"The Unwanted"

            I agree with Ardiana's blog "The Unwanted", if a person is convicted for killing another person then why don’t they convict all the women that are killing their unborn babies.  A baby has no fault in the decision that their parents take, so why are they the ones being punished. Of course just like all the cases, there are some circumstances that might lead to pregnancy like rape. That’s one of the only times when a woman should have a right to choose, continuing with the pregnancy or to abort. In my opinion they should pass a law making abortion illegal.

Incarceration for the Innocents

Incarceration for the Innocents

            According to reason, United States is one of the countries that has one of the highest incarceration rates in the world. There are 1,524,513 prisoners in state and federal prisons. The International Centre for Prison studies calculated that U.S. has an incarceration rate of 743 per 100,000 people. Compared with other countries, our rate for incarceration is at least double. The U.S.  Incarceration rates have increased in the last three decades, why? It’s all due to the recent policies that have been passed that determines who goes to prison and how much time he does. Does that mean that were surrounded by criminals, no it only means that people are being thrown in jail for misdemeanors.

            I think that, that number is way to high for a great country that we are. Personally, I think that only dangerous criminals and people that endangering people’s lives should be in jail serving time. We are in a period of time that you can be incarcerated for a simple think like possession of drugs like weed in small amounts. According to the CEPR (Center of Economic and Policy Research), nonviolent offenders make up more than 60% of the prison and jail population. Nonviolent drug offenders now account for about one-fourth of all inmates. In other words, many innocent people that were found guilty for non-dangerous things are being placed in jail. There have been some circumstances that people that committed a more serious crime spent less time in prison than someone that was in for a misdemeanor.

            I think that there are many consequences of this wrongdoing. The first thing that comes to my mind is family. All those people that are placed in prison are being separated from their families. There are a lot of kids that are being left without a dad or mom; which really has an emotional effect on them. There is a big financial benefit of not incarcerating people for nonviolent crimes. Right now the cost for correctional spending is over $50 billion a year. With that money that we could save, we could improve and fund other aspects like education. For me, incarceration for nonviolent crimes seems like a joke.

The American Dream

I agree completely with Estefany’s article concerning “The American Dream” for many immigrants. Even though I was fortunate enough to be born in this country not every one has that luck, like my family. Even though I didn’t struggle personally, I did see some consequences the “American Dream” had. My family spent a lot of years not being able to visit their loved ones, which for them was a big burden. My dad worked two jobs earning minimum wage in order for us to live a better life than we would in Mexico. Having a better life is one of the main reasons a lot of people, not just from Mexico, decide to migrate to an unknown land hoping for the best. Just like Estefany said in her article, immigrants don’t come and “steal” the jobs away. Rather they are taking the jobs that the citizens don’t want or refuse to take, like jobs in agriculture and other hard-labor jobs. From the beginning of this country’s history, the only thing that immigrants want is a better life for themselves and their families. Hopefully one day not far from today, Congress passes an immigration law that helps many immigrants fulfill their dream

Is It Really Helping or Hurting Us?

Is it really helping or hurting us?

There have been a lot of recent controversies that make the public wonder about the true purpose of the NSA. When the first controversy emerged, people were angered with the idea of being monitored. Many people including myself don’t like the idea of being spied on even if we have nothing to hide. The government said that it is only used to prevent any more attacks by terrorists and to ensure protection. In my opinion by making it public, terrorists are going to look for a new way of communication since phones are being used to track a possible attack. But a recent controversy revealed that the U.S. was spying on its own allies in Europe. Rather than keeping an eye out for terrorism, they are focused on its own allies. The espionage has gone too far and we might be endangering our relationship with our allies. Now the president and others in the government claim that they were unaware of such thing. You have to wonder is all of this is true or they are trying to cover themselves up. One question that came to my mind was which was worse, a President knowing about espionage or a President that has no clue what is happening inside his own government. I think that some espionage is good to keep the citizens protected from an attack but it should have a limit. They can’t go all around the world spying on what people are doing just because the technology is available. According to the Secretary of State, John Kerry, thanks to the NSA they “have actually prevented airplanes from going down, buildings from being blown up, and people from being assassinated because we've been able to learn ahead of time of the plans."

Avoid Debt By Not Paying Social Security

John Aravosis, from AmericaBlog, critiqued the way some republicans think that it’s easy to get rid of the debt. According to republicans there was no terrible consequence if they didn’t raise the debt ceiling. One republican in general, George Will, actually thought that there was enough revenue coming in that is needed to pay the debt. Except it’s all going to certain programs that are consuming a lot of money like social security. George states that “default is a choice” since we could pay off the debt if we reduce/eliminate other expenditures. He believes that we should first pay off the debt and then worry about home problems.

John believes that none of the people receiving social security should get deprived from those benefits. Most of the elderly are depending on social security to have a decent life. And if their benefits are removed to pay off the debt, those people are going to have a miserable life or even worse death. John states “America has ten times the money it needs to pay of its debt. All it has to do is kill off its citizens”.

I agree with John because if it were so easy to pay off the debt we would not be in this situation right now. Also the elderly people receiving social security are only being compensated for all those years that they were working. Plus they are only complaining when it comes to paying back to those people and not when they are paying into the system.

Hands Off Our Cellphones

Los Angeles Times published an article on police searching through people’s phones. Once a person has been placed under arrest, police officers are allowed to confiscate and search the person’s phone. Just like The Times Editorial Board, many people think that officers need a warrant to go through the phone just like they need one to go into your house. They also believe that courts should not take that kind of information into consideration since certain rules were created way before the digital era that we are currently in. There have been two separate cases in which people were convicted for the information found in their phones. David Riley was pulled over just for expired tags, then guns were found when they impounded his car for having a suspended drivers license. As they arrested him, his phone was confiscated and searched to find a video/pictures of him being involved in a shooting. The whole purpose of the searches was to protect the officers from any harmful situations in which the suspect might have a weapon on him. Now with smartphones holding more valuable information about the certain person/suspect it could free or convict them. It could lead to the capture of someone who could be a threat to the lives of citizens but it can also invade the privacy of many innocent people. In my opinion phone searches should only be done when they know for a fact that that person was involved in a crime. If they aren’t sure about a person then they need a warrant to go through that certain person’s phone. No one wants other people to go through their personal information because they were just stopped for a misdemeanor. 
Even though the author of the article does not want police officers going through the cell phones, he contradicts himself and agrees that sometimes it is necessary. At the beginning he starts by stating that times have changed and so have the technology. The new technology that we have now a days contain a lot of personal information that only the owner has the  right to. But then he argues that if the suspect is guilty, he might go and delete information that could implicate him of a crime. The conclusion leaves the reader with an idea that officers are only doing it to place criminals in prison even though it's also invading the privacy of the innocent people.

Shooting Reopens Stalled Debate

Fox News published an article about the recent shooting in Washington’s naval base. After the shooting of 20 children, another shooting now in a Washington Navy base happened leaving 13 navy civilians dead. Aaron Alexis had a record for being mentally ill. There had been some records where he said to be hearing voices, and police records of him arguing with people to an extreme where he started shooting. This recent case is probably going to put some restrictions on who can buy guns/weapons. There were a lot of promises after the shooting in the school of Connecticut but most of those laws/bills were never passed. There has been a slight change on the overall background checks but not for the mentally ill. A recent bill was just defeated in congress where they wanted to expand the background checks on people.  The state legislatures have been more successful than the federal govt. in passing mental health laws. This can be important because the more you know about a certain individual, the safer the community can be.