Reverse Discrimination

On April 24th, my classmate's America The Beautiful blog had a non titled post on affirmative action in education. I disagree with her stance on the issue. State colleges already have to automatically admit the top 10% of each high school in Texas. In 1978, the Supreme Court decided on the case Regents of the University of California v Bakke in an 8-1 decision for Bakke. Bakke won the trial and was to be admitted by the fact that his test scores were higher than the minorities that got accepted to the medical school. Also, in 1992, Hopwood v Texas went to trail for the same reason. Hopwood and company would win this as well putting two trials against affirmative action in higher education. In 2011, the Texas Tribune stated that the overall population for minorities was at 55.2%. When a state school is supposed to accept the 10% of every high school in the state and 55.2% of the people are minorities, it does not make sense to say that everyone does not get a fair chance. College acceptance should NOT be about the color of someone's skin, but about the knowledge the person has. The rules that these public colleges have put into play are those that are supporting reverse discrimination. I happen to be native Choctaw and could be admitted to any state college in Oklahoma, but if someone whom has a 5.0 on a 4.0 scale to my 3.0 on a 4.0 scale, why should I be allowed to take the spot of someone whom is more capable? Because their skin color is pastier than mine? The fact is that minorities have just the same opportunities as whites, or even more with 55.2% of the total population in Texas and whites with better GPA's and/or test scores should be put before any number system to boost a college's minority numbers.

Climate Change

As a suburban Texas native, I grew up with strong conservative beliefs. Most of these beliefs I still retain, but my views have changed on particular issues. I'm an eighth Choctaw (Native American) and am a strong believer in taking care of our environment so that future generations get to enjoy the same beautiful nature that we do. On February 21, 2010 the San Diego Union Tribune posted an article titled "Pro: Climate change is real; there is no debate." It starts off by stating facts about climate change and stating that there is no debate about them. It states that "Carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas that acts to warm the planet." This basically states that the emission from cars, carbon dioxide, is put into the air and sits within a layer of the atmosphere and creates more heat within that layer and everything below it. The article goes on to state other facts about climate change and what causes it. It gives possible solutions to helping the fight against climate change such as leaning more on renewable resources and the use of solar panels. The ending paragraph acknowledges that American's in the past are know for their innovations and their success. That American's have the right tools to find more solutions to reducing our country's footprint.

I disagree with the policies that our current president has with environmental spending as he does not believe in global warming. A lot of people in power do not care enough about the funding for environmental policy and it's disheartening as a person of such a beautiful country and world as a whole.

On March 31st,  Cloudy with a Chance of Politics blogged "Climate Change and the Environmental Budget" talks about the budget for the Clean Air Act that Trump cut funding for over the Paris Agreement. He stated that this took US out of the world leadership for climate change for the future programs. He then goes on to state that President Trump argued that Climate Change is a scam and that China was worse of then America, yet by 2020 China will be spending around 360 billion dollars in renewable energy. He ends his commentary by talking about the dying world that is the coal industry and that if we do not act now, our children's children may never get to enjoy the beauties of today.

I whole heartedly agree with these statements. I do have my doubts about climate change in general, but that's because I'm a "seeing is believing" kind of person. As for the words our President remarked, I can see that China is last just by recalling the Olympics and how awful the athletes had it there and the media coverage alone spoke to many. I believe that we should are further ahead of China in emissions, but could be spending money to help out the further generations by doing all that we can to preserve the world's beauties.

US Gov: Mary Jane and Me

Ah. Of course, a millennial college student talking about marijuana. What are the odds? As for this blog, I'm going to stick to the approval of recreational Mary Jane around the nation.

There's one specific study in England that shows that kids between the ages ages 17-20 that have higher cognitive activity were more inclined to smoke marijuana. The study shows that the higher cognitive kids showed the trait of "openness to experience" (ProCon). The point is that the effects of marijuana could help a struggling researcher come up with the next big thing.

Another reason is if you look at ADHD medicine, and possible other medications, Adderall and vyvanse are about a hair away from being cocaine and meth. Marijuana, depending on the strain, has the same cognitive effects as the pills. Where it relaxes the brain and helps people like myself and our brain slow down. Where as the pills contribute to the lack of appetite and can keep you up all night, marijuana helps people enjoy foods more deeply and seamlessly fall asleep. Overall, the use of marijuana can be used as a formal remedy for many illnesses.

Lastly, marijuana will do two things for the government once it becomes legal. If you haven't paid attention to Colorado's economy in the last few years, the state has turned marijuana into a billion dollar industry....... just within a single state. Think about what an extra billion dollars per state could do for this country. And if you're not interested in the economy, marijuana can single handily destroy the use of hard drugs such as cocaine, meth, LSD, and heroin. Some people just want to escape reality in any form that they can get their hands on it seems like. Once marijuana is legal nation wide, it'll be so common among the streets that the prices for it will drop dramatically. A druggie, whom probably doesn't have very much money to begin with will be more than likely willing to spend more money on a cheaper drug like marijuana in certain amounts than those that are harmful and cost a lot more money.

In conclusion, many people were so focused on the fact that the government wouldn't be able to regulate the recreational use of marijuana which is why everyone kept ignoring the legalization of it. Well, there are now 26 states that have some legal form of using the plant. The plant is also known to help those that have many different types of medical conditions to ease pain and help retain happiness as well. The use of marijuana will even eliminate the use of harder drugs and thus faze out the cartels from smuggling things across our borders. Marijuana will become legal with due time.

Republicans vs. Polar Bears

The NY Times posted an article on January 9th, 2017 titled "Human-Driven Global Warming Is Biggest Threat to Polar Bears, Report Says" by Erica Goode. I picked this one because I've been watching a lot of wildlife shows lately and it deals with polar bears against the government. The article states that the overall theme going on in the population decline in polar bears is human based global warming. There was a pretty important bill to be voted on when Trump first took office to help with emission output. The article does not state the outcome, but judges Trump and the rest of the republicans on how against global warming they are. Trump did pull out of the Paris climate agreement though. The article goes on to state that even though in some areas there has shown decline in the population, that the overall percentage of polar bears has remained the same. These scientist and native Alaskans (article based in Alaska) are trying to make sure the climate stays under 2 degrees Celsius so that the ice caps remain for polar bears to be able to hunt for seals.

I agree with this article. I don't particularly know everything about global warming, but I do believe that the actions we take do affect our environment. I'm like most Texan's and enjoy hunting, but I believe there are a difference between hogs and deer, and those animals such as polar bears. I am also native american (Choctaw and Sioux Nation) so I do believe in respecting the animals, but also that they were put here to provide as such as the food chain suggests. As hogs and deer, their population is stable enough for people to hunt to provide food for. As for polar bears, there is no need to hunt these animals as you do not need to make their species suffer as they have about 75% less population than that of deer and hogs. As the article suggest, it would be nice if Trump could show more initiative to preserving the animals that have been here long before we had gas powered cars. I for one will be investing in a electric car in the future to help preserve the polar bear and other species that need a little help from us humans. Overall, I agree with the article and think they are on the right path to the end goal of saving the planet from our boneheaded ways. 

Trump v. Media

On February 24, 2017, Politico posted an article titled "White House goes to war with the media" by Matthew Nussbaum and Nolan McCaskill. The intended audience is the average American that doesn not quite know what goes on everyday with what President Trump states on his twitter page. Both of the author's have political experience while one words for the white house and the other is just a news reporter for Politico. Their argument is that the "fake news" Trump claims is not in fact fake. The stance they take seems a little sarcastic as they sort of mock Trump and white house. The message behind the article was that Trump really jumps to conclusions without having any real knowledge on the subjects he speaks about on his social media accounts and in real life. The evidence they use are just quotes from the president himself and those coming out of the white house.

I personally believe that the president is not making up the things he talks about on social media. CNN is a very biased media source. I relate PETA to CNN as they take stories and twist them up with very little facts to make the story more interesting. I'm not a big fan of Trump, but at least he has the power to do what he wants since he's not biased to any party. He doesn't have to listen to them because he is his own brand and won without either party's help. The man shouldn't be on twitter ranting and raving about things like this, but at least he's telling the world how he really feels. No president before seemed to have any courage when it meant standing up to the media sources like Trump does.

Taps

On February 7th, 2016, TIME Magazine, time.com posted a story with the title "A True American Hero..." written by Melissa Chan, about 84 year old Guy Taylor's death. Taylor, for the past 5 years, played "Taps" on his trumpet at dusk in honor for his fallen friends in the military. He served in the Korean war in 1950. Although he is responsible for saving two of his friends, he had many die during the war.

I've personally been able to see Mr. Taylor play "Taps" at dusk in Galveston, Texas. It's a different feeling actually being there to see how emotional it got while every stood there frozen while this man dedicates so much to the people he, and the whole military, have lost. Recently losing a close friend, I realized how important it was to Mr. Taylor and why he does this everyday at the same time. The point from this is that no matter who you are, you matter to someone. The past month has been hectic in politics and we all need to come together and be there for one another. To set aside the differences in each others lives to pay attention to the people that need our help, before it's too late.