Concept, save tens of billions, if not hundreds of billions od $'s...

[rasputin1952]

#1 Enough war. The cost in lives, cash and prestige is not worth the the cost.

#2 Legalize pot. I don't smoke the stuff, but take away the cash incentive and guess what, crime rate, (including murders in Mexico) cease.

#3 High tech, I love the stuff, but do we need to spend a half trillion dollars on stuff we don't need? Does anyone realize an aircraft carrier is not merelely a hull w/some planes? You have to man the thing, you need fuel, you heed an entire group to go ut with it for protection? How many are many? Do we need need a USS GHWBush w/all of the attending accouterments?

#4 The USAF is s till fighting the USSR. Mach 3/4 fighters sound cool, but if the missile you fire doesn't go at Mach 4.2, you shot yourself down...lot's of sense in that!

#5 The most obvious, and despised by the GOP...EDUCATION! Get back to a lot of basics. I came up in the 50's, I can read, do basic math and can write reasonably well. I fought bullies in schoolyards, protected the weak, shared sandwiches with others who had nothing. Today, children go hungry, have great difficulty in making it through basic reading/writing programs and forget math; most people can't get out of a grocery store w/o being within 20% of being anywhere near what they thought they spent.

#6 Enact laws and prosecute thieves. Want to see a drop in Medicare fraud? Prosecute corrupt doctors and hospitals that charge you $8 for a Tylenol that doesn't work on the pain anyway. I knew a retired postal worker who went every 6othhs for a check-up/ Each time, and EKG was charged as well as a Chest X-Ray...every time! He died of heart failure and lung cancer. If the tests were actually performed, things might have been different for him and his widow.

7# Pay people what they are worth, and when possible, save for a purchase, don't use credit. Screw the banks and their cabal of thieves; take away the profit from using credit. Sure, credit can be necessary, but if you need a new set of knives, why pay an extra 22%. Cars, houses, slightly different, but there need to be limits considering what can be charged. FWIW...the bank doesn't want a foreclosed house or property...they want cash. Land is often a liability for a bank, and the loss on the house can crush a bank.

#8 I am not a violent person, I like to consider myself somewhat civilized. But make the punishment fit the crime. beheading people is bestial...how about beheading some of those doing the beheading? At a minimum, life in prison, beatings every 15 minutes and gruel for "food".

#9 Torches and pitchforks...we're getting pretty close to taking down the "Landed Gentry". Take their cash, distribute it to people who need coats and blankets, food and medicine. Take it all, leave the bastards destitute.

Just a couple of thoughts on the way things look from one person's POV. And sometime today, preform a random act of kindness...:)

[Sherman A1]

1. Some might be a bit over the top, but overall I like

your list

#1, 3, 4 & 5 in particular