Tuesday, March 29, 2016
"Land of the Free" ?
With the number
of incarcerated increasing again, it’s really hard to call United States the “land
of the free”. It has had the reputation of having the highest prisoner
population rate in the world. And then you begin to wonder, what’s the purpose
of keeping so many people in prison, and whether out national government values
retribution or rehabilitation.
On the United States Department of Justice
website it says “More than 650,000 ex-offenders are
released from prison every year, and studies show that approximately two-thirds
will likely be rearrested within three years of release.” So if the U.S has
this information, how come there isn’t a visible change? It seems as if our
prison system focuses more on pushing problems under a rock instead of acknowledging
it and solving it. I understand that a murderer deserves punishment but someone
who is in there for drug abuse due to being raised in an unfortunate
environment, deserves help and rehabilitation. The people that are released
should be able to come back as better civilians rather than people that are
simply expected to go back to jail. The government should make it a priority to
invest money into programs within prison systems that help inmates for the
better. If people find this to be an unnecessary funding then think of how it
affects the society. If these inmates are released and not treated they will
only hurt people and cause more complications.
However,
as many years worth of stats have shown, the U.S government only seems to find
wasting money on wars and military reasonable. I mean, not like America has any
other major problems that could use the time and money, right?
Friday, March 11, 2016
Presidential Primary
On
the America blog I found an article by Jon Green titled “How much does primary turnout tell us about general election turnout? Not much.” The argument Jon
Green is presenting in his blog is that “Republicans want to believe that
having higher turnout in primaries means that they will have higher turnout in
the general election.” However Jon Green goes on to prove that is not true and
he supports his argument by showing that there is very little evidence to
support this conclusion. His evidence is strictly statistics from previous
primaries and general elections, which show no correlation between the two. “In
2000, Republican primary turnout exceeded Democratic primary turnout for the
first time ever, and yet Democrats won the popular vote.” This shows that even
if one parties turnout is higher it doesn’t necessarily predict the general
elections results. Jon Green also has a background
in politics and comes with a B.A. in Political Science, which makes him
credible. Jon Green also explains why turnout is what it is in the parties.
Green claims that Hilary is portraying the same scenario that took place in
2012 with Mitt Romney. He states that Hilary just like Romney may not be the
most inspiring candidate but she is the “Prohibitive favorite” for the democratic
nomination. He also explains why Trump is dominating the republicans. According
to Jon Green the “ Trumps dominance in the nominating contests is being under
cut by the fact the Republican Party is desperately trying to deny him a
majority of pledged delegates heading into the convention.” But once again
these results do not predict the General Election.
Jon Green's intended audience was not
any specific party supporter but overall any voters. His purpose isn’t to bash
on either or party but instead explain a misguided theory. Also, to remind all
voters that primaries don’t mean much and that the general election can change
everything so voter turnout should only increase. After reading this you don’t really
have a choice but to agree with Jon because he supported his argument with
enough evidence and logic.
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