions of dollars in profits, are suffering at the hands of "regulations" that do not exist anywhere outside of your propaganda bubble. Tell me again. Tell me the job creators simply cannot work under these harsh economic conditions. Tell me to worry about the deficit, caused by the rich. Tell me to take cuts to my assistance as I try hard to find work to pay for your bailouts. Tell me again. Please.

I think Congress is doing their job. The Republicans are trying to reduce spending and the Democrats are trying to keep it as is or increase spending. There will not be much in the way of constructive legislation until both houses are controlled by Republicans. If both houses become controlled by the Democrats, we will be in even more trouble.

If there are as many people that know what is happening to our economy and how much we are in debt, why wont the press actually inform the less informed as to this economic disaster?
Our republican candidates should be accomplished enough to get the public informed. Stop the bickering and get to the issue! The debt is so large at this time and growing we actually have no way of paying is back. Our debt is so large that it is nearly impossible to make sense of it. If we payed over 25 million a day since Christ's birth that wouldn't be enough.
How do you make sense of it? How did we not get this under control sooner with our electeds in congress supposedly watching out for the average worker? WE ARE NOT TOO BIG TO FALL.