US Rep. Collin Peterson was our guest speaker at the Mar. 12, 2015 meeting. He gave an update of the stalemate on issues due to the vast polarization of politicians that are on the far left or the far right. Out of 435 districts in the US, only about 30 of them (including ours) have competitive elections due to gerrymandering that has occurred over the last decade. Until that is fixed, Rep. Peterson doesn't see the divisiveness lessening in Congress. On things such as the Affordable Care Act, most of the Democrats are for it; the Republicans want to scrap the whole thing; however, Rep. Peterson (the last of the original Blue Dog Democrats) would prefer to fix several things in it and stated that eliminating it now would cause a huge disaster because it is tied into every part of our healthcare delivery system. As far as the budget goes, about 65% is entitlements and that won't be reduced until the formulas for Medicare, Social Security and Farm Programs are changed. The remaining 35% is appropriations and about half of that is the Defense budget.