http://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/is-the-ebola-crisis-affecting-the-midterm-elections/

Will the threat of Ebola affect midterm election results??

This one is very interesting. Brought to you by Harry Enten of 538, this article is an argument against Politico's allegation earlier in the week that the threat of Ebola would cause more people to vote Republican in the coming weeks. It argues that just because people have less confidence in the government, it doesn't mean they will desert their party. (This reminds me of our Unit Two test.) Enten writes that whichever party isn't in "control" at the moment will automatically have distrust for the federal government-for example, when the presidency switched from Bush to Obama, the confidence switched from Republican to Democrat. 

Also interestingly, he claims that people are concerned about Ebola about as much as people were concerned about the swine flu in 2009. And there have only been 3 cases in our country, think what the panic could be like in another few months!  

http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2014/10/19/24-7-wall-st-worst-states-women/17344861/

Utah Ranked Worst State for Women???

Based on recent Census Bureau, USA Today published a listing of the ten worst states for women, and our very own state ended up in the first spot. This is why-

 

> Gender wage gap: 70 cents per dollar (4th worst)
> Poverty rate, women: 13.6% (13th lowest)
> Pct. in state legislature: 16.3% (6th lowest)
> Infant mortality rate: 5.0 per 1,000 births (2nd lowest)

Perhaps we don't notice these discrepancies because we live here and this is just life to us. 

I would be curious though, (forgive me for being defensive of our wonderful state) if the results would be the same if other factors were considered? For instance, I don't see any suicide or depression rates, and while I'm not saying women here can't be depressed, I am saying that there are important other factors in the "worst state for women" that should probably be included. Perhaps domestic abuse or rape percentages, education levels, etc. 

That being said-to the girls in the class-let's make the "% in state legislature" statistic a little higher, sometimes I definitely feel a bit under-represented! 

Original story here:
http://www.cnn.com/2014/10/18/politics/texas-voter-id-law/index.html

Supreme Court Approves New Texas Voter Law

Two days before early voting starts in Texas, the Supreme Court ruled that the state could keep the new voter law they've decided to enforce. According to this law, citizens must show state-issued identification in order to vote at the polls. At first glance, this seems pretty simple. The only problem? As Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg points out in her (7 page!) dissent to the decision, about 600,000 citizens of Texas don't have state-issued identification. Further, a large majority of these citizens are African-American or Hispanic, which, at least in my mind and the minds of the three dissenting judges, sets off an alarm pointing back to the old Jim Crow laws that the Civil Rights movement abolished in the 60's. For this election, at least, the voters of Texas will have to show ID to get into the polls, but with further argument and review, the Republican government of Texas may change their plans. 

In my opinion, this kind of thing is the reason Texas may soon become a state of Democrats, if they aren't more careful to listen to the overwhelming presence of minorities. 

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/scott-brown-elect-republicans-to-make-america-safer/

Scott Brown: Elect Republicans to make America "safer"......?

Here's an interesting interview to look at! Scott Brown is a Republican running for the Senate in New Hampshire (he's already been a Senator for Massachusetts) and his claim is that Obama's leadership is the reason the United States is so vulnerable to the problems in other countries. He discusses several problems in the Middle East and blames the lack of American leadership in the world for the problems in governments half a world away from here. So far, this just seems like a matter of opinion, right? A typical situation-one candidate is throwing the other one's party under the bus just to get ahead. But Wait! It gets better! Scott then claims that if Republicans were in charge, they would fix it. They would set America on a safer path through this confusion. 

This is the problem I see, folks-plenty of states have elected Republicans as leaders and yet...the leadership seems no better or worse from the representatives of either party. Obama is not the only person who can do anything about it. Ultimately, if they are in unison and willing to work together, I believe that Congress can be even stronger than the President. 

So, I will believe Mr. Brown when he proves that the Republicans can be cooperative, true leaders as he claims they can be. Until then-I would suggest that supporting the President (even when you don't fully agree with him) is probably a better way to keep us safe than blocking him as every turn. 

DEMOCRACY FOR HONG KONG??


Original story...
http://news.msn.com/world/thousands-rally-in-hong-kong-as-democracy-campaign-heats-up?ocid=ansnews11


To begin-I know that this story isn't about American issues, but I feel like it's a good thing to mention because it puts our own government in perspective.

Years ago, when China regained control of Hong Kong from Britain, all of the parties involved made an agreement-Hong Kong could be Chinese again if the Chinese government allowed more democracy for the citizens of HK than they do for the rest of the Chinese people. Needless to say, the Communist Party of China really doesn't want to give a lot of freedom to HK, for fear that the desire for freedom will spread and loosen their hold on power. So, when the time to elect a new city leader came recently, the Chinese government tried to limit the candidate options to only those people approved by the Communist party. Because the citizens of HK don't consider this to be a democratic solution, they've been holding rallies, which are slowly spreading to other areas. Perhaps the Chinese government's efforts to keep control could result in even less control than they began with? Now that the rest of the world is paying attention, they need to be careful-if they give in too easily, other provinces in China may try to protest for their freedom. However, if they refuse to acknowledge the demands of the HK residents, Great Britain will not be happy at the violation of their agreement. Situations like this are what make me glad to be an American-even though sometimes I'm not happy with the way the government controls things, I at least have the power to voice my opinions without the threat of undue punishment.

original story here:
http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/after-the-midterms-the-diversity-gap-in-the-house-will-be-wider-than-ever/

After our discussion in class yesterday, I went to FiveThirtyEight.com and I browsed the politics section, where I found an interesting article on the predicted outcomes of the midterm elections for the House. According to Silver, the GOP will still hold the House. (More Republics than Democrats will have seats.) However, a different statistic had the Democrats very excited-their caucus will be composed of more than 50% female and minority Representatives.  I have a few opinions on why Republicans can't get any women elected, but since they are similar to Silver's, I invite you to read his original article, posted at the top. To the women in the class I ask- would you feel misrepresented as a member of the Republican party or as the citizen of a Republican-dominated state? (Just to keep it clear, I definitely would/do.) And to the men in the class-do you think it really makes a difference to have women in our government or do the men do a good job of representing both sexes? And to everyone-what about minorities? Are they well represented even if the Representatives don't have the same background, race, religion, or ethnicity?

Just as a follow-up....you can read the story of our President deciding to get involved at http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/sep/10/obama-speech-authorise-air-strikes-against-isis-syria.
I suppose this answers my question! Don't get me wrong, I would not be happy if we went back to war. I do not necessarily support military actions, but I also don't support taking no action at all. Also, does anyone else find it an amazing coincidence that this was released the day before 9/11? Clever political move, dontcha think??