Millionaires and unemployment: The guidelines need to be changed

Just more than a year ago, Amanda Clayton won $1 million in the Michigan state lottery and later was charged by the state’s Attorney General for welfare fraud because she continued to collect welfare benefits including food stamps. At the time, Clayton, who recently was found dead of a possible drug overdose, defended her actions saying she was entitled to the benefits because she still needed help.

People across the country were outraged. Clayton was found guilty of felony welfare fraud, ordered to repay the $5,500 she received in food and medical benefits after winning the lottery, and sentenced to nine months probation.

Justice…right?

Message to congress: DO SOMETHING, DAMN IT!

An open letter to elected officials in Washington, D.C.:

Words cannot express the anger, the frustration and how immensely powerless Americans are feeling as they watch and experience the economic pressures thrust upon them by the gouging of oil and gasoline prices at the whim of big oil companies.

Since 2007, big oil companies have had free reign of raising gasoline prices, increasing them anywhere from 5- to nearly 20-cents a gallon overnight on the flimsiest of excuses. And now, they are ordering price increases at the pump within hours — even minutes as demonstrated by this ABC News report.