I feel that it is extremely important to attack gang violence at its roots!

Make no mistake about it, "Gang Violence is Organized Crime" that must be stopped wherever and whenever it raises its ugly head. Gang thugs routinely prey on the elderly, the poor, the homeless, innocent citizens, businesspersons and vacationers who visit our Great State for some fun-in-the-sun. I will not permit these armed street gangsters to run roughshod over our daily lives, to make us live in fear of walking our streets or visiting a local park.

I especially will fight-the-fight to protect the lives of our children from gang influence. It is no secret Gang Members enlist our young children to do their dirty deeds for them. Gang leaders and their followers are nothing more than cowards who hide behind and use our children. As good citizens, we together will act to stop Gangs in their tracks, for they are the root system of the evil tree of crime.

When gang members are apprehended after committing a crime against our citizens, I will speak out to urge our State Prosecutors to level additional charges against them under available "Racketeering" laws. I will be a strong advocate of adopting further increases in criminal sentencing for gang members who use our children as crime pawns.

Our children should never have to rely on, nor look up to, gang members as their "mentors" or "after-school family".  The time is now to combat gang violence!

I support our men and women who serve in the Armed Forces and I am extremely proud of the brave men and women of our military who, in the past and now, serve our country with honor both here and around the world. I praise and pray for all those who have laid down their lives in the line of service to protect the freedoms and security we as Americans enjoy each day. They have given us the ultimate sacrifice and they should be highly honored and remembered as “America’s True Heroes”. For those men and women who return home badly injured from performing their military duty, I pledge to join with other congressional representatives to ensure these brave Americans receive the medical treatment and rehabilitative services they need.

To the families and friends who have lost loved ones during the war, I offer my deepest condolences and sincere gratitude to all of you who have suffered so deep a loss.  My prayers and thoughts are forever with you.

It is important our Military Heroes will not have given their lives and health in vain. I intend to seek out the best way to properly and honorably bring our men and women home from the Middle East. Enough is enough I say, and it is high time leaders from these troubled foreign lands take control, accountability and responsibility for the fate and security of their own countries. As you all know, warlord controlled regions in the Middle-east have been at war with one another for thousands of years. Shedding more precious American blood will never change their established way of life.

Our brave men and women of the military died to give these foreign lands and people the chance to walk a “Path to Freedom”. If the governments of Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan do not quickly take advantage of the opportunity our brave Americans soldiers have given them, then we as Americans must responsibly act to bring our military personnel back home as soon as possible. Then, we Americans can fight the war against terror on our own soil, here at home by using our military personnel to better secure our borders and ports, so that we do not have a repeat of the September 11th attack. I will use every bit of my energy to make this happen, the right way.

As a candidate for Florida’s 23rd Congressional District, I believe that is extremely important for a congressional representative to give our law enforcement agencies the financial support they need in order to enhance their ability to fully “protect and serve” our communities. In order to attract and hire Police Officers and Deputy Sheriffs who are the “best of the best”, Federal, State and County Grants must be made available to our men and women of law enforcement so they can benefit from continuing education and state-of-the-art equipment needed to fight crime wherever it exists.

On the streets of our cities, towns and villages, it is our law enforcement officers who represent the greatest visible form of our government. Their constant presence within the community is a clear deterrent for those who choose to lead a life of crime, and; these valiant men and women of law enforcement need and deserve the educational, strategic and communication advantages necessary to succeed in their constant battle against street crime, drug dealers and violent criminals.

I will be your staunch advocate for superior law enforcement capabilities to make certain our personal level of safety improves, and improves rapidly.

All too often our local newspapers and TV stations run news stories reporting on our cities or towns considering the implementation of “teen curfews” as a means of getting kids off the streets. Ask any kid about this topic and most all of them will tell you the same thing. “We kids don’t have anywhere to go, anything to do after school or at night” they’ll flat out tell you. I am sure we adults have heard that response all too many times, but let’s begin to face the fact that what the kids are telling us is true.

As Candidate for Florida’s 23rd Congressional District Seat, I’d rather see kids playing and working-out in a fitness gym inside a government owned and operated health-fitness recreation facility under adult supervision, than to see our kids “hanging out on street corners or in the woods”.

Our wise senior citizens will tell you “Idleness is the Devil’s Workshop”, and when it comes to kids lacking suitable places to congregate and fun things to do after school, the end result is mischief and an increase in juvenile offenses against society.

What Ever Happened To The Presidential Program For Health & Fitness?

As your Congressional Candidate for 08’, I think we should lead our children along the road to health, fitness and the cultural arts once again, in a manner highly reminiscent of the 1960’s when Presidential decrees emphasized and required health and fitness programs for young Americans as a means of reducing teen crime, offsetting child obesity, improving the health and fitness of our children to the benefit of America’s Health Care System, and, as a positive means of strengthening our kids character and outlook on life by affording them the opportunity to experience the joys of leading a healthy life through good sportsmanship coupled with positive life-style mentoring etc.

Once I am seated as “Your Congressman”, I intend to seek out federal funding to construct local facilities that will offer our kids an opportunity to experience fun things to do on their off-time. For instance, within our 23rd District I would like to build a few state-of-the-art facilities that offer kids activities such as gymnastics, modern dance, art and graphics, computer classes, swimming, martial arts, off-site horseback riding excursions and music lessons, just to name a few of the possibilities out of a myriad of constructive activities kids should be participating in, today and always.

When I, Ray Torres Sanchez am Elected to Congress in 2008, I will visit with local City and Town commissions and councils to address the need for, and funding of, Capital Improvement Projects for the construction of recreational and fitness facilities that will be compatible with their community’s needs. I will also visit local schools during Parent Teacher meetings for some straight talk with out kids, their parents and teachers to find out exactly what they want in the way of interesting and exciting program activities.

Please join Ray Torres Sanchez, Candidate for Florida’s 23rd Congressional District in support of this most worthwhile and long overdue cause.

America’s vulnerability to a major Terrorist Attack is as great today as it ever has been since the 9-11 tragic attack on the World Trade Center’s Twin Towers, the Anthrax attack in Boca Raton FL and the Murrah Federal Building (all perpetrated on U.S. soil).

Improving Homeland Security is a national effort on both sides of the political aisle with concerns being expressed on a very wide range of topics from (for example) protecting our public drinking water sources to securing our Nuclear Power Plants.

For now, I will address some of the vital areas within our 23rd Congressional District as well as in some of our nearby sister districts in order to emphasis how important enhancing and improving Homeland Security efforts are to you, me and our families.

Let’s look at a partial list of some of our vulnerabilities directly relating to all of us here in Florida’s 23rd Congressional District (and similarly throughout our Nation in general):

• Port of Palm Beach, Port of Ft. Pierce, Port Canaveral, Port Everglades
• St. Lucie Nuclear Power Plants I & II (Hutchinson Island)
• Florida Power & Light (FPL) Power Grid
• Public Drinking Water Supply
• Natural and Liquid Gas Pipelines
• Interstate Highway System
• International Airports – Palm Beach & Ft. Lauderdale
• Hospitals (Blood Bank Inventories Near Record Lows)
• Schools
• Cyber-Attacks (Government and Financial Institutions)
• Food Sources
• National Borders (340,000 Motor-Vehicles Cross Our Borders Each Day)

There are numerous other resources at risk of terrorist attack.  There are in fact so many it would take hundreds of pages to list them all, but for now let us imagine a Terrorist attack on one of our listed local resources.  Life as we know it here in Florida would come to an abrupt halt for an extended period of time, a period of time that might span months if not many years into the future.   Let us examine just one hypothetical scenario.

An Attack Upon Our Sea Port(s)

Recent data shows that more than 60,000 shipping containers (a container is the long storage unit hauled along our highways by semi-tractor trailers) enter our Nation’s ports each day together with too-numerous-to-count shipping vessels from foreign lands.

Only 1% to 2% of all such shipping containers entering our ports are inspected by port security personnel or the authorities.  That means (on a national basis) 59,400 shipping containers move into our ports each day without being inspected for nuclear or high explosive weapons of mass destruction, biological or viral weapons, bombs placed into shipped cars arriving here from oversees etc.  It is too scary to even think about how exposed we are to Terrorist attacks.  Take for example, the hypothetical scenario of one nuclear weapon shipped in an un-inspected shipping container by terrorists wishing to destroy Port Everglades, where there are major gasoline and other petrochemical transmission lines, a Terror-Container that slips past the eyes and inspection equipment of port agents. 

After bomb detonation, our area’s prevailing southerly to southeast winds would spread radioactive fall-out and highly toxic clouds over every one of us who live in our district and beyond.  Port gasoline supplies now burning out of control if not completely destroyed in the blast, would add to the mix of a toxic storm swelling above the clouds.  Sheer horror would strike us all, a terrorist attack scenario we are currently not ready for, nor prepared to handle.  In the aftermath of such a catastrophic event, unfathomable hardships and un-measurable loss of life would by comparison, dwarf all previous terrorist attacks on our Nation, be it foreign or domestic.

Thus you can see the importance of beefing up inspections at all our major ports, an element of my future Homeland Security efforts that I will continually strive to stress and follow-up on in the Halls of Congress.

Ray’s Efforts to Obtain Federal Dollars to Improve Local Security

Could this life altering scenario happen to us?  Hopefully not, but we must be prepared for anything considering the voracity of the enemy and their hatred for America.

Admittedly, any major attack by a terrorist master-mind would be difficult for local first responders to deal with, and for we citizens to suffer through.  In this day and age the threats are real and I will not be complacent, nor will I sit idly by without bringing your safety and that of our Nation to the floor of Congress as a “must do” now, in 2008, and beyond.

Our security will be one of my highest priorities in 2008 and forever thereafter, and; I will strive to secure every Federal Dollar available for our Florida based Emergency Response Agencies to provide them the necessary personnel, training and high-tech tools needed to detect and neutralize a terrorist plot, before it becomes a reality.

When it comes to strengthening our Homeland Security efforts, my voice will ring out strong and determined as “One Voice For All People”.