American Politics and Other Such Nonsense

Commentary on Innocent, but Found Guilty

2008-12-11T16:51:00.000-08:00

My commentary is on the Daily's blog post Innocent, but Found Guilty. I agree with you, it should be a lot harder for innocent people to be convicted of life ending crimes. I think it would be better for us to miss some criminals rather than become the very ones unjustly stealing the lives of innocent people. If you remember the Salem witch trials, a lot of innocent people were killed and imprisoned on the testimony of some weak minded brats. I think beyond the shadow of doubt should mean more than just whether or not you think it's likely the person is guilty. We need real evidence and if we don't have it we should let the accused go until we do.

American Prisons on the Rise

2008-11-26T15:05:00.000-08:00

The prison system in this country needs reform. According to recent studies we currently have less than 5% of the world’s population, and have around 25% of the world’s incarcerated prisoners. This is a staggering number, and shows an inherent flaw in our correctional system: In 2001, almost 6 million people were receiving punitive recourse from the U.S. government correctional system at the years end. From 1973 to 2000 the rate of incarceration quadrupled.

Prisons are not fixing the problem of chronic law breakers. Most ex-prisoners return to a life of crime and eventually prison. This leads to over crowded prisons that do little more than reinforce criminal behavioral patterns. Ultimately this problem is a reflection of cultural changes taking place in the U.S. Children are being ever more exposed to violence and pornography. Narcissism and materialism are on the rise and people are losing hope of achieving success. With out hope there's not much reason to worry about anything beyond present consequences.

I think that another problem is that most prisons are privatized. This basically means that they are a business. If they do not “correct” the issues in prisoners minds, then business is good. There is no motivation for the private sector to lower our crime rates; but plenty of reasons to maintain a steady influx of prisoners. Federal penitentiaries have shown a much lower rate of returning inmates than privatized.

As it stands now, what we are doing is not working. I think we should look into other means of correction, with empirical evidence and scientific study to back that choice of correction.

Blog stage 6 Obama 2008 Review

2008-11-14T11:31:00.000-08:00

I am reviewing A B C GO's post titled Obama 2008 . I completely agree with your
statement that Obama took the high road in his campaigning. Although there may have been some attack adds that I didn't see, In his speeches he kept it clean. We can't say that for the other team. I also agree the calling him a socialist is an ignorant cheap shot that has no real bearing. Are CEO's going to stop working because the taxes they are supposed to pay have increased? It's funny how people can accuse Obama of not being a Christian and at the same time condemn him for going to a radical protestant church. Although I agree with you, It doesn't matter either way because what some one claims there religious views to be actually has very little tangible effect on there actions. Also funny is calling Obama an elitist when he has come from moderate means. Although if you consider his intelligence he certainly is elite in that manner. Although you assert that you are a foreigner, your zeal for American dreams is inspirational and I would be proud to call some one like you an American.

What are taxes good for?

2008-10-31T14:57:00.000-07:00

I believe that our government has gotten too big to be efficient. The money that is collected in taxes and then spent on pork barrel projects "projects for us as citizens supposedly", would have been better simply left in our pockets. The basic process of collecting taxes is in it self inefficient. Not to mention that the countless hands it must pass through before finally returning to benefit us the taxpayers. Yes, we do need roads and bridges but do we need state funded malls? There are things we can all agree that we need the government for. Such as protection ,but do we really need a bridge to nowhere? We need education for ourselves and our children as well as affordable medical services, but should we be paying 8 times the going rate for prescription medications.

The only good I can imagine coming from high taxes is a socialist goal. Closing the gaps between peoples income levels. Since the extremely rich would rather get extremely richer rather than pay there employees better. We do need something to step in and force them to continue to pass the wealth along. If you consider how a monopoly works it is quite similar to the problem with ever increasing polarization of wealth. Because Walmart has Billions of dollars they can charge very cheap rates for there products. Because they have billions of dollars they can hang around until they drive other smaller businesses out of business. After they have succeeded in defeating the competition they can then raise prices because there is no competition left. As well they can pay very low wages because the only alternative for many people is being unemployed. So now that wall mart has raised prices you would think they would pay there employees more but instead, the people at the top pocket most of the benefit and an ever decreasing percentage is passed down the chain. Also as more profit is made inflation kicks in and the smaller growth percentage of the lower ranks is even further reduced.

If you look at the industrial revolution and the use of children in factory work you will see a startling example of the effect of greed in economics. Because children could be paid very little and could operate machinery as well as adults, the factory owners could pay adults very little as well as children. Because factories produced goods much more cheaply and quickly. The people who previously made goods by hand were put out of business. Now they half to work in a factory ran by a greedy rich person and there children are losing fingers in the machinery. Because of the advent of technology it is no longer in most cases, cost efficient to make things by hand. The problem is that factories require very few owners and a lot of workers. If the owners can pay the workers very little than the benefit of the factory only serves the owner.

With all of our technological advances we can produce staggering amounts of goods more cheaply and efficiently than ever before. Is it really right for a hand full of rich people to reap the rewards while the rest of our nation struggles to get by. It's a very clever form of coerced slavery if you ask me. While there is definitely many degrees of opportunity here in America the fact is, there are only so many positions to be filled. I believe it's a pyramid shaped economy with the few wealthiest at the top and the many poor at the bottom. While we are such a rich nation that even our poor are fat, the belief that we can all be rich if we work for it is a fallacy. It simply isn't true especially considering that those with money will pay those who work for them as little as they can get away with regardless of the profit made by the business.
If extremely wealthy people paying higher taxes is socialism than I'm a socialist.

Trickle What ?

2008-10-17T17:51:00.000-07:00

The commentary I'm critiquing is titled "Bush Proves Trickle Down Doesn't Work As Advertised". It was posted on the 28 of June in 2006. The Author is known only as Bonddad and has posted countless stories on the Daily KOS website. There is also a link to Bonddad's own blogroll on the Daily KOS website. I believe the audience that was intended to read this commentary is mostly politically left leaning and independent minded people, as well as any random web surfer who is interested in understanding why this economic theory doesn't work. In the commentary the writer explains that trickle down economics is the theory that high taxes will prevent a wealthy person from spending and investing there money. The Theory asserts that if we lower the taxes of the rich they will spend more of there money. There buy employing the poor people of the country who eventually benefit from the same tax cut that was given to the rich people.

The writer asserts that the Republican economic policies have demonstrated the fallacy of this theory. He goes on to point out the decline in average hourly wages for production level workers from 2001 to 2006. The lack of a statistically meaningfull rise in total domestic investment in the US. The lack of job growth and GDP Growth. He also lists many facts and figures supporting his claims.

Some of the references he uses are the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Census Bureau, the Federal Reserve, the Federal Reserve's Survey of Consumer Finances for 1998 and 2001, the National Bureau of Economic Research. He assures us that no matter how you measure it the facts will tell you that the total GDP growth in a supply-side economic year is comparable to non supply side growth. I agree with his statements and appreciate his use of facts to support his claim. What I don't like about his commentary is his lack of clarity in explaining the issue. He doesn't mention the ever widening disparity between the very rich and everyone else.
He also forgot to inform us that the application of the theory is termed supply side economics. He didn't tell us anything about the history of the theory or how it came about. He didn't even try to explain why the theory is itself not practical.
For a more in depth look at the history, application and effect of the Supply Side economic model click here.

Main Streets Blind Faith, Article Critique!

2008-10-02T09:59:00.000-07:00

The Article I'm critiquing is titled "Main Street's Blind faith", and it was posted in USA Today's columnists' opinions section on the USA Today website. The Author is Ted C. Fishman. He has written numerous articles for USA Today as well as The New York Times Magazine, Money, Harper’s, Worth, Esquire, GQ, and the Chicago magazine. He also has a book for sale entitled "China Inc." that explains the implications of China's growing economic prowess.
I believe the author of the article I'm critiquing intended his audience to be mostly middle class Americans, both male and female. Common working men and women who pay taxes. In his article he claims that our present financial crisis is the product of our irresponsible elite. He contends that the root of our financial problem stems from a lack of true moral ethics in our elitist financial sectors of business and government as well as our higher education centers who train them. The appeal to taxpayers is obvious. We are stuck with this staggering bill while the people responsible for it are still reaping millions. A popular phrase in the media is that we are privatizing gains while publicizing losses. He goes on to say that wall streets failure is ours as well. That our own lack of self control and intelligent investing is as much the cause of our present problems as the people who are ripping us off up stream. The problem it seems is a moral decay that manifests itself in our culture through frivolous self interest and Social Darwinism. He proposes that our government has financially over extended itself already and that digging a deeper hole is not the answer to our credit problems. He has linked to his article a number of other articles which expound and support his argument. There is very little in the way of actual hard evidence connected to his article but his logic is solid and concise. While he is obviously against it, he acknowledges that we are going to do this bail out. As bad as it is for us the average American taxpayer, were going to further over extend our nations debt. It would seem that our own instincts of self preservation will take precedence over the quality of life of our children.

McCain's campaign is like a SNL routine!

2008-09-18T18:03:00.000-07:00

I think you should read this article because it's thoroughly entertaining! The truth is after seeing Obama and Hillary on the tube I was sure that I would never support either of them in any sort of way. They, As far as I could tell must have been some kind of actors or puppets. All I can say is that the propaganda has gotten to me, or am I better informed? It's hard to tell, maby both. I have sifted through countless blogs and articles seeking the truth about our presidential candidates. It's so hard to discern truth in today's media that you have to take in almost everything you read about politics with a grain of salt. My first impression was that McCain would be the lesser of the three evils, but now I'm beginning to lean towards Obama. Truth be told all I can do is speculate and in the end I'll never know if I was ever right. The essence of the article I chose is Obama humorously bashing McCain with some facts thrown in here and there. There are some hilarious videos attached to this article as well.

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/9/18/114240/551/383/602716