Avoiding Climate Talks

California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger had a plan to make all of the presidential candidates convene for some sort of debate on climate change and global warming, but it appears to have fallen apart. Nobody really even knew that it had been planned until Senator John McCain told everybody last month that he had been invited to participate. The reason he brought it up is because he is widely known as one of the more progressive candidates when it comes to reversing climate change, and this especially separates him from the other Republican candidates. The reason that the project fell apart was because hardly any other candidates besides McCain were willing to participate in the debate. However, the event’s planners hope to continue the debate perhaps sometimes later in the primary season, even if not before the New Hampshire primary. Mitt Romney apparently could not participate because he had been scheduled to appear somewhere else already, Fred Thompson had not made a decision as to whether or not he would participate, and Rudy Giuliani had simply not responded.

The Republican Schwarzenegger has said that he would like it to be a bipartisan debate, and that just while the participation of McCain was nice it was not enough. I personally think that, judging by the information given in this article, the Republican candidates seem to mostly be scared that they will get killed by the Democrats and McCain. Despite this fact, I think they need to step up so the real issues in this country can finally be addressed.

The right to arm bears

Sorry, though I'm sort of ashamed of it now I must say the first time that I saw an old, bearded man with a shirt demanding the right to arm bears I laughed ridiculously hard. Anyways, I was posting comments on other people's posts and this idea came to my mind, so I figured I might as well right about it. It sorta ties in with the talk about gun control and that stuff that people are talking about today. Here is basically the gist of what I am going to write about: the right to bear arms is an unnecessary right that is outdated.

Lots of people would find this position to just be absolutely appalling. They loves their guns, they have every right to keeps their guns, and you can pries their guns from their cold, lifeless hands. So let me just sort of explain my stance on this. It is my belief, as I assume others because I doubt I came up with this on my own, that the right to bear arms was created as a precautionary measure. The founding fathers did not sit back and imagine that in two hundred and fifty years their dreams of walking around with fully automatic weapons that would do absolutely no good if one were hunting. The fact of the matter is this: guns are only good for one thing and that is protection. But if your average Joe did not have and had a very hard time obtaining a gun (so basically just law enforcement had them) then you would have very little reason to need to protect yourself with a gun. The true original intent of the right to bear arms was for the newly formed states to be able to support their own militias at the time if it ever came down to it. It was frankly just easier on this new baby government if each of their citizens had their own gun instead of having to provide them with one. It is not like they decided that it was a key civil liberty; nobody believed that it was an intrinsic right of every human being to be allowed to own a firearm.

There are some things in the Constitution that are just clearly outdated. For example, when was the last time that the U.S. government even tried to quarter troops in our homes without our consent? That was really just a knee jerk reaction to something that they had experienced in their lives as colonials, as the right to bear arms is. I can understand why so many people are so clingy to their right to bear arms, because they think it is some sort of tradition that must be preserved. But really today this right is being abused, and if we could use gun control to lower the amount of crime and death due to guns I personally don't think the right to bear arms should be a viable argument, though I guarantee you it will always be seen as a viable argument by most of the country, especially the Supreme Court.

Multiparty... Single Party... Mario Party...?

So basically this entire post will be about what I think on this whole American party system issue we've been talking about in class. Though I think it is obvious that the best way to party is the Mario Party (by the way, Yoshi is by far the best character in the game), it really has no relevance to this topic. I just thought it would be fun to include in there. So as of right now I'm not really sure which way I'm leaning on this topic, but I just sorta plan to write about it and hopefully by the end I will have addressed enough of the arguments to decide for myself which side I'm on.
First of all, I really don't care about what the founding father thought about this topic. Though most people wouldn't like to admit it, there is a lot of things the founding fathers didn't want us to do that are part of our culture today. In fact, if you really look at it we really aren't following their wishes in the majority of what we do, but that's sort of off topic. In this particular case, we decided to ignore their ideas long ago when we went to a two party system so that is really irrelevant now. I personally am a fan of having everybody's ideas represented in Congress. For this reason I am a fan of the multiparty system. It's pretty obvious that the political spectrum as represented by a single line (which is really how we are doing it with a two party system) is not really a good way to gauge people's political views anymore, if it ever was. It would definitely be better in my opinion if I could vote for somebody who had views that were very close to mine, so I could be positive that my views are heard in Congress. A big argument against the multiparty system is that a candidate could win with say 80% of the population not having voted for them. While this certainly sounds bad, I don't think it is necessarily that different from today. For one, taken on a post-election level today we only have about 3 of every 10 people who approve of our president, yet we seem to be getting along fine. Sure things could be better, but it isn't all that bad. And even in an election the way we have it today: say the winner wins with 47% of the vote. I guarantee you that a very healthy part of that 47% did not even necessarily want that person to win. The candidate maybe only shared one of their many views, but they fit better under his big tent than the other persons. Also, many people vote just so "that other guy doesn't win." I personally don't think that the difference between true 20% support in a multiparty system (assuming it only gets that high. it would never really split evenly among 5 or 6 or however many groups. depending on the times i'm sure there would be strong favor towards certain parties) and the 30% of the nation who really voted for a candidate because they support the majority of his views that we get in a two party system. Granted, I really am sort of spitballing with my numbers here, and it really is mostly speculation but I hope you can see that there is some validity in those statements.
However, there is one big thing that really bothers me about the multiparty system. It is that one fatal flaw of democracy, the bureaucracy that accompanies it. Everybody knows that it can take years for important issues to get resolved as it stands now, and I can't imagine how it would get done in a multiparty Congress. I just don't trust our politicians to be able to resolve their differences and come to a solid conclusion. As sad as it is, I actually prefer the block voting we get now from our two parties, because at least it usually resolves things. You just have to hope that you are covered by whatever little piece of that tent you fit under.

Border policies

It's a race against time! 2:26 and still 34 minutes to go, but trying to make it a good post too. So for AP Spanish we had to get recent news on immigration policy/laws in spanish, which was absolutely ridiculous, and then have a debate. Spanish teachers are crazy so we never actually had this debate (even though she has been saying "Proximo clase" for like 2 weeks now) but I know the issue pretty good now so I'll report on that. As this is the case, unless you want me to link to the article in spanish I won't have a link this time, but I promise this happened. Also, you know this is your chance to have one of your 3 comments just say "I agree! Spanish teachers ARE crazy!"

So basically the newer border policies are that over the past year or so our country has been abandoning the short detainment then deportation policy that we have been using for a very long time. Instead, somebody came up with the idea that if the detainment periods are much longer, than it might become more of a deterrent than the previous slap on the wrist, now go home. To tell the truth, only hearing this it doesn't sound like such a bad idea. Then I heard what the problems that came along with this. This policy, along with just the standard stricter border control, has led to an increase of over 30% (don't remember the exact number, so I'm probably undershooting it) in illegal immigrant inmates in United States prisons. Now, almost all of our border prisons are completely overcrowded. The Hispanic community is arguing that immigrants are being treated like they aren't even human in these places. Major American newspapers have reported abuses among prison guards specifically targeted at immigrant inmates, and unlike regular inmates immigrant prisoners can basically be transferred to wherever whenever. Part of the reason for these abuses is that federal prisons really try not to take on too many inmates (or they are already overcrowded) so these immigrants are being taken to private prisons where the actions of the guards aren't as strictly regulated. As far as the transferring thing, it has been said that some immigrants have been detained in Texas for a short period of time, then sent all the way to California for another short time, then sent all the way back to Texas for a little while before being deported. This is one of the ways that they are trying to deal with their overcrowding issue. Basically they are being treated worse than regular inmates, even though they really aren't regular inmates. Some people have brought up the fact that they really havn't broken any laws, so they shouldn't even be in the same prisons as regular inmates.

I can't say that I have a solution to these problems, but for now I think we should go back to our old policies on the border. I realized that they were flawed and not really a deterrent, but the results were much more humane that what we are working with now. And I guess that's all I really have to say about that. That was a nice, quality 16 minute post. Hopefully it gets credit.

Why Giuliani can't win anymore

Two words: Pat Robertson. Also known as the craziest person known to man. Even though old people around the country love him. As seen here:http://tinyurl.com/2zd82e. He recently pledged his support to Giuliani, and I really don't know who this hurts more. Let's see on one side we have Pat Robertson, known for being super-religious, in fact that is the only reason that he is an important figure at all. And here he is, supporting a presidential candidate who is pro-abortion. On the other side, we have Giuliani, trying to garner some serious support from the electorate here. I think that people who know who Pat Robertson really is will understand why this move hurts him, and I will devote the rest of this to why Pat Robertson will hurt his chances. Which basically means I get to make fun of Pat Robertson for a while.

To start off, I'm not gonna lie. Half of this is from what I can actually remember of Pat (as I will now call him) and the other half will be from wiki probably or something along those lines. So about thirty years ago Pat Robertson did those wonderful church TV shows in which he managed to perform miracles in front of hundreds of people and many more on TV. People criticized him for being so faithful that God was willing to listen to him when he turned his organ on and picked out people who were obviously not pre-chosen from the crowd, but after that his healing powers were gone. He also once said that Episcopalians, Presbyterians , and Methodists were the spirit of the Antichrist. So obviously, he is a very religious, tolerant man. He announced that his prayers have stopped at least four hurricanes from hitting places he didn't want them to hit, most notably his place of business, though one of the places he claimed to have prayed for actually did get hit. One thing that I do remember that was absolutely wonderful was when he televised a nationwide 3 week prayer about 2 years ago. He wanted the entire country to pray for some vacancies on the Supreme Court, because he hated the people who were currently serving terms.

I know the question that you all want to ask me, "But how does he feel about lesbians?" Yes, I too asked myself this question when hearing of all his other exploits. In Pat's mind, feminism and lesbianism are very closely related. Really he thinks that... well let me directly quote Pat for you, so that you understand his position exactly. Basically, feminism is a "socialist, anti-family political movement that encourages women to leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism, and become lesbians." What about being gay in general? Is there a problem with that? According to Pat, this is a most grave matter. Any acceptance of homosexuality could lead to hurricanes, earthquakes, tornadoes, terrorist bombings, and even a meteor striking earth. So let's make the clear jump from gays to terrorists here. How did Pat respond to 9-11? Was it the fault of terrorists? Islamic extremism? Who is to blame for 9-11? Who? I must know, tell me Pat! Well when one of his buddies claimed that it was caused by "pagans, abortionists, feminists, gays, lesbians, the American Civil Liberties Union, and People for the American Way," Pat couldn't help but agree. Of course! Why didn't we lock up all these people before 9-11? And it was right in front of our eyes the whole time.

This is getting long, so I'll just give you a couple more highlights of the long, crazy roller coaster ride that is life with Pat. He once said that it would be good for the country if we nuked the State Department. He said that he thinks we should assassinate Hugo Chavez. In Pennsylvania one area voted out all members of a school board who supported intelligent design. In response, Pat told them not to be surprised if they were hit by some sort of natural disaster (God's wrath) and not to ask for God's help if they were, because they abandoned him. God told Pat that the Iraq war was going to be a mistake (why did we ever doubt him? We must have been crazy). But he didn't tell us this until after, so I guess we couldn't have known better. Ariel Sharon's tragic stroke was the wrath of God. And I'll end this post with a direct quote from Wiki: on one of his shows "Robertson stated that people who have too much plastic surgery "got the eyes like they're Oriental" and stretched his eyelids in a manner stereotypical of Asians." Isn't it sad that these sound like Chuck Norris jokes, except that they actually happened?

In conclusion, if you were Giuliani, would you want this man saying he supported you?

Here is me being controversial

So I've been really bored and couldn't find anything THAT new or interesting to blog about, so I'll go with an ongoing issue and a two week old article that is addressing it. The article is from the Times describing how so sex offenders go untracked: http://tinyurl.com/2xpzqa. So basically because I just feel like these guys (and I say guys because not very many girls are classified as sex offenders) are often judged unfairly, and I think that people already start out with a prejudice against them, I'm going to go ahead and protect the rights of sex offenders in this post. Why? Those reasons, and because I enjoy being controversial and am interested in how people will respond. You'd be surprised at how much stuff I say just to start up some healthy debate, because frankly a lot of people argue without having any real substance to what they are saying. And here we go on this wild ride.

To start off, basically last year a bill was passed (Proposition 83) that forced all sex offenders to be monitored for life (I believe by satellites) and they can't live within 2000 feet of any parks or schools. And as everybody knows, just about everywhere (if not everywhere, I'm not totally sure) sex offenders are required to be registered and I'm fairly certain that anybody can look up where they live, and if there are any in their neighborhoods. I'm pretty sure that you actually have to go tell everybody in your new community personally that you are a registered sex offender and living in their neighborhood, but I can't be positive. That's messed up. Now I understand that this was voted on by the public, and this is what they wanted. But I'm not arguing about that, what I'm saying is that it's unfair, not that it isn't what the public wants. For one, it is totally ridiculous for only sex offenders to have to do this. Let me ask you this question: A man brutally stabs a stranger 5 times when he is 17, but he survives. He serves 20 years in prison, comes back and lives in your neighborhood like nothing happened. Now who would you rather know about: this man or a sex offender? And for that matter, why are sex offenders the only people that get labeled so negatively. I mean besides calling somebody an ex-felon nobody else really gets tagged so badly. And you can never really be an ex-sex offender. Once you make that mistake, it sticks with you the rest of your life.

As far as the rest of your life goes, apparently society just gives up on you after you commit a sex crime. By forcing these people to register and letting the world know about them you are labeling them as dangerous to the community. Do we officially just have no faith in our prison system anymore? Sex offenders are just that hopeless, that they can never be rehabilitated? Or maybe it has actually already been working. According to this site http://www.kare11.com/cs/blogs/scott_goldberg/archive/2006/05/17/1988.aspx, the majority of sex offenders aren't even second time offenders. 92% are first time offenders. So why do we need to do so much harm to the dignity of these people who most likely won't even commit a second crime? Oh right, because we already declared them to be a lost cause. And instead of protecting children in these 2000 feet 'safety zones' from registered sex offenders, maybe we should do something to protect them where they have been proven to be most vulnerable, in their own homes. As it turns out, everybody is WAY more likely to be sexually harassed by people they know, and not by stranger registered sex offenders. So why is there such a prejudice against these people who, just like many other people in America, just made a mistake at some point in their lives?

I just want to tackle one more point before I finish this. Some people say that many sex offenders ARE lost causes because most of the people who commit these crimes do so because they are mentally ill, and as such they should be monitored etc. etc. Well if this is the case and they are mentally ill, then they can't really be criminals can they? At that point they would obviously no longer be capable of being in any state of mind to control their own actions, and as such should not get such a bad stigma for doing things that they can't even control.

As you can see, anti-sex offender laws really don't make any of us that much more safe. At worst, you can probably admit that the resources and time used on these laws could have been better allocated. Most of these people did their time AND their probationary time, so why do we need to make them suffer more?

Sucks to be a Republican

So that time I said I would make this post entertaining... I lied. Thats due to some mix of laziness, other homework, an unwarranted preoccupation with football, and that my life might depend on listening to B5 and Omarion right now. Whatever the case, this post will be more lame than I want it to be.

On Sunday night the Republicans had a debate in Florida that turned out to be one of the more exciting debates for that party this year. It all started when former Senator Fred Thompson decided to blast his presidential rival but party-mate Rudolph W. Giuliani for stances on abortion and “sanctuary cities” for illegal immigrants. He declared that Rudy Giuliani supports gun control, supported a Democratic candidate over a Republican candidate, and is too similar in his personal views to Hillary Clinton. Giuliani decided to not just stand pat and take it, but rather he shot right back at Fred Thompson with some fire of his own. He immediately returned by asking why he sided with trial lawyers instead of GOP senators, and attacked his voting record on things that Giuliani said would “make our legal system fairer.” Giuliani also attacked Thompson’s lack of executive experience, while simultaneously defending the aforementioned sanctuary cities. But it wasn’t just among these two. Senator McCain got into it with Mitt Romney over his previous statements. And again, it became very clear that nobody really had the support of the religious right in the election.

I personally think it is sad the state that the Iraq war has left the Republican Party in. What was supposed to be a debate really just turned into 90% of the candidates bashing each other and pointing out their flaws. At this rate they will never win the election, no matter who wins the nomination. The only thing they ever really agreed on was that they needed to bash Hillary Clinton all the time. And that probably won't win any of them the election.

Clinton's health plan only for citizens

Yeah so a variety of other homework for tomorrow means that this will be another not funny post, but I'll try and get something good in next week. So for this week my topic is Hillary Clinton's proposed healthcare plan. She recently revealed that it would not cover immigrants and would be solely for American citizens, which I personally did not even know was an issue, I just assumed this would be the case. Assuming that her fundraising techniques provide enough money to support this plan, I would honestly like to hear people come up with reasons for why Clinton's healthcare plan would not be good for America. Since we all sort of get the idea of what a healthcare plan would do, I'll spend the rest of this post answering a couple of the most common negative responses to national coverage.

I'll start off this part by saying that I think we can all agree that having some sort of coverage is better than having no coverage at all, right? Like even if you had to wait two months for a checkup, this would be better than never going to get a checkup at all? I'll go ahead and assume that we are all cool on that issue. So that sort of answers the common complaint that "I know so-and-so person who lives in European Country X who offers healthcare, and they had to wait 4 months to check out her rash and then they found out it was really bad and needed some sort of surgery (why would a rash ever need surgery? I don't know. But it must have been a pretty freaking intense rash. Like the kind I told Ferris that Greg had last year on the first day of school) which then took another 3 months to schedule and blah blah blah. OK, yeah, it sucks that this person had to wait so long to get the gross rash checked out, but its better than never having it checked out at all, right? And its not like this person is being forced to wait if they have the personal wealth to have their own private insurance, because Clinton's plan allows you to keep your personal provider. Another big issue in the past has been people talking about how those who don't even contribute to the system will be getting all the benefits, so they were obviously talking about immigrants. Well, Hillary cleared that one up pretty clear didn't she? I'm sorta getting lazy here in thinking of other arguments against it, but if you bring one up I'll promise to address it in the comments.

Also the South Florida Bulls make me cry. Oh well, back to the old plan. UCLA for Pac-10 Champs!

Article:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071019/ap_on_el_pr/clinton_health_care;_ylt=ArjNwb3lTZWw_.TBTwUcaRlI2ocA

LaRouche attacks the most sacred American artifact: Halo 3

So this isn't exactly the most recent news (maybe 2 weeks old?) but I found it to be so disturbing that I had to blog about it. Lyndon LaRouche, who I'm sure everybody here has heard of because he's run for the presidency eight times since 1976 according to trusty old Wiki (I don't even know if that math works out right), has condemned Halo 3 as a corrupter of American youth. Good sir, if I may say so: HOW DARE YOU?!?!? While I certainly respect his opinion, I mean who wouldn't listen to a man who was sentenced to fifteen years in prison for conspiracy to commit mail fraud, I must disagree. Halo represents all that is good in American culture. There is absolutely nothing more American than Halo. I once read that Halo jumped into raging rapids to save a basket of puppies. No joke. Sure, maybe Mr. LaRouche can draw some credence from the fact that over five reputable sources have declared him to be an anti-Semite. Oh wait no, I forgot that we aren't Nazis. My bad. Fact of the matter is, Lyndon LaRouche is an absolute political radical (read what he said from the link I'll post at the end, it's almost scary), convicted criminal, and apparently just all around intolerant man. For these reasons, I have absolutely no reason to respect his opinions. For some reason, I highly doubt that, as Mr. LaRouche claims, the Virginia Tech incident was caused by video games. Plus, his middle name is Hermyle. And I just can't bring myself to trust any man with the middle name of Hermyle.

On a somewhat more serious note, politicians seriously need to get off the whole attacking video games thing. Do they honestly make people that much more violent than violent movies, TV, or news? More importantly, do these other violent things provide any benefits. I recently was bored and started thinking about, in my lifetime, how many hours I've spent playing video games. After it got into the thousands I just kinda got sad and stopped trying to count. Yes, in case you hadn't figured it out yet, I am a HUGE nerd. So just for kicks, I'll say the total was 1,000 hours. Even though it's probably way, way higher. Some quick math figures that to be about a month and a half of my total life. Do I see that as wasted time, or time that was spent turning me into a crazed killer? Absolutely not. In fact, I completely attribute almost all of my problem solving skills, reflex times, and knowledge about football/basketball/baseball strategies to video games. And let's just say that I'm probably better than 90% of the American population in at least two of those categories. So basically, video games are not evil and in fact are very beneficial.

On a closing note, I hope you have not lost all respect for me as a human being because of that last paragraph. Though I would be totally OK with it if you did.

And here are the statements made by Lyndon LaRouche: http://www.larouchepac.com/news/2007/09/26/halo-3-third-wave-destroying-u-s.html

Today an orange grasshopper tried to maul my face. As in it jumped at me screeching. I personally think it was a trained assassin come to silence me for my blogging. But on to the actual post, I was having some trouble getting this post up earlier, something was wrong with my internet or something, but now I can get this baby rolling. The article this is based off of is http://tinyurl.com/2tv3hf.

Despite the fact that the first voting for who will run for president in the next election will begin within the next three months, the religious right has yet to determine who their favorite candidate is. This makes religious leaders afraid that Rudy Giuliani could take the cake, which would be a blow to their cause. This is because Giuliani would be the first Republican hopeful to openly support abortion rights since it was legalized. But the problem lies far beyond just who to vote for as a presidential candidate, the evangelical leaders have many internal problems as well. In the past, these leaders have pushed for legislation on the most pressing religious issues (which has been hampered by the loss of Congress due to sex scandals), but now their movement has become somewhat “diluted” as they are fighting for a multitude of issues. The seemingly most religious of candidates, like Mitt Romney and former Governor Mike Huckabee are dubious choices because of how they conveniently flip flop on issues depending on what state they are in. These religious leaders are even threatening to support a third candidate, just to make sure that Giuliani does not win the nomination.

I think it is sad that the agenda is so set for these people, but then again I might be biased. I’m sure there are issues that I would like to see resolved quickly but don’t see as foolish just because I don’t disagree with them. The religious right should most certainly do whatever it takes for them to get their candidate, as it is very important to have every point of view represented in government.

Bush to Burma: "Hey. Hey. Stop it. Stop it. OK? OK?"

Recently at the United Nations General Assembly, President Bush reprimanded Burma for the way they oppress their citizens. That's right Burma. Burma, Burma, Burma. If that sounds strange to you in light of recent news reports about protests in that country, it is because that country has officially been called Myanmar for the past 18 years, but this information apparently did not get around to Mr. Bush. Its OK though, one of these days he will pick up a newspaper, find out that Y2K didn't happen, realize that the war with Iraq ended in 1991, and see that people are officially done with hearing 9/11 as an excuse. In all seriousness though, it is possible that Bush was making a statement of not recognizing the military leadership in place in Myanmar (the U.S. officially does not recognize the name Myanmar) but you would think that he might still use the name that is accepted by the United Nations at a United Nations General Assembly. Personally, I like the idea of ignorant Bush more, but I'm getting off topic.

So the basic problem in Myanmar that people are being abused (and have been for many years) and persecuted by the military government. The direct quote from President Bush was that "Americans are outraged by the situation in Burma where a military junta has imposed a 19-year reign of fear. Basic freedoms of speech, assembly and worship are severely restricted . Ethnic minorities are persecuted, forced child labour, human trafficking and rape are common." I don't know about the rest of you, but that sounds pretty bad to me. So how should we, America, the leaders of the free world, respond to this world offense? According to article, it should be done by tightening "economic sanctions against the regime's leaders and their financial supporters, and widen a visa ban on those responsible for human rights abuses, and extend it to family members." Come on guys. Are you serious? I think we all know theres only one good way to go about this. Run in there with guns blazing. Just bust a cap in those oppressive military leaders. *GAT GAT GAT GAT*. I mean it works every time, just take a look around. Afghanistan? Iraq? Delicious! When it really comes down to it, is this situation that different? If we truly have a responsibility to protect the people of the world, shouldn't we be on our way into Myanmar already?

For the article on this event visit:
http://tinyurl.com/28snlf

Obama vs. Taxes

Sorry if this post isn't as interesting or humorous as the last one, but I just got back from the football game (Tucker is a bulldozer at left guard. Pancake city!) and it's late.

On Tuesday the popular Barack Obama revealed that he plans to shift the tax burden from the poor the rich, as stated in this L.A. Times article: http://tinyurl.com/2mcj7w. As well as revealing his plans for tax cut repeals from the rich, Obama gave some ideas for cutting taxes or giving certain tax relief to the poor elderly, among many other people. I find it interesting that he reveals his plans to do this after revealing some parts of his plans for national healthcare as well. It seemed sketchy as it was how much money he planned on squeezing out of the current system for future healthcare, so he was really heavily relying on the money from repealing the wealthy's tax cuts already. Sure he will be making the less wealthy more happy, but in the end with tax relief for those people the result will probably not be a very big gain in the national budget.

Obama has centered much of his campaign over being the 'Washington outsider.' While he mostly uses this to separate himself from that manly 'Washington insider,' Hillary Clinton, I think that this move really shows how much of an outsider he is. Everybody knows that Obama is a fundraising machine, but it would be pretty absurd to think that every penny comes from fifty dollar donations from Jenny and Joe down the street. Nor is he running a lemonade stand (though Obama brand lemonade would be absolutely GENIOUS!). Fact is, a good chunk of that money probably came from corporations, or the very wealthy, the evil special interest groups; you know the people that would get mad at these kind of changes in the taxing system. Obama might find out that dealing with these people might be just a little difficult, as they expect something back for their support.

For the record, I'm not an Obama trasher. In fact, I sorta like the guy. But it gets tiring hearing the same stuff every year, it's not like you expect a guy to come out and say he'll tax the poor more heavily. Honestly, if some dude with balls came out and said, "Yep. I plan taxing the hell out of the poor and letting the fat cats live it up with tax cuts," I might vote for him just to see the change. I mean really that's what ends up happening anyways, so why try to hide it by giving these speeches?

The dawn of a new age of blogging

Alright it's the first post here so let's get this party started off right... I don't know what song that was (or any other words) but I'm pretty sure it was pretty lame either way. In any case, first post, start off strong with nice grammar and capitalization and all that good stuff that I'm sure I'll slip out of within a couple of weeks. In any case, prepare for all your blogging preconceptions to be shattered (unless your preconception was that this blog will be comprised of 100% pure awesome, in which case you would be correct. no blog from concentrate.) and for your mind to be boggled by the unique yet poignant observations made in this blog. This blog will be everything you dreamed of - and more! Just give it time, I have to wait until some weekday afternoon when I'm really bored to make it look cool and the such.

On to the writing! While the event I'll tell you about in a second hasn't really broken the municipal threshold yet, the arguments that surround it have and for all the accusations being made this could make it all the way to the Supreme Court.

The article this post is loosely based off appeared in the Op-Ed section of the LAT, under the title of "Thong politics" (yeah, now you're excited) and was written by Jill Fields, though some of the big questions posed were asked by her. If you want to read it, here's a link to the article http://tinyurl.com/3bz98d. I don't remember exactly how long that link holds up but I'm pretty sure it lasts for over a month, so hopefully that's sufficient. Anyway, here is the gist of the event: recently some Louisiana towns have passed laws that prohibit the showing of any undergarments in public, and similar measures are being considered in Georgia, New Jersey, and Connecticut. That's right ladies and gentlemen, it's NOT just the South, so it can't be THAT crazy of an idea. Essentially the law is meant to stop the sometimes extreme sagging of pants that has become seemingly commonplace and the oh so popular "Hey everybody! I'm wearing a thong! Oh you don't believe me? Don't worry, as soon as my backside is to you the entire world will know because I'm an attention whore who needs the whole world to look at me!" look (yeah that's what that look is called. don't question) that my female counterparts seem to enjoy so much.

A lot of people are opposed to this law for a variety of reasons. The ACLU argues that this law is violating the 1st Amendment rights guaranteed to all Americans, many detractors in the South say that it is unfairly targeting the black youth of the area as they are the ones that primarily prescribe to the saggy pants fad, and other people think that enforcing a city-wide "dress code" is just absolutely preposterous. I tend to agree with all of these people, but I have a different question that I think is just a little bit more important. Do the city legislators in these respective cities honestly have nothing better to do than create a dress code for their youth? Especially in the South, shouldn't these people be figuring out how to keep these mostly black kids out of gangs and crime, the usual problem areas for this demographic, rather than dictating what kind of jeans they can wear? Maybe if they spent this time improving on their school system they wouldn't be ranked 55th out of 50 every year in education, though I'm not exactly standing on top of Mt. Olympus here writing from California. Furthermore, it needs to be determined exactly how far these people plan on taking this. What they are doing with this law is widening the boundaries of what can be classified as "indecent exposure," but the line is much more fuzzy than it was before. Really, what is more "indecent:" an 18 year old guy whose boxers you can see, or an 18 year old girl who is wearing a pink bra under a white shirt? Essentially you can see it just as well as if she hadn't been wearing a shirt at all, but due to the fact that she has that see-through white shirt on she can't be busted. And for that matter, would you have to classify a push-up bra or a visible panty line as being "indecent?" Because as of right now they aren't, and that seems mighty unfair to the guys.

Let's face it, kids don't want to do what their parents tell them. In fact, they want to do the exact opposite. And what better outlet is there to rebel than their clothing? It isn't the government's job to control the social outcomes that are based off our inherent rebellious nature. I really do hope that this gets challenged to the point where it makes it all the way to the Supreme Court, so it can be shot down once and for all as discriminatory against both young blacks and males (the young black males have it harsh) and as a violation of our civil liberties so that it can never come up again. Although really, who would be surprised to see it upheld 5-4 with the deciding vote being that of the Grim Reaper himself, Antonin Scalia? I know I wouldn't. Well I just wrote more than I ever expected to, so hats off to you if you actually read that whole thing.