Legalizing Marijuana

When reading my colleagues writing on her opinion on the legalization of marijuana, I completely disagree. I do believe that this person should have used more facts to make her point but since this is an editorial, I guess that does work. First off, I do not smoke marijuana but I know plenty of educated individuals who do. Legalizing marijuana would create a new multi-billion dollar industry in the United States with a substance that can be taxed by the Federal Government thereby generating more money to fund government programs and create more government jobs. Isn't that exactly what we need? Marijuana has also been proven on more than one occasion to not cause cancer unlike it's legal counterparts tobacco and alcohol. Patients suffering from things like Cancer, Aids, chronic pain and insomnia would have easy access to a natural pain reliever. With that being said, I think the least of our worries would be that people would be walking around more calm and "chill-faced" then usual.

Pell Grants in Higher Education

Pell Grants in higher education is vital to those who cannot afford to put themselves through school. With a new act in federal legislation that cuts the middle man ( private banks) out of the equation, students not only in Texas will still be able to recieve the amount they need. Without this new legislation, it was talked about that there might have to be cuts in the amount each person could recieve to meet a certain budget. With the way that the economy is, tuition is going to be rising and people just can't afford to not recieve the gift of a pell grant in the amount that they need.
The way that the federal government is going to do this, is to phase out the banks that the students would be paying for their federal student loans and have the student pay directly to the federal government. This cuts out a cost that can go towards the pot of pell grant money.
Even though I personally don't recieve pell grants or student loans, I believe that in the future it may come to that and it makes me feel reassured that there is help for higher education. I know many people personally that rely on pell grants and loans that would suffer emmensely without them. Way to go new legislation!