Looking into the crystal ball of the American economic future is a frightening prospect for a college student with less than a year until graduation.

Exactly what kind of economy are we as young Americans inheriting and where will we stand in the world marketplace in a few years?

More importantly, will we - as the country’s future entrepreneurs, innovators and workers - be allowed our chance at the American Dream? Will the United States still be the shining beacon of free enterprise and industry by the time the government is through?

The outlook doesn’t look pretty.

When it comes to freedom from government oppression, the First Amendment gets all the credit. When it comes to those liberties we all readily enjoy — speech, religion, assembly, petition and press — there is such a strong and unified understanding in America that these are inalienable rights that they’re hardly ever questioned.
Yet when it comes to the Second Amendment and what should be an inalienable right to bear arms, the concept of personal independence is suddenly lost on half the population.

This Independence Day, let’s re-examine that concept.

A smudge of red lipstick, tussled hair, a rumpled sheet covering all but a bare back. And that coy, come-hither gaze that seems to know so much more than can possibly be known at 15.

That’s the image of teen star Miley Cyrus that’s been thrown on every news talk show on every channel; the image that’s had mothers apparently throwing their hands up in despair, father’s covering their little daughters’ eyes, and talk show pundits lamenting about the sexualization of a child.

“The budget should be balanced; the treasury should be refilled; public debt should be reduced; and the arrogance of public officials should be controlled.” -Cicero. 106-43 B.C.

The saying goes that nothing is certain except death and taxes. In America, it seems nothing is certain except debt and taxes.

Our country is the victim of one of the biggest con games every committed, an epidemic spreading so fast that the chief auditor of the United States calls it a “fiscal cancer.” And it’s a disease that only now – with an economy on the brink of a recession, mounting inflation, rising unemployment, and a devalued dollar – is causing sufficient alarm.

Within the past week, New York Times columnist and former foreign correspondent for the newspaper, Roger Cohen, has written two interesting opinion pieces relating Barack Obama’s family history, and the effect his presidency would have on world foreign relations.
Cohen, now reporting for the Times from Nairobi, Kenya provides an interesting angle on Obama as the next possible world leader by letting us gain a glimpse of the presidential race as seen from Obama’s country of heritage.His father, Barack Obama Sr., was born in the Nyanza Province of Kenya and worked as a domestic servant to the British. Obama, now undoubtedly one of the most well-known faces in the world, was at that point just a little boy helping his father herd goats.