Gay Marriage

The dictionary defines marriage as the, “legal union between a man and a woman.” I believe that does not mean that there should not be other legal avenues for two people to live together, and protect each other’s assets & benefits. It is not up to the government to decide how one’s assets should be protected. We need to examine the legal avenues to protect all of our citizens.

Voter ID

I am for presenting an identification card to vote so that it will provide a fair & honest election. However, this is not meant to harass and discourage voters.

State Income Tax

I am opposed to the proposed state income tax. A state income tax can be an added burden to our capitalist way of doing business. Today, it is difficult to lure companies to El Paso. Having a state income tax will make it that much more difficult. Since businesses would have to pay this tax, this will reduce the business expected margin which will hinder those businesses from competing domestically & globally. Consequently, this added tax burden will be added to the product & that additional cost will make these products non-competitive in today’s global market. Also a state income tax will decrease household’s discretionary income, which is the income that individuals spend on goods & services after taxes. This will prevent economic growth, and increase unemployment in the El Paso area.

Illegal Immigration

I understand that we are a nation and state built of immigrants. And I also understand that economically and politically it is not feasible to close our borders to Mexico and our “Sister City”. However, we need to know who is in our state.  They too should have to contribute to our city if they’re going to live there by paying taxes like all El Pasoans must do. I am for the already federally implemented re-issuing of identification cards that cannot be falsified to account for those who are here.

Legalization of Marijuana

During my last debate with my opponent in March of this year, he mentioned that he would support the legalization of Marijuana—and that brought some concern to me. My concern is to maintain and grow the education in El Paso. Presently, marijuana is already a plague in our high schools, middle schools, and making headway into our elementary schools. By legalizing this drug it could make marijuana more accessible to students, being that parents could legally hold inventor y of this drug. My goal is to improve graduation rates in K-12 and college. I believe that by legalizing marijuana our quality of education could suffer and our graduation rate could dwindle.

Healthcare

Like everything in life, US Citizens will incur an opportunity cost, which is by implementing the Healthcare Reform, 32 million people will gain insurance coverage. However, a cost to society also exists.  The cost of coverage for insurance for all Americans will cost $940 Billion over ten years. Unfortunately, the burden in cost will go to the working people of our country. Our cost of Medicare and Medicaid will increase. Hard working Americans will have to cover not only their portion of insurance costs, but a portion of additional costs incurred to cover the additional 32 million people.