First Step in the Semester Reflection

For the H2O project, I am most proud of the way my partner and I worked together to come up with the end product of the beach reviews on InDesign. I liked the fact that it drew people in and at the same time they were able to know which beaches are the safest as well as the dirtiest to swim in. I feel like I'm making a difference in the fight to make the water cleaner and safer for both animals and people to live longer and healthier lives. The most interesting thing I learned from doing this project is the type of bacteria that is in the water. Before this project I had absolutely no idea what indicator bacteria even were and the types of sicknesses such bacteria can cause. This information was gathered mostly by going out to different beaches, taking the water, and then running it through different steps before actually figuring out what bacteria is present in the water. Of course my biology teacher gets the credit for teaching us students about the different types of bacteria and showing us how to correctly collect water so that we are better able to test it.

Whale Hunting

Who is "right" in the controversy involving whaling and the Sea Shepherd?

The controversy that involves whaling and the Sea Shepherd is a two-sided issue that deals with whether whale killing should be legalized or not. Judging from what I've read in the packet about Paul watson and his crew and the right to kill whales I don't think any of the sides are correct.

In the text it says. "Whaling is not banned, but it is not exactly permitted either-an ambiguity resulting from political compromise and shortsightedness." I think this would be confusing for those people who do go whale hunting because there's no real yes or no answer for such an action. However, when it comes to Watson's actions and what he did, then that's when the line should be drawn between killing whales just to kill them or because they're actually going to be used for something.

Martin Sheen said, "He's one of the gutsiest guys on the planet. I am just so grateful to him for his commitment and his courage and his daring and his humanity." I think all of these qualities are good to have, but NOT when it comes to the killing of animals just for the sake of killing animals. An issue such as this one should be dealt with by the people who make laws so that other people don't get the thinking that it's ok to go out and start killing a big number of living things.

Neptune's Navy
Paul Watson's wild crusade to save the oceans
by Raffi Khatchadourian November 5, 2007

Does Race Matter?

The question, "Isn't it time for the language to move on?" to me means that instead of judging someone by there appearance through our speech, we should think before we point out eachother's differences. It seems as though her question is making it very clear to her audience that humans today are so stuck in one position that maybe, just maybe we should switch our focus of language back to logic.

Throughout the piece of writing written about Obama by Marie Arana called, "He's Not Black," she is simply making the point that Obama isn't just one race, he is biracial. So for people like ourselves to just call him black because of what we see is a bit naive because we know the facts, we know he's African-American, but we still choose to call him black and like Arana pointed out, on the front page of the Washington Post newspaper it stated, "Obama Makes history: U.S. Decisively Elects First Black President." Personally, I think that what he's called, whether black or white, it doesn't really matter. I mean the fact that he is the first black man to be President I feel is a huge honor for African Americans who lived back then as well as now. However, I think that we could argue this all day until we turn blue in the face, but still have a personal preferance to what we what to call him. Race shouldn't even be our main focus. Why is it that an article is written about race when were trying not to focus on it? All it's going to do is cause our minds to thinking that every time we see someone, were going to try and place them in a race they really don't belong to, which I don't think is Marie Arana's motive at all.

She does a good job making the connection between her family and his family and how they are both biracial. She says, "Like Obama, I am the child of a white Kansan mother and a foreign father who, like Obama's, came to Cambridge, Mass., as a graduate student." When she makes this connection, it's clear to me as a reader that she has respect for his mixed being rather than bashing him. This shows me that the similarities one has with another human being is better than the putting down of a person because of their race or what they look like. So tell me this, does race matter?




He's Not black He's White

Thanksgiving Break

Personally, I am thankful that I have the privledge to live in this great land known as America. I can't even express in words how special I feel that I can have the freedom that so little people have. It's a gift that I shouldn't take for granted because rather than deserving it,it was given.

1. Testing the water for our project during Thanksgiving Break
2.Finish the Report card as well as the rough draft article for Humanities
3.Make report layout

The H2O Project

So far I'm discovering that I need to make my calendar clearer than it is. Before our first critique, I felt like I was just going day by day doing busy work rather than doing work that will actually be useful for my end product. Because I am doing a report card of six different beaches, and I haven't tested any of them, it is sort of hard to get a real rough draft of my article on paper, but since I am going to start that this week I am actually going to get somewhere with this project. Starting today, my next step is to test the waters of Coronado, Mission Beach, Shelter Island, San Diego Beach, and Ocean Beach and from those results write my article.

This link, I think, sums up the rights of different groups. It shows me that through this last presidential election groups such as African Americans, young people, women groups, and whites have risen up and voted more through a black president running for president. A recent article by Wall Street states that "blacks are no longer disfranchised -- by any definition. Through Obama, I think that blacks aren't going to be looked at as low as they were before.

Two examples of Products

My group members and my question is: "How do we as humans affect the beach and how does that effect us in return?"

Two examples of the products we'll be using include-
First Product
Second Product

OUR GRADING PROCESS:
Grading Beaches
• Bacteria Level
• Trash Level Environment around the beach
• Runoff

Talk to Brandon
• Possible if we could go w/ people testing waters
• Maybe meet over the weekend so we could test waters

Grading Methodology
• Out of 100 points
o Bacteria Level
• 55 points
• A-45-55
• B-35-44
• C-25-34
• D-15-24
• F-0-14
• Trash, Environment, Runoff
o 45 points
o A- 13-15
o B- 10-12
o C- 7-9
o D- 4-6
o F- 0-3

Dream Goal- Getting beach reviews in Peninsula Beacon

Beaches
Coronado
Mission Beach
Ocean Beach
PB
SD Bay
La Jolla

Election Reflection/H2O Project

The results of the recent 2008 Presidential Elections had me feeling ecstactic. It seemed too good to be true. I didn't know I would live to see the day where an African American man would be President of the United States of America. Although I don't consider myself a democrat, I am ready to see things governed differently than they were before. Through our new President, Barack Obama, my hope for this country over the next few years is to see people happier than they were with Bush as well as have willing hearts to help the economy change rather than sitting back and not doing anything. I hope to see black and white folks become better friends with eachother. Instead of bashing eachother I hope that they will build eachother up. I hope that another Great Depression will not take place through our mistakes. As well as Obama keeping his promises as he leads this country. On the otherhand, my concerns for America are that things aren't going to change as fast as some people want it to. We are an impatient nation, so if things aren't moving as quickly as some people want it to, then people will get anxious and have a bad view of President Obama. It's time that we learn patience and not be so quick to want what we want when we want. It's time to be thankful that we even have a leader that can help us stay on track rather than live in a land of chaos.

In this class these past few months, we've done well staying focused on the election and watching the debates. I feel that what I learn in this class will definitely benefit me in the future as it is now. I have never in my life been so focused on politics and actually know what's going on. I think that we could do better attempting to understand current events by relating them to different topics so that I could get a clearer picture of what different topics mean. Through talking about the elections with different people, I felt like people thought they were better than me just because their views "sounded" better. It was as if they were shoving it into my face. For example,when I talked about different propositions and talked about where I stood on them, they would say something totally off topic and when I said something, they would just nod their head in confusion. So I feel like what I'm learning in school causes me to think deeper through different issues as well as having evidence backing up my points.

Part 2
Calendar:
Nov. 7th-Talk to my group about meeting on Nov. 8th
Nov. 8th-Possibly meet up at our 3 locations
Nov.9th-Write a detailed outline for my article
Nov.10-Start rough draft
Nov.11th-Edit rough draft
Nov.12th-Have it peer critiqued
Nov.13th-Have Randy look at it and write my final draft
Nov. 14th-Have my final done!

The Group's Outline
Grade the beaches Rubric:
1. Bacteria level
2. PH level
3. Trash level
4. Environment around the beach
5. RunoffA= 50 points, 10 points per thing
Beaches:
1. Coronado beach
2. La Jolla beach
3. Mission bay
Products:
• Actual report card that would be sent to city officials
• Also would be put up around shops near the beach
• Dream Goal.
Publish in newspaper
Article How do humans affect the bacteria level in our local beaches?
Ideas:
1. Writing about the concepts in the report card
2. Beach reviews
3. Comparing beaches Beaches:
1. Coronado beach
2. La Jolla beach
3. Mission bay
Products:
• Article (magazine/web)

Research Questions

Two Questions that I am considering researching for the H2O project are, "How can we as humans change our actions to make marine life such as various fish and seal, live longer? and, "Which beach in San Diego has the worst death rate of marine life due to ocean pollution? How can we stop the death rate from elevating?" Here are some facts: The ocean buffers the weather and helps regulate global temperature, manages vast amounts of our pollutants, contains all kinds of amazing creatures, and supports all life on our planet. But—the ocean is just now beginning to be understood and with that understanding comes the increasing realization that the ocean is in deep trouble. Marine conservation efforts are simply overwhelmed by the number and scale of the problems the ocean faces. Meaning that marine life death doesn't just have to do with humans, it has a lot to do with the weather as well.


Citing:
Marine Biology

ACORN Scandal vs. Vote-Suppression

Before I go into depth about the ACORN scandal vs. voter suppression, it's very important that we know what they are. The ACORN scandal starts with a non-profit organization that register people to vote. The people who work there are paid from $8.00 and $13.00 an hour for collecting registration forms. There is a problem though, with this freedom, it is quite possible for these people, depending on their views when it comes to elections, could choose not to register some forms or vice versa. It is stated in The New York Times that according to Project Vote, in 2006, 71 percent of eligible whites were registered compared to 61 percent blacks, 54 Latinos and Asian Americans. So this raises questions for us Americans, " Are ACORN's employees trustworthy? Do they take any actions to avoid voter fraud? and "Who does ACORN benefit the most." Well, I got answers for you. Yes, some employees can be trusted while others cannot. According to Factcheck, Obama has "long and deep" connections with this organization so that would lead me to believe that Democrats are the main people ACORN touches base with meaning the Republicans don't have connections with this organization. Washington Post says, ACORN itself has acknowledged problems, noting that in Nevada "there have been several times over the past ten months that our Las Vegas Quality Control program has identified a canvasser who appears to have knowingly submitted a fake or duplicate application in order to pad his or her hours." ACORN says it phones those who sign voter registration cards to verify that the applications are valid and flags the questionable registrations for election officials. Which has me thinking that ACORN rarely avoids voter fraud.

On the otherhand, Voter Suppression is when the government or any other organization discourages or stop citizens from voting. A recent story that took place in Georgia talks about a girl who was going to vote for the first time, however, she received a letter from the mail saying that she was not a citizen of the United States and therefore not able to vote. She later realized that a computer mismatch was made in their personal identification information. This is a scenario that is constantly being repeated across the nation meaning that voting supression grows that way.

The Nixon Vs. Kennedy Debates and Biden vs. Palin

As I read about both the Nixon vs. Kennedy debates and the Biden vs. Palin debates I noticed that they are very similar, even though the Nixon/Kennedy debates took place in 1960. One of the more apparent similarities include the amount of viewers that tuned in because of Kennedy's good looks which also seems to be a factor for these recent debates when it comes to Palin's looks. Also, since television just came out back then, people were much more drawn to it than they were to the radio. When they heard Nixon speaking on his first debate on the radio they thought he won, until Kennedy was seen on TV and was later known as a charismatic and very smooth speaker. Today, in America's society, I think more people focus on looks rather than speech, especially when it came to the vice presidential debates. Because of this thinking of mine that looks play a great part in politics, then Sarah Palin, being a woman would grab people's attention and oblivious people who aren't truly passionate about what's actually being said in the debates, will be pulled in by her looks and think little about how she views different topics. Also, the fact that television was the new cool thing to use for information, internet today is like the cool thing for people today. We can easily log on to get information about any topic we wish to search and our freedom is definitely expanded through this thing called the internet. So my point being, that even though we have similarities, it's also good for us to keep in mind that what the candidates say is what will help our country, not their looks.

The Internet's Effects on technology and Democracy...

How has the Internet affected the way Americans approach democracy?

In my opinion, I think that the Internet has been like a catalyst that has sparked people's way of thinking, especially when it comes to democracy. For example people are able to look at different Internet sites and compare them, and then from there decide where they stand, based on the information they read. I think that this presidential campaign has drawn people in more and more because one group of people say one thing and another group say something else, that's why I feel like the debates have been a hit this year because citizens, especially the “undecided” ones are more tuned to hearing from the actual candidate. According to New York Times, Republicans and Democrats are increasing their use of Internet through interactive websites, candidate and party blogs, and assembling crowds for rallies. They say that the Internet is a more efficient and less costly than traditional tools of politics such as door knocking and telephone banks.

How does the Internet and its effects fit into the historical context of technology and democracy in America?

Since the Internet is a more recent development compared to telephones and rallies, people I think are going to be more drawn to it just because its a newer quicker way to communicate. So when comes to things like elections, candidates will rely more on the Internet to get information out to get more people behind them. Also, telephones can't be used to call a big number of people at once and the Internet can easily do that. Although its hard for us to admit sometimes, we'd rather communicate online or text message than take the time to pick up the phone and talk because our world today has to go fast and nothing else.

Newspaper Reflection

For this newspaper mini project, as a group of four I feel like we all contributed an equal amount of work to make the newspaper come to life. Personally, I wrote one of the incorporated articles and helped look for different ads and images that could be put in it to make it look more pleasing to the eye and make it look like a modern-day newspaper. I was also the editor of the group, so as the editor I looked over the writing portion of the newspaper and made sure it was clear, understandable to the audience, and followed a the newspaper format.
If there was ever a next time for this project, I would definitely like to spend more time editing the whole written part of the newspaper because I mainly focused on my part of the writing, which isn't fair to my teammates. The headlines could've been more eye-catching because since it is the main focus of the paper and it's in bold letters, people are going to be drawn to it and if it's not interesting, then people won't be excited to take the time to continue reading the newspaper. We also could've put much more color and more creative fonts to make it look good-especially since we had a whole week to work on it.
As I look back at my process throughout this project, I don't think I used my resources as well as I would've liked to. There were some days when I didn't do anything because I felt like my part was done and one of my group members was pretty much just taking on the next step of the project after I had already done the first part.
To have a better turn out with this project, I think that I would've liked to get better education on In-design so that on days when I'm not doing much I could at least be more productive and help the person who's designing the newspaper. I think that I also should have spent more of the time that I was not doing anything to look at the actual newspaper to see how it could be made better because the end product wasn't as professional and well-organized as I hoped it would be. So with that said, since I know where our weaknesses are, I think our second draft could be a close to perfect newspaper.

What has Sparked my attention so Far this Year?

So far this year in Randy Scherer's humanities class I have learned so many interesting things. However, there is one particular topic that stood out to me more than the others. This was the excerpt, "Dying For Dixie" that was taken from the book Confederates in the Attic. The story about the death of Michael westerman shocked me. I thought it was immature of Michael Westerman to be so naive to the fact that carrying a confederate flag in the back of his truck was offensive to the blacks in the town, specifically Freddy Morrow. Westerman was fired from his job after cursing at the restaurant's cook and referring to her as "nigger!" Morrow shot Westerman for his actions and now suffer the consequences in prison for the rest of his life. If this had taken place back when slavery was a bigger issue, than I would have more understanding for Westerman's rude behavior and Morrow's rash decision to murder. But because this story took place in 1995, it just shows me that violence and revenge are taken too far just as a way for people to build up their egos and feel better. When really I think that deep down inside they hurt, but they just don't want to show it.

http://dcn.davis.ca.us/~gizmo/1999/horwitz.html

Demographics-Do they Matter?

When it comes to the elections, I think the demographics between both candidates will be questioned by many citizens. As a person under the leadership of one of the candidates, I would want to have a clear picture of what Obama and McCain are doing economically. Obama was raised by a single parent, his grandma. According to these graphs 54% of children live in low income families. So because he went through a difficult life where his grandma had to give up what she wanted in order to put food on the table, it seems more likely that he would feel more sympathy for people who went through what he did. Concerning McCain, he might show a little bit more fairness to the people than Obama would, but also have more sympathy for soldiers because he was in the military.

Questions:
Is Demographics also practiced in different countries? When do the people of the state fill out a survey about all their household information?

The Lincoln-douglas Debates & The McCain v. Obama Debates

1. My group members and I had to continue with the topics from the Galesburg debates, further comments on the Dred Scott case, and slavery in the territories. Our main focus was the slavery views on both sides. We included quotes from both candidates and their particular personal views on slavery. From This Article Lincoln states his view quite clearly, he says, “I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races that I am not nor ever have been in favor of making voters of jurors of negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, not to intermarry with white people; and I will say in addition to this that there is a physical difference between the white and black races which will ever forbid the two races living together on terms of social and political equality...” Douglas questions Lincoln's statement about the superiority of whites over blacks. He made the point of asking, what the point of a Declaration of Independence was, if men like him are just going to keep twisting the words to what he wants them to sound like.

2.Regarding the Presidential and Vice Presidential 2008 debates, I think that the candidates are very repetitive on their views. I haven't seen any new idea either of them have brought up. My overall feeling about it is, "I'll see what happens once one of them gets in office." I mean to me their being honest and quite clear, I just don't see anything really taking place until one of them is president of the United States. If I were to compare them to the Lincoln-Douglas debates I think that a big difference is definitely the time. These days the time is so much shorter than the hour and a half Lincoln and Douglas had. I really don't think that Obama and McCain could do as well with 90 minutes of talking without repeating their sentences at least double what they already do. On the other hand, if Lincoln and Douglas had to speak for only 2 minutes, they would look at us as less intelligent because our focus is not on them speaking as much as it is who's winning the election. So both ways I think would be difficult for both sides.

Sexism Then and Now

Cleaning...like always.

Sexism is the belief that one sex is inferior to the other. It had quite an effect on the people in the time the civil war took place -particularly women. During the Civil War, which lasted from 1861-1865, women had more responsibilities after their husbands went to war. They did the normal cooking, cleaning, and sewing, but on top of that, they also had to defend their homes from enemy troops that were in town. What this meant was that they were basically taking on both roles of the man and woman. Although they weren't necessarily shunned as people, woman were looked down upon because of their sex.


Even though womens' rights weren't yet established, there were still a couple of those who weren't afraid to stand up for their beliefs. One woman who sparked ideas about women standing up for themselves was Sojourner Truth. In her book “ Ain't I A Woman,” she says, “Nobody ever helps me into carriages, or over mud-puddles, or gives me any best place! And ain't I a woman? Look at me! Look at my arm! I have ploughed and planted, and gathered into barns, and no man could head me! And ain't I a woman?” She's simply making the point that it doesn't matter what it is we do as people, we're all equal no matter what. A few of the disadvantages women had were not being allowed to vote, married women had no property rights, husbands had legal power to imprison their wives or beat them, and their self-confidence and self -respect was robbed from them and were made dependent on men.


In today's society, sexism seems more demeaning than it was back during the Civil War. Women are like toys these days. They're used to advertise products in various mens' magazines. Music videos are constantly being made “better” through the exposure of women's body parts and video games are displaying inappropriate images of women that unfortunately make young boys think that it's alright to think of women as less important than men. Even though women actually have higher more rewarding positions in the work force than they did back in the 19th century, there seems to be a lower level of respect for them today.



For example, a girl at this Roman Catholic high school in Alabama who was pregnant was forbidden to go to her own graduation ceremony and was told to no longer attend the school for “safety reasons.” Not only that, her name wasn't even put on the graduation program. So, instead of receiving her diploma in the traditional way of walking up to the teacher and getting it in front of everyone, her counselor decided to bring it to her house. But that's not all, the father of her baby, who was also a senior, was allowed to be in the graduation ceremony. There's sexism everywhere, sometimes it's more subtle than other times but it is definitely an apparent issue in this economy of ours.

Sources:


The Raw Story, Dara Parvis



Video Game Curse, Mark Hurst, Tarrytown, N.Y., June 23, 1997


Sojourner Truth Quote, Sojourner Truth (1797-1883): Ain't I A Woman?Delivered 1851Women's Convention, Akron, Ohio

Marbury vs. Madison Case

Through this case, individual rights rose to the top. William Marbury sued James Madison, who was secretary at the time, as a way of forcing him into delivering his comission as a justice of the peace. According to The Madison Archives, Marbury also had the authority of declaring acts of the President as well as declare them unconstitutional. Because of his authority, the courts became the arbiter of the Constitution and the Supreme Court became the goverment's "right hand man", and has been that way ever since. However, from what I read, it seems clear to me that Marbury is using his power to get what his wants as a federalist.

Blogicon Reflection

What am I Most Proud of My Blog? Why?
The part about my blogs that I felt most proud of were the connections I made about history and my personal opinions. I felt like bringing my opinion into the blogs, gave readers a better sense of where I stood on various topics.

What Would I Like to Improve? How?
Next Time, I would like to improve on choosing topics that I'm more familiar with so that I could write more about that topic and readers get a clear picture of what I'm talking about so that they aren't struggling to figure out what my topics are. I plan to do this by simply thinking about a current topic that I understand and relates to our assigned blog somehow.

How Can We Better Connect Our Blogs?
As a class, I think that talking about our blogs and stating the types of things were going to incorporate could be helpful to students. This way, we can all get an idea of what everyone's doing.

What does McCain Say to Abortion?

Does McCain Want to Ban All Abortions?
Brooks Jackson
September 8, 2008

Thesis: McCain believes abortion is necessary in cases of the mother being raped, incest, or her life is at stake.
Class connection: In this article, it is clear that Senator John McCain supports abortion only partly. From an interview he had on January 30, 2000, he stated that all abortions should be banned. Two weeks after this interview, he says that he wants it to be in the law that abortion can only happen under certain circumstances. My question to this is, how do we know as people under him, that he will not change his mind again? Even though he wasn't running for office at this time, he already seemed to do what most people do when they run for office, which is to sugarcoat what they say to make it sound pleasing to their audience. But from my view, I think that that they should be telling the truth from the getgo, whether people like it or not. It's a better method because once they're in office, people don't have to question their word. I believe, it's better to loose with the knowledge that you told the truth, rather than loosing knowing that you lied just because you thought that the happiness of the people is better than their safety.

Here's a copy of John McCain's interview from January 30, 2000:

Russert (Jan. 30, 2000): A constitutional amendment to ban all abortions?

McCain: Yes, sir.

Russert: You're for that?

McCain: Yes, sir.

Russert: If, in fact, all abortions were banned in America ...

McCain: I understand.

Russert: ...under President McCain ...

McCain: Understand.

Russert: ... let's look at our country. What would happen to a woman who had an abortion? McCain: Obviously, it would be illegal, but I would not prosecute a woman who did that. I would think that it would be such a terrible trauma that -- but I would not make those abortions available or easy as they are today in America

Here's a copy of his debate with Bush on February 15, 2000:

McCain: George, do you believe in the exemption in abortion, case of abortion, for rape, incest and life of the mother?

Bush: Yes, I do. I do.

McCain: Then, you know, it's interesting, you were talking about printed material that's mailed out. Here's one that says that George W. Bush supports the pro-life plank. The pro-life plank.

Bush: I do.

McCain: Yes. So in other words ...

Bush: Yes ...

McCain: ... your position is that you believe there's an exemption for rape, incest and the life of the mother, but you want the platform that you're supposed to be leading to have no exemption.

Bush: Yes, but ...

McCain: Help me out there, will you? ...

Bush: The platform talks about – it doesn't talk about what specifically should be in the Constitutional amendment. ... The platform speaks about a Constitutional amendment. It doesn't refer to how that Constitutional amendment ought to be defined.

Sources:Republican National Committee, "2008 Republican Platform," Sep 2008; 51.

Transcript, NBC Meet the Press 30 Jan 2000.

Transcript, CNN's Larry King Live, South Carolina Republican Debate
15 Feb 2000.

Transcript, ABC This Week 19 Nov 2006.

FactCheck

Blacks+Whites=Inequality

Amnesty International USA/ADA Law
Action for Human Rights. Hope for Humanity
Racial Profiling

Thesis: Discrimination against race, religion, ethnicity or nationality, makes human rights and each individual's freedom pointless because they're being broken anyways.
This topic connects to the Declaration of Independence in the way that the colonies wanted separation due to the violations of human rights and as we see in this topic, human rights seem to be broken everywhere. The Declaration of Independence states that "All men are created equal and that they are endowned by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness." This should be a guide that we refer to before jumping to conclusions and judging someone because of either their race, religion, ethnicity, nationality, or abilities. When the government makes laws, it is our duty as citizens or non-citizens to follow them because then what's the point of a rule that is not going to be followed. Life needs rules, without them this world would be chaotic and there would be no real order to anything. So when it comes to Human Rights, I believe we should think twice before we judge someone about their physical or spritual being. Everyone's different and unique in their own way, so who are we to judge them before we even know their capabilities? On the otherhand, ADA Watch is an example of the other side of this ongoing issue. It is an ammendment act that George Bush has made the first human rights law for people with disabilities. In my opinion, as Americans, it seems as though we're becoming more fair in terms of giving people chances to prove themselves in the workfield.

Lawyer/President

Signers of the Declaration of Independence
John Adams
Sources: PFG, EA

The most interesting thing that I've studied so far in Humanities is about John Adams, specifically about his views on standing up for those who are innocent rather than guilty. I liked the fact that he stood up for what he thought was right rather than what other people would think of him. Adam said himself that, "No man in a free country should be denied the right to counsel and a fair trial, and convinced, on principle, that the case was of utmost importance." He felt as though it was his duty to take on a case because he was in fact a lawyer. But he also wanted to show Britain a new way of fighting for what he believed in, and a fair trial was his way of showing them that fighting with weapons solves less than fighting with words.

US History

Federalist's Action Towards Environment

The Truth about Obama and McCain on Energy
July 28, 2008
The Democratic Party
[ABC News , 6/26/08]

Thesis: Senator McCain believes that even though offshore drilling might not help those who are struggling, it'll help boost his campaign through donations.
Class Connection: This connects to our class because as a federalist, he cares about a strong central government under the U.S. as a whole, rather than a non-federalist who believes more in state's rights than the governments'. Dealing with the issue of offshore drilling, McCain seems a bit absorbed in himself. I don't see how he thinks a move like that will make people want to support him:especially, if they're the struggling ones. In the second paragraph, Governor Schwarzenegger states that, "Anyone Who Tells You That Ending The Ban On Offshore Drilling Will Lower Gas Prices "Anytime Soon Is Blowing Smoke."
My Response: Personally, I don't think McCain is going about this topic the right way because offshore drilling will only continue to raise gas prices, which the majority of people aren't happy about and from what I read, who wants a president who only cares for himself, and no one else. How far will that take America? I think it topics like these that should raise a red flag in our minds and cause us to question America's future.

Democrats.Org

A Struggling Economy

Obama attacks Republicans over convention
By Andrew Ward in St Paul
Financial Times, September 5th, 2008

Thesis: Last Friday, Obama brought it to the people's attention that America's economy is struggling. During his campaign, he accused his opponent John McCain that the policies that he has made will fail because they've failed these last 8 years George Bush has been in office.

Connection: Although it is a bias statement Obama made, I think he has a good reason backing it up. It is true that the policies Bush said he would take care concerning the economy have not been taken care of and since McCain is promising so many things, I don't get a clear picture of exactly how he's going to stop the economy from struggling. I feel this connects to the Enlightenment because Obama made a statement and had reason backing it up.

www.ft.com

A Maverick Who Now Must Lead
Roger Simon
Friday September 5th, 2008, Yahoo News

Thesis:Our purpose as republicans is to make a change somehow. Once we give into corruption then we loose the trust of American citizens.

Class Connection: I believe that this article represents life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness because John McCain is making an effort to gain America's trust and doesn't want a bad reputation-especially since he wants to be in office. He also quotes that "Nothing brings greater happiness in life than to serve a cause greater than yourself."

My Response: I believe that John McCain's statement is smart because he seems to be looking out for what the people want rather than just the government. On the other hand, he also seems to be wishy washy on important topics such as abortion and gay marriages.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/20080905/pl_politico/13182