Drunk driving is illegal for a reason...

Drunk driving is illegal for a reason, because it endangers the lives of many. In a recent post that one of my colleagues made, she argued that drunk driving should be legalized.  One of the arguments she made was that in our society people drink everyday and that is why they shouldn’t be punished for killing someone while under the influence because they “didn’t intentionally mean to”. I find her argument weak because well for one even though their judgment gets impaired when they consume alcohol, people are still however fully aware of their actions prior to consuming alcohol and if they choose to drink and drive, they are completely responsible for their actions. Society doesn’t encourage drinking, they merely glamorize it, making it seem like it is the best thing in the world. But lets be honest, what doesn’t our society glamorize. Recent television shows like Breaking Bad make producing and selling Methamphetamine seem like an easy way to earn thousands if not millions of dollars but just because it’s an easy way to earn lots of money, doesn’t mean people should do it because again it can lead to severe consequences.

            The reason why drunk drivers are sent to jail is so that they realize the severity of their consequences. In a way it’s to teach those dumb enough to drink and drive a lesson.  Saying that drunk drivers don’t mean to go out and kill someone seems a bit too defensive in my opinion.  Mean sure they don’t mean to go out and kill people but at the same time when they choose to drink and drive they are willing to put lives at risk including their own. If drunk drivers are put in jail, they’ll be learning a lesson, and it is likely that later on in the future they’ll think twice before drinking and driving.  Personally if someone in my family was drinking and driving I would want them to be put in jail and on top of that get fined so that they won’t do it again and would realize the severity of their actions.

Another reason why they should be put into jail is because murder is murder regardless if you’re aware of your actions or not.  If someone who is mentally ill can go to jail for murder then someone who is intoxicated should also be punished for his or her actions. My colleague argued that drunk drivers shouldn’t be punished because they aren’t aware of their consequences, however what if a drunk driver killed your parents or even your child? Would you not want them punished because they should have been more responsible and shouldn’t have drove intoxicated?

            Society doesn’t really preach to the people to drink instead it uses drinking as an excuse for everything and it seems like drinking will solve any problem. Society is responsible for people getting drunk however nowhere in society does it ever say or even show that people should go out and drive while intoxicated. There are other means of transportation that allow drunk people to get home safely without endangering someone else’s life.

            Drinking and driving is illegal in fifty states and should remain that way because when people drink they should drink responsibly, and if they need to get home, then they should arrange other means of transportation instead of driving under the influence.  Drinking and driving is illegal for a reason because in the end it all comes down to how responsible a person is. If a person is irresponsible and drinks and drives, regardless of whether of not they kill someone, they should be punished. 

Government isn't at fault!...completely

Previously, I wrote about the effectiveness of our national government. In my eyes, our national government isn’t very effective however it isn’t their fault. Like I said before, our government is the TMZ of politics, they only focus on current issues and completely disregard the prolonged unresolved issues. Even though it may appear that our government is to blame for their inability to solve issues like the reconstruction of New Orleans, in actuality it is the citizens of the United States who are at fault. We as people don’t take a stand and demand our government to help us.  Studies have shown that our government does respond to the needs of the people however, just like any change, our government needs time to respond to the demands of the people.

So is our government truly to blame for unresolved issues in our society today? Not really because we as citizens don't take action and are unresponsive. With issues like Hurricane Katrina, if the people wanted, the government could have spent money and rebuilt cities like New Orleans. However, because there were other issues going on in our nation at the time such as unemployment, the citizens shifted their attention from the disaster left behind from Hurricane Katrina and focused their attention on the more current issues.

The reason why we shouldn’t blame our government is because we as citizens aren’t strong enough to have a dramatic impact on our government. So technically the people are to blame for the infectivity of the national government. We tend to focus all of our attention on current issues and put all the old issues aside. Our government is only partially to blame for this because our government does a terrible job at keeping the citizens informed about the progress made on these issues. If we as citizens become strong and focus our attention on one issue at a time, we would be able to solve most of the issues that are a part of our nation today.

Since we live in a democratic society, it is our jobs as citizens to be informed about the issues and the progress made by our government to solve these issues. If  on some occasion our government is unresponsive, then we as citizens have the right to demand that our government respond to our needs. If our government is responsive to our needs like it says it is, then whatever the people want, the government will do.  

Bias in the Media

In a fairly recent blog post from Give Me Liberty or Give Me My Money Back, the blogger had a post on how the media tends create propaganda and how different types of media networks tend to bias. However, what the blogger fails to note is that the reason why the media tends to be bias and creates propaganda is because that’s what the people want. If the media outlooks didn’t create controversy and weren’t bias then they wouldn’t be as popular as they are now.  It common knowledge that most Conservatives tend to keep up with the Fox channel because it too is a right leaning media network and tends to be very critical of the Democrats. I being pretty Liberal, watch the Fox channel because I find it entertaining how they tend to over exaggerate and blow unimportant issues out of proportion and it’s not just Fox it’s other channels as well. It’s safe to ask would the channel have such high ratings if it weren’t bias? Not really. People enjoy controversy that’s why every other day there is a new celebrity sandal because that what people enjoy reading and listening to.

Now even though there are many very bias media outlooks, most of them try to give insight into both sides of the controversy and they tend to be very equal about covering both sides of the issue. This is a horrible way to cover an issue because the coverage itself becomes vague and unoriginal. If someone is reading the article or hearing about it in the news they don’t want the highlights they want author and or reporter’s opinion. The reason being--especially when it comes to politics--is that Americans are very uneducated about politics. They’ll hear one thing from one place and something completely different from another place and then they’ll formulate their own opinion based off the information that they have gathered. The job of the report and the author is to influence their audience and the only way they can do that is if they are extremely bias. The reporter and author have to back their opinion up with facts. Without facts their news report will be dry and public will look over it. That is why even though people criticize newspapers and television networks for being bias, what they fail to note is that because they are bias they are successful.

Why do you think the Presidential Debates are so boring? It’s because the debate conductor gives each candidate equal amount of time talking about their issue and criticizing the other candidate. If the debate conductor was to let each candidate go on for as long as he or she wanted and there was civilized argument between the two candidates then the debates would be more intriguing to watch.

So it is evident that the more bias media networks tend to be more successful than the ones that aren’t bias.

How effective is our government?

The sole purpose of our government is to help the public and restore problems in the nation. But is the government responsive to the needs of its citizens?

In 2005 when Hurricane Katrina hit the Atlantic Coast and the Gulf of New Mexico, thousands of lives were taken and many people were left without a home, especially in New Orleans. Our government immediately declared the National Response Plan in response to the hurricane in attempt to help the hurricane victims. Nonetheless despite the various government relief programs, eventually the needs of the people in New Orleans were forgotten about and as a result today hundreds of people are still homeless there. Even though our government was responsive at first, eventually it  stopped worrying about it’s citizens because the cost to repair New Orleans was tremendous. Our government can’t afford to help it’s own citizens--people that put them in office—because it’s too costly however presidential candidates can spend millions of dollars on campaigns making empty promises just to get elected. It’s surprising to note that neither candidate has yet to mention how they’ll effectively restore New Orleans in any of their speeches.

Our government is portrayed as the TMZ of politics.  It constantly argues about the latest issues regardless of how important they are. However, our government fails to resolve previous issues that are continuing to affect citizens. It’s safe to say that the government is going to have some sort of relief program for the victims of Hurricane Sandy however in a couple of months those people and their needs will be forgotten about because there will be some other issue that seems more important that the government will divert it’s attention to.  

            Despite everything however, our government-- even if it’s for a little bit-- attends to the needs of the people in order to pacify the public temporarily. Take a look at President Obama, when he was running for office back in 2008, he promised to restore the economy and end the war in Iraq. Even though he made some effort to please the public, he was unsuccessful because again like TMZ he pushed the old issues aside and focused his attention on the new ones. As a result now the public considers his presidency unsuccessful. What the public fails to note is that every president is like that and will continue to be like that. In the first couple of years they’ll do whatever it takes to please the public, then after a while when they have spent some time governing our nation, they'll slowly begin to push issues that the public previously found important aside and begin to focus their attention the more current issues.

If our government were able to focus its attention on one issue at a time then more issues would get resolved and citizens will be more pleased.   

Column: Obama needed debate blowout but didn't get it

      In this column written by William A. Jacobson, Jacobson in the beginning of the article mentions how Romney had a strong performance on Tuesday’s debate. However, there is no indication in the throughout the column of Governor Romney’s strong performance on Tuesday’s debate other than that reference. What Jacobson--a right leaning columnist—is doing is creating unnecessary controversy. He pin point vague topics that President Obama made throughout the debate and poorly critiques them. For example, one of the main points that Jacobson made in the column was that the day that our ambassador was killed in Libya, President Obama, “went to Las Vegas for a fundraiser”. What Jacobson fails to recall is that the day of 9/11 there were a huge controversy as to the whereabouts of President Bush who was a Republican. So Jacobson goes on to criticize President Obama for going to a fundraiser the day that our ambassador was killed however, he fails to mention that on day of one of the biggest events in American History, no one was able to recall President Bush’s whereabouts. 

        In addition, Johnson also notes that President Obama’s biggest mistake in the debate was failing to address how the next four years of his presidency will be different.  However isn’t the whole point of the Presidential Debates to address the changes that will occur with the next presidency? From personally watching the debates, I can safely say it seems pretty clear as to where both presidential candidates stand on issues and how their policies in the next four years will address the issues. Johnson’s column seems to be written just to display a poor written argument. It appears that Johnson has no background at all as to where either candidate stands on the issues. Johnson seems to base his argument only off of Tuesday’s debate, and the propose seems to be to attack President Obama and the Democrats. Where the majority believes that Obama did substantially well on Tuesday’s debate, Johnson seem to think otherwise. Because he is a right leaning columnist, Johnson has to create an argument against President Obama. His intent on the audience is show them that President Obama is a weak candidate and shouldn’t be in office. However, Johnson’s column fails to make logical arguments that clearly display weaknesses in President Obama’s performance.