President Barack Obama’s Tour

President Barack Obama leaves for India on a ten-day tour ending in South Korea, costing around $200 million dollars a day. Obama is bringing approximately 3,000 people with him. A total of 40 jetliners will take Obama, his family, friends and staff. They’ve rented the entire Taj Mahal Palace and Tower Hotel, all 570 rooms. Obama is also brining all his teleprompters.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Obama is going for a need of defense contracts for billions of dollars, which will play well in the United States. With all this money being spent, I still think he’s going for the right reason. Obama is trying to help our country in war and trying to make our country a safer place to live. He is trying to get military supplies and equipment for our American Soldiers, so it will help them in succeeding in the war. President Obama is going with a serious approach and is trying to better the country. I think most people are looking at this as an unnecessary trip because of the exuberant cost, rather than the main cause. Everyone should look at the big picture. Like Barack Obama said himself, “Americans, still believe in an America where anything's possible - they just don't think their leaders do.”

-Justin

Hindu’s Upset over Newsweek’s Picture of Obama as Shiva

Last week the Newsweek magazine published a picture of Obama as the Hindu god Shiva, carrying a pile of policies and standing on one leg. The article that went with the picture was about “Why the Modern Presidency May be too Much for One Person to Handle.” The president of the Universal Society of Hinduism in Nevada, Rajan Zed, and many other important US Indian-American organizations were upset over the picture.

To comment on Newsweek’s article and picture, I think that it was very stupid of Newsweek to publish a picture of Obama as Shiva. They should have anticipated that they would get a lot of comments from critics, upset over them using the Indian god Shiva as a depiction of Obama. There will always be controversy if magazines, such as Newsweek, associate religion and politics. That is why magazines should not try to use such images for their article.

-Gabby

Politics: Where Everything Gets Blown Out of Proportions

In politics, seemingly little things can get a lot of publicity. Much like celebrities in movies, television shows, or famous musicians, everything that someone, a president or anyone of importance, does is monitored, analyzed, put forth for the average citizen to judge. And judge we do, whether our conclusions come from biased or unbiased sources.

For instance, in 1979, President Jimmy Carter went fishing and a rabbit swam up to his boat. Not wanting the rabbit to get to him, he splashed the rabbit with his paddle, causing the rabbit to swim away and get out of the pond. That innocent encounter turned into a legend of President Carter being attacked by a killer rabbit. And this was all because a reporter heard this story and found it worthy enough for embellishment and attention.

But the point is, there was never a “killer” rabbit, and attacking would be an exaggeration of what really happened. And this happens a lot, things being blown out of proportions for the public to see. But do people realize that? If we all realize what is happening, why can’t we make it stop and get the truth? It makes one think, what is different from what we think we know?

-Sofia

Obama Re-Election

It may come as a big surprise to many based on the recent elections in the House of Representatives and the large unemployment rate, but President Barack Obama is likely to win the 2012 presidential election. According to Ray Fair, an economist at Yale University, if the American economy continues to improve through 2012, President Obama will win by a landslide. Mr. Fair has created a model that shows the effects that the economy can have on a Presidential election. It has been his experience that if the economy is improving in the election year, the President will often get re-elected.

I agree with Mr. Fair that the economy plays a major role in the election of a President. I think that most will want to re-elect a President if they see that he is doing something right economically. I also think that it is a little too early to judge how well the economy is doing. The country still has almost a ten percent unemployment rate and I don’t think that number will just change overnight. If Obama is to be re-elected, I think that he will have to find some more Americans jobs.

-Max

TSA’s Full Body Scanners Causing an Uproar

Going through security at airports may be an even bigger hassle this Thanksgiving. A Virginian man, Brian Sodergren, started a website called optout.com. It has gained many followers and sparked an uprising of other groups that are to boycott full body scans at airports on one of the busiest days for travel, the day before Thanksgiving.

CNN stated that the secretary of state, Hillary Clinton and president Obama agree with the boycotters in that it is an invasion of privacy. Wewontfly.com is another website group that encourages people to “fly with dignity” and gives a list of ways people can “raise hell”. A claim stated on the website is that the radiation doses are too high and can cause damage to the eyes, but Richard Morin, a radiologist specialist insists that the radiation levels are too insignificant to do any harm.

TSA has stated that though they empathize with the public’s discomfort, it is necessary that people are thoroughly checked for weaponry or explosives. TSA does not plan to change their current policies and continues to reassure the public that the screenings are for the safety of passengers.

-Kacy

Abortion

 There are approximately 3,700 abortions daily in the United States. With this being said, many people have diverse views on this subject. Like Barack Obama, I'm pro-choice, meaning I think women should have their own right to have an abortion or not. You never know what the circumstances were, and how they got pregnant. For instance, a woman could have been sexually assaulted and got pregnant. It's a highly viewed topic in politics and is extremely important.

The fetus may be alive, but so are eggs and sperm. The fetus is a potential human being, not an actual one. It's my belief like many others, that in the early stages of pregnancy the fetus is not a viable living thing, but it is rather a group of tissues. We celebrate birthdays because it's the day of a child's birth, however, we don't celebrate the day of conception. I strongly believe that you are not terminating the life of a human being when you have an abortion during the early stages of pregnancy.

Additionally, it's extraordinarily important that every woman has the right to choose. It would be unfair to restrict a woman's choice by prohibiting abortion. In my opinion, I believe it's every woman's fundamental right to make a decision regarding her body. Reproductive freedom is a basic right for all women in our society. 

-Justin

Banning guns may create more crime

Some elected politicians such as Harry Reid, Chuck Schumer, and president Obama want to ban guns, but the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution states “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed”.  Our nation is based on our Constitution and the rules that our forefathers made, therefore, taking away our right to bear arms would be unconstitutional and un-American.

If guns were banned, they would wind up in the hands of the wrong people through a black market.  In other countries, such as the United Kingdom, they have been banned from the general public, however they remain common among criminals.  Since the United Kingdom banned handguns in 1997, gun crime has nearly doubled.

The Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act of 1996 instituted federal background checks to ensure that no one was able to bypass any existing gun law.  It is it illegal for any person who is the subject of a restraining order or been convicted of a domestic violence misdemeanor to possess a gun so performing these types of checks prevents people from easily buying guns if they fall under either category.

-Kacy

Marijuana

In California, a great debate rages.  Should marijuana be legalized or should the current system of illegal pot farms be kept.  The latest vote of Proposition 19, as it is called, showed that fifty-four percent of California’s population is still against having marijuana out on the streets.  The majority of these opposing votes come from the older members of the state along with people that know the harmful affects of the drug.  Most legalization supporters agree that in order to win, they need more money and a more detailed message.  The next vote on Proposition 19 will be in 2012.

I think that legalizing marijuana would be a positive move for the state of California.  There are so many illegal marijuana farms anyway that making it legal would improve the lives of many of these farmers and cut back on police spending.  It would also stimulate the economy because the drugs could be sold and distributed legally instead of under the table where it does not help the economy at all.  I think that the people who are concerned about the dangers of the drug should take a look around at other things being sold in American stores.  The best example of this is any tobacco products.  These are probably just as harmful as marijuana.

The legalization of marijuana has many positive aspects.  These positive aspects outweigh the negative things.  It would be a good move for the people of California. 

-Max

Minimum Retirement Age to Rise?

This week there is a new debate over raising the social security retirement age. Americans life expectancies are growing longer, which means that they are spending more time in retirement than they were in the 1940’s. Senior research associate Melissa Favreault and senior fellow Richard Johnson’s from Urban Institute found that for seniors to spend the same amount of time in retirement as they did in the 1940’s, the retirement age would have to be around 73. Currently, the retirement age is 66, but it is planned to increase the age to 67 by 2022. This means the current generation of kids will have another year to wait until they could retire with social security payment. 

But, raising the retirement age would save money, money that this country needs. If the retirement age rises to 67, social security would save almost 30% of funds. But even so, some still disagree with the idea. Some argue that if we raise the retirement age, then some seniors will get hurt. Others say that the seniors can work office jobs, or other jobs that don’t require physical labor.

-Gabby

H.O.P.E. Highschooler opposed to political extremism

While in the car today, my family and I passed by a car with a lot of bumper stickers. Of course, quite a few were related to politics and the difference between liberals and conservatives. Many people view this topic as a black and white type of thing. But I think our country needs to start working in the gray side.

Plenty of individuals think of liberalism and conservatism in the blank/white opposite-ends-in-the-spectrum viewpoint. If you have ideas pertaining to one side, you don’t have ideas pertaining to the other.

To be more specific, one common idea is that pro-choice and anti-abortion are opposites. But I disagree; I feel that every women, every couple, every family, should have the option to use abortion or not. But personally, I would never do such a thing to a possible child, even if he/she were to be an “accident.”

But as everyone knows, there is always a gray area to any topic. For example, babies who aren't born in a hospital purposly would be considered hippie or liberal in this time era. However, in relation to history, it doesn’t make sense. Look at Elizabethan, Victorian, hunter-and-gather, almost any time except for the recent past, and what would you find? The recent past and present are a small blip on the timeline of all history too. How could you call these old traditions ‘new age’?

Therefore, for this topic there should be a gray area. If we try to separate ourselves into little boxes of liberal and conservative, what will we accomplish? I think we should let the gray area in to create less of a us versus you society and help each other to learn how to coexist.

-Sofia