Asylum
It's the end of another year which can mean only one thing: lists summarizing the year past are flooding the newstands and everyone has an opinion on something, it's our consitutional right to be able to peaceably assemble and speak our minds; its our constitutional right to print what we wish and publically object to our administration. Believe it or not, few people hold this level of freedom more dear. However as long as we're making lists. I'm going to make one of my own---
Political things I could do without in 2006, an exhaustively researched topic by Jared Cordes:
1. Rolling Stone is a music magazine, it's supposed to editorialize on music and present current events in music. This month they released a list of the mavericks and renegades of 2005, it was prefaced by an article by Michael Moore and virtually everyone on the list had become famous by vocally taking a stand against this current administration. The Rolling Stone needs to stick to music, if I want liberal editorials I'll read the New York Times. I want to open this magazine to find out when the new Foo Fighters CD is coming out.
2. People referring to the President as "Bush," like him or not he has garnered the title and we alll should at least respect the title, it's "President Bush"
3. Staying on the Political front, I'm tired of hearing mothers whine on television about the unjust death of their soldier child in Iraq. I take issue with this for two reasons. First I blame the media for putting this on television because it is mearely banking ratings off the suffering of these poor women and thats wrong. More importantly though the men and women killed in Iraq knew the risk they were taking when they enlisted. Clearly they didnt sign up expecting not to come home from Iraq however it was a very real option. i also do not have any extra sympathy for the parents claiming the kid only signed up for the free education, this is the risk they took by signing up. We have a volunteer military. Why must these parents sully teh legacy of their children by blaming the government for their loss? I can not possibly begin to comprehend the sacrifice made and I have so much respect for the families of the soldiers but a few weeping family members is making our country look ignorant.
4. It bothers me that it has become the hip thing to be liberal. walkign across campus it is clear their are a lot of people who are democrat only because they dont know what it really means to be republican. we are portrayed as insensitive, elitist, self-interested rich folk and thats not fair.
So now to show that I am not the crazy fascist that I think many people think I am going to dictate my personal views in a few sentences on the hot topics of the day:
FEMA: It is not the responsibilty of the federal government to rebuild New Orleans, nor is it FEMAs fault for the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. In times of disaster, first response has to be local. It is the burden of the Cities to coordinate their rescue teams, only after this should the federal government be looked upon to provide relief aid. I agree that FEMA dropped the ball, however far too much is expected of government intervention.
Military Conflict in Iraq: since our invasion of Iraq, Sudan has expelled terrorist training camps and organizations that flooded the Sudanese streets, Libya has renounced its nuclear weapons program, and Iran has most certainly taken notice of our intentions. It is unfortunate that the WMDs have not been recovered as expected but it is important for people to realize that the intelligence we based this upon was not entirely our own, the intelligence gathered was corraborated by a number of countries (including, England, Germany, Isreal, and Russia). Furthermore if anyone is still using the argument that we are in Iraq because we want their oil than you couldnt be anymore offbase. The amount of money that we have spent on the military actions in Iraq and Afghanistan could have bought us more oil than we'd ever know what to do with. Buying oil would have been exponentially cheaper than this.
Welfare: is bullshit. Their are definitley a number of people in America that sincerely need welfare and unemployment and I completely sympathize with them and I'm not advocating the abolishment of the programs by any means. However a massive overhaul is needed. With the current state of welfare many people have no incentive to work because they could get a job and get paid virtually the same that they get paid now not to work. Children are being raised in an environment were it is socially acceptable to grow up and expect to be on welfare. I'm tired of our families being required to pay for the sloth that plagues our country
Death Penalty: is a concept I struggle with. On paper I'm completley against it. There is no empirical evidence that shows that capital punishment effectively dissuades potential criminals from committing capital crimes. The Judicial system is intended to be a rehabilitation stint for criminals and its hard to rehab when you're dead. However when I hear about people commiting these capricious crimes I have a hard time not calling for their heads, but that goes back to revenge which we cant in good faith endorse. Luckily many countries agree wtih us on the death penalty: Iran, North Korea, China, Sudan, Yemen....
meh thats enough for now
let the fire fight begin
Political things I could do without in 2006, an exhaustively researched topic by Jared Cordes:
1. Rolling Stone is a music magazine, it's supposed to editorialize on music and present current events in music. This month they released a list of the mavericks and renegades of 2005, it was prefaced by an article by Michael Moore and virtually everyone on the list had become famous by vocally taking a stand against this current administration. The Rolling Stone needs to stick to music, if I want liberal editorials I'll read the New York Times. I want to open this magazine to find out when the new Foo Fighters CD is coming out.
2. People referring to the President as "Bush," like him or not he has garnered the title and we alll should at least respect the title, it's "President Bush"
3. Staying on the Political front, I'm tired of hearing mothers whine on television about the unjust death of their soldier child in Iraq. I take issue with this for two reasons. First I blame the media for putting this on television because it is mearely banking ratings off the suffering of these poor women and thats wrong. More importantly though the men and women killed in Iraq knew the risk they were taking when they enlisted. Clearly they didnt sign up expecting not to come home from Iraq however it was a very real option. i also do not have any extra sympathy for the parents claiming the kid only signed up for the free education, this is the risk they took by signing up. We have a volunteer military. Why must these parents sully teh legacy of their children by blaming the government for their loss? I can not possibly begin to comprehend the sacrifice made and I have so much respect for the families of the soldiers but a few weeping family members is making our country look ignorant.
4. It bothers me that it has become the hip thing to be liberal. walkign across campus it is clear their are a lot of people who are democrat only because they dont know what it really means to be republican. we are portrayed as insensitive, elitist, self-interested rich folk and thats not fair.
So now to show that I am not the crazy fascist that I think many people think I am going to dictate my personal views in a few sentences on the hot topics of the day:
FEMA: It is not the responsibilty of the federal government to rebuild New Orleans, nor is it FEMAs fault for the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. In times of disaster, first response has to be local. It is the burden of the Cities to coordinate their rescue teams, only after this should the federal government be looked upon to provide relief aid. I agree that FEMA dropped the ball, however far too much is expected of government intervention.
Military Conflict in Iraq: since our invasion of Iraq, Sudan has expelled terrorist training camps and organizations that flooded the Sudanese streets, Libya has renounced its nuclear weapons program, and Iran has most certainly taken notice of our intentions. It is unfortunate that the WMDs have not been recovered as expected but it is important for people to realize that the intelligence we based this upon was not entirely our own, the intelligence gathered was corraborated by a number of countries (including, England, Germany, Isreal, and Russia). Furthermore if anyone is still using the argument that we are in Iraq because we want their oil than you couldnt be anymore offbase. The amount of money that we have spent on the military actions in Iraq and Afghanistan could have bought us more oil than we'd ever know what to do with. Buying oil would have been exponentially cheaper than this.
Welfare: is bullshit. Their are definitley a number of people in America that sincerely need welfare and unemployment and I completely sympathize with them and I'm not advocating the abolishment of the programs by any means. However a massive overhaul is needed. With the current state of welfare many people have no incentive to work because they could get a job and get paid virtually the same that they get paid now not to work. Children are being raised in an environment were it is socially acceptable to grow up and expect to be on welfare. I'm tired of our families being required to pay for the sloth that plagues our country
Death Penalty: is a concept I struggle with. On paper I'm completley against it. There is no empirical evidence that shows that capital punishment effectively dissuades potential criminals from committing capital crimes. The Judicial system is intended to be a rehabilitation stint for criminals and its hard to rehab when you're dead. However when I hear about people commiting these capricious crimes I have a hard time not calling for their heads, but that goes back to revenge which we cant in good faith endorse. Luckily many countries agree wtih us on the death penalty: Iran, North Korea, China, Sudan, Yemen....
meh thats enough for now
let the fire fight begin