The Virginia couple who slipped through White House security and shook hands with President Obama will do the Fifth Amendment, which protects against self-incrimination, if subpoenaed to testify to Congress.The couple has been called "perpetrators" even. The couple is accused of crashing state dinner on November 24. House committee is to vote Wednesday on whether to subpoena the Salahis.
CNN

Palin's Up, Obama's Down

Sarah Palin has erased her drop in the polls that followed her resignation as Alaska governor, so says the CNN polls. After she resigned her approval rate dropped to 39%. Americans are split on Palin, with 46% saying they have a favorable opinion of her and an equal amount saying they have an unfavorable view. There is a gender gap too, instead of women liking her, men do; 51% percent of men see her in a positive light, with an nearly equal amount of women view Palin in a negative way. McCain brought her in to appeal to the women voters, not the men in the first place. Hmmm...Maybe that newsweek magazine showing her in shorts helped her out with her male voters.

Another poll finds that Obama is down to 48% approval rate. The drop is mostly from the noncollege white voters. Six out of ten people favor Obama's plan for Afghanistan. But the approval rates for Regan and Clinton also dropped to below 50% in their first year.

Palin
Obama

Read this 4000 page bill!--No problem

The senate and health care bill adds up to 4100 pages. How will anyone read that without blowing their brains out? If you read 1 page per second it would take you an hour and eight minutes. Here are some ways to read a bill thats looooong.

1. Read a summary of the whole thing, or a section by section summary to get through all the legal language.

2. Print the table of contents, so it is easier to refrence back to each part, because bills usually do.

3. Read the bill in a pdf-like format so you can search through it and find exactly what you are looking for.

CNN

Battle for 2012 Presidencey?

A group created a website called 'Draft Dick Cheney 2012' to try to motivate Cheney into running for president in 2012. He says he doesn't want to run and thinks that Palin can run if she wants to and that she is "charming and engaging". He already did his thing and loved it, but he doesn't have any aspirations of being in the white house again.
CNN

Box Office Hit? Probably Not.

Filmmaker Jeff Reichert is writer and director of an upcoming documentary about redistricting--it is called Gerrymandering, how exciting. His reasoning for making a movie about something most of the population doesn't care about/thinks its a nuisance is that 'its just that important'. There isn't a definate release date for the movie yet. Part of the film’s mission is educational with its centerpiece an animation he calls Gerrymandering 101 that explains the process.
Movie Website
MSNBC

Woods Refuses to Talk, Like a Boss

Tiger Woods was in a single vehicle crash. Around 2:30am he drove his car into a fire hydrent and then a tree while being barefoot. He cancled his third interview with the police.

Woods has every right to not talk to the police under the 5th amendment-gives everyone an absolute right to refuse to talk to the police. The only way to force him to talk is too get a search warrant, but there is nothing to justify it.

CNN
My Dad

She Keeps Coming Back

• Palin's book tour gives her a chance for her to present her policy ideas.
  
• 3/10 people don't think she is qualified to be a president.
  
• Her next move is critical because she can introduce herself on her own terms.
  

Palin has one thing on her side, fame. If she decides to run for president on 2012 she will have to reach out to the independants and the more conservative democrats. No one knows for sure if she is going to run or not.
CNN

What's Next, Book Burnings?

Frequency of Reasons for Challenges
Sexually Explicit: 61
Unsuited for Age Group: 49
Nudity: 26
Violence: 17
Anti-Family: 15
Insensitive: 14
Drugs: 15
Sexism: 13
Abortion: 13
Homosexuality: 6
Offensive Language: 5
Other: 6
Sex Education: 4
Religious Viewpoint: 3
Political Viewpoint: 2
Anti-ethnic: 1

Earlier this week a friend of mine said she was reading Lord of the Flies and said many times that this book should be banned on school grounds for the violence and the side of human nature in young boys it shows. What she said goes directly against the first amendment-intellectual freedom. The freedom to read whatever we like even though it may be controversial or unpopular. Many books have been challenged and banned, but some have made it through with the help of teachers, librarians, and authors. The ALA celebrates intellectual freedom by having a Banned Books Week to show the importance of the first amendment; that all books have the right to be read.

Challenged Material in Colorado
ALA

Faces

These children are more than just faces, but what about the faces of American children who also need help?

Today we watched a video on the invisible children of Uganda. They appealed to the public by making us sympathetic and compassionate for the children in another country. They handed out papers to get signatures to support their cause of making Obama create strategy to save these children and that he should pass their bill.

We should not force Obama to take care of these other thing when his own plate is full. Especially when there are people in our country who need help-the millions without health care. We should be focusing on our problems, not other countries. We should make our country better before others. I know this is selfish, but it is the truth. How could we take care of these children when we can't care for our own?

Picture
Invisible Children

Clinton's Two Cents

Clinton voices his opinion that the new Health Care bill must be passed because it is "an economic imperative". His points are that the U.S can't handle the costs of the pricey insurance and the cost of 50million uninsured. He says that there is no perfect bill, we just have to act and get the ball rolling.

Clinton, and others, want the bill to be passed as quickly as possible, but Senator Durbin (No. 2 Democrat) says it just isn't possible to go quickly because of all of the controversy. Abortion rears its giant, controversial, head in the bill; saying it will be federal funded. This caused a rift in the Democratic party as well.

If this bill wants even a chance at being passed it will have to take out the federally funded abortions section because of the rifts and disapproval it is causing.

I believe that the bills that are being edited need to have abortions being federally funded. It would support the idea that woman have a right to chose and should not be told that it is wrong. Not everyone has the ideals, like Liz Searcy said, of Christians. Mine views are a bit more radical. Abortions are apart of people's health and should be in the Health Care Bill, not dropped because the Bill wants to pass quickly.
Clinton says we need to get the ball rolling, but shouldn't the bill be accurate to get more U.S wide acceptance, republic or democrat? I don't think a flawed bill will help the country, even if it just act and just get the ball rolling.

Msnbc
Liz's Blog

Don't Ask, Don't Tell: BS

Daren Manzella was discharged under the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy. He began having a relationship with a man and was then harassed anonymously by emails and phone calls. The didn't stop so he decided that he should seek advice from his military supervisor. The next day he was under investigation of breaking the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy. The investigation was closed and Manzella was let back into his unit.

He was able to enjoy talking about his relation, call his boyfriend, and not fear repercussions that a heterosexual man wouldn't have to think once about. The "don't ask, don't tell" policy says that being openly gay will hinder the performance of a unit, but this unit was pulled closer together. "It made me feel like I was more a part of the family"--Manzella. Later he went to talk about his story to spread it around, but was then later honorably discharged; his discharge papers read "homosexual conduct admission."

The "don't ask, don't tell" policy also costs money. Since this policy has come into law the military has discharged 13000 gays, lesbians, bisexuals. 800 of those discharged had a 'critical' skill that cost the military $200 million in the retraining and rehiring of these discharged people.

Why should a man be punished for serving in the military based on sexuality? Will he not get the job done just as well as a straight man? It would be easier to handle the tough conditions of war if you were able to lament about a oversea lover. While the other men talk about their girls back home or girls about their men, you are not allowed to talk of such things. This policy is promoting discrimination against the homosexual community. "We should be celebrating their willingness to step forward and show such courage ... especially when we are fighting two wars."--Obama.

Links
CNN
Fox News
Solomon Response

No Parole!? Whaaaa----

In this article,in short, it was said that sentencing teenagers for life without parole is a cruel and unusual punishment that goes against the 8th amendment.
They are mostly looking at people with non-murder cases. Here it states that in Florida, prisons hold 70% of juvenile defendants. Overall there are about 2500 cases of people serving life sentences.

In Florida two specific cases are being looked at; Joe Sullivan (13 when sentenced) and Terrance Graham (16).

Sullivan(to the left), who is now 34, was found guilty of raping an elderly woman.
While Graham, now 22, was guilty of armed robbery while on parole.

Pro Arguments

• Four years ago the Supreme Court ruled that the death penalty would not affect people under 18-why not make this for life sentences too?
  
• Second Chance
  
• Children are less culpable than adults.
  
• It is a bad idea to render a final judgment about people so young. "They are unfinished products, works-in-progress"-unknown.
  

Con Arguments

• It is difficult to discern adults from minors psychologically.
  
• Why would a kid get constitutional rights to hope while adults don't?
  

If a man who did a drunken hit and run get 24 days, why should a teenager get a life sentence for stealing on probation? That is what I don't understand. Aren't driving drunk and killing frowned upon more so than stealing? Many of the juvies put to life sentences were by assosciation! Whether the reason be fame or double standards this is an issue of morals. Is it right to send a teenager to life in jail? and why should a teenager get special privileges? It is not right to send them to jail and because teenagers are easier to rehabilitate than adults. The younger the mind, the more malleable it is. Teenagers are different than adults.

Some argue that the juvenile court need to be revamped to keep up with the more violent crimes teenagers commit. Many courts have low funding and don't get the proper care it needs. If we put more attention into this it would surely help! The juvenile court system was made specifically because not only teenagers, but children are different than adults and need to be tried and persecuted differently. It is cruel and unusual to not give the youth a second chance.

'Stevenson noted that juveniles on death row in Florida — all convicted of murder — "got a better sentence than Joe Sullivan," life prison terms with the possibility of parole.'