The 'Empathy' Nominee, http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124338457658756731.html. 27 May 2009.
The word that gets the closest to this authors tone in this reading is skepticism. The author's view on Judge Sotomayor is that her idealogy has nothing do with the law but rather her background. The article brings up that when Judge Sotomayor said, "I am . . . not so sure that I agree with the statement. First, . . . there can never be a universal definition of wise. Second, I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life." She set the agenda that she will base her decisions on cases based on her life rather than her interpretation of the law and how this will effect her decisions on the Supreme Court. The article uses two cases that she had heard in her lower court that have been overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court such as, Riverkeeper v. EPA and Merrill Lynch v. Dabit. The article also brings to light her ruling on Ricci v. DeStefano. The author is also scared that she will rule in favor of minority groups instead of ruling in a fair and just way. I think this author feels that she was not nominated because of her merit and accomplishments but because she fit the President's " ideal match for his view that personal experience and cultural identity are the better part of judicial wisdom." (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124338457658756731.html).
Thursday, May 28, 2009
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Congress Matters
Well, I'm going to write about May 20th's Today in Congress because I have no idea how to find May 26th's, so hopefully this works. I even tried to switch the 20 in the web address to 26 but that gave me the same information. Cross my fingers lol.
I will say I'm glad we went over the things we did in class because it gave me a much better understanding of what I was reading. For instance, the HR in front of the bill numbers, etc. Like, it was said in class I believe Congress is a very hard idea to wrap your head around so the clarification made this blog/article, whatever it is a lot simpler to navigate.
One thing I noticed about this was how informal the writing style was and how biased it seemed to be. I know, I know media/politics is always at some sort of bias, but I was wondering who writes for this website. He's definately not a conservative from what I read. Not a fan of any Republicans (I clicked on his name). Is it a random reporter or it someone that Congress has appointed to write these articles, knowing this would help me put this into a little bit better context.
Okay, so the first thing I noticed when reading this blog was what the House was meeting on. What popped out at me was the National Missing Children Day and Teacher Appreciation blah blah. Don't get me wrong I'm not an ass (sorry I know you said not to cuss but I can't help it), and these things are important, but do we really need to be spending time in Congress on this kind of thing. I know you mentioned in class about these sorts of debates but why couldn't we send around a professional survey (or something equivelant) and congressmen and women could vote on it during their own time. There are so many important issues out there and why are we spending tax dollars (there I go with the whole tax card) to decide these issues. I would like to know how much time and money is spent on these mundane issues. Now that I've made myself look like a biatch I'll move on.
Moving on, I did notice that the House spent the majority of their time on bills such as the Credit Cardholder's Act which I'm divided on and need to do better research on. They also met on the Small Business Act and the PACT Act. I clicked on the PACT Act because I wasn't sure what it was about so I was interested in that it was about the tobacco taxes. It was good to see that these sort of bills are what is spent the most time on.
As far as the Senate goes, why did they only convene for one bill when the House spent their time on five different bills. I understand that the Senate has will filibuster a bill but are there other reasons for this. I also noted that the list of committees was much longer for the House than what it was for the Senate. Is this basically because of size or are there other reasons for this. Piggy-backing on this I will say the Senate sets up a better schedule than the house and seems to be a little bit more organized than what the House. But with a quarter of the people to corral I guess it might be easier to be more organized.
I'm gonna Google this David Waldman guy because I want to know what I am reading. I have a hard time reading stuff like this because I don't really care about what other people wonder or their opinions. I have my own so when I'm reading something like this I want "just the facts." So I'll have to do some personal homework after I send this in.
I will say I'm glad we went over the things we did in class because it gave me a much better understanding of what I was reading. For instance, the HR in front of the bill numbers, etc. Like, it was said in class I believe Congress is a very hard idea to wrap your head around so the clarification made this blog/article, whatever it is a lot simpler to navigate.
One thing I noticed about this was how informal the writing style was and how biased it seemed to be. I know, I know media/politics is always at some sort of bias, but I was wondering who writes for this website. He's definately not a conservative from what I read. Not a fan of any Republicans (I clicked on his name). Is it a random reporter or it someone that Congress has appointed to write these articles, knowing this would help me put this into a little bit better context.
Okay, so the first thing I noticed when reading this blog was what the House was meeting on. What popped out at me was the National Missing Children Day and Teacher Appreciation blah blah. Don't get me wrong I'm not an ass (sorry I know you said not to cuss but I can't help it), and these things are important, but do we really need to be spending time in Congress on this kind of thing. I know you mentioned in class about these sorts of debates but why couldn't we send around a professional survey (or something equivelant) and congressmen and women could vote on it during their own time. There are so many important issues out there and why are we spending tax dollars (there I go with the whole tax card) to decide these issues. I would like to know how much time and money is spent on these mundane issues. Now that I've made myself look like a biatch I'll move on.
Moving on, I did notice that the House spent the majority of their time on bills such as the Credit Cardholder's Act which I'm divided on and need to do better research on. They also met on the Small Business Act and the PACT Act. I clicked on the PACT Act because I wasn't sure what it was about so I was interested in that it was about the tobacco taxes. It was good to see that these sort of bills are what is spent the most time on.
As far as the Senate goes, why did they only convene for one bill when the House spent their time on five different bills. I understand that the Senate has will filibuster a bill but are there other reasons for this. I also noted that the list of committees was much longer for the House than what it was for the Senate. Is this basically because of size or are there other reasons for this. Piggy-backing on this I will say the Senate sets up a better schedule than the house and seems to be a little bit more organized than what the House. But with a quarter of the people to corral I guess it might be easier to be more organized.
I'm gonna Google this David Waldman guy because I want to know what I am reading. I have a hard time reading stuff like this because I don't really care about what other people wonder or their opinions. I have my own so when I'm reading something like this I want "just the facts." So I'll have to do some personal homework after I send this in.
Thursday, May 21, 2009
State Representative and Senator
I actually just officially changed my address to McLean County so that's why I used for this assignment. A little background on McLean is even though it is the largest county in Illinois it ranks 13th for population. McLean was originally formed out of Tazewell County in 1930 and named after John McLean. John McLean was a Senator for Illinois and died in 1930. As far as farmland goes it is one of the top-producing counties for both corn and soybeans.
The state representative for McLean County is Dan Brady who is a Republican. He was the McLean county coroner from 1992 to 2000. In 2003, he became the State Representative for McLean County. A few of the issues that Brady supports is keeping the existing gun control laws, stopping unfunded state mandates placed on local governments, and developing new markets for agriculture in Illinois. He is also a pro-life supporter.
The Senators for Illinois are Richard Durbin and Roland Burris. Richard Durbin was appointed to his Senate seat in 1996 and then was reelected in 2002. According to his website his issues are protecting consumers, fighting for farmers, enforcing gun control, and working for a fair tax credit.
Roland Burris was just recently appointed to his Senate seat after President Obama won the election in November and left the seat vacant.
I didn't find anything as far as current events for these guys when I googled them.
The state representative for McLean County is Dan Brady who is a Republican. He was the McLean county coroner from 1992 to 2000. In 2003, he became the State Representative for McLean County. A few of the issues that Brady supports is keeping the existing gun control laws, stopping unfunded state mandates placed on local governments, and developing new markets for agriculture in Illinois. He is also a pro-life supporter.
The Senators for Illinois are Richard Durbin and Roland Burris. Richard Durbin was appointed to his Senate seat in 1996 and then was reelected in 2002. According to his website his issues are protecting consumers, fighting for farmers, enforcing gun control, and working for a fair tax credit.
Roland Burris was just recently appointed to his Senate seat after President Obama won the election in November and left the seat vacant.
I didn't find anything as far as current events for these guys when I googled them.
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Democrats in Senate Block Money to Close Guantanamo, by David M. Herszenhorn. New York Times, http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/20/us/politics/20detain.html?_r=1&ref=politics.
This is an article I feel very strongly about because I think it shows how little our president knows about homeland security or defense. I'm very glad to see that his own party has taken a stand and decided to tell him how ridiculous of an idea it is to allow terrorists into the U.S regardless of them being in a prison. As the article states no one has escaped from Guantanamo since 9/11, I don't really believe that the same would hold true if these prisoners were moved to the states. I also liked how the article mentioned that the money that was going to be used to close the prison in Guantanamo would take money away from our defense in Iraq and Afghanistan (oh let's not forget that these terrorists are part of the reason we are there). $80 million dollars is a lot of money that I don't really think we need to be spending on terrorists or moving the prison where they are detained.
I do agree with the statement that something will have to happen with Guantanamo eventually but this is definitely not the time or the way to do it.
This is an article I feel very strongly about because I think it shows how little our president knows about homeland security or defense. I'm very glad to see that his own party has taken a stand and decided to tell him how ridiculous of an idea it is to allow terrorists into the U.S regardless of them being in a prison. As the article states no one has escaped from Guantanamo since 9/11, I don't really believe that the same would hold true if these prisoners were moved to the states. I also liked how the article mentioned that the money that was going to be used to close the prison in Guantanamo would take money away from our defense in Iraq and Afghanistan (oh let's not forget that these terrorists are part of the reason we are there). $80 million dollars is a lot of money that I don't really think we need to be spending on terrorists or moving the prison where they are detained.
I do agree with the statement that something will have to happen with Guantanamo eventually but this is definitely not the time or the way to do it.
Monday, May 18, 2009
About Me
Well, a little bit about me is I am currently a full time student and work for the Illinois Air National Guard in Peoria and Macy's in town. I have a dog named Allie who drives me nuts because she is about 6 months old and likes to tear shit up. lol. I was active duty military for 4 years and have been in the guard for a little over a year now. My title in the AF is called a loadmaster and I basically load up big cargo planes and fly random crap and people wherever they need to go. I also do a lot of airdrop which is kicking that crap and people out of the airplane in-flight. I like to walk my dog, spend as much time outside as possible, get some gym time in, and watch as much Law&Order:SVU as possible (although that's not very often).
My expectations of this class are to boost my knowledge of U.S. politics and get rid of the Constitution Test requirement that I need.
Since I've been in the military I've definately pay attention to daily issues. Because of this background I tend to lean towards a more conservative view of things than the rest of my generation. I like to debate controversial topics so I usually try to be well informed when doing so.
Hopefully, this is what I was supposed to do for this assignment.
Lacey
My expectations of this class are to boost my knowledge of U.S. politics and get rid of the Constitution Test requirement that I need.
Since I've been in the military I've definately pay attention to daily issues. Because of this background I tend to lean towards a more conservative view of things than the rest of my generation. I like to debate controversial topics so I usually try to be well informed when doing so.
Hopefully, this is what I was supposed to do for this assignment.
Lacey
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