US Politics

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This article talks about the future of spy chiefs. The House of Representatives intelligence committee Democratic chairman told President-Elect Barack Obama that he should keep the Bush Administration’s spy chiefs. By spy chiefs I mean the CIA and National Intelligence. Obama has stated that he is keeping Bush’s Defense Secretary Robert Gates, but he hasn’t made a comment as to what to do with these say agencies. People oppose these agencies because of their counterterrorism tactics. This includes harsh questioning of suspects and wiretapping Americans’ international phone conversations. But these tactics and the agencies as wholes could change after a new chairmen take over. I think that these spy agencies are very important for the country. Even though they do invade our privacy it is worth it to catch a terrorist, or something of far worse magnitude. Ill quote my motto, “better safe than sorry.”

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The new rumor as to whom President-Elect Barack Obama is choosing for his cabinet is nominating Steven Chu for energy secretary, Lisa Jackson for environmental protection agency administrator, and Carol Browner as the head of all things dealing with energy. His choice for interior secretary is still unknown. Tomorrow Obama will announce former Senate Democrat Leader Tom Daschle as secretary of health and human services, but this is old news. Nancy Sutley from Los Angeles will lead the White House Council on Environmental Quality. A peculiar fact is that Sutley is the first member of the gay and lesbian community to earn a senior role in such a high position. We see that Obama if focusing on his natural resources and environmental team lately. The fact that Obama choose a LGBT(lesbian, gay, bisexual, transvestite) person for his board shows that Obama will probably be dealing more with that issue than previous presidents.

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Bernard Kouchner, a socialist, originally pushed for the creation of a human rights ministry in France, however, he now says that it was a bad idea. According to Kouchner Frances human rights policy can interfere with its foriegn policy. Interactions with countries such as Libya and China would be prohibited if France strictly followed its policy on human rights, but it would also cause major financial losses. As an example relations with China have become somewhat strained after Sarkozy met with the Dalai Lama. Koucher says it is too ambiguous of an issue to be handled by the government.

The idea of a human rights ministry seems like a good one, but it is an unfortunate truth that Frances foreign policy would contradict their human rights ideals, this should not be the case but if a country restricts it’s foreign relations it is at a huge disadvantage, the only way that foreign policy and human rights wouldn’t contradict is if more countries took on the same policy and possibly force those that violate human rights to change thier policy.

http://www.nj.com/news/ledger/index.ssf?/base/news-14/1228628268215130.xml&coll=1

This is a funny article about a little girl that was basically told that Santa was on a budget this year. While the article goes on to quote the family’s conversation, it is sad to see this. Even a little girl’s Christmas is being directly affected by the economy. When will this stop? I mean I never remember worrying about the economy when I was younger. This is something that has to stop. Parents should not be telling this to their children. Even though they cannot afford something extremely expensive for their children, they should not announce it like this.

http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2008/12/corzine_nj_should_establish_sa.html

New Jersey’s Governor Jon Corzine has said today that same-sex marriages should be established sooner rather than later. He urged Legislature to “seriously review” a report released by the NJ Civil Union Review Commission that said civil unions have failed to grant full rights to same-sex couples and urged the state to quickly enact same-sex marriage. While Corzine pledged to sign a gay marriage bill if it reaches his desk, it’s unclear whether the Legislature will take up the issue. Garden State Equality, a group campaigning to legalize same-sex marriage has planned for a rally tonight in South Orange and another Thursday night in Collingswood.

While same-sex marriages are becoming a big deal around the United States, it seems like it would be the right idea to have this happen sooner rather than later. It would save everyone a large amount of money, 1 for the state to have police patrol at these rallies, 2 for these rallies to even be set up it costs a lot of money. So all in all right now would be the better time to enable these rights rather than later.

There is a new feature on Obama’s transition website that allows questions to be submitted, the best ones are voted for and chosen, then they are answered live. I think that this is a great way of making personal questions that many have, but cannot directly ask Obama to be answered. It shows the the new administration will see the importance to answer and deal with any questions that the American people have. There is definitely an increase in the use of the internet for this election year. It is interesting that he is using technology and reaching out to people to use the most convenient ways to get their ideas across. I think that from this point on, the internet will be invaluable to future elections.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/meast/12/10/iran.spy.arrests/index.html#cnnSTCText

Several Iranians working directly for the country’s nuclear research program were among those arrested recently for funneling information about the program to foreign nations, according to an Iranian media report. The Tabnak report which was released on Tuesday did not say which countries were connected to the alleged spying ring or how many Iranians were arrested in the past few months. The report said the arrests were made after media reports which claimed the United States and other Western intelligence agencies were trying to spy on Iran’s nuclear program.

I believe that the world needs to become more aware of how important nuclear sources are. They can entirely ruin the world in an instant, yet also provide valuable energy for people to use. The fact that workers are funneling info out is because many countries just do not trust Iran. I believe that Iran is indeed hiding something, and we will only begin to see the whole picture soon.

http://money.cnn.com/2008/12/10/news/international/china_exports_fall.ap/index.htm

China’s exports shrank unexpectedly in November as global demand plunged, raising the threat of heavy job losses that could fuel political unrest, and a sharper downturn in the world’s fourth-largest economy. November’s exports fell by 2.2% from the year-earlier period, the government reported Wednesday, a sharp drop from October’s 19.1% expansion and far below analysts’ forecasts of up to 15% growth. Imports fell by 17.9%, pushing the trade surplus to a new monthly high of $40.1 billion.

I believe that this failure can be attributed to the lacking US economy. The US is the biggest importer in the world and also is one of China’s main exporters. With the shape of the economy today, people do not want to spend as much money. That means buying less products and therefore decreasing the value of China’s exports. I do believe that when the economy gets better, China’s exports will  go back up to normal.