Eternal Sunshine

The story structure in the movie Eternal Sunshine of The Spotless Mind as something that was not usual. The usual movie structure is that there are characters and there is a plot. In Eternal Sunshine there was no clear plot, you never knew where the story was going. It was the development of a character instead of a clear plot that you knew where the story was going and that there was going to be a story to be learned. There was no clear bad guy or good guy in the movie. The beginning of the movie is also the end of the movie. It confuses you in the beginning because you don't know what's going on, you don't realize that Joel and Clemantine were meeting for the fist time a second time.

Pride

There are many things that I am proud of, especially this semester.
One project that I am exceptionally proud of is my H20 Project.
I'm really proud of this because I really put my heart and soul into it. It was more than a grade to me, it was something that I grew to really care about. I know that it is an important thing, it's for our health and it's for our culture. I put in extra hours into the project and I think that you can tell. I did more work than I think I've ever done.
I accomplished all of this by staying after school, making sure that everything was going together smoothly. I did a lot of extra work, I did a lot of research and I went out there and did a lot of the research myself. I got some of the data from our test results in Biology, I went to go do the interviews myself, and I overall did a lot of these things because I wanted to.
Another project I'm really proud of is my Blog. I'm really proud of it because I really like looking into current events and I like keeping myself updated with politics. I'm also really proud of the fact that I go out and try to find new sources and I look for new information. I'm really proud of the fact that I get different kinds of media into my blogs, they all have pictures or videos, or both.
I do all of this by putting everything together and writing about something that I really care about. I really do care about Paulson's Financial Plan. I look on youtube for videos and I look for different kinds of websites or news sites. I try and get the story for different angles, I do that by looking at several different news sources.

Prop 8

Gay Marriage will save the economy.

Paul Watson

Paul Watson is the captain of the Farley. He attempts to stop whaling because he believes whales are more intelligent than humans. He will go to any measures to help stop whaling. When he attacks ships, he will do anything to get them to stop. Many companies and countries are against him because they believe that he is just looking for attention, some even see him as a terrorist. Greenpeace won't have anything to do with him even though he was one of the founders. Paul does a lot to get fame for what he does, he wants a lot of supporters and people to get behind him to support his cause.
While I do agree that if the Japanese are not doing any type of real research, they should be stopped. They have shown no real results and they end up selling the whale meat on the Japanese black market. Because they are whaling endangered species they should be protected by the international whale laws. They should be protected because the people that are whaling are not even showing real results. While I do not agree that it should be treated as a show, I do think that someone has to step up and take charge to stop the whaling. I do believe that someone else could join and make Paul Watson's reputation better.
I think that because no one is taking action against the whaling that some stern step should be taken. It shouldn't have to be such brute steps, but there should be some steps forward.
I agree with Paul Watson that things should be done to help the whales, but there shouldn't be such harsh steps.

Is he black?

Is it OK to be a mutt? While we all have our own views and our own way of thinking, we do share one thing, we all have very different backgrounds. As Marie Arana says, we are all put into subgroups by our skin tone. While we may have a lighter skin tone and be Samoan, we will always be "white" to a new person. While it may be hard to say all of our genetics, we are still that. President Elect Barrack Obama is black, but he is also white, so why is the white part always left out? While he does have a darker skin tone, he was raised with a white mother and a white grandmother, he only knew his father for a month before he left. I believe that our nation's vocabulary has to be updated and it has to be updated now.
While we continue to call people black and put them into those categories, we are leaving out so much. We are leaving out their background. While Barrack Obama being elected the next president of the united states is a major feat, we have to acknowledge that he is a biracial man. We have to see that people are more than what they appear. Arana told a story about a German woman who had a darker skin tone, how people would never think that she was German because of her skin tone. Is it racism or is just the way our brain works?
I agree with Arana's idea about the fact that our language has to develop, because we as people have developed. We have become better, tolerant people and though we are not perfect, we are still improving. We have to show that we are moving just as the times are. As people in this world, we are becoming more and more diverse, there are differnent combinations of just about everything, and just calling them mutts, is not ok. They have to be acknowledged as bicultural people, because we all are.
This world is just moving foward, just as our language should be. We need to be moving foward. This nation has so many diverse people, and we see them as having only the culture that their skin tone represents. Maybe we should all just look at each other with different colors for every culture that we are. Our language should be moving foward fast, because we are.

What are you discovering so far?

So far I've learned a lot, I've learned how water affects the surfers and how many different kinds of diseases or infections they can get. I've learned that the infections happen quite frequently and that if we don't do something now, the water's going to become worse making it impossible to get into the water and it will also lower the amount of money that San Diego gets because it will lower tourist rates. I've learned a lot about how to avoid getting these infections and I've learned what we as people can do to help the ocean.




What surprises you about this project?

Not a lot surprised me while researching my project, except for how severe some of the infections got. I didn't think that because of contaminated water you could get things such as Hepatitis or liver infections.



What are your next steps to have a cool product and a great piece of writing?

I'm going to interview some people at the Break room in pacific beach on Thursday and I'm going to both interview people from Surfrider and film them while filming the part where I'm talking/my written part. By Saturday I'll be done filming and by two weeks I will have all the editing done. So I plan on writing a really good script and having people check over it, I also did a lot of background research, so I hope that it will be enough to get some good questions for the interviewees and for the script.

Hispanics in the 2008 election

The Hispanic vote went up dramatically in 2008. Many Hispanics decided to vote for Barack Obama and because of this, some believe that it helped Obama win. Obama's campaign set out to gain the Hispanic vote, they encouraged hispanics in Nevada, Colorado and New Mexico to vote. Because of their efforts, their numbers went up dramatically. In Colorado, the numbers went up by 9%, in Nevada and New Mexico the numbers went up by 10%.



While in the 2000 and 2004 elections Hispanics voted for Bush, this year they leaned more towards Obama. Most assume it's because Obama made more of an effort to reach to hispanics. Hispanics voted in huge numbers this year and because of Obama's effort to reach to them, they voted for him. Being a hispanic myself, I've heard a lot of people speak about voting for him because they believe that he actually has them in mind and that he's going to do something in this country that's going to directly affect them.



The Wall Street Journal says that Hispanics may soon become the deciding vote in many swing states.

My Project Models

Here is an interview with the CEO of the Surfrider Foundation, although I hope to be more professional than the man conducting the video, the premise is the same.



The Union Tribune put Donna Frye in the "Hot Seat" and asked her a lot of questions.

Here is the link to the Interview.


I plan to make my interviews more casual and more understanding for all people. I want to make it so that all people understand what is happening, and get new information out of my interviews. Like in the above interview, it is very casual, too casual for me, but it does have important information that is shared. In the other interview with Donna Frye, it is asking her about her plans with water and how she plans to improve San Diego, I plan on taking many tips from both these interviews.

Water, Questions and Elections

How are local San Diego surfers affected by contaminated ocean water?

Resources I need are: bacteria results from Pacific Beach, I'm going to need to contact Surfrider, Coastkeeper and several other surfers in the San Diego area. I'm also going to need a camera, a tripod and a way to get to every location.

I'm going to need to interview:
Donna Frye, Skip Frye, people in the Breakroom Surfshop, People in the Tourmaline parking lot, people from Surfrider, Pierre Rivet, and several doctors in the Urgent Care located in Pacific Beach.

Thursday: Put finishing touches on questions for both surfers and for doctors.
Friday: Ask Randy for help on making the questions good enough for actual interview
Weekend: Put together a list of things to do for the following week and the following interviews.
Monday - Friday: Conduct interviews with the people listed above.

On November 4th the next President of the United States was decided the American people. Here are my thoughts:
Well before election day came I had decided that I was a supporter for Barack Obama, simply because I believe that he can take care of major concerns today. I believe that he had a better plan for the economy and that he was really in it for the middle class. I thought that if McCain was elected, he would give major tax breaks to big oil companies and already rich CEO's. Obama spoke about giving tax breaks to the middle class and giving them their money's worth, giving the middle class health care, education and giving them an affordable America. I was a little surprised when Obama won because I looked at the screen one minute and it said that he still needed about 30 or 40 votes to get the 270, the next minute, he was over by about 20. I didn't think that he had already won until I saw people celebrating in Rockefeller Center on CNN. I was quite sad when I saw McCain take the stage in Phoenix because right then you could tell that he really wanted to become President, you could tell the tears in his eyes and you could hear the crack in his voice. Overall I was pretty happy about the result of the Presidential Election.

In the next couple of years I hope to see more job opportunities here in the United States and I hope that the American Dream will still be alive. I hope that every young person in America can strive to be a college graduate, not just a clerk at the local supermarket making ends meat. I hope that no matter what skin tone you have, no matter how much money you have and no matter how old you are, you will strive to become a better person. I hope that in the next couple of years we will have a better education system and we will have a good, healthy, working economy.

I have no concerns yet, but I'm going to be keeping a close eye on the economy and how it's going to improve.









and Yes, i realize, it's spelled Humanites.

Clean Water Project

For my clean water project assignment I am thinking of doing:

1) Having an interview with different surfers in different locations such as Pacific Beach, Imperial Beach, Mission Beach and several other beaches to see how their health has been affected since the end of water testing by the city.

Surfrider and Coastkeeper are doing their best to keep our beaches clean, so I want to see if surfers have been affected by the lack of testing by the city.


Surfrider San Diego
CoastKeeper San Diego

My second idea is:

2) Checking to see Crystal Pier and seeing how it's being affected by the lack of city water testing, it's already the most polluted beaches in San Diego, what's going to happen if nothing is being done to help it?

What can we do to help Pacific Beach, the most polluted beach in San Diego?

Beach Water Quality

The Merry Wives of Windsor

For my second book I chose The Merry Wives of Windsor by William Shakespeare. In the entire play there was an enormous amount of dramatic irony. The audience knew that Falstaff was being tricked by Mistress Page and Mistress Ford. Falstaff tried to make money off of both women by sending them both identical letters. The purpose of his letters were to seduce both of the women, so much so that they would give him power over their husbands' wealth. When both women find out that they got the same letter, Mistress Ford goes to Mistress Page's house and tells her about the atrocious letter. From that moment on, they make a plan to get back at Falstaff by making him believe that his "seducing" is working. Mistress Ford tells Falstaff that she would love to take him up on his offer. All the while, Mistress Page's daughter, Ann Page, is trying to be won over by Dr. Caius, Fenton and Slender. Mistress Page wants Ann to marry Dr.Caius while Mr. Page wants Ann to marry Slender; however, Fenton is the one she really wants to marry.

When Master Ford finds out that his wife might be having an affair with Falstaff, he tries to find any way to prevent it, or at least find out everything that's going on. He makes up an alter ego named Brooke and goes to find Falstaff, he offers him a lot of money and tells him that he wants to know every little detail because he's been in love with Mistress Ford since high school. Falstaff, thinking seeing only money signs, agrees and promises to tell Brooke everything, he tells him that he's going to Mistress Ford's house that afternoon. When Master Ford hears this, he rallies up a lot of men and tells them that Falstaff is in his house having an affair with his wife.

Meanwhile Mistress Ford is at her house with Mistress Page trying to plan what's going to happen when Falstaff gets there. When Falstaff does actually get there he tries his hardest to seduce Mistress Ford. When Mistress Page comes back to tell Mistress Ford that the men are coming to the house, Mistress Ford hurriedly goes towards the door and opens it. She tells her that the men are on their way to the house and that if Falstaff doesn't get out of there quickly he's going to be killed. Falstaff ends up running out of hiding and runs into a big laundary basket. They pull him out of the house as soon as the men come in. Mistress Ford and Mistress Page just sit around and say that they were just home all day talking.

The whole play goes on to talk about how Falstaff finally learns his lesson when both Master and Mistress Ford and Master and Mistress Page pull a huge prank on Falstaff making him look like a fool. Ann Page ends up choosing Fenton while both Dr. Caius and Slender end up being tricked into marrying guys.

The play uses dramatic irony to the fullest, none of the characters knew what was really happening until the end, and in the end they all learn their lessons.

Voting Rights of American People Threatened

UPDATED: October 30, 2008

There are two major controversies revolving around the American people's voting rights. One being the case of ACORN and the other being the case of the potential vote-suppression.

The ACORN controversy is one that isn't much of a controversy, at least it shouldn't be. Really all what ACORN did was turn in registration forms, which they were legally obliged to do. Every registration form they receive, they legally have to give to the election officials. Because ACORN saw that many forms had strange names such as Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse, they flagged many registration forms before turning them into the officials. Now it's being said that ACORN knowingly turned in those forms and tried to register fake people.

According to the New York Times, "Acorn is a nonprofit group that advocates for low- and moderate-income people and has mounted a major voter-registration drive this year. Acorn says that it has paid more than 8,000 canvassers who have registered about 1.3 million new voters, many of them poor people and members of racial minorities." ACORN is supposedly responsible for registering thousands of fake voters under names such as Princess Nudleman, a goldfish in the state of Illinois. They registered hundreds of people to vote and gave money to both candidates. In the third debate McCain kept saying that ACORN gave tons of money to the Obama campaign but according to Factcheck.org both candidates got money from the corporation. McCain said, "“is now on the verge of maybe perpetrating one of the greatest frauds in voter history ... maybe destroying the fabric of democracy.” McCain believes that the ACORN fraud may lead to the end of democracy because they are faking voter registration.

In the case of Voter Suppression, it's been around for years, but always seems to be on the loose during election years. With voter intimidation and misguided voter information, not to mention the never ending technical problems with ballots. People are being misguided and intimidated everyday, they are told that they aren't eligable to vote because their information doesn't exactly match. Some people are being tricked into thinking that the election is another day, in Virginia, "A phony State Board of Elections flier has been posted around the Hampton Roads area, stating that Republicans vote on Tuesday, November 4th, and Democrats vote on Wednesday, November 5th."

Many people's citizenship is being questioned during the election; according to the Jackson Free Press a woman from Georgia was sent a letter saying that she was not a citizen and had no right to vote. When she got the letter she called her mother for her birth certificate and she called to see what was going on, they later said that the same thing happened to 50,000 other voters. According to many people this became a matter of voter suppression and it made people question whether the government was taking the rights of some people away by not letting them vote. Lots of people are scared that this might become a problem in swing states such as Ohio and Florida. Some also say college students are victims of voter suppression and that their vote might be at risk for voter suppression.

Describing The Presidential Debates

The Lincoln Douglas debates were about three hours long while the 2008 presidential debates were only an hour and a half long. The Lincoln Douglas debates asked 1 question and allowed time for rebuttals while the 2008 presidential debates gave one minute to answer the question and about 30 seconds to rebuttal.
Many people watch the presidential debates because they allow them to see what each candidate is bringing to the table and what he plans to do for our country. This presidential election is going to be very important because we are in need of a new president. We have on of the worst financial crisis' ever, we have two wars going on and we have many angry citizens.
Both candidates are trying to convice people that they are the man for the job and that they are the ones that can get it done sccessfully. They want people to vote for them and sometimes it makes people think that they will say anything for a couple of votes.
Both candidates point fingers at each other saying that they will increase taxes, make it harder for citizens to get healthcare and they say that they don't believe that they can solve the financial crisis.

Newspaper Reflection

UPDATED: OCTOBER 28, 2008

The thing that I thought I did really well was set up my time and make everything go together. I think that I made a good paper, because I was the only one who really focused my time on it and really took it seriously. I did most of the work and I think that at times I got frustrated, but in the end, I believe that the work I did was worth it. I believe that my ledes were good and that they were enough to catch people's attention while still fulfilling the requirements. I did a lot to make my writing good in the time I had, I made good body paragraphs and I left enough room to make more of the story on any following page.

I really disliked the overall process, I thought that a lot of things were left to me and that I didn't have enough time to do everything I wanted to make the newspaper the best it could be. I made the pictures, I wrote two articles and I put the whole layout together; I think that working in uneven groups really makes some people work harder than others. I would want to work with people that would help me more, my group did help me, but they also made me do a lot of things on my own that weren't my responsibility. I think that I did really good considering the amount of time I had and how much work I had to do. Even though I did do most of the work I was really happy with the end product, I put all I could into making the newspaper good and I believe that it really came through in the end.

How has the Internet affected the way that Americans approach democracy? How does the Internet and it's effects fit into the historical context of technology and democracy in America?

Luna's Photography

Well it said that we could pretty much post any pictures we wanted, so i'm going to post some of mine.
:]

All of the following pictures are 1000% mine.


This picture was taken in San Ciro de Acosta, San Luis Potosi, Mexico

This picture was also taken in Mexico.

This picture was taken on a steep hill called "la cruz", it is called that because at the top of the very large hill is a giant cross with the virgin mary under it.

This picture was taken the day after my birthday in my backyard, apperantly it had either snowed or hailed and left a giant patch of ice in my backyard.
For more click HERE!

While watching the news, i saw a video clip of McCain getting booed at one of his rallies. While many criticize McCain for calling Obama a decent family man and a man that should not be feared, I believe that it was an honorable thing to do. I believe that McCain sees that his numbers are going down, and that he's trying to reassure his supporters that this world isn't doomed when Obama takes office. McCain is trying to be a man, and I can see why his supporters would boo and say that he's accepting defeat, I believe that it was an honorable thing that McCain did, he did not let his supporters sound ignorant and call Obama an arab or a terrorist. He didn't let people insult Obama but he did say that he himself believed that he would be a better president.With all of this, I have found myself to have more respect for McCain and how he's fighting for his place in the white house.

Debates

My debate was the one in Freeport Illinois. Both Lincoln and Douglas were talking about the fugitive slave act, admissions of slave states and interstate slave trade. Lincoln was basically saying that the country needed to come up with a plan that would affect the whole country instead of having pure democracy. Douglas on the other hand believed that popular sovereignty was the only way that the slave states could be treated. He believed that the states should have the power to say whether or not they wanted to have slaves, if they didn't, they could ban it, and if they did want slavery, they could have it.
Lincoln believed that Douglas was just trying to cover up the fact that he supported slave states. He believed that Douglas wanted to hide behind popular sovereignty and wanted to hide the fact that he was pro slavery. Douglas came back by saying that Lincoln wanted political equality for blacks, not just the abolition of slavery.

I believe that now and days debates are much shorter and more for entertainment. They are trying to put as much information as fast as possible. They are a little bit more less formal and they take less thinking. Even though they are more entertaining and take less thinking, I think that I'd rather watch the debates now then the debates back then.

Link



Vs.

Demographics and Politics.

While most of the population is white, Obama has higher numbers than McCain. Obama has 50-52% of the votes while McCain has 44-45% of the votes. A lot of states that would normally vote republican are now voting for Obama. My question is, what brings people to love Obama so much? Is he really just a good speaker or is America wanting a change? Is America sick of having a white president? Are they just sick of the same?
I ask this because Hillary Clinton was a white woman with a lot of experience and a democrat, but she did not get elected. Is America more sexist than racist?
When McCain changed his slogan to "Change" his numbers went up, even though he didn't change any of his ideas.
A question I have about demographics is how do they get all of these numbers? How do they know for sure that all of these numbers are solid? I want to learn more about demographics and I want to learn how to use them and find real averages and numbers.

We Live In a Racist America

Racism and segregation are just as evident today as they were in the 1950's. Although we all try to close our eyes and make it seem as though we do not have racism in the United States, we do. Segregation in schools is not something in the past anymore, segregation is unfortunately still around and is affecting everyone in the country. Even though it has been a long time since slavery and segregation, racism amongst Americans is still present today.

In 1954 there was a little girl who was in the third grade named Linda Brown, she had to go to school four miles away because the "white" school would not let her attend. Even though the "white" school was only a few blocks away they would not let her go there and instead she had to go to a school where the school was a dangerous four miles away. When her father decided that this was unfair, he decided to do something about it. Her father decided to look for help in the NAACP, they were eager to help. They went onto say that because blacks were forced to go to different schools that they were being considered inferior to whites therefore making schools unequal.

Americans are now are being reminded of race everyday because one of the presidential candidates is black. While we try to say that race no longer takes part in our world, it does. In politics and in the world, race is a huge part of the united states. It's as if though people are being racist to themselves.


This poll shows that African Americans and other races believe that there is still racism in the united states today.

In the 1960's George C. Wallace said "Segregation now, segregation forever." but then again, "In this speech, delivered to a largely white student audience at the University of California at Berkeley on October 1966, Carmichael states the Civil Rights Act exists in order to ease the conscience of white America, and that the fight against white supremacy was not yet finished," even then, Carmichael knew that racism was not something that was just going to go away.

As Harriet Breecher Stowe once said, "When whites were captured, taken prisoner by Indians, they were separated from their families, and Indians would keep them, let's say, hoeing corn. Rhetorically, Mrs. Stowe asked, Is escaping a sin? Are the Indians now "your masters"? Are you now "their servants"? duty-bound to stay with them? to not escape? Is that God's will for you? If opportunity to escape occurs, is escaping a sin? or taking Indians' food or supplies for the journey with you? Instinctively, Northerners understood Mrs. Stowe's point: There were no masters, none authorized by Bible or Constitution, and so, no obligation to obey them. But rather, there is a right to escape, to use standard self-defense methods, and, for others to aid you in escaping, a right to rescue." During the Civil War, blacks were slaves and even though the war didn't start because of slavery, slavery was a huge part of the war. After the war slavery became illegal but segregation was still there. In 1954 the law was passed that made segregation illegal.

Even though we try everyday to make racism and segregation go away, it seems as though that day's not coming very soon.

Works Cited:
Cozzens, Lisa. "Early Civil Rights Struggles: Brown v. Board of Education." www.watson.org. http://www.watson.org/~lisa/blackhistory/early-civilrights/brown.html (accessed Oct. 2, 2008).

Heffner, Richard D.. A Documentary History of the United States: (Seventh Revised Edition). New York: Signet, 2002.

Mcconnell, William. Great Speeches in History - The 1960's (hardcover edition) (Great Speeches in History). Farmington Hills, MI: Greenhaven Press, 2002.

"Abolitionists Opposing Slavery and Tobacco." Index - Slavery - Tobacco. http://medicolegal.tripod.com/abolitionists.htm (accessed Oct. 3, 2008).

Judicial Review

In 1908 there was a case between Marbury and Madison. John Adams who was a president that was leaving appointed many people to new positions as to let them still be in office while he was gone. He meant to send out many letters but he didn't get a chance to send them all out by the time Thomas Jefferson took office. When Jefferson noticed what Adams had done, he put an immediate stop to the mailing out of letters. Jefferson told Madison to stop sending out all of the letters. One of the letters happened to belong to William Marbury. Madison was one of Adams' men but since he was the one that didn't send out the letter he was the one that Marbury sued. When the trial was taken to the supreme court Marbury argued that under judicial review he was allowed to get a writ of mandamus. It was granted to him and he got his position.

Background information.

Now the U.S is refusing the bill that would give the government billions of dollars to fix the stock market. There is no apperant reason as to why they are refusing the bill, but it does have something to do with Judicial Review. It seems that many laws have been switched and gives certain powers to different branches of government.

Bailout Plan Rejected- Supporters Scramble

My Bloggie Reflection

Randy's making me answer questions.

Question number 1: What are you most proud of on your blog?

-Personally, I'm really proud of the fact that I have some kind of media on every single blog that I post. I really like the fact that I put my personal opinion in everyone of my blogs. I really enjoy the fact that I find interesting stories that are at least somewhat important to the whole country. Most of my topics have something that can relate to people. Such as my Hurricane Katrina entry and my stock market crash entry.

Question Number 2: What will you improve during future blogs? Why and How?

-I think that I will improve my writing and I will add more on how my blogs connect to the class. I want to make it more obvious as to how my blogs have a direct connection with the class and what the subject is. I want to add more things and make my writing stand out more. I want to add more personal opinion but also back it up with facts more. I need to add more things, better pictures, more videos and an all around better blog. Even though I do believe that I do get good articles to do my blogs on, I think that I can add more things to my blog and make the article even better. I also want to start putting in updates on some of the older information that I put on here.

Question Number 3: How has blogging impacted your understanding of the U.S., the media, current events, and "old news"?

- I think that starting to blog has made me understand whats going on in the country and it has actually helped keep me updated on what's going on in the country today. I learn more and more about what kind of things that the country goes through, what kind of controversy, what kind of gossip and what kind of topics are floating around. I get a much deeper understanding of how important the government really is and for the first time ever, what it really does. I also learned that the media isn't always right and sometimes they put out more of an opinion than a true fact. I've learned that most things that are going on right now in politics goes really far back into old documents such as the constitution and the declaration on independence. I learned that most topics now and days will go back and have the same kind of arguments that they would have 300 years ago.

Ron Paul on the Economy

Did Ron Paul predict what was going to happen?

Did he know that one of the biggest financial crisis in America was coming?

Stock Market Advice

Article Title: Wall Street Worst Loss Since 2001
Author: Stephen Labaton

Update: In the last couple of weeks something is trying to be done about the financial crisis we're in. Henry Paulson has asked for 700 billion dollars to fix the financial crisis we find ourselves in. While the stock market is crashing and the government has officially started to help out and bail out companies, my opinion stays the same. I believe that the government should only step in somewhat. The government should not have a full say in what happens to this countries financial issues, they didn't have a say in where people's stocks went and so they shouldn't do anything about what happens when the stocks go down. People chose to do things the way they did and they should not depend on the government; they should not look to the government as a life vest.

While the economy goes down, Bush tries his best to tell everyone that the decreasing economy at the moment is only temporary. He says, "In the short run, adjustments in the financial markets can be painful — both for the people concerned about their investments, and for the employees of the affected firms. In the long run, I’m confident that our capital markets are flexible and resilient, and can deal with these adjustments.”

My advice to quickly slipping economy is this, let the government interfere slightly. The government should not have full control over the stock market. If the businesses fail, they should not depend on the government to take them out of their problems so quickly. Tax payers should not always have to pay for a business' mistakes. However, if the business effects everyone and needs to be saved, it should be.
Businesses should be conscience enough to know that they can't let out that many loans, but they should have a better understanding of the whole situation, they should know that thousands of people are depending on the fact that they need their business to do well.

“Education is obviously not the issue Senator McCain spends the most time on,”

Title: McCain Calls for Limited U.S. Role in Schools
Author:Sam Dillon

John McCain wants to increase teachers wages if they show that they are doing a good job by showing that their kids have higher test scores. He believes that the federal government should have a limited role in public education. He would make it easier for students who are failing to get tax-payed tutors. He wants to make some changes to the No Child Left Behind act but does not yet want to let out specifics. He would make the government check the tutors to see if they were up to par, and if they are, he would let them directly market to parents.

My question is, if McCain does is not very concerned with public education, and wants the government to have a limited role, why does he get to handle the money? He wants to spend the money differently, for more bonus pays, instead of having more supplies for schools.

Write own gun laws

Original Title: House Committee Bill Would Let D.C. Write Own Gun Laws
By: Mary Beth Sheridan

At the moment, hand held guns and rifles are not allowed in Washington D.C. but that changed when the Supreme Court ruled against it three months ago. They would allow D.C. officials to write their own guns laws within 30 days. Some are afraid that it would increase the risk of another terrorist attack. Most would want the law to change the law so that you can have weapons in your own home, but you can't take them outside. Most say they only want guns anyway to have a way of self defense.

I believe that it would be a huge risk if hand held guns and rifles were allowed in the United States, but I do believe that it is their right to have a gun because it is in the Constitution. I agree that residents should only have the ability to have the guns in their homes and not be allowed to take them outside where they can be a hazard.

It's all about who gets the most votes?

During the republican national convention only one African American is scheduled to give a speech. There are only 36 African American delegates out of the 2,380. Some say that they are frustrated by the lack of diversity at the convention. Other's claim that minorities are against republicans because of what happened with hurricane Katrina and the fact that Obama is running for president as well.

With all of these numbers going around, i feel that it is more of a game then anything else, it's to see who gets more votes and who appeals to what kind of audience. It's no longer if you enjoy what the person's ideas are, it's about what they can say so that they can sway you to vote for them. I feel as if though just because you might be a minority and you may be young, your vote will obviously go for Obama; and if you're older and white, your vote will go for McCain. It's an all out brawl to win the presidential election, but who knows if everyone's promises will be kept.

Article: In A More Diverse America, A Mostly White Convention

Author:Eli Saslow and Robert Barnes

Evacuees safe?

People that were evacuated from New Orleans only days ago were allowed to come back today. The mayor announced that residents were allowed in if they could show identification showing that they were truly were residents of the New Orleans area. They are letting residents come back even though Louisiana officials are saying that it is too soon to return to the area. If residents do choose to come back, they will have very few resources. Some that have already come back are spending hours looking for a working gas station. Even though there are some gas stations open they do not believe that their supplies will last long.

Original Article: Evacuees Return to Power Outages.
Original Article By: Jacqueline L. Salmon and Dana Hedgpeth

Click here for original title.

With all of the problems surrounding the return of evacuees, why risk their safety and let them come back? Most of the city doesn't have electricity which means that they do not have the means to return. They don't have resources, so why take a chance and let the residents return?