Switching Focus

Iraq! It seems to be the war that most people think about these days. What about Afghanistan, did we forget about that country? A fair amount of US troops are stationed in Afghanistan trying to combat Al Qaida and Osama Bin Laden. Now Obama is shedding more light on the Afghanistan affairs and is focusing less on the Iraq War. Is this the right move? Well I believe we did a fair job in helping Iraq establish itself better than when ruled by Saddam. I believe, though, that going to Iraq before finishing the job in Afghanistan was a big and fatal mistake. We nearly had Bin Laden and the Taliban. Our forces were closing in and, according to a show on the history channel, they interviewed a soldier who nearly had him in his sights. But our Government hesitated due to the Iraq issue and speculation of weapons of mass destruction and thus they got away. We never did find WMD, but at least we made Iraq a more established and a safer country. Now with most of that war behind us it's time to focus on the main task at hand; catching a man and his men who we almost certainly know were behind the 9/11 attack. So I think that finishing what we started in afghan is the right thing to do, it's just that we've should have done in sooner.

Are Americans the only ones with voices?

Rich Lott, a republican candidate running for Congress, is being accused of being a Nazi enthusiast. He was questioned for doing a WWII re-enactment of German soldiers. He was asked if he believes in Nazi ideology. He denied. Instead, he replied that he is presenting an unbiased view point that educates people on the life of German soldiers during WWII. The German point of view is just as important as that of an American’s.

I have a large German ancestral background and, just as well, I am an American. I do condone what the Nazi party did, but I don’t think that all Germans are in the wrong. When Germany was falling after WWI, the German citizens needed a leader. In an unfortunate turn of events, Hitler took the helm and promised to guide the Germans. The people of Germany were in desperate times and Hitler took advantage of that. It may be hard to forgive the German soldiers of what they did. But, in desperate times, when you have a family to care for, what else is a man to do? Sure, the German soldiers made mistakes when they joined the ranks of the Nazi party, but they have a voice and it can justify their reasoning for doing so.  What does this have to do with Lott? He was sticking up for the voice of our past enemies as he would for the voices of his own people. If an American cannot understand that a simple German soldier has a voice too, then their sheer ignorance shows that they don’t value their own rights.

Health Care (Issue #1)

One of the United States' biggest of problems is its health care system. There are millions of Americans who are uninsured, because it is unaffordable. Health care is especially expensive because of the various competing private insurance companies that offer health care plans to employers. This is to be expected, being the United States is a capitalist society. It is because of this issue of affordabilty employers often switch to cheaper managed care, such as PPOs and less reliable HMOs.  To solve the issue of unaffordable health care, one possible idea is Universal Health Care. The Federal Government would be the single purchaser of health care, elimating competition between insurance companies, but creating affordable health care for everyone. The opposition to this view is that health care would become poor because competition is what makes health care better. Medical doctors would receive the same amount of pay no matter how skillful they were because they would all be working for the same insurance company.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Managed_health_care
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMO

One major inevitablity with our capitalist society is that fact that there will always be a separation of classes, upper, middle and lower. There are jobs to fit each category and that must be filled, such as janitors and Wal-Mart employees. For this reason, there are going to be some members of society who cannot make enough money to afford health care. By instilling Universal Health Care, only this one problem would be fixed, but others would come. For example, the members of the upper and middle classes, who probably have reliable health care already, would likely receive the same health care as members of the lower class. If you could afford great health care, why should you have to settle for less? The Federal Government would purchase equal health care for all people, ridding away any competition between insurance providers that give the incentive to medical doctors to take care of a person that is sick. Hence, Universal Health Care would be poor health care. Also, doctors are of the highest paid professionals in the world, with Universal Health Care, they would begin to earn less and less money until an evident downward trend was set into motion, discouraging the recruitment of new medical doctors. Even Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa says, "Doctors are ready to close their doors because of high malpractice insurance costs and low government remimbursement rates." Where would our health care be without medical doctors? Nowhere. We wouldn't have it at all.

http://healthpolicyandreform.nejm.org/?p=2366


Issue #2: http://katieireneiverson.blogspot.com/
Issue #3: http://noelleushistory.blogspot.com/

Obama accepts his mistakes for Democrats booted out of office.

The Wednesday after mid-term elections, Obama pins blame on the economy, which is still suffering, as the reason for the numerous house seats lost by the Democrats. He says: "I've got to take direct responsibility for the fact that we have not made as much progress as we need to make." Currently, the unemployment rate is supposedly 5% and Obama hopes that, even though he believes his policies haven't done enough, this will inspire Americans to have confidence in his policies.
What does a President do when his buddies lose their seats in office? He whines about it. The answer to fix this country's economy is to man up and do something about it. Perhaps Obama shouldn't spend so much money on health care. If America wants to pull the economy together, governement spending should be reduced. The more inflation that the American dollar gets, the worse the economy gets. If health care is a major component of Obama's agenda, he needs to change it. The economy is more important now.

U.S. Economy still has Rocky Bottom Fever

According to the media, the U.S., supposedly, is out of the recession. This is mostly untrue as there are still many states facing adversity. As elections are approaching tomorrow, the weak U.S. economy is, quite possibly, the biggest issue. In an NBC/WSJ poll, 60 percent of voters believed that the economy is heading in the wrong direction due to a rise in unemployment and home foreclosures as well as workers receiving inert wages. Of the people in this poll, 70 percent they would like to see Republicans take control of the office.

Everyone knows that the media has a tendency to sugarcoat the truth and feed it to the public. When I digest the phrase, "the U.S. is out of the Recession!", I get the notion to regurgitate that information for feeling that the media is trying to avert my attention from what is really going on. Ever since President Obama and the democrats took the majority of the White House, the direction of the U.S. economy has plummeted. I can't even think of one good decision that has been made since. Do I hope that republicans take office? I do, because I think that the democrats had their turn. Do I have complete faith in them? Not exactly, since I oppose partisanship, but I believe they could do better than the democrats. If this country wants to take a new positive direction, we cannot afford to succumb to ideals right now. Instead of trying to achieve universal health care, we should pick ourselves off the dirt and pull our economy out of stagnant waters. We need to stabilize ourselves.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/39918295/ns/business-eye_on_the_economy/

War Dollars contributing to National Deficit

One of the biggest contributors to the National Deficit of the United States comes from war. When the nation is at war with another country, the President is in command of the U.S. armed forces and the war fund. For this reason, the blame for creating a larger national deficit is often associated with the President. But, Congress has the power to approve funding of the war through the Federal Government. This is known as "the Power of the Purse". However, when Congress introduces higher taxes to fund war efforts, they might find it harder to get rid of them when they may seem unnecessary. For example, former President Bush was in favor of funding the war efforts, but many of the people did, and still, believe that the war in Iraq was dragging on for far too long. If Congress tries to make changes in the war policy to reduce war funds, but the President is in favor of the war, the President could veto the policy and allow the war fund to continue. Then, does this make the President responsible for the national deficit or Congress?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_deficit
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_of_the_purse

War has always been a drain in the wallet ever since the existence of war. I think that too much money that we do not have has been spent on war, creating a greater national deficit. Joe Weisenthal, a writer for Business Insider, writes: "We have spent a trillion dollars at war, often financed by borrowing from overseas. This, in turn, has short-changed investments in our own people, and contributed to record deficits." To keep our economy from crumbling, we must understand why the U.S. is descending into debt. Where does the money come from? It comes from the people who channel their money to the Federal Government through taxes laid by Congress. Then, it is used by the President to fund the war. During wartime, there is a balance of power between Congress and the President. The President can claim war against another nation, but only by having a reasonable war fund, created by Congress, would doing so be rational. So, when a greater national deficit begins to build up, who is responsible? Because the President could veto a decision to end a war fund, some people would probably say that the President is responsible. But, if Congress creates a war fund policy with an set expiration date on it, this would prevent the President from perpetuating the policy to fund the war and, ultimately, creating a greater national deficit. Does this make Congress responsible then? Members of Congress, as well as the President, are always at the mercy of the people during re-election. Therefore, everyone: Congress, the President, and the people, are all responsible for the national deficit.

http://www.businessinsider.com/obama-announces-end-of-iraq-war-turns-it-into-speech-on-the-economy-2010-8



Other Related Links
Spending What We Can Afford (Issue #2): http://katieireneiverson.blogspot.com/
Social Insecurity (Issue #3): http://theresasocial.blogspot.com/

Potential Terror Attacks in Europe

U.S. and European security experts are concerned with the safety of Europe as they believe that al-Qaida is planning more terrorist attacks. Also, Osama bin Laden is thought to be behind the plotting of the attacks. To protect Americans living or traveling in Europe, the Obama administration, on Sunday, encouraged vigilance especially in public places, tourist attractions and transportation hubs. The threat level, being "severe", is considered to potentially hurt tourism in Europe and students who are wishing to study-abroad.
Above all, I wish that nobody in Europe will come to harm. I find it extremely unfortunate for American students who are planning to study-abroad either sooner or later, depending on how long the threat will last. Chances are, students that are planning to study-abroad will less likely to be able to do so for the time being. Just as well, tourists who are hoping to visit the Louvre Museum or the Eiffel Tower in Paris may have to postpone their dates to a later time since sites such as these are probably prime targets for terrorist attacks. Osama bin Laden's persistency to cause paranoia in Europe truly stands as a testament to his cowardice. Hopefully, when he briefly finds some cajones to step out of hiding, we can finally blast him to bits and be ease up on the paranoia.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/39484389/ns/us_news-security/

Wellesley Middle School students partake in muslim prayer service during a field trip.

On September 6th, 2010, the Wellesley's school superintendent apoligized for allowing students, who were on a field trip to a Roxbury mosque last spring, to take part in a Muslim prayer service. During the field trip, a woman was chaperoning for her son's class and she caught 10-minute long video footage of 5 students participating in the prayer service. The video was received by the Americans for Peace and Tolerance who, then released the video to the public.
I don't think that the Wellesley's school superintendent has anything to apologize for. The school neither advised the children to participate in the Muslim prayer service nor did they advise against it, because they are not allowed to make that decision. The superintendent, Bella Wong, admitted that the school had not expected for the students to participate in any prayer service while on the field trip. Even the president of the Muslim American Society of Boston, Bilal Kaleem, said that the tours do not invite people to take part in Muslim prayer or reject them from doing so. The decision lies with the students and, for that reason, the only thing that can be done is for the parents to give their kids a slap on the wrist. The superintendent isn't at fault and the cultural center isn't at fault. Instead, it's the fault of the parents.
http://www.boston.com/yourtown/news/wellesley/2010/09/wellesley_schools_chief_apolog.html

Pastor Jones backs down from his Koran burning plan.

Some people would probably like not to have mosque stand at ground zero of the 9/11 bombing, especially those who had lost loved ones to that day. Although there is very little that those people could actually do to stop the construction of the mosque, Pastor Terry Jones of Florida tried to hit the Muslims where it hurts, their holy book, the Koran. It was a bold move, but their was too much pressure from many Americans that were against it and over a hundred death threats saying to stop. He was forced to back down.
My opinion is that their should not be a mosque built at ground zero, but I know that Muslims have as much right to build a mosque there as the majority of Christian Americans have to build a church there. Instead it should just be kept as a memorial to the people lost on 9/11. What Jones tried to do was to provoke anger in Muslims, for wanting to build their mosque, by threatening to burn their holy book. His way of logic is dreadfully wrong, instead, the answer is that Christians and Muslims should learn to accept each other's beliefs and not give in to ignorance so quickly. After all, Christianity and Islam are, in many ways, quite similar. They just tell their stories a little bit differently.

Sources:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/39113743/
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/39086961