Gun Control

Tuesday will be an influential day for the Supreme Court. One of the biggest cases in many years will come in front of the justices, and the topic of choice will be a controversial one - gun control. The Court will aim to decide two major issues: whether strict state and local gun control laws are unconstitutional becuase they might violate the "right to keep and bear arms," and whether an individual's right to own a weapon extends beyond federal jurisdiction. Diane Latiker supports a law in Chicago that prohibits the owning of a handgun, while Otis McDonald is fighting this very law in court. The main purpose of the law currently is to try to prevent violence between people. Handguns are the most easily hidden firearms, making them perfect for violence in small crimes. For this reason, the Supreme Court decision could have a large impact on whether or not violent crimes are related to gun control. The main reason that the Supreme Court is trying this case now is becuase the Court at this time has a conservative majority. The conservative views of the Court might outweigh the liberal views on this desicion, ultimately creating a precedent with less gun control than currently noticed. This is a good issue to go to the Supreme Court, because it needs to be decided. It will be interesting to see what happens. The link to the article is here.

No Legislation for 2010

It is only February in the new year of 2010, but still almost no large decision has been made by Congress yet this year. The scary thing is that this trend could carry for the rest of the year. Some political scientists and political observers of the legislative scene say that the gridlock that is now being experienced could continue all of the way until the mid-term election. This is because both parties cannot get a solid grip on any issue, and neither party will side with the other on any matter that is debatable. The democrats are not afraid to take chances that might alienate the voters, because they know that their time is ending in Congress if no changes are made in our government. However, republicans know that if the democrats don't do anything until the mid-term elections, they will likely lose the incumbent race for reelection. This means that if the republicans make it so that nothing happens in Congress for the rest of the year, the republicans will gain many a number of seats. Then they will attempt to follow their own plan for Congress. This is not good news for any American that wants to see change in the important issues of the nation. One party wants to change things, but not for the right reasons. The other party does not want to change things, also not for the right reasons, however. It's basically one giant stalemate in which neither side has their head screwed on straight. They do not realize that what they are going on each side looks bad to the general public. It's only a matter of time before we have a third party enter the equation, if the two that are here cannot pick up the slack of their ideals.

Important Census

The 2010 Census Can perhaps be considered one of the most important in recent history. With public support of President Obama well below 50 percent, it does not take a stretch of the mind to believe that the public will not reelect some of his Democratic counterparts in the 2010 midterm elections. Why does the Census tie into this? Because with the Census comes redistricting and reapportionment. This means that a truly nonpartisan process ends up become extremely partisan - it is truly a battle to see how much representation certain parts of the country should have. This battle translates into a battle for House and Senate seats between the two parties in the U.S. In a sense, this could either be really bad for the Obama administration, or extremely good. If redistricting favors democratic populations, then Obama bad popular support might not turn into a bad turnout for the democratic party on election day. However, if redistricting favors republican populations, the Obama administration will lose even more seats in the House and Senate than they are already going to. This would translate into disaster. I feel that it is quite the coincidence that the Census fell on probably one of the most important mid-term elections in recent history. With a republican majority in the House and Senate, and a democratic President, it's likely that we could see stalemate for the next two years. The link to the article is here.

Applied Miranda Rights

One of the precedents set under the Miranda vs. Arizona case is the fact that a criminal has the right to know he has the right to an attorney , and they have the right to remain silent until a lawyer is present. In a recent criminal case, Michael Shatzer was questioned for the first time during an investigation, but denied answering any questions until he had an attorney present. The case soon went cold, and Shatzer sat in jail for another three years. When more information on the case was found, police soon went back to question Shatzer. This time, he waived his right to remain silent, but was not told of his right to an attorney. The police said that since he had known he could have an attorney present three years ago, he did not need to be read that right once again. The first court of appeals held that the court could not use Shatzer's confession because he had not known the right to an attorney. The Supreme Court overruled this, however, by saying that Shatzer never specifically requested an attorney for the second interrogation; the Court figured that Shatzer would remember he had the right to an attorney, even if the police did not read it to him for a second time in three years. In my opinion, Shatzer could have forgotten about his right to an attorney during the three year period, because three years is quite a long time. The police should have read him all of his rights again in order to keep all fairness the same.

Killer Not Heard by Supreme Court

In 1999, Paul Powell killed a 16 year old girl in the state of Virginia, but was only convicted of raping the girl's 14 year old sister when he was taken to trial. He was put into a long prison sentence. Thinking that he had somehow escaped the death penalty, Powell decided to brag about what he had actually done. Powell thought that because of the double jeopardy clause in the constitution, the state could not take him back to court for the same crime. This is true, but in the letter, Powell admitted to killing the 16 year old girl, a crime that he was not fully on trial for during the first go around. So the courts took a look at the entire case again (taking the new confession into account), and convicted Powell of rape and murder - he was thus sentence to death sometime in the near future. Powell appealed his case to the Supreme Court, because he thought that he was unjustly tried do to the double jeopardy clause of the Constitution. This is partly true, but the crime tried was partly different. For this reason the Supreme Court recently refused to hold a hearing for Powell's case. In this light, Powell now sits on death row, awaiting his turn for the lethal injection. The Court denied the appeal because of the fact that Powell's letter was basically a straightforward confession to guilt. After all, with the truth out in the public, it's hard for the courts to protect a lie. The truth must ultimately be heard if it is a truth. The link to the article is here.

Palin Continues to Talk

After Sarah Palin lost the 2008 election as the vice presidential candidate with Senator McCain, she resigned as the governer of Alaska. However, she continues to be an influential force in the actions of the GOP. With all of her free time, she seems to be making speeches at almost every important conservative convention possible. In May of this year, May 14th to be precise, she plans to speak at the National Rifle Association (NRA)'s annual meeting. The NRA, interestingly enough, is one of the most influential interest groups in the United States. By the transitive property of government, with Sarah Palin as the keynote speaker, Sarah Palin is therfore one of the most influential people in American government. Not suprisingly, she is currently one of the most, if not the most requested speaker in the United States of America. If this at all reflects what the public would think about her running for the White House in the 2012 election, it can be seen that there is almost no stopping her. With all the help that she will get from speaking at the NRA meeting in South Carolina (South Carolina is an early state in the primary elections), its almsot as if she will walk into the White House position. Then we might just see how downhill the world will go with her writing on her hand.

Poll - People Dissatisfied with Democracy

A recent poll done by CNN revealed that most people in the United States are dissatisfied with the way that democracy is working in our country. In my opinion, this is something that people should not say when regarding a poll. If you live in the United States, you should know that our democracy is so complicated that almost nothing gets done in a noticeable amount of time. But what people need to realize is the fact that this is the same democracy that unites us into one people, and protects all of our civil liberties and civil rights. The only reason that nothing seems to get done is becuase of our system of checks and balances. However, if these checks and balances were taken away, our freedoms would be threatened in the process. For this reason, if people are dissatisfied with the way that democracy works in the United States, perhaps they should move out of the United States. And I do not say this to be interpreted in a mean way - after all, this is probably what I'm going to do once I finish being a river guide/ski bum. Preferrably these people could move to a more effective democracy, and then it would be one less person cogging up the United States' system. After all, perhaps I will meet these people another country some day. That would be ironic.

Legislation Relying on Polls

This last year, the Democrats proposed a unique health care plan for the United States. The plan started out with a popularity that was over 50 percent in the polls. However, with confusion over the bill, that popularity soon dropped below 50 percent, and the current support for the bill is below 40 percent. Basically, Congress can do whatever it wants with the legislation it creates. However, if the public does not approve of decisions, the legislators will never get reelected at the state level. For this reason, public opinion is important in determining what Congress will pass. The goal of the Congress in the next year will be to raise the popular support for the health care bill so that it can be passed in some form in the future. Congress believes that the numbers in the polls must be raised by approximately five to ten percent in order to justify passing some kind of health care bill that looks like the Democrats' plan. So in reality, when I say that it will be the goal of congress to raise the support for the bill, it will really only be the Democrats trying to raise support. The Republicans will be doing the exact opposite, trying to shoot down any attempt to raise public support. One thing is for sure in this matter: if nothing happens in the next year, support for the both the Democrats and the Republicans will fall like a rock. Something must be done - even if it's not what everybody in the world wants or supports.

The Patriot Act

On Tuesday the United States Supreme Court hears cases about the controversial Patriot Act, and whether or not it violates people's freedom of speech and expression. The Patriot Act makes it illegal for any United States citizen to help a group deemed as a terrorist organization in any way. The interesting fact is that this not only includes aid in bomb making, combat training, etc, but that it also includes an American talking to a designated terrorist organization about how to resolve issues peaceably. The Humanitarian Law Project is involved in such activities. The president of the organization, Ralph Fertig, has been arrested the the United States government many times. He is arguing that the government has no constitutional right to punish somebody for promoting peace in an international incident. Perhaps the most complex part of this case is whether or not the actions of this organization and others like it actually do more harm than good. Even though they may be attempting to push peace, do their actions eventually endanger the United States. Endangering the United States seems to be the primary issue. In my opinion, a group should be able to talk to a terrorist organization in a peaceful manner as long as those talks do not endanger the United States in almost any way. The only problem is that this is a hard thing to judge and enforce. The link to the article is here.

Cadillac Health Care

As the government attempts once again to reform health care, President Obama made it clear recently that one thing should be included in the new plan. This is the inclusion of an excise tax on high-cost health care plans. The point of this tax is not really to make money for the government (the income would not actually be that great), but rather to make people look for the less expensive, untaxed health care plans. The idea is that when people have these less expensive plans, doctor visits may cost more than what people are used to; this is supposed to make both doctors and patients more conscious about what procedures and tests are done. If health care costs are not covered completely by less expensive insurance, people will think twice before flooding the emergency room with visits. In a way this makes sense, but to me it does not seem like a logical thing to do. The doctors are getting paid basically the same amount (now some of the cost is just out of the patients pocket), so why would they bother to change the examination and testing processes which they already have? I can see why the patient is more conscience of health care, because they are paying more, but the doctors have no incentive to change their practices. In this way, I think that all this tax would do is create more unneeded stress for the patient. I don't really think that a tax needs to be put in place to have patients buy cheaper health care, it just doesn't make sense. The link to the article is here.

Job Bill Passes

The last few months have been quite hard on Congress, and the Democrats in particular. Now, finally, the Democrats and the rest of Congress have something the cheer about - the passage of a jobs bill. The boost on hiring in the United States is expected to be modest, but the passage of the bill shows that a bipartisan agreement can actually be made on something. The GOP was planning to filibuster the bill, but five votes from Senate Republicans kept the bill from being filibustered; the bill ended up passing because of this. One of the key votes came from Republican Massachusetts Senator Scott Brown, who is quite new to the legislative process. One of the only reasons many of the other Republicans voted against the bill was because of the "heavy hand" method Democratic Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada used. Otherwise, support for this bill was quite strong. This fact is a relief, because it shows that Congress can actually come to a decision on some pieces of legislation. One can only hope that this progress is a good sign for partisan relations in the time coming. One thing that this shows is the fact that a small number of votes in the Senate can make quite the difference - only a few people need to be swayed in order to create a majority. This thought makes a stalemate in the Senate all the more interesting. The link to the article is here.

Lawmakers on "Don't Ask Don't Tell"

The "don't ask don't tell" policy of the United States Military has been a law for almost seventeen years. For this reason, lawmakers are questioning what might happen if they lift the policy and allow gays to openly participate in the military. President Obama believes that if somebody wants to serve their country patriotically, they should not be limited to this right just because of their sexual orientation. The lawmakers do not see the policy as so cut and dry, however. Many Congressman want to talk to the service executives about what it would take to make the transition smoothly. Many of the service chiefs currently say that any plan to allows gays and lesbians to openly participate in the military must be thoughtfully executed. This entire issue falls into the realm of civil rights which we are learning in class. In essence, this issue is an example of a group of people (homosexuals) lobbying for their right to serve in the military of the country that they love. Of course, there are probably many gays and lesbians already serving time in the armed forces without openly admitting it. Withdrawing the "don't ask don't tell" policy would allow these people to openly celebrate what they have been doing for their country in a proper, truthful manner. It seems like a great possibility that this case makes it to the court systems in order to decide whether this civil right behind the decision applies in this situation. The link to the article is here.