Predictions and Analyzations - Democrats

Now that former Senator Edwards has announced his candidacy for President of the United States, I'm going to start making a few predictions about him and his Democratic opponents. Since I'm no longer working for Senator Clinton, or at least for now...I'm going to let some of my words flow.

Here I will post my prediction that Senator Clinton and Senator Obama will announce their candidacies for president as well, but each are most probably trying to pick different dates with minimally a week apart. This is because each candidate wants their own spotlight.

Tom Vilsack was the first to announce candidacy, and him being the Iowa governor, may help him in the Iowa primary. Though by no means is he considered a front-runner. Vilsack's lack of celebrity status will hurt him as well as him not being the best looking candidate, which is actually something that's subconsciously very important to voters. He has little name recognition nationally, but governors have been able to get over that. Also, his slogan "V for Vilsack" is relatively catchy and I think people will remember that.

John Edwards announced in a very non-traditional way. It was not in the Capitol, but in New Orleans, at a job site where Edwards helped to repair someone's house. He has a few things going for him. He ran once, was defeated, and I'm sure he learned a lot about why he lost. Secondly, he was picked and nominated as the Vice Presidential candidate in the 2004, which gives him some more political pull and celebrity status. This is name recognition at its best. Supposedly he has a different strategy, but is still going to emphasize his "two americas" theme, which is obvious by his usage of the hurricane Katrina disaster as a prime example. Edwards reminds me of the Kennedy family from the 60's and 70's. He's younger, good looking, rich, and smiles like it. Not that it's a bad thing, he just looks like one of the elite.

Dennis Kucinich has announced candidacy, I believe. He has some slight name recognition, but that will not help him. In my opinion, Mr. Kucinich is a really good person, and knows a lot about policy, but does not have what it takes to be President. If he did we would have seen him as a shining star in the Democratic Primaries. He probably won't win any states in the primaries. He is a non-issue. Sorry Dennis!

Hillary Clinton has been setting up a presidential run for countless months. She set up numerous exploratory committees and has really basically put everything in place to make her the #1 front-running candidate for the President of the United States. She already has celebrity status and better name recognition than anyone who can be on the ticket. After all, she was the first lady for eight years and has been a senator for six years already with also having won her re-election in a landslide. Almost every citizen knows who the first lady is, and everyone knows who Bill Clinton is. Having him as her husband and as the possible first gentleman is quite an advantage to have as well. New Yorkers just voted her back in to the Senate, and she and her campaign staff must realize a possible increase of anti-clinton sentiment when she announces a presidential run. It will be an interesting campaign strategy that the staff will have to pursue to overcome a decrease in popularity from anti-clinton sentiment. Some people may see her re-election to senate being used as a stepping stone for her political gain. I'm not sure what to think. She looks better now than she did many years ago, so that may help her, not to mention the fact that she is a woman and it is time to see if we are ready for the first female president.

Barack Obama is my hero. I think he is an excellent role model for any child. That being said, his popularity is remarkable. If one thinks about it, he was not even elected Illinois Senator yet and he delivered the 2004 DNC keynote speech. That's pretty impressive to be able to so with party politics as they are today. That rose him to superstardom for Democrats, and now Republicans are just starting to hear his name and know who he is too. I doubt many Republicans watched the 2004 Democratic National Convention on television. Obama's integrity, smarts, leadership, and his eloquence are four things that have made this man who he is today. He also set up many many avenues to make his candidacy easier. The Senator seems like an amazing presidential candidate to me, but I think the color of his skin will be a problem for too many people. Much of America is still racist and I am unsure if America as an aggregate is ready for a black president. One thing he really has going for him is he's young and good looking. That should help him as well. He is still a front-runner with Hillary Clinton and possibly John Edwards.

Now for the true predictions. I think Hillary will get the Democratic nomination and will pick Barack as her Vice Presidential candidate. Since he's a Senator, he knows the Senate already and will know how to do his job pretty well if elected. This will also set him up for a stronger presidential bid being the vice president once one or two both terms are over. That would be interesting: the first female president and first black vice president. I think Edwards does have a chance though, but I feel he's much harder for me to predict.

Senator Clinton and a run for the White House

Let it be known that I am a pretty avid supporter of Senator Clinton and that I actually work for her campaign. Let it also be known that I am no way, shape, or form saying that she will run for President of the United States of America nor do I know if she will announce candidacy for it. With that precursor in mind, I will express my own opinion on her current situtation in New York.

I work at the Broome County Democratic Headquarters, stationed in Binghamton, NY. There, I have taken up the title of Chenango County Coordinator, for I am responsible for most of the political happenings with Senator Clinton's campaign in that county. My duties also are spread to include Broome County activities with the other interns. Yes, you heard me...I am indeed an intern, like everyone else in the world it seems.

Every county in the southern tier of New York is majoritarily Republican. Some counties such as Stueben County, I believe, have double the amount of Republicans over Democrats, and that is not counting the Liberal Party or the Conservative Party. Yes, those are actually parties too. The Southern Tier consists of approximately seven counties. The reason I bring these sorts of figures up is because Senator Clinton, nor any other democratic senator that I know of has won these counties.

New York, as a whole seems like it is relatively similar to the United States. I will provide the breakdown with my findings to support my claim. NY has its counties like the U.S. has its states. We have NYC, which is itself, then all of our other cities like Buffalo, Syracuse, Binghamton, Albany, Ithaca, Utica, etc. Those cities correspond to the nation's top cities which I don't feel like listing out. These cities in both the US & NY are predominantly democratic. The similarities are showing. Everywhere else are suburbs and rural areas, which are predominantly republican, just like in the general consensus of the United States. As one can see, I find much similarity between the two.

Now, if Senator Clinton wins these Republican dominated counties, whether its some, none, or all, I think it has a lot to say if she does decide to make a run for top cop. If these counties correlate to the red states, then they will be a large indicator of how one would do in the bid for President. Many republicans are angry and want change, and even more democrats want change. We have wanted a different president since Bush came in to office. I think our democratic headquarters in Broome County has the opportunity to change the tide of an election, and perhaps future. Just like the butterfly effect; the flap of a butterfly's wings can cause a tornado across the world. Could it be possible that it is in our hands? There is so much speculation on Hillary and running for President. If she won some of these counties, would it mean she could win some red states of equivalent proportion? I am not saying that it would be easy to win these counties, because it is definitely an uphill battle for all of us working from the Headquarters in Broome County to take the Southern Tier of NY. If we do take some of them, which would be absolutely amazing...it doesn't mean it would be easy to take the red states, but possible with a good amount of work and political strategy. I just find it amazing that so much CAN be centered around ONE state in the upcoming months/year. New York.

Education Plan Continued...A new course initiative.

In order to make people more aware with our political system and politics in general, how about mandating separate course studies throughout middle and high school. By separate course studies I mean a politics class. Plain and simple, every year for a full year in middle school and high school, have children take a politics class.

Fundamentally it will do a few things. One thing it will do is increase political awareness. Secondly, it will boost voter registration and voter turnout, especially among the youth. Thirdly, candidates will hold more respect for younger voters and be more issue-based. If schools can teach a politics course it will also create many more thousands of jobs and would do this nation a great justice.

This concurrent plan may have an adverse effect on political science programs in universities, so I would have to explore this further. But I am sure that to a certain extent, this program could be successfully coordinated and implemented with no adverse affect to colleges and universities.

I will end this post with a statement.

The common people have a right to know, not just the elite.

The start of an education plan that will take a long time...

Okay, so I discovered something while debating education reform the other day. It was that the secondary schools, meaning k-12, will never reform if they are not made to. The only way to force them to become better and more learning intensive, is to increase the standards of the post-secondary schools, meaning universities and colleges. Make the minimum passing grade higher, increase the standards for admissions. i will elaborate more later.

A Sociology Presentation that i wrote on the gap between the rich and the poor.

A social class is, in the most basic sense, a group of people that share the same or similar social status. The relative importance and definition of membership in a particular class differs greatly over time and between societies, particularly in societies having a legal differentiation of groups of people by birth or occupation. In the well-known example of socioeconomic class, many scholars view societies as stratifying into a hierarchical system based on economic status, wealth, or income. With the social changes of the 20th century, a gradually developing urban middle class appeared in most Western countries, producing three strata: an Upper class of the immensely wealthy and/or powerful, a Middle class of managers and highly paid professionals, a Lower class of people paid average or low wages or receiving "welfare.” This includes those who are homeless. Karl Marx suggested that the primary social division was between a “ruling class" and a laboring class.

In the article I read, dated August 16th 2004, it describes how the gap between the rich and the poor has continuously increased over the years. And while there is some sociology rooted in this problem, most of it is political. The rich get richer and the poor get poorer, and this applies to this day. The rich and powerful will do everything they can to stop social mobility and to help their friends in the upper class. For example, President Bush’s tax cuts and how most of the $1.3 trillion dollars went to the wealthy and only a small portion of that went to the middle and lower classes. Here’s a statistic for you: The wealthiest 20% of households in 1973 accounted for 44% of total U.S. income, according to the Census Bureau. Their share jumped to 50 percent in 2002, while everyone else’s fell. For the bottom fifth or bottom 20%, the share dropped from 4.2% in 1973 to 3.5% now.

One of the problems affecting all that are not rich is inflation. Our economy has undergone inflation but everyone’s paychecks have not. People have not been getting raises and their salaries are more or less the same as it used to be and there has been close to no compensation in terms of keeping up with inflation and the economy’s growth. Many of the every day things we buy have went up drastically, including gas. Sooner or later people will not be able to afford the price of gas. Three in five pay below the national median hourly wage of $13.53, said Sung Won Sohn, chief economist for Wells Fargo. On a weekly basis, the average wage of $525.84 is at the lowest level since October 2001.

Another reason the poor are getting poorer is because of the crumby support system they have. Most of the poor have a worse education than one who has money. Rarely will you find a married couple both with Masters Degrees and still making close to nothing, but it is out there. People who are poor or homeless need two things to get themselves out of the lower class and to rise in to the middle class. First, they need a better welfare support system to help them with what they actually need, instead of trying to give someone a band-aid to fix a broken leg. Some people need some money and food stamps, some people don’t…it’s all dependant on the person. The other thing that is needed, though, is education. There needs to be a program that can give these people a better education, necessary for getting a higher paying job. Special schools or institutes, even allowing the earning of G. E. D’s during all times of the day should be implemented so they too, can move up the socio economic ladder.

The middle class is moving two ways. Many of the middle class jobs are being outsourced or companies are just laying massive amounts of people off. Either way, often times it is hard to find a new job that is steady with equal or better pay. So much of the middle class face economic trouble causing them to start to head down to the lower class level. And a good portion of the middle class is moving up, and they are making more money than they ever had before, mostly by working very diligently for most of their lives.

On the back of our 1 dollar bill, there is a pyramid, with the eye of illuminati. If you notice, the top of the pyramid is not attached and is floating above. That small section represents class structure and mostly a lack of social mobility. The rich and powerful is that small section with the all Seeing Eye, watching over you and controlling the ladder. The upper class has the smallest population, then the middle class is next in line, and the lower class has the largest population…able to be represented in a pyramid form. The reason the top section is detached is because no one below that is supposed to be able to reach that kind status, so the rich keep the rich in power.

So it seems the growing trend of our economy and society right now is for the middle class to thin out so much where there is only a small population still remaining in the middle class. The poor don’t have such programs stated earlier and many people are working multiple jobs just to put food on the table; there is almost no social mobility within the lower class. The upper class is the smallest, and certainly the richest, allowing close to no mobility in to the class of the rich and the powerful as well as controlling most of the job market. I explained a few things to help the lower class achieve a better socio economic status, but there is still way more to do as well as keeping a nice big middle class of informed, educated, Americans that don’t literally have to live paycheck to paycheck.

Global Warming...a problem? I think so.

The greenhouse effect is responsible for the Earth's warm, livable atmosphere. Greenhouse gasses keep the Earth about 33 C (60 F) warmer than it would be without its natural blanket of protective gas. While the greenhouse effect is perfectly natural, we can change the climate from things we do. Water vapor, methane, carbon dioxide, CFCs, ozone and nitrous oxide are all greenhouse gases.

The greenhouse effect is when sun rays go through our atmosphere to warm up the ground, water, and everything else exposed to the sun. Those things exposed to the sun emit infrared radiation a.k.a. heat. Molecules in the atmosphere absorb the infrared radiation and release heat within the atmosphere, trapping the heat in the atmosphere.

Chronologically, here is a timeline of what has happened historically with global warming. In 1896, a Swedish scientist named Svante Arrhenius discovered what the greenhouse effect does and what it is. In 1913, Charles Abbot found that global warming correlates to weather patterns. In 1979, the first World Climate Conference was held in Geneva to discuss global warming and its effects on us. In 1988, the U.N. establishes the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and Carbon Dioxide levels reach 350 parts per million from the pre-industrial level of 280 parts per million. In 1990, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change presented its first assessment report, stating that we are doing harm to our planet. In 1992, the United States, and more than 100 other countries sign the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in Rio de Janeiro, attempting to make efforts to curb our global warming increases. In 1997, the Kyoto Protocol is negotiated to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 5.2 percent below 1990 levels by 2012. The U. S. signs the treaty although the U.S. Senate agrees in advance not to ratify the treaty citing economic concerns. President Bush will withdraw the U.S. from the treaty in 2001. In 2005, the Kyoto Protocol enters into force on February 16. The Protocol was ratified by 140 countries that account for most of global emissions from industrialized nations, according to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. Concentration of carbon dioxide now stands at 372 parts per million, higher than at any time in at least the past 420,000 years according to David King, chief science advisor to the British Government.
What has caused us to rise to 372 parts per million of Carbon Dioxide and what is causing us all this damage? One thing that is doing excessive damage and seems to be our number one global warmer is hog, pig, and cow raising. What makes them our top contender for the number one spot is because of what they are forced to be fed, causing excessive methane gas from their wastes. One million metric tons of methane is equivalent to the emissions of 24.5 million metric tons of carbon dioxide, so as you can see…methane is a very harmful greenhouse gas. Another thing that contributes to the highest carbon dioxide levels ever is our everyday trucks, cars, vans, sports utility vehicles, SUV’s, and pretty much all construction units with wheels. While cars, vans, and SUV’s have emissions standards, the rest have way less and some of them have no standards. So while these vehicles are running they are releasing CO2 & Chlorofluorocarbons, or CFC’s. Both of these are greenhouse gasses, which contribute to the warming of our atmosphere and other problems as well, like ozone depletion, quality of air, smog, etc. The other main contributor to global warming is the factories and plants all around the globe. The United States Republican government now has a policy of de-regulation for all of these big-business factories so they don’t have to spend as much on environmental regulations and filters on their smoke stacks. So instead of being able to produce much cleaner smoke in to the air, they are putting raw pollutants in to the air. The U.S. is the largest global warming contributor, and China is in the second place. The United State’s role of non-involvement with the Kyoto Accords just shows how greedy we are and how much the government doesn’t care about our long term future. China is listed as a developing country, still, so according to the Kyoto Accords, they need not have any emissions standards on their factories.

What is the effect that global warming is having on the planet and all of us? One of our main concerns is the raised water levels from melting ice caps on both poles. When the ice caps melt, the water level will rise so greatly that it will bring the water up multiple feet, entrenching many towns and large cities situated along the coasts. Giant icebergs are cracking off the Antarctic that are gigantic in proportion, showing a rise in surface temperature even down there. Warming up the planet where blooming and seasons for animals and reptiles are starting earlier every year. For instance, the Japanese cedar is a tree that many are allergic to, and this season it’s producing more pollen than it ever has due to global warming, so it is affecting the health of the Japanese citizens as well. Receding and melting glaciers on large mountains like Mt. Kilimanjaro are a large problem, and are causing longer droughts in the surrounding areas, affecting the whole ecosystem there too. Alaska’s polar bears are thought to be roaming on snow and ice but these days you can even find them on the frozen ground…why? Because the surface temperatures and atmospheric temperatures have risen to the point where it doesn’t snow there in as much of an excess as it did in the past. The Sea bird population decline has been linked to global warming as well. The black guillemot population is declining from 1990 levels because melting sea ice has increased the distance the birds must fly to forage for food and reduced the number of resting sites available. The warmer water can affect migratory patterns of fish too, and in turn birds who feed on those fish. Global warming does not just affect humans, it affects the entire biosphere.

Who can we blame? We can blame the republicans and conservatives who are anti-environment and pro-money. They are helping big business out by imposing their policies of de-regulation on the factories and plants so that it is cheaper to run the factories by letting pollutants enter the air more freely instead of them being filtered out through emissions standards. We can also blame the President for repeatedly declining involvement with the Kyoto Accords, which over 100 countries are parts of. We are supposed to set a positive example for the rest of the world but instead people from the other countries dislike us for all of the bad things we are doing internationally.

What can we do to prevent further damage? The first thing I would suggest is getting a new President of the United States. It is clear that his imposition of his lack of values is ruining our planet. Second, we can regulate the factories again, like we had done in the Clinton administration. We can set better emissions standards for our trucks, cars, and other vehicles, so fewer pollutants are released in the air. We can require that all hog factories meet permanent performance standards to achieve environmental and public health goals and that they take care of the waste problems as well in a clean manner. The last thing we can do is hope that nothing extremely major and life changing happens.

My Agenda

Hey guys, it's been a while since I've posted. I will finish that religion article sooner or later. But right now I've made a list of things I believe we need to change within our country, and I'll be concentrating on writing about each one of these problems. This will be one of my new projects of things to do. I'll be researching each of the topics and doing my best to write the most objective plan to fixing them. I'll be editing this post and adding things to most categories as well, and from there I'll write separate pieces on each topic. In no particular order of importance, my list is as follows:

Welfare

FCC Censorship

Social Security

Border Patrol/Security

Immigration

Separation of Church and State

Environmental Issues
· More Regulation not De-Regulation
· Global Warming
· Fossil Fuels

Education
· Higher Education

Healthcare

Military
· Slightly less than 1.4 million active soldiers (2002)
· 875,000 reservists (2002)

Budget Deficit
· $675 Billion; second largest since WWII; 5.9% of the GDP
· By 2009 the proposed budget deficit is around 2.55 Trillion, which would be the largest in history.

Supreme Court

Trade

Gay Marriage

Stem Cell Research

U.N. Relations/Foreign Relations
· Iraq
· Korea
· Russia
· China
· Israel
· France

Tax Breakup Bracket / General Taxes

Abortions

Voting rights

Incarcerated Civilians’ Rights

· Currently inmates have no real rights besides the right to a lawyer. Their very basic right of the freedom to vote has become void. They should at least be allowed to exercise their right to vote. There are 2,000,000 inmates in the United States. That number is higher than our active military’s population.

Crime

· Murders
· Public school crime

Gay Marriage....A Constant Battle.

There has been a lot of anti-gay sentiment and it's pretty sickening. While this country was formed on religious persecution, we as a government should be religious no more and should hold a secular role. The banning of Gay Marriage is purely because of people’s religious views, hatred, ignorance, and stupidity. If two people of the same sex are in love why not let them get married? Do they not have feelings too? Should we not award them the same insanity that straight married couples have? Is the argument that people think two same sex people can't raise a child properly? While I can understand they can't procreate, they can still adopt children and raise them as a couple, and nothing is stopping them nor will anything do so. You don’t need to be married to raise a child, as we all know. While I feel a child should grow up with the appropriate mother and father role models, I wouldn't let my personal feelings get in the way of what someone can and cannot do. Is it that the parts don't fit how nature intended? Haven't we all heard the saying that what we do in our own private lives is our own business and nobody else's? Marriage should be a right for everyone. Marriage is a sacred relationship that is an official and legal bond, bringing two people together so they can share their lives with each other. Homosexuals should be afforded the same right as men and women, so they, too, can have that special bond with one another.

Election Lawsuit

To my understanding, the votes were recounted and Bush was still heavily in the lead in Ohio. I honestly am not sure what to believe. Now I know that President Bush's super Christian attitude and influence has gotten a lot more of church goers and conservatives to get out and vote for him on the ballots, but there were an insane amount of fuck-ups in that state. It was the Florida of 2004. TONS of ballots were mysteriously lost in Democratic counties and even more were just thrown away, also from moreso liberal areas. This dearly bothers me.

Republicans may be up in everyone's face about their "ethics" and how superior Republicans are, while Democrats haven't really been standing up to the plate as much it seems, but at least the Democrats are honest. We do honestly follow the rules way more than those Conservative Capitol Hill politicians. The Republicans win the big elections the dirty way. They secretly organize losses of ballots, screw-ups of important mistakes, etc so that they can use all of the turmoil to help them win. We all know that Gore won Florida in 2000 and should have been President of the United States right now. With all of those stupid dimple chads, hanging chads, some party line votes, some not, it screws things up. And I shall not forget the vans of votes suddenly getting lost too! Sorry, but I'm not a conspiracy theorist but I seriously think that all of that was planned and organized. G.W.B.'s brother, Jeb, just also happens to be Governor of Florida, and one of the women (my mind is in an absence of her name) on the Bush campaign also was leading/handling the Florida election process. Sorry, but the evidence of a set-up is way too clear to dismiss and I really have a strong feeling of that entire state being pre-rigged.

SAME shit going on with Kerry and Bush in Ohio. How in every other state were there not lines for 10+ hours but in Ohio there were?? You know, the state with 20 electoral votes that decided the election? Also, votes were lost and all that BS. Its asinine I tell you, completely screwed up. While there was no corruption in the high political tiers of Ohio that I can see, there were definitely some people pulling strings in the voting districts... Why in the highly important states with a fine line that sways either way from democrat to republican, seem to get screw-ups on election day? Tell me that, and I will give you a cookie.

Elections in a broad sense

Well I learned some rather surprising things today, one of them being that our voter turnout percentages have been wrong for decades, and the other, which I will get to later. I'll elaborate on what I mean by the voter turnout numbers.

The media and many other sources have claimed that in the 2000 election, we only had a 51% voter turnout. What was not mentioned is that it was 51% of all people in the United States of and over 18 years old. This includes: prison inmates that are not eligable to vote, patients in mental hospitals, immigrants, illegal immigrants, citizens that aren't registered to vote, and I'm sure there's more.

This false percentage is one of the things giving us a bad wrap world-wide. That such an established, respected (it used to be at least) counry that is the world's largest superpower can have such a poor turnout. Only 51% would not show for much and that people in the United States don't care.

In 2000, the V.A.P. or Voting Age Population, released by the census bureau, was 205 million people and the number of voters was 105 million people. The Population of Eligabable Voters, another product of the census burea, was said to be 156 million eligable voters in the United States. Subtract 156 million from 205 million and you come with the amount of uneligable voters that were used, which comes out to be a whopping 49 million people that couldnt vote.

The right number we should be matching up the 105 million people that voted to should be the 156 million eligable voters. If you do the math, you'll come up with a 67% voter turnout. I think that is damn good amount of people when the country and economy were doing extremely well. It gave the voters less motivation to go out and vote too, and that was in 2000.

Four years have now passed and it is almost 2005 now and we still do not have the election results. We had a much higher voter turnout this presidential election due to it being so incredibly heated, motivating people to go out and vote for their pick for pres. But there is one thing I can guarantee you, and that is when the official results are released, the numbers will be misconstrued and the media and news sources will be using the wrong numbers once again. I think the real percentage of voter turnout would be around 72-75%? Something like that.

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To continue on a similar subject, but different note, I got wind today that a "three prong" lawsuit is in the works against the State of Ohio claiming widespread voter fraud.

Cliff Arnebeck, the Attorney representing the Alliance for Democracy, claims he has evidence of fraud and he's confident when the votes are recounted, Ohio will go Kerry. And as of this morning, the NY Times reports that Kerry and Edwards have officially joined the effort!

Now I am a Kerry supporter, and I actually worked a little bit for the campaign in terms of fundraising activities, but I am doubtful that this lawsuit will be successful. I believe Bush had a 136,000 vote lead over Kerry. That is one LARGE number to overcome. I believe Kerry would need over 50% of that number to gain those 20 electoral votes, so that is something like 69,000 or 70,000 votes going to Kerry. I could be wrong, after all, it is 3:52 AM. Hooray to insomnia.

As much as I hate Bush, I still think he is going to come out in the end with Ohio's official recount figures. I will be following this topic as closely as possible, due to my improbable hope that Kerry can actually take Ohio and win the election.