Crazy Tenet...

Today six former CIA officers wrote a nasty letter to the former Director George Tenet who is blamed by many for being one of the main reasons why we are at war. Interestingly enough the former officers accused Tenet of misleading the American public and our congress with the type of information he chose to release in order to make a case for Iraq. The officers expressed their anger and frustration with tenet because the reports from officers on the field clearly showed that there were no WMD in Iraq and that Saddam and Al-Qaeda had no ties to one another. The officers also requested Tenet giving back the Medal of Freedom he received from President Bush before leaving the Agency. What amazes me is that Tenet’s new book is coming out on Monday and he actually gets to profit from all the pain and suffering he has brought to our nation and the rest of the world.

I am not even going to title this...

www.votearaz.com

Ever since I found about the “wine making” video, I have been going around showing it to everybody that I know. Star Girls video was so funny that It inspired me to make this post.

Myspace/Facebook and local elections...

One of the major problems facing the future of the United States is the lack of political participation by young voters. Voter turnout between the ages of 18 and 25 have declined sharply since the 1970’s which has motivated intellectuals and political leaders to strive to find an effective way to motivate young adults to vote. Many thought that with the advent of the Internet, the explosion of information available would motivate an increase in voter turnout among the entire population, not to mention the Internet-savvy youth.
After the success of Howard Dean’s internet fundraising scheme, attention to the power of the internet as a means for political participation was once again spent. As such I found it particularly advantageous to consider the potential for gaining support amongst my peers when I decided to run for a position as a member in the local school board.
I realized that the popularity of social networking sites amongst my fellow schoolmates and friends could possibly be a tool for gaining support for my campaign. Thus, I began researching the impact of the Internet, mainly social networking sites including Myspace and Facebook, on voter turnout from the 18-25 year old age group.
Today Myspace has over 87 million members, and continues to increase at 270,000 new signups each day. Despite recent controversies regarding pedophiles and other sexual predators, Myspace continues to grow, even internationally. There is no better way to find individuals and contact them with political informational material. Facebook, like Myspace, is a social networking tool that was initially specifically geared toward students and business people with registered email addresses in their respective networks. Since it’s advent in 2004, Facebook has gained over 12 million registered users. Since Facebook required a valid school or work email address, it was the perfect tool for finding educated people and funneling information. Furthermore, since positive correlations between educational level and voter participation have been found, it seems that Facebook would be a very useful tool in targeting an educated populace geared toward political activism. The combined popularity of Myspace and Facebook may be a worthy target for political activism, since the combination of the two totals nearly 100 million people. If a fraction of this large group of people were successfully targeted, it could mean enough to decide a local election.
I knew that if I could combine this new Internet strategy with the more traditional styles of campaigning, I would be able to build a base of support large enough to out seat my opponent. Thus I formed support groups on both Myspace and Facebook and managed to have 436 members by Election Day. In my opinion, this support was instrumental in increasing the voter turnout from 7,548 votes in 2000 to 8,467 in 2006 (smartvoter.org), which is an increase in almost 11 percent (or 919 votes).
After the election, the group members were surveyed and as a result we now know that 68% the members were first time voters; and 64% stated that they would have not voted if it wasn’t because of the personal connection they felt towards the campaign as a result of being members of my group. Looking back at the Election, I now can show the importance of the internet and social networking sites in helping shape the future of local elections.

Response...

This is a response to a post titled “Where were the police?!?!?!” by StarGirl:

This was a great post. All day the media has been going after the administration for not doing enough. I on the other hand would take the administrations side because I just get really sick of the media (not you) going crazy and trying to find somebody to blame after every major tragedy that we are faced with as a nation. In this particular case, I think the administration took the necessary steps to deal with the situation; the first group of officers at the first scene believed that it was a domestic dispute that resulted in a shooting. The officers then surrounded the building and started looking for proper evidence (talking to witnesses) as a means to collect information on the suspect. I don’t think that it would make sense for a university that large (population of more than 36,000) to have all operations stopped over what was thought as a single incident by the university police. That being said, I believe that there is always room for improvement and I am sure that all universities around the country are going to review there emergency policies over the next few weeks. I also liked the idea of warning the students using helicopters after it was known that a madman was going on a shooting rampage. But in my opinion, for us to be so quick in pointing fingers at one another is not the best way to deal with such a catastrophe. Now is a time for mourning and reflection, those who are to bed held accountable will be so at a later date, for now let us stay united.

Response...

In response to my friend Buddha who posted a comment on my last post titled Drunk Driving. In my opinion a Terrorist is someone who knows their actions can bring pain and suffering to a large group of people. Someone who chooses to drink and drive knowing that it could cause harm to others is no different than a person who kills themselves knowing it would cause pain to masses.

All about the money...

So, Obama is close on Hillary Clinton’s tail with fundraising. He has already raised $25 million, which apparently almost matches the amount that Clinton has raised. Furthermore, he has tapped over 100,000 donors, two times as much as Clinton. Does this mean that Obama is holding his own in the race for the democratic nomination—that he may be developing a quality base of constituents? I hope, in the midst of this frenzy to gain money and popularity, that Obama can actually prove his worth as a leading political candidate. I’m still waiting to hear, other than his homely background and charismatic public appeal, what his platform is, and how he truly represents the wishes of America.

Drunk Driving

Last night, the director of “A Christmas Story,” Bob Clark, and his son Ariel were killed in a drunk driving accident in Pacific Palisades. One of Hollywood’s greatest talents, gone. Just like that. Gone because someone decided to drive home after a few drinks instead of letting his wife drive, or just calling a friend. Irresponsible people like THIS are the true terrorists in America—completely disregarding the safety and well-being of others by driving drunk. How many parents, children, friends, teachers, brothers, sisters, grandparents have to die before people wise up and do the right thing?

Diplomacy!!!!

Well, the hostages are free once again. I must say, I was surprised that the British admitted to their mistake, whether it was true or not, and that the Iranians accepted it and returned their men. Who knew diplomacy could actually work in this world. In fact, this relatively painless transfer of POWs actually gives me hope for future diplomatic relations with Iran, it proves to the rest of the world, or just the rest of America, that they are not mindless fundamentalists, but that they are reasonable when it comes to making deals with other countries.