President Elect Obama!

So Obama won!!! I didn't actually vote for Obama, but I'm actually really excited he won... Although it's getting pretty annoying hearing all of my friends comment on how he won and how my guy lost, I'm really happy to see him as our new President. I think I'm actually more excited to see what he'll do. To see how he'll make sense out of all of this. Another thing I'm waiting to see is if he'll keep to his platform and if he'll actually do what he said he would. Now, that he's going to be President and the majority in Congress is Democrat, if nothing gets done or passed, all the blame goes to them. At the same time, when, if* change occurs, they get all the glory.

I Hate Lines...

Is the voting system outdated. In reading the post someone wrote about Recount and with the election coming up, it makes you wonder how the whole process works. I saw the movie as well and found myself getting really upset as to why they couldnt just count every vote again. The way the whole system is organized is basically that its not organized. When I went to vote, the lines were ridiculous and so you'd think there would be organization when so many people were involved. They had it by last names and of course I was stuck in the longest line. They then started to split the lines and at one point there were like 5 lines, so meanwhile while i was waiting for 2 hours, someone who had just shown up 15 minutes prior got in just because their last name started with an "H". I know it seems petty, but little things like that discourage people, especially people who have things to do like go to class or work...

Bailout

The whole country thinks the economy is struggling in the U.S. right now, but are we actually struggling? We are freaking out because of stock prices going down and bonds not being worth much, but we can all make some adjustments to make it easier. Are we just being greedy and selfish? What a lot of people are really concerned about is not getting the same luxuries they used to get before. No one is going hungry, no one is starving more because of this? Then there is this bailout plan, that Bush of all people created... We'll just keep on loaning ourselves money and letting th eproblem get worse... Maybe instead of giving more money to people to spend (in which case they'll probably save) we can cut prices on things, get the economy going again without having to use money we don't have.

To Vote or Not to Vote? Part II

Something that goes hand in hand with my last post concerns something else I heard. My mom's friends are extremely pro-life, and thats what they're basing who they're voting for on. In telling one of my friends this, she stated that that was a stupid reason to base your decision on and I was a little annoyed at her comment. Who is she to say what issue is more important? I believe that if there is an issue you feel strongly about, you run on it. Some people care more about the economy and they vote congruent to that belief and others feel strongly about abortion...

But am I being a hypocrite by saying this? Can't the same be said for those who vote for a certain candidate because his opponent is too old? or his opponent is black? Is there a line we can draw that distinguishes between what's appropriate and relevant when you vote?

Leadership

After learning about leadership and the different roles leaders can have, I began to wonder whether we'd ever have leaders like they did back then. I know the circumtances are different and I guess less extreme, but can't we get leaders like RFK or MLK? or even FDR! It seems like the economy is in a recession and if not will be very soon, so can't we get the boost they gave the country when they were alive? Do leaders with such enthusiasm and passion exist anymore? The most passion we get is from Obama and even his speeches don't seem that sincere... I feel like leadership has a lot to do with its followers (obviously) but not just in the sense with them following but how they respond. Someone who follows MLK is not the same as someone who follows Obama. Although they're both leaders in their own respect, the attachment seems so much deeper and heartfelt than any Obama fan... If leaders were able to lead like they use to, can't it be said there'd be more followers?

To Vote or Not to Vote?

I'm not sure whether I should vote or not... Election day is fastly approaching and I'm still on the fence as to whether I should vote. I read a lot about politics and have been following pretty intensely with how the election has been unfolding and I can honestly say, I'm not impressed with either candidate. I know I wouldn't vote for Obama, but I'm not the biggest fan of McCain either, so should I just call it quits and not vote? A lot of people say that I should vote regardless because every vote counts and blah blah blah, but what good would my vote be if it isn't sincere? In all honesty, I probably will vote because we're able to vote on other issues and candidates (at lower levels) in spite of the presidential nominees (which I've also done research on and have stronger ties to) but what about those uneducated (by uneducated I don't mean a formal education, just about the election in general) voters, who should they vote for? Should they even vote?

I was speaking with a friend (who's totally and completely against gay rights), who mentioned she was voting for McCain. To summarize the gist of her reasoning, she said it was because he was republican and apparently republicans have some loyalty to opposing homosexuals. Well in all actuality, with gay rights (in terms of same-sex marriage), Obama, as well as McCain are opposed. In speaking to her, this seemed to be the only issue she cared about (or at least knew anything about) and yet the outcome would of been the same (in terms of gay rights) regardless of who won. Yet after telling her about this, she still said she was voting for McCain.

Should people like her, unaware to facts or anything for that matter be allowed to vote?

I've heard people say they're voting for Obama because he's black and I've heard people say they're voting for McCain because Obama's black? Wtf?! I know that everyone has the right to voice their opinions, and yes, we live in a democracy, everyone has a right to vote and thats all swell, but I don't want some uneducated voters risking my future well-being on their prejudices, indifference and/or ignorance.

Obama v. Palin? Shouldn't it be Obama v. McCain???

Most Democrats have decided that Palin's biggest drawback is her supposed lack of experience but this seems a little ironic to me considering their Presidential candidate barely has any either.


OBAMA:
He was a community organizer, an attorney and a professor before his public office career. He spent 8 years as Illinois Senator where in his spare time he continued to teach law as a professor at the University of Chicago (life as a Senator must be very time consuming) and started serving the U.S. Senate in 2005, most of which was spent running for President.

PALIN:
Served 4 years in City Council and served 6 years as the mayor. She was the first female governor of Alaska and has substantial experience in private-sector management. She has actually made decisions and formed budgets.

Palin has executive experience which I believe is worth more when considering their running for an executive position and in comparing the two, she has more executive experience than Obama has legislative and executive experience combined. I'm not saying she's more qualified, given her lack of knowledge reagrding foreign policy, I'm just saying that neither seem fit to be President. I've noticed that when people are comparing how little experience Palin has, they always compare her to Obama. With this tactic, it seems to me that those who claim Obama has more experience than her, they are just trying to mask the fact that he is just as inexperienced as Palin. If you haven't noticed, I am comparing Obama to Palin, but truth is, if you compare Obama to McCain, McCain would have the edge hands down (at least in terms of experience).

Affective Forecasting

In one of my classes we were discussing affective forecasting. It dealt with how people felt about certain things and whether they would guess right when attempting to make guesses as to how they would feel in the future. In one of the experiments it showed that people tend to look at the differences when making a decision and use that to telll whether they'd be happier in the future. So if I were choosing two homes and decided to pick one because it had a bigger yard, I'd choose that one because I think in the future it would make me happier. What the results showed though was that people more often than not don't accurately predict their future happiness. In fact, the people in the experiment ended up being more or less just as happy with their decision. You're probably wondering what this has to do with anything but my point is will people accurately predict which President will make them happier?

"Cold Calling"

In practically every commercial concerning the candidates, outsourcing, trade, American jobs, and the economy seem to be hot topics. So what exactly is the right solution? This post isn't necessarily to try to find which is better; to outsource or not to outsource, more international trade or less international trade - because of course they each have their pros and cons - but rather, it's how to lower the cons of each...

Many Americans advocate reducing trade because they think it would preserve more jobs here at home, but is that really the case? A couple of years ago, the government demanded a sugar quota wherein they reduced the amount of sugar imported into the U.S. in order to preserve jobs in the U.S. sugar industry. What happened was some candy firms were forced to close down because the price of sugar was way too high (in comparison to the world price) for them to continue their business. All in all, those who gained included the U.S. companies that produced the sugar but the U.S. companies that used sugar, their employees, and us as consumers lost out.

Outsourcing ss kind of a double edged sword, people are losing their jobs to global outsourcing, about 200,000 a year to be exact, but isn't it true that approximately 7 million jobs are gained and lost every year in the U.S., 30 million jobs are created as old ones are destroyed? Service sector jobs account for 70 to 80% of the jobs in the U.S. so can we really be doing that much damage by outsourcing? Outsourcing allows corporate owners to benefit, investors to benefit and most importantly, consumers to benefit. It saves money for the corporations since they're able to lower the expenses and it thus lowers the prices to consumers, in effect boosting the economy. Do we consider technological change a form of outsourcing? Why isn't that looked down upon if it has more or less the same effect? But then what about those who lost their job and don't have any training in any other field? Should they just be left to live in poverty because their job was shipped to another country for the sake of a cheaper commodity? Then we have the issue of the effect it has on other countries. Are we not, although not directly, promoting sweatshops, encouraging low standards of living to foreign nations? Is the solution to continue to outsource while also training more workers in the U.S. to occupy other jobs? Or should we just bring the jobs home and risk having to spend a higher price on goods?

A Black Guy or a Woman?

This post is similar to Noelle's in that it has to deal with the issue of not only race but prejudice in general. In this article, reporters went out to the surrounding cities of Detroit and got the opinions of those regarding who'd they vote for. One man stated "What kind of choice do guys like me have? A black guy or a woman, it's a lesser of two evils." To him it was basically voting for an old white man (who he thought would soon die and have the presidency given to a woman) who he coulnd't relate to or a black man who portrayed most of his ideals. In reading that, I got so annoyed at how ignorant people can be. I'm Hispanic and get rather upset when I speak to someone and they assume I'm some bleeding heart Liberal just because of my ethinicity. In the same respect, I don't think it's fair for Obama (or the country for that matter) to believe in him as a candidate because of all of his ideals and policies but not to be able to see past his color. I believe in Democracy and if the country wants what Obama stands for as something to run the country, then that should be the deciding factor, not the fact that he's black. At the same time, let's say McCain wins the presidency, who's to say that he won not because people believed in what he stood for, but because he was the only other option to a black man. It's not fair, but it's also not reasonable. Why on Earth would you vote for somebody who you think is going to tear your means of living apart when there is a perfectly good candidate that emphasizes your goals?

At the same time, many say McCain picked Palin because she is a woman. How is that fair to her to say that it's not the fact that she's done this or that for the country, just that fact that she's female is what is going to give her the ticket. It undermines her as a candidate and demeans her as a woman. When Clinton was running, the remarks made towards her dealt with gender identity politics so when she was called a "bitch," it wasn't about not liking her, but not liking her because she was a woman. And of course the only reason she got so far was because she received all the female votes. But in reality, when she ran, 35% of woman voted for Obama as opposed to the 30% that voted for her. Why is it so hard for people to believe that women can hold powerful positions because of their ability not because of some external factors that ultimately degrade their accomplishments?

I might be generalizing, but I think people focus entirely too much on the candidate and not on their platform. Of course, I understand that it is the candidate who is running, but they are running to represent a nation, not a gender and not a particular race.

What's Fair?

I've always been entertained by the media and how ridiculous it can be at times, but how necessary it is nonetheless. In class we discussed how the media is forced into playing the footage they do and how they must compete with other stations and although this may be true in some cases, I still blame the media for the lack of complete information they portray. To me, media, at least when it comes to mass politics, has a responsibility to inform the country. I honestly think, our country would be better off if people were more informed and were able to make educated decisions regarding our country. Although media stations do need to compete with each other, I don't think that's an adequate excuse for understanding why they can't give decent information and facts.

Something I do believe is somewhat out of the media's control which might explain why they relay stories that are rather trivial or biased at times is because of the ownership of the media sources. If GE is under some scrutiny and there was some news story that made GE look bad, it would most likely not be played on MSNBC due to the fact that it's owned by GE even if it's played on nearly every other station. There is this cycle of approval in which reporters, journalists, anchors, etc, don't do their job (that being adequate news stories) because of their ties to the companies that own the sources. These people want to maintain relationships with those in charge and this in turn affects the reporting. It leads to this sense of pressured journalism where they try to benefit or make more attractive those who are in control, and in no way would they want to alienate those who they should be loyal to.

In response to this, some have enforced standards for fair media but even this isn't necessarily fair. I don't think media should be unbiased, one because it's impossible to have objectivity with such an array of information where you can't possibly cover every story and two because things like equal time and equal credibility is just not fair. I know that sounds contradictory, but I believe that biased media is good media. Networks are known for leaning towards one side and as long as they tell the whole story from one side and the other side tells the whole story from their side, then you get what you need. I think it's up to the viewer, listener, reader not to have to necessarily do research on their own, but just to know that there are two sides to every story. I learned about "equal time" in the media and I think it's a ridiculous concept. Although it seems like a reasonable suggestion, it's not necessarily good. For instance, if talking about Global Warming, if it were according to the equal time rule, they would give someone who is informing us that the environmental crisis' we've been facing is due to global warming and then have someone counter it saying that it's an evolutionary climate change. Although there might be truth to the climate change argument, in reality, global warming is the cause, yet some will not know any better because they continue to emphasize both sides when one is clearly not right. Along with this, equality in media isn't always fair anyways. I don't remember what show is was, but it was on MSNBC and they were talking about the economy in response to the presidential candidates. They had commentators from both the Democratic and Republican side in order to expose some sort of impartiality, yet everytime the Republican spoke, he was completely cut off and interrupted. Instead of this kind of demonstration, can't they just show what the Democrat thinks about it and then let another station deal with Republicans side?

They Have Emotions Too...

We discussed in class "emotional contagion" and how emotions are a tool for promoting identification with a candidate. I thought this was very interesting because we tend not to realize or at least not acknowledge that we make decisions and act on behalf of emotions, which could in turn allow us to make very bad decisions and judgments about people.
The whole "framework" aspect of our discussion also caught my attention because it happens so frequently. I disagreed with the example used in class with the WTC and how they felt the RNC exploited the issue, because also being from NY, whenever 9/11 is mentioned, it stirs about an enormous amount of emotions within me and when it's brought up, I feel as though people acknowledge that it actually happened. In one of the videos we watched, they mentioned that 9/11 happened 7 years ago and seemed and seemed almost apathetic about it and I was almost hurt from the way in which they said it. In realizing this though, that one of my classmates who was also from NY felt that is was an exploitation whereas I totally disagreed I understood that candidates definitely play on their audience and their expectations.

Something not mentioned in class but I think is equally important is how a candidate's emotions affect us. If you contrast McCain to Obama, McCain is so indifferent in his sentiment that when he smiles it seems almost creepy and definitely forced, and it also gives signs that he doesn't seem sincere in what he's saying. Obama on the other hand, the emotion he portrays and the fervor he gives off makes whatever he says seem as though it's something he's passionate about. Although not an Obama supporter, (or McCain supporter for that matter) I'm always so amazed at his orating skills and how it gets me wound up even though I'm not one of his supporters. With this, can you imagine how heavy that plays on someone who is on the fence? Someone who isn't sure with way they're going will most likely see Obama's enthusiam and emotion as signs of someone who is concerned and who cares. At the same time though, for an avid supporter of the opponent, hearing a speech like Obama's might just annoy them and think he's exaggerating and completely artificial.

End of War... Right Part II

He says that his ability to withdraw the troops will allow him to help the economy and decrease the deficit, but even his supposed speedy removal wouldn't help the budget, if anything, refueling the military and restoring those countries is more likely to cost him.
And these families that are being hurt, I'm sure they'll be plenty happy when their sons and daughters and brothers and sisters and moms and dads come home just to be redeployed to Afghanistan. So yes Obama, of course we'd love to bring our troops back, but maybe you should inform the people that you plan on sending thousands of troops not only to Afghanistan but possibly and probably to Pakistan as well. He's ready and willing to invade a sovereign country, with an unwarranted attack which could not only undermine the country's stability, but create even more militancy.
Obama flip flops more than Kerry did and he does it whenever he deems relevant. It's nice to tell the American people that you want out of war for the sake of your campaign but then you also threaten to attack a country to show supposed strength as a leader.

End of War? Right...

One of the things Obama continues to rely on is his position on the war in Iraq. He claimed he would have the troops removed form Iraq within a 16 month time frame and in fact, thats what most people hear, but maybe they missed him not committing to removal of troops by 2013 in one of his recent debates. His smooth talking makes him a great orator but for those who are willing to listen, his talk is naive and insincere. He is all about getting the troops out because lives are being lost, families are being hurt, the economy is suffering, our resources are dimming, etc, etc...Let's take a look at what he hasn't said...
Since the resurgency, Iraq has changed for the better, there is less violence and troops are able to finally make progress there. Troops are now withdrawing and the forces in Iraq have been able to give more leadership positions to those in Iraq and in certain places are just there to overlook what's going on. And yes, Obama pledges not to maintain bases in Iraq, but he still wants to leave troops there. A "residual force" he calls it. Well if there isnt a reason to be in Iraq, then why does he feel troops should remain?