Semester Blog

[4Brianna]

political and economic systems of the world:socialism - where the government owns and controls businessescapitalism - where businesses are privately owned and operated by civilianstheory of communism - is what communism is supposed to be like. There aren't any examples in history because it's never really gone how it has been planned to be.practice of communism - the government controls everything. the purpose of this is to make everyone equal. the government takes what they want from you and then they divide it out evenly among the people.constitutional and absolute monarchies -democratic/republican viewsabortion-REPUBLICAN- pro life (against it) they think the government should make it illegal.DEMOCRAT- pro choice (for it) they think it's a woman's right to choose if they want the baby or not.gay marriage-REPUBLICAN- against it for particularly for religious reasonDEMOCRAT- for it, say it's a civil rightflag burningREPUBLICAN- think it should not be legal.. there is a constitutional ammendment protecting it.DEMOCRAT- they think it should be legal.. the constitution says everyone has freedom of expression, so that's why it makes it okay.gun controlREPUBLICAN- they say people should be allowed to have guns. In the constitution it says everyone has the right to bear arms.DEMOCRAT- think we need stricter gun control.. keep guns out of the hands of criminals and others who may not use them correctly.the environmentREPUBLICAN- say strong environmental laws harm the economyDEMOCRAT- we need strong environmental laws to protect our environmentrace relationsREPUBLICAN- they think that we need to give people more credit than that.. most people are not like that anymore. Many oppose the affirmitive action law because it might work the other way, like hiring people of different races and not giving the job to a white person so they don't look racist.DEMOCRAT- they think we need really strong anti-discrimination laws. they also are in favor of the affirmitive action laws.minimum wageREPUBLICAN- It will hurt businesses to raise minimum wage, so therefore, they are opposed to it.DEMOCRATS- Raise it.. people work hard to earn their money, so they deserve it.health careREPUBLICANS- favor doing insurance privately, the government shouldn't provide itDEMOCRATS- favor having the government control health care.. universal health care for everyone is their plantaxesREPUBLICAN- tax cuts allow people to have more $$$, so they will spend it, which will help our economy.DEMOCRAT- tax the wealthy.. they have plenty of money anyway..even though they already give roughly half of it already to the governmentmilitary spendingREPUBLICANS- increase military spending.. sometimes to win you have to pay a little priceDEMOCRATS- cut military spending and give the veterans more moneydeath penaltyREPUBLICAN- think we should have it be legal. it is an effective punishmentDEMOCRAT- opposed to itprayer in schoolREPUBLICAN- think it's fine.. we have religious rights in the constitutionDEMOCRAT- think we should keep church and state seperatewar in IraqREPUBLICAN- support it fully. said we wouldn't leave until it was fixed.. hoped to leave in a couple years after their government was establishedDEMOCRAT- supported it at first.. they think President Bush messed it up and hope to withdrawl troops A.S.A.P.GLOBAL WARMING.. or is it?The climate system is getting warmer.. but is it just a regular cycle the earth has or it is it something we need to be worried about? Right now some things that are happening are ice and snow are melting, the sea level is rising and in some places there are droughts. Scientists are debating on this subject and it's a subject they are torn on. Even though there is physical evidence, there is also history. The media likes to see us in a frenzy, so part of the reason there is so much hype about "global warming" is because they like to see us worry. But as Senator James Inhofe has pointed out, they have gone back and forth between coming ice ages and global warming several times in history, and so far have been wrong every time. And even though the things I mentioned before are happening, they may not be as drastic as you have thought. True, the temperature has increased, but on average only by about 1 degree. And the sea levels are rising, but it's a matter of milimeters not miles.Kyoto Protocol:This is an agreement was made by the UN. If your country ratifies it, then what happens is that you have agreed to reduce you greenhouse gas emissions. The United States has signed it but has not ratified it yet. Reasons for this include that it would make a lot of people jobless, and at the rate were going now, we really don't want more people unemployed. Another reason would be that even though the US and China are the 2 biggest greenhouse gas producers, (we make up 55% of it together:O) the Kyoto Protocol does not include China. It's not that we are completely opposed to it though as we are trying to get better about our greenhouse gas emissions.Overpopulation:Overpopulation is having too many people and then it effects the world not enough resources for everyone. Some things that are major contributors are as follows: decline in death rate. Our medical field is getting better and better so not as many people are dying. Increased birth rates are a big factor. There are also a lot of people moving to one place which is called migration, so there are more people in one place . There is a lack of education because people aren't emphasizing how big of a deal this is. In third world countries, lack of birth control and unsafe sex are big contributors to this problem. Poverty causes overpopulation. When you don't have money, they think they need to use money for more important things and ended up having children. A LOT of them.Effects of overpopulation:Resources get used up faster and they can't be replaced that quickly. Drinking water is getting used up quickly and so we don't have enough. It is overall just polluting the earth because there are so many people, the polution is obviously going to be higher.SOLUTIONS:education-people need to be educated on how to preventlimit how many children you can have for example, 2/woman.Globalization:With today's technology, you can communicate with people across the world literally in seconds. It is incredible how much technology has evolved and continues to do so. This can be a good thing or bad thing depending on how you look at it. In the good sense, there are more ways to communicate and communicate quickly. Technology is also causing the world to become flat in a sense. All barriers are really broken down, and because of these advancements, we are going to be competing with not only our peers locally for jobs when we are fully grown, we will also be competing with people from the rest of the world from all countries. Companies will hire who will work for the least pay and the best skill. If you have the same skill as someone from say China, if they are willing to work for cheaper, who do you think will get the job? Obviously the one who saves the company the most money and does the best work.Afghanistan:In the country of Afghanistan, it's kind of a mess right now. Not nearly as bad as it was when we first came, but it's still a piece of work. Right now we have troops over there trying to sort out their situation. There is a plan to send about 30,000 more troops over there shortly. Even though Obama's position on this was to not send a lot more troops over and pull them out A.S.A.P., he is doing it anyway, I guess.Iran:Recently, we have had some problems with Iran. We have been upset with them for providing Afghanistan with lethal weapons to kill our soldiers with, especially when we're over there trying to help people. When we confronted them about it, they told us that they would stop. This was not the case we found out later. They continued supplying Afghanistan soldiers with weapons, and we found out while they were again when we discovered weapons there with their stamp on them. The other problem we've had with them, and not just the US, but we also recently discovered nuclear items there. They claim it's for energy reasons, but I have a feeling that's not the case. Nothing has been proven at this point.Somalia:Somalia is a failed state. A failed state is a country that has no government or their government is currently failing. Now those states are pretty much living in anarchy. For Somalia, things really started falling apart after Europeans started arriving and breaking up their clan systems. In this system, there were 5 clans. Each clan kinda just fended for themselves and had the young people do all the dirty work. They would steal from other tribes, and as long as they had permission from their clan leader, this was considered acceptable. I think it's wrong to do things like that, and any time you have a system like that, it's bound for failure. Another key point was when they overthrew their dictator Mohammed Siad Barre. This happened in 1995, and ever since, the country has been in complete and utter chaos.There are pirates who dock on the coast of Somalia because they know that with the state it is in right now, nothing will be done, no one will try to catch them. The only thing that's really left of Somalia now is the city of Mogadishu, and that is pretty well destroyed. You can tell that it used to be beautiful, which is one of the sadest things about it. People take refuge in abandoned lighthouses, like the one above, that's how bad it is over there. There are refugee camps they can go to, but some of the Somalians have a die hard attitude and want to remain in Somalia until they die. I think they would just be better off going to these camps instead of sitting around waiting to die.Rwanda:It has now been a little over 15 years since the genocide in Rwanda. Even though some still refuse to refer to it as genocide, I am certainly convinced that it was. In earlier times when Belgium and other European countries controlled parts of Africa, they came in and set up a system. That system was really just pretty much racist. In this system, specifically in Rwanda, there is a group called the Hutus and a group called the Tutsis. The Tutsis were put in a higher status than the Hutus because of their physical features, therefore had more control over everything. The Hutus then built up their numbers and prepared. In April of 1994, this genocide began when the president at the time, who was Hutu, had his plane shot down while trying to make a peace treaty. The killings began in the next 24 hours. If you were a moderate Hutu or a Tutsis, you were to be killed. These mass killings eventually stopped when the Hutus were forced out and a cease fire was ordered by the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF.) It was awful how many people died and the ways that they were killed.Crisis in Darfur-Sudan:In 2003 two rebel groups, the Sudan Liberation Movement/Army (SLA) and the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM), joined forces and attacked. They claimed that the Sudanese government farvors Arabs over black Africans. This isn't just a recent issue as this conflict began as early as the 1930's and resurfaced in the 1980's. A major group fighting back against the rebel groups is a militia called the Janjaweed.In 1989 when the NIF, National Islamic Front, took over, they began taking away weapons from the non-Arabs that they had been using for their attacks and armed the Arabs with more. I think that was a very poor decision, but some people think that this may be an attempt at a major ethnic cleansing, which should be considered genocide, so the UN should be doing something about it. This all has led up to the current crisis.Right now in Darfur-Sudan, there is a major lack of resources. This has led to even further disputes. Some of the results of the fighting and everything is thousands upon thousands of deaths and millions of people being displaced. The death toll is a subjective thing at this point. The Sudanese government is saying there are roughly 20,000 deaths. Others claim there are as many as 400,000. Another enormous problem is rape of women and girls. They think that it happens when they are out to retrieve firewood. The women asked in this area have either been raped or know of someone close to them that has been. The treatment of people here is just ridiculous, and I don't think that just because they're not Arab they should be discriminated against.There was a peace treaty signed in 2006, but it was only between the government and just one of the armed groups. So I guess it's not real effective yet, but hopefully it will be.The US is considering this a genocide with almost 400,000 people dead, unofficially. The UN is not, so there is no action taking place. They're helping out with the refugee camps, but still I think there's a lot more that they should be doing.