Mother Jones FEC: We Won't Treat Tea Partiers Like Jim Crow-Era NAACP Supporters

     This article by Andy Kroll appeared in Mother Jones online, today, November 21, 2013. The work presents the topic of the 3-2 rejection vote that was issued by the FEC (Federal Trade Commission) in response to an earlier request by the Tea Party group that their donors not be exposed by name to the public. Specifically, the filed petition was made on behalf of the Tea Party Leadership Fund which has received millions in private donations by around 600 individuals in just the past few years. The  demand was predicated upon a much earlier concession that was made for the NAACP years ago when it was feared that under the Jim Crowe laws, individuals who gave money to support causes could be at risk for racial hate crimes or other types of assault on their reputations or persons. Citing the potential for “harassment, threats, and reprisals,” the group claimed they should be due the same consideration. However, the argument failed to sway the FEC who rarely gives this type of exemption, and generally only for extreme situations. In essence the policy claim by the petitioners failed to convince the committee. By way of counter-argument and or rebuttal, opponents of the filing by the Tea Party pointed out that the evidence given to support their claim of threats to their personal safety and or actual damages was meager and failed to reach the level of requiring protective measures.      

http://www.motherjones.com/mojo/2013/11/fec-tea-party-exemption-jim-crow-naacp

a letter to Abercrombie

This article is mainly focus on the claim declared by A&F’s CEO - Mike Jeffries. In the pervious interview, he had affirmed that the clothing in A&F stored only designed for the pretty and thin people but not for the larger group. His affirmation implied that the larger group are not deserved to wear his clothing. This aroused considerable opposition and discontent from the public. Some people formed the facebook group to isolate this brand – A&F together; while others posted many article and video to criticize the claim of Mike Jeffries. This article uses the verbal irony, which is a discrepancy between the written meaning and the intended meaning, to criticize the claim of Mike Jeffries and ask the public to isolate the brand. I think using the irony is better then criticizing other directly since we can prevent using some meant and rude word, as well as some space can be leave to the audiences and readers to develop their imagination. 

http://redemptionpictures.com/2013/05/16/abercrombi/

A Modest Proposa - Keeping Higher Education Out of Reach

Dear Secretary Of Education Duncan:                                              November 21, 2013

                I am writing to you today with a plea that I know will hit close to home for you as a true American educational elitist. As a man who breathed the rarefied air of Harvard University, you also know better than most what a danger the status-seeking working proletariat poses to our blue-blooded Bourgeoisie life style. Your custom-made navy blue suits and bright red power neckties are the mark of a true aristocrat and I can tell by your recent verbal assault on whiney American soccer-moms and their pathetic plea to hold on to their meager education subsidies for their special needs children: that you know what is really important in America. What is important is maintaining the status quo, and keeping women, minorities, and yuppies away from the best America has to offer. After all, we know that the best educations, the best jobs, and the memberships in the top country clubs around the U. S. of A, belong to people like you and I. What would become of this great country if every poor schmuck with a Harley Davidson t-shirt addiction, a Walmart credit card and an affinity for Big Macs could actually presume to achieve post-secondary educational success? What would happen to the land of Wall Street and Brooks Brothers if everyone could afford to drive a BMW?! Well, I am sure that you agree that the connotations are too horrific to even ponder. We simply cannot have it. No we must take a stand and we are depending on you Mr. Duncan and your delicious disregard for all things common to send a message and do it now. We beseech you Mr. Secretary to do the right thing and be true to your ivory-tower roots. Help us keep “Class,” in the American collegiate classroom, and keep post-secondary educational options out of the hands of the working class. We both know that this  is for their own good and even more – the good of our America.

                                Sincerely,

                                Michele Malone (Dobin)

                                Chairwoman – KHEOOR (Keeping Higher Education Out of Reach)  

  

A modest proposal

The government shutdown was needed, they work too hard in Washington, heck they do not even spend much money. I’m sure the NSA did not take any time off though, and I am positive the United States citizens don’t want them to have any time off. The people find it critical that the NSA is watching every conversation they have, how could they take a week off from their very own reality television show. They couldn’t go a day without knowing my personal schedule and what I am going to eat for lunch. I guessing they have nothing better to do than watch all of our personal lives. I’m sure during the time off the government officials spent all their time making sure everything was going to be perfect once they got back to work. They obviously worked their tails off to get Obamacare going, I mean they had a lot of time. Unfortunately, they forgot to do one minor thing. They didn’t make the website completely operational. To me that does not seem like a terribly important thing, but I guess some Americans were disappointed when they could not get there health insurance figured out, and possibly spent a day or so uninsured. While it seems people are always blaming the government for things like taxes, health care, wars, and spending, I don’t think we should get mad at least their trying right? It should be like kindergarten, they didn’t win, but they should still receive a participation trophy. Everyone deserved a few days maybe even a few weeks off, but not everyone could get one, so naturally the Government took the vacation time. What could happen anyway, it’s only the government?

Article Evaluation: Oprah Plays Obama Race Card from the Canada Free Press Website (also discussed on Fox News)

http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/59279

While traveling, I saw a snippet on the news (believe it was Fox News) discussing Obama’s current approval ratings and how some believe his lower ratings are due to Obama’s race, being African American.  I wanted to hear more so found an article in the Canada Free Press which reports that Oprah Winfrey, during a recent BBC interview commented on a recent statement made by Republican Congressman (Joe Wilson-South Carolina) who called the President a “liar” due to the recent Affordable Health Care Act issues.  Winfrey stated, “…there is a level of disrespect for the office that occurs and that occurs in some cases and…maybe because he’s African American”.  The author of this article took the stance that comments like this is “pure hogwash” and Obama has “…received preferential treatment from the media because of his race and liberal policies”.  I believe the article had a majority of value claims as he makes statements around the fact that the President’s race has nothing to do with how his approval ratings are and how many republican presidents had to do with constant attacks from the Left, such as Regan and W. Bush.  Another opinion he states which leads me to believe this is a value claim is that he says the president, “…fumbled the rollout of ObamaCare.  Clearly, he did not fumble because of racism in the country; it was due to his administration’s utter incompetence and the waste, fraud and abuse that characterize ObamaCare and every government program.”

 

 

 

Australian kangaroo exporters look to hop into meat-hungry China

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/11/19/us-australia-china-kangaroo-idUSBRE9AI07820131119

Australian officials are claiming there is a great market for selling kangaroo meat as a luxurious and exclusive product to China. Grounds are China has a fast growing middle class with a growing meat consumption with the increased personal cash flow in that middle class. Warrant being most Australians will not eat it and usually has just been seen as a pet food ingredient. This also factors in a little bit of an argument by dilemma. Kangaroos are not farmed-not allowed to be in Australia. They are hunted only from the wild (except for those ones in sanctuaries and zoos) and right now there is a lack of grazing area, due to drought,  between the healthy populations of kangaroos and cows. There are already some Chinese buyers willing and ready to accept this new delicacy(for them) although it is not official and legal yet. As I see it in the way it was explained, it is like hunting a deer and if there is a place the meat can go to be beneficial rather than wasted why not as long as I don't have to eat it.

Terrified Obama Trapped Inside Healthcare.gov Website

http://www.theonion.com/articles/terrified-obama-trapped-inside-healthcaregov-websi,34615/


This article uses satire to point out the flaws in the Healthcare website by saying that Obama was trapped inside the mainframe when he was trying to figure it out. They used the cluttered mayhem occurring inside the website to serve as a symbol for the confusion that people are facing when they are trying to navigate through it on a daily basis. They use adjectives such as "indecipherable"to describe the information that is flying past the trapped President, actually representing the information that is presented to the American public. After searching through the website, the author stated that Obama found a "crumbling" core, possibly referring to the core of the Healthcare act, even though it is a good idea.

A Modest Proposal

As I rolled out of bed this morning, I did what any college aged girl would do; I checked my phone to see if anything drastic had transpired online from the hours of 2:00 to 9:00. And, as usual, something groundbreaking and downright earth shattering did occur. Miley Cyrus shaved her eyebrows. I am unsure as to how the earth today is still going on as planned, since all if could see scrolling down my newsfeed was sheer panic and confusion as to why she would do something to drastic.  Then again, things of this magnitude of importance happen every day in our society, we need to start getting used to it. I am unsure as to what the world is coming to these days, I mean, the older generations had life so easy. Everyday I have to stomach through the tragic stories of one celebrity breaking up with another, or someone having a stain on their designer dress during the premiere of the fourth sequel of a movie. Forget the Cold War or any of the World Wars, the war of greatest importance was the feud between team Aniston and team Jolie, fighting to see who would win the heart of Brad Pitt. The celebrities that we invest so much time in are genuine and reliable role models and it is of vast importance that we spend the majority of our time worrying about them and their taxing lives. After all, thats all anyone should inspire to me. 

A Modest Proposal

Average Starbucks workers should not have had to gone to court over tips. Average Starbucks workers should not have to now abide by a law forcing them to share tips with their shift supervisors. It is bad enough the average Starbucks worker is only working part-time and in those part-time hours slaving away at grinding coffee beans and concocting Frappuccino’s for the much better off average American consumer. How dare a law be put into effect that these people, treated almost as sweatshop workers be forced to share a pittance of a tip left by a kind soul or two. Even worse is that it has to be shared with a person under the title of “Shift Supervisor”. A worker that only works part-time as well, grinds coffee beans, concocts and serves Frappuccino’s to those important people coming through the door but has the luck of getting the task of juggling everyone’s schedules for the week and keeping the work day run smoothly. So unfair to share tips with a fellow part-time worker that, if even, is paid probably only 50 cents more than that average Starbucks worker due to  the privilege of having more stressful responsibilities. Average Starbuck worker if this is unsatisfactory and unfair for you, as it should be, take a stand and do something about it by working at a place like McDonalds…where there are no tips. No tips, no legal battles to fight over sharing.


http://www.suntimes.com/business/23912121-420/appeals-court-in-ny-sides-with-starbucks-over-tips.html

A Modest Proposal

For this assignment, I will be re-writing a letter that was sent to Senator John Kline from one of his constituents, asking the Senator to “live like the rest of us.”

This is the link to that letter: http://www.mnfaireconomy.org/2012/07/constituents-ask-u-s-representative-john-kline-to-raise-the-minimum-wage-live-like-the-rest-of-us/

November 21, 2013

The Honorable John Kline

United States House of Representatives

101 West Burnsville Parkway, #201

Burnsville, MN 55337

Dear Representative Kline,

As you know, the federal minimum wage hasn’t been raised since July 24, 2009. In 2007 you voted against that increase. Since then, our economy has collapsed and more and more of your constituents are struggling economically.  

I am one of those constituents and I am writing to you today to ask that you continue to vote against an increase in the minimum wage. It might be difficult for you to imagine what $290 a week might look like. Because of that, I would love to highlight some of the stimulating challenges of this lifestyle.

I am writing to you today in support of your continuing disapproval of raising the minimum wage. I appreciate that I can rely on you to keep the minimum wage below what data shows to be an inaccurate amount if the rate of inflation over the years were to be considered. Some of those daydreamers would argue that it should be at least $10.74 per hour. However, I am a minimum wage earner and I think the struggle to keep up with rent, tuition, and cost of living is a fun challenge. Some negatively-minded minimum wage earners might say it is impossible. I like to think though, that nothing is impossible. I live for the decision to decide between milk or yogurt for the week – because buying more than one dairy product a week is not in my budget. See, it’s little things like knowing where you stand economically that make life worthwhile.

Some of your constituents must not understand the necessity of a good budget. And by budget I mean sometimes going without luxurious amenities like electricity or following the social rule that you must eat three meals a day.  I say we forget about that large population of minimum wage earners, aka those naysayers, and let the survival of the fittest live through this exciting struggle.

It has been brought to my attention that some of these naysayers have suggested that you live on a minimum wage budget. I, however, think you should continue to live your lifestyle. The lifestyle that is free of struggle and choices. You should continue to be able to afford more than one dairy product a week, for dairy helps build strong bones – and your constituents need a strong representative.

I would like to thank you in advance for you time and consideration. I also wanted to inform you that I do not expect a response. I am merely a minimum wage earner and do not deserve acknowledgement from someone of your economic standing.

Sincerely, and oh so humbly,

Alexandra N. Henderson

"A Modest Proposal": Alternatives to Abortion

            One of the main reasons that many people use as a reason to keep abortions legal is that they can terminate the pregnancy if they find out that their child will be born with a birth defect or disease.  Some people even think it is okay to do an after-birth abortion.  What about the people who do not get diseases until they are older? Once we find out that they have a disease, we should just kill them too, right?  Or why should we kill the children right away? Let’s wait until they’re older and kill them then!

            Another reason that I have heard a little bit of is that abortions are fine because it’s a way of reducing overpopulation.  If we want to reduce overpopulation, we could just start killing people once they hit a certain age.   We could just have an international law where once you get to your birthday of a certain age, someone is designated to snap your neck and get rid of you.  Sounds like a perfectly plausible option!

Another option we have is to have everyone have a restriction on the number of children they are allowed to have.  That would surely reduce overpopulation!  If we are killing babies by having abortions anyway, why not have them be mandatory after someone has a certain number of children?  If we see nothing wrong with abortions, why would we find anything wrong with this tactic?

There are so many options to face the problems that we use as an excuse for abortions being “okay”.  These solutions seem to make just as much sense to me as simply just keeping abortions legal.

A Modest Proposal: Children's Characters Drawing Em In Early

A Modest Proposal

 The packaging of many junk food items in our country features the beloved faces of various popular licensed cartoon characters such as SpongeBob SquarePants and Scooby Doo. This advertising tactic is SO effective with children! It’s beautiful to see how easy children can be manipulated into loving things that their favorite television and movie characters say are great. I propose that we use this tactic to lure child consumers into other markets where they are underrepresented. Where are the child consumers for products like cigarettes? Alcohol? Online gambling? So what if these things have age limits. Let’s start getting kids interested early so they can start purchasing when the time is right. Plus, there is ample research to suggest that children will try out these before they’re supposed to anyways, right? I think it’s time to teach kids what to smoke, what to drink, and what games to bet their money on. I mean come on! I for one think that children have a right to know something like… what’s the best scotch to drink. And who better to tell them that than Shrek? I mean, come on! First of all Shrek is Scottish, so it’s perfect. Scotch sold by the most famous Scottish cartoon character in the United States? Little boys and girls would LOVE that stuff. And Dora the Explorer, she goes on a lot of long walks. Doesn’t Dora ever need a cigarette while she is going from “la casa” to “la biblioteca”? Dora would definitely light up a Fortuna cig on one of her adventures, it’s one of the most popular Spanish cigarette brands around so you could even probably weave it into an episode, or two, or five without anybody really noticing! YAY for product placement! Gotta love it. I truly believe that it’s time to accept the fact that anything dangerous CAN in fact be kid-friendly under the right circumstances! Just add a cartoon character that they know and trust, and you my friend are golden. 

Modest Proposal

After taking power in March, the Chinese President Jinping Xi launched a high-profile anti-corruption campaign, vowing to catch both tigers and files – big and small corrupt officials. There are many campaigns in China, but this one appears to be the most vigorous since China opened up. By now, some corrupted officials have been caught. For example, the mayor of Nanjing, a major city in eastern China, was arrested on suspicion of accepting bribes worth about $3.3 million last month.

I feel so angry about this. My proposal is that please stop this stupid campaigns! This campaign is just like a rock standing in the way towards success or something. I cannot imagine that one day we Chinese could live in a society without corruption, which would be terrible since we have no way to get success. It is obvious that if you bribe somebody, you can get the door open. The more bribes, the higher opportunities. What do the students in China study so hard? To work for government or any other companies after graduation and accept the brides! That is obvious. So please stop that campaign and keep the corruption going on.

Modest Proposal

People who agree with corporal punishment think the corporal punishment is effective method for education. However, there are some ironies. In school, teachers teach that the violence is wrong behavior and hitting someone is the violence. Though the lesson, teachers hit the students in the name of the education. Students, especially kids, learn the behavior and word of their teachers. The students can think the violence based on reason is just and right. The most important thing is that the corporal punishment is putting the cart before the horse. The education is for students. Parents and teachers teach them and remedy their fault for children. However, the corporal punishment is not for children, but just for education. Children do not bad behavior because they are afraid of the corporal punishment. There is a line in a drama with Korean high school, “It means that you will only be nice when you are beat up.” A teacher says the line to his students who is heavy trouble maker. The corporal punishment make the strong person is the best. The teachers make students think the teacher and parents are objects of fear. That is not the effective method of “EDUCATION.” The corporal punishment is the effective method of “MAKING STUDENTS AND CHILDREN BE SHUT UP AND BE NICE.”

1st 3 Women Marines Graduate From Infantry Course

     With the Pentagon and the military actively pursuing expanding the roles of women in combat, much to the disdain of many male infantry Marines such as myself. The first three women have successfully graduated from Infantry Training Battalion East in Camp Lejuene, NC. While this is a pilot program and the females will not receive the military occupational specialty of Infantry. This was a milestone positive or negative nonetheless. Earlier this year 15 females attempted the subjectively harder Infantry Officers Course and all failed to pass, while three enlisted females out of 15 passed the enlisted equivalent. The article argues that this is a positive milestone in the history of the Marine Corps while many male infantrymen and other females recognize and argue through example and precedent that females are physically weaker than men as well as have special hygienic needs that men do not require. There are other that argue putting women into austere locals with men can have a negative affect on unit cohesion and combat effectiveness and that simply holding females to different physical standards as the Marine Corps currently does, shows that they are already unequal and that is not a bad thing. It is just a bad thing when you are doing the kind of work that is required of the infantry in general. Many argue that this is a political effort to have equality for all, when the simple facts remain that men and women are not built the same and have different strengths and weaknesses.

Modest Proposal

Modest Proposal

            Marijuana is a dangerous drug, for this reason we must abolish its use. Unlike alcohol, it destroys the mind, and creates waste of people. Most marijuana users don’t even drink alcohol! There is no connection between marijuana and mental illness, but that is not going to stop us from fighting it. Those who have symptoms of mental illness seem to benefit from marijuana, but that is not an excuse. We should imprison those who use marijuana, because we don’t have any issues with overfilling cells and how much it costs. It’s not as if taxing marijuana would help anyone, we don’t need the money. The cartel’s need a job, who is going to provide them with work? Dugs like heroin and LCD have disabled our youth, and drugs are drugs. Why would they call it drugs if it doesn’t hurt our youth? Although marijuana has never been shown to be addictive, we are concerned about the addictive properties in the drug. Marijuana users are poor and alcohol drinkers are less deprived, why do you think alcohol is legal? It is not legal because those with power employ laws, it is because alcohol has been proven to not have long term effects. Alcohol is simply not addictive, you can choose to just have one drink that is why it is an acceptable thing. Hopefully the United States never legalizes marijuana, because if we continue it as an illegal drug, then people will stop using it.

Modest Proposal

Qianying Ji

Daniel Horvath

COMM 1313W

11/21/2013

The Modest proposal：Haze in China affects people's normal life, so we should try our best to control air pollution

Nowadays in China, almost every city has haze, which is the result of air pollution. However, Chinese people really enjoy the haze that we have! First of all, the haze helps to stop other counties’ reconnaissance by spy satellites. The haze is the product of military strategic significance, since the other countries' military satellites cannot take our images of military drills anymore. In a long term, the haze prevents foreign invasion for us. In addition, haze is really a good tool of birth control. We do not need to worry about the one-child-only policy, because haze can let our population go down automatically. Also, haze accelerates human evolution. The genes of people who cannot resist PM 2.5 will extinct. Humans who have resistance genes will live. Therefore, we make contribution to prepare the future exploration of planets with atrocious atmospheric conditions. What’s more, the haze provides convenience for people’s life. Citizens do not need to buy curtains anymore, because no one can see through the haze. Also, if you run a few red lights accidentally, don’t worry. The monitor can not record your license plate number clearly and correctly. People will have better health conditions with haze occurs every day. The haze reduces the direct exposure to the sun's ultraviolet rays, and this helps to maintain good skin health. Given the fact that there are many people with myopia in China, people can wear respirators instead of glasses. Since even with glasses, we cannot see each other clearly.

A modest healthcare proposal

A Modest Healthcare Proposal

                Einstein said insanity that was doing that same over again and expecting different results. But what did Einstein know? The government spends over half of the healthcare dollars in this country, so the most obvious solution for our current healthcare crisis is for the government to become more involved in healthcare and to spend more of our money on healthcare, basically to follow the fatal path of socialized medicine used by many countries around the world. Countries with socialized medicine insure their citizens, but insure them with nothing. Compared with the United States, women are two and half more times more likely to die of breast cancer in the United Kingdom and New Zealand, and almost twice as likely to die in Germany. Numbers like this are not at all uncommon for any kind of fatal disease, but hey, at least people are insured for their deaths. The United States has four times as MRIs per capita as Canada, but that’s only diagnostic equipment, surely there are enough doctors in Canada. Some Canadian towns have to enter their citizens into lotteries to see who can see the town doctor that month because there are doctor shortages. But who doesn’t love lotteries? Some people spend hundreds of dollars a weeks trying to score big in the Powerball if the payoff becomes big enough.  The Affordable Care Act is bound to be a huge success at insuring people, force people to do anything by force and people will do it. Maybe the government should subsidize risk in the housing market next; surely nothing bad will happen there (oops…). Maybe Einstein wasn’t wrong…