There is a topic going around that the majority of Americans are familiar with. This topic is being broadcasted by the SCOTUS is about the constitutionality of gay marriage and the bans on gay marriage. In June of 2015 the Supreme Court will be holding a court hearing and make a final decision on whether or not same-sex couples are granted the same rights and equality akin to heterosexual couples. The main concern for the public is that whether or not the federal government can bury state rights and say "Gay marriage is legal and most be recognized in every state."
Those who support gay marriage obviously say that everyone deserves equality and the lack of discrimination in their life. Yet those who would say that homosexuals do not deserve the equality - they have very different and very odd reasons. Some compare that homosexuals marriage will affect them the same way that witnessing a murder does and others say that children will be affected by the homosexuals being parents. More "reasonable" reasons are that same-sex couples will be affecting the religious facilities of Christians and other religious folk.
My opinion on gay marriage is that there should be an equal definition of marriage, at least in the legal definition. Gay marriage should have to be recognized in every state and that does not mean that every priest has to go out and cater gay wedding ceremonies.
Hillary Clinton
is running for president in 2016 and some aspect that she has too much economic
policy similarity to the current President, Barrack Obama. Clinton is a liberal democrat who holds to
her views on family-oriented workplaces, higher taxes on the rich, and
government investment. Clinton is a
strong advocate for regulatory of markets for successful economic growth and
creating a sustained growth balance between business growth and civilian
growth. Even though the United States
was pulled out of recession with Obama being nominated to office in 2008, there
is gridlock occurring and not much progress.
In 2016, there will be many people voting for Clinton because she is a
female and the majority of the population would not mind seeing the effects of
a woman in office. While the majority of
the population might vote for the Hilary in 2016, most are looking for
progressive movements that will get the country’s economic growth moving.Hillary Clinton
is running for president in 2016 and some aspect that she has too much economic
policy similarity to the current President, Barrack Obama.Clinton is a liberal democrat who holds to
her views on family-oriented workplaces, higher taxes on the rich, and
government investment.Clinton is a
strong advocate for regulatory of markets for successful economic growth and
creating a sustained growth balance between business growth and civilian
growth. Even though the United States
was pulled out of recession with Obama being nominated to office in 2008, there
is gridlock occurring and not much progress.In 2016, there will be many people voting for Clinton because she is a
female and the majority of the population would not mind seeing the effects of
a woman in office.While the majority of
the population might vote for the Hilary in 2016, most are looking for
progressive movements that will get the country’s economic growth moving.
It is easy to understand why Americans would be afraid of having someone like Clinton as a President considering she has a viewpoint similar to that of Obama's when it comes to public policy and political agenda. Clinton is popular for her husband's political career yet also independent from his popularity; she is famed because of her decisive leadership and management of government. Many people believe that Hilary Clinton is a good source of values that the average American holds true and being in agreement with most current issues of Americans. No one exactly knows how Clinton will successfully engage in managing public and economic policy; no one is able to justify that Hilary will be similar to Obama in running the country because she has not held the type of power. Clinton may bring a refreshing and new look on economic growth and growth in fondness of the government if she were elected to office or we could see the same gridlock we have seen with Obama, only the 2016 election debates will tell.
The United States Supreme Court
is taking on a federal
question case on whether or not bans against same-sex marriage in states
are constitutional. Same-sex marriage is
recognized in over half of the states in the United States with a quite large
population of citizens considering themselves attracted to the same sex. The Supreme Court is set to discuss same-sex
marriage constitutionality in mid June. With
a large amount of the population is becoming more accepting and open-minded of
LGBT-equality, causing politicians to change or flip-flop views on homosexual
marriage, and changing the course the 2016 election is going to take. Several cases have been brought to the
attention of the Supreme Court over the constitutionality of bans and legality
of same-sex marriage so the Supreme Court is finally addressing the issue this
year. Thirty-seven states have approved
same-sex marriages including Pennsylvania, New York, New Mexico, and
Alaska. Thirteen states have enacted
bans on same-sex marriages including Georgia, South Dakota, Tennessee, and
Ohio.
It is not
difficult to see the path same-sex marriage is taking. It will be quite unexpected if the Supreme
Court were to go and declare bans on same-sex marriage constitutional and the
whole aspect of the marriages unconstitutional.
Judicial philosophy
suggests that if one justice were to vote in favor of same-sex marriage then
none of the others would want to go down in the history books as the one or two
judge(s) to vote against the marriages.
I am quite hopeful that same-sex marriage will be prevalent the day, as
the Supreme Court rules in favor of it.
As for the election of 2016, it would not surprise me either if American
elected a president such as Hillary, with the democratic shift and liberal
views dominating current issues in the government.
14 state attorneys
(Connecticut, District of Columbia,
Indiana, Idaho, Hawaii, Iowa, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Mississippi, New
Hampshire, Northern Mariana Islands, Pennsylvania, and Rhode Island) asked
Congress to push an investigation by the U.S. Food & Drug Administration
that would involve supplements from brand names. This controversy started in early 2015 when investigations
of supplements from varying stores (including GNC) had discovered that herbs
and other ingredients were improperly listed or not listed at all on the
ingredients list. The United States
health advocates have a close relationship with supplements and other dietary
pills. Being a country where so much of
that population is overweight or obese people are looking for simpler ways to
get nutrition with our without the exercise.
The types of investigations that were performed on these supplement
brands consisted of DNA testing that highlighted certain herbs listed on the
labels not actually included in the material of the supplement. The tests also had shown high levels of
metals such as lead, mercury, and arsenic.
These state attorneys are subjecting the FDA to engage in more strict
oversight of herbal, vitamin and dietary supplements such as of the oversight
of pharmaceutical products. Letters sent
to the subcommittee
that deals with product safety and health for consumers whose head chairpersons
are Kansas Senator,
Jerry Moran and Pennsylvania Representative, Joe Pitts are still waiting on
response and hoping for positive news, the letter will be brought to the
attention of full committees, interest groups, and lawmakers.
Over half of the U.S. adult population uses supplements (majority of them being multi-vitamins, with Calcium and Vitamin D have increased significantly in the past years), according to a statistic by the Center for Disease Control, 2011. It is no surprise that we are a nation of health addicts while the majority of our population is obese or overweight. Supplements can make people feel that there is no need to exercise, that these magical pills or powders will make them as buff as superman. Yet what happens when we are not able to trust the labels on these supplements and hidden ingredients are added or the herb that we are purchasing is not even in the supplement itself? 14 attorneys are calling for Congress and the FDA to take action against store brands that may have did just this. While these stores would not agree to the accusations and simply state that they are "doing their best at maintaining their products and ensuring their safety" the tests that these attorneys are signing on say otherwise. As a consumer of supplements myself (typically vitamins, yet sometimes others) I found it disturbing that I may be consuming heavy metals or the supplement I am purchasing may not even have the ingredient it promises will change my life. Hopefully an iron triangle can take hold on this situation and produce a promising outcome for consumers.
Tuesday, March 24, 2015
----- Why Did Democrats Block Human Trafficking Bill? ------
23 March 2015Unit 4: Institutions
of National Government
Divisive issue
of abortion stalls human trafficking bill
The Democratic Party in the Senate found a small but largely
controversial addition to the human sex trafficking bill being discussed. That small find is a “slip-in” addition by
the Republicans that adds a reference to abortion. The bill itself was
introduced back in February of 2015 with a bi-partisan effort backing it. There is no telling when the bill will be
moved forward or at worst, forgotten about.
This bill is important to the United States because it helps the
thousands of children that will find themselves a victim engaged in sex
trafficking. According to the US Justice
Department, an estimated 300 thousand adolescents are at risk of being lured
into human sex trafficking each year in the United States, most of these
children are runaways. Some of the
biggest cities for trafficking are El Paso, Houston, Philadelphia, etc. The bill is supposed to launch a program that
would give police officers all over the nation the funds to purse trafficking
cases. It would tighten the way
prosecutors target their offenders of the law, by tightening it was established
in the proposed law that anyone convicted of sex trafficking or other
similarities of the bill is automatically charged a $5,000 dollar fine that
would go back into the funded program to help with resources and salaries for
officers.
One of the current issues that the United States and
in many foreign countries are dealing with right now is human trafficking
whether for drugs, prostitution, or other means of slavery. Human trafficking happens on all levels of
government: national, city, and local.
President Obama’s attorney general nominee, Loretta Lynch, was
practically in the middle of signing the bill before the republicans held her
back until the abortion issue between the parties is solved. Many women, even those who are Republican,
believe that it is a woman’s right to do what she wants with her own body. Many Democrats and Republicans were appreciative
that this bill was looking promising before the abortion battle began. The democrats want funding for abortion
clinics and had to filibuster the bill would it came to Republicans slipping into a hole that would cut
funding for abortions. It does not look
good from a political standpoint on either party holding up the bill as they
are. Negotiations are being done yet
there are thousands of children being forced into human trafficking situations. This bill could help thousands of adolescents
be rescued from this miserable way of life.
Who the matter is concerning is conservation groups (such as Oregon Wildlife) who believe that the gray wolf is worth protecting versus the farmer organizations (Cattlemen’s Association) who believe that wolf populations need to be kept a low numbers in Southeastern states where the gray wolf population resides and has resided for hundreds of years. Early 2015 district judge Beryl Howell said that certain states (Wisconsin, Michigan, and Minnesota) did not provide the proper protection to gray wolves; stating that they had not reached their historic levels of population. There is conflict over whether or not gray wolves should be protected by national wildlife services in the states they reside in because scientists say that their population is still not viable yet conservative groups refute by saying that the population has exceeded the terms for endangerment and hunting is necessary for population control, protection of livestock, etc. In 2011 the federal government decided that the gray wolf population was viable enough to take the species of the endangered list so they turned the protection of the wolves over to the states.This has prevailed in the conflict of whether or not the wolves need protection from large hunting groups who want the population sustained. Certain hunting Interest Groups want to extinguish the population of gray wolves because they believe the wolves harm their livestock and that the wolves are not worth protecting.The reason the wolves are worth protecting is because they are an important part of the ecosystem and if the population were to dwindle then the food chain would be at risk.
My opinion on the matter concerning the ruling of District Judge Beryl Howell, unlike the Obama Administration and states Wisconsin and Michigan, I believe that gray wolves should remain protected. I disagree with the non-governmental organizations (NGO's) such at the Cattlemen's association because gray wolves do serve a purpose to the food chain. The purpose gray wolves serve is they keep deer and elk migrating (and their population healthy) so that they do not over-graze, that vegetation helps against erosion of riverbeds, provides nesting areas for birds, and helps river life survive. There are interest groups such as Oregon Wildlife and scientists who think that the wolf population is still not viable and needs to be protected. Not necessarily suggesting that they are an endangered species but aiming toward the goal that would have states protecting their wolves against aggressive game hunters. Hunters and NGO's are stating that their livestock is being tampered with by the wolf population and they believe that the numbers should stay low. The refute against this from the Washington State University with conduction of a study that shows that killing gray wolves that prey on livestock only leads to more killings of livestock. This being factual because Alpha males and females are the only wolves in the pack that are allowed to hunt down livestock (and breed for survival of the pack) thus when hunters kill one or both of the alphas, other members in the pack breed and thus create more livestock killings. Oregon has made progress in keeping their wolf species alive and healthy and since hunters were not able to hunt the wolves while the population grew, livestock killings were kept low.
In April, wildlife officials plan to decide whether or not the protections of the wolves will be lifted off Oregon or not even though that northern two-thirds of the state will still have the wolves marked as endangered.
The 21st
century, the great debate over gay marriage has really started in the early
2000s. Alabama, one of the most
conservative states where 2/3 of the population oppose gay marriage and one of
the only states that strongly opposes gay marriage; that is challenging for
same-sex couples in that region. Whether
for isolation or religious factors, Alabama population do not agree with gay
marriage If the Supreme Court finds
that gay marriage bans are constitutional then those bans could last decades in
the South states, especially Alabama.
The article
talks about how Alabama’s population does not have political tolerancefor same-sex marriage
in their state. There is reasoning in
why Alabama does not support same-sex marriage and that could be because of
religious views, Christian and conservative views, or because of isolation, the
percentage of gay people in Alabama is not high and the population does not
have a predisposition of gay people – both reasons are considered political socialization. There are gay activists in the rural states of the south who are
seeking approval from the Supreme Court so their marriages can be honored disregarding
what their state believes. While public
opinion shows that many adults in the US favor gay marriage, in 2012, Alabama
enacted a ban on gay-marriage that was very popular in the state. The stability in Alabama is very little and some think
with time that the population will change their minds. In June, if the Supreme Court honors
gay-marriage being constitutional it will make millions and myself happy.
Yashinari Effinger kissed Adrian Thomas as they were declared a married couple Monday in Big Spring Park in Huntsville, Ala.CreditGary Cosby Jr./The Decatur Daily, via Associated Press
